World's 1st Tibetan language search engine in trial operation

Cloud Tibet, the world's first search engine dedicated specially to Tibetan-speaking people, has been launched for trial operation, the China News Service reported on Tuesday.

Developed by a Tibetan language research center in Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai Province, Cloud Tibet will help Tibetan-speaking people access a variety of information in text, graphic and video formats, said Tselo, head of the development team.

Also, the search engine will provide users with encyclopedia information, archive data and a Q&A service in Tibetan, Tselo said.

Search capabilities in Tibetan are not available on China's largest search engines, such as Baidu and Sogou, while foreign search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing only offer simple search results.

"The databases of Google, Yahoo and other foreign search engines are based overseas, so their search results are limited both in terms of quantity and quality," Tselo said. "They fail to provide users with effective, up-to-date news on Tibet, and their search results relating to Tibetan culture are not precise and extensive."

During the trial operation, Cloud Tibet will further improve its search and matching function and expand its database, Tselo said.

It is estimated that Cloud Tibet will attract some 2 million users in Qinghai, Tibet, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan Provinces, which are home to the largest number of Tibetan-speaking people.

The project was launched in April 2013. Of the 150-plus developers, 87 percent are ethnic Tibetans.