About the Author: 

Randolph (Ran) Hock, Ph.D.

Ran Hock, through his one-person company, Online Strategies, creates and presents seminars and workshops teaching people how to use the Internet more efficiently and effectively. In conjunction with this, he writes about the Internet, with four books (plus two second-editions) published and a variety of articles appearing regularly.

  • Over his career, Dr. Hock has trained over 14,000 online users in thirteen countries.    Ran Hock 
  • He has created courses on using the Web for professional associations, government agencies and ministries, non-governmental organizations, schools, libraries, and companies.
  • Ran is the author of The Extreme Searcher's Guide to Web Search Engines  (1999, 2001), The Extreme Searcher's Internet Handbook (2004), Yahoo! to the Max (2005) and The Traveler's Web (2007), and is a frequent contributor and columnist for professional journals, including ONLINE and The CyberSkeptic's Guide to Internet Research .
  • During his career he has held management and training positions with DIALOG and Knight-Ridder Information Services and has served as chemistry librarian at M.I.T. and as a reference librarian at the University of Pennsylvania.
  • He has served as adjunct faculty for the University of Maryland College of  Information Studies and Johns Hopkins University's Division of Public Safety Leadership, and  is currently an adjunct faculty member for Lesley University (Cambridge, MA), for which he teaches in the Technology in Education Program, and for Catholic University's School of Library and Information Science. Dr. Hock is active in the American Society for Information Science and Technology, where he has served on the Board of Directors, chaired chapters and committees, and served as a peer reviewer. He is also a member of the Association of Independent Information Professionals and the International Association for Intelligence Education.
  • His biography has appeared in Who's Who in America and he is a recipient of OSS.NET's OSINT Platinum Candle Award
Ran lives in Vienna, VA, USA with his wife Pamela and two younger children, Stephen and Elizabeth. His older son, Matthew, is the lead singer in a rock group, The Explosion. Ran's hobby, should he ever find time to get back to it, is genealogy.

Email Ran

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Publications


Books

Hock, Randolph . The Traveler's Web: An Extreme Searcher Guide. CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 2007

________. The Extreme Searcher’s Internet Handbook: A Guide for the Serious Searcher, 2nd Edition.  CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 2007.

________. Yahoo! to the Max: An Extreme Searcher Guide. CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 2005.

________. The Extreme Searcher’s Internet Handbook: A Guide for the Serious Searcher.  CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 2004.

________. The Extreme Searcher’s Guide to Web Search Engines: A Handbook for the Serious Searcher, 2nd Edition. CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 2001. 
                  (also available in Chinese translation)

________.   The Extreme Searcher’s Guide to Web Search Engines: A Handbook for the Serious Searcher, CyberAge Books, Medford, NJ, 1999.  
 

Selected Articles

 

Hock, Randolph. “Search Engines: From Web 0.0 to Web 2.0 and Beyond” Online, v31 n1, January/February 2007, pp. 26-30

 ________.  Seriously Search Engines,  Monthly column in The CyberSkeptic's Guide to Internet Research.  January 1998 - present.

 ________.  The Latest Field Trip: An Update on Field Searching in Web Search Engines.  ONLINE, v28 n5, September/October 2004, pp. 15-21.

________.   A New Era of Search Engines.  ONLINE, v26 n5, September/October 2002, pp 2-27

________.  Revisiting Web Search Engines Features and Commands. ONLINE, v25 n5, September/October 2001, pp 18-24.

________.  Web Search Engines: (More) Features and Commands. ONLINE, v24 n3, May-June 2000, pp 24-28.

________.  Web Search Engines: Features and Commands.  ONLINE , v23 n3, May-June 1999, pp 24-28.

________.  How to Do Field Searching in Web Search Engines: A Field Trip. ONLINE, v22 n3, May-June 1998, pp 18-22

________.  Sizing Up HotBot: Evaluating One Web Search Engine's Capabilities.  ONLINE, November 1997, v21 n6, November-December, 1997, pp 24-33.

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