SEARCH ENGINE BREAKTHROUGH KNOWS TO IGNORE 'JUNK'

Cleveland, Ohio, Nov. 29, 2001 - A leading search-engine software vendor is the first to solve the junk results problem. Junk results are search hits that match words in web page headers, footers, and navigation menus, as opposed to the page's actual unique content.

The Webinator site-indexing product, from Thunderstone Software, now automatically ignores text repeated across multiple pages of a site. Users thus receive more precise search results, without spurious matches on boilerplate text.

The breakthrough enhancement is part of the new Webinator 4 release, available immediately. Webmasters may download a free version of Webinator from Thunderstone's web site.

Many additional features are new in Webinator 4. They include:

• Categorization. Pages may be automatically assigned to categories that are searchable separately, even if the site itself is not organized by category.
• Web-based administration. Settings such as the indexing schedule may be controlled by an authorized user, from a browser anywhere on the internet.
• Source code. Programmers now may modify any aspect of the program, by means of familiar SQL commands and CGI scripting.

Webinator is an application of Thunderstone's sophisticated Texis system, a combination search engine and database. Texis serves more than 30 million searches a day at eBay, and additional millions a day for other popular web sites such as HotJobs, About.com, and Master.com.

Essentially the same software powering those sites is available free to web site operators. "Most webmasters don't need to pay for a site-search function," said Doran Howitt, Thunderstone spokesman. "Free Webinator will let you search up to 10,000 pages per index, which is more than sufficient for the majority of sites."

Webinator is subject to acceptable-use license provisions. Thunderstone offers expanded support and capacity for purchase, if needed. Promotional discounts for upgrades or expanded capacity are in effect until Dec. 31.

About Thunderstone Software

Thunderstone Software LLC provides high-performance solutions for text-searching in conjunction with relational database applications. Uses of this technology include publishing, catalogs, classified advertising, corporate portals, and web-searching. Thunderstone is a 20-year-old, profitable company, whose products are used on thousands of web sites worldwide.