2004年Text 1

　　Hunting for a job late last year, lawyer Gant Redmon stumbled across CareerBuilder, a job database on the Internet. He searched it with no success but was attracted by the site's personal search agent. It's an interactive feature that lets visitors key in job criteria such as location, title, and salary, then E-mails them when a matching position is posted in the database. Redmon chose the keywords legal, intellectual property, and Washington, D.C. Three weeks later, he got his first notification of an opening. "I struck gold," says Redmon, who E-mailed his resume to the employer and won a position as in-house counsel for a company.

　　With thousands of career-related sites on the Internet, finding promising openings can be time-consuming and inefficient. Search agents reduce the need for repeated visits to the databases. But although a search agent worked for Redmon, career experts see drawbacks. Narrowing your criteria, for example, may work against you: "Every time you answer a question you eliminate a possibility." says one expert.

　　For any job search, you should start with a narrow concept--what you think you want to do--then broaden it. "None of these programs do that," says another expert. "There‘s no career counseling implicit in all of this." Instead, the best strategy is to use the agent as a kind of tip service to keep abreast of jobs in a particular database；when you get E-mail，consider it a reminder to check the database again. "I would not rely on agents for finding everything that is added to a database that might interest me," says the author of a job-searching guide.

　　Some sites design their agents to tempt job hunters to return. When CareerSite's agent sends out messages to those who have signed up for its service, for example, it includes only three potential jobs--those it considers the best matches. There may be more matches in the database; job hunters will have to visit the site again to find them--and they do. "On the day after we send our messages, we see a sharp increase in our traffic," says Seth Peets, vice president of marketing for CareerSite.

　　Even those who aren‘t hunting for jobs may find search agents worthwhile. Some use them to keep a close watch on the demand for their line of work or gather information on compensation to arm themselves when negotiating for a raise. Although happily employed, Redmon maintains his agent at CareerBuilder. "You always keep your eyes open," he says. Working with a personal search agent means having another set of eyes looking out for you.

43. The expression "tip service"（Line 4, Paragraph 3） most probably means
[A] advisory　　
[B] compensation　　
[C] interaction　　
[D] reminder

[答案] D

[解題思路]

　　回到原文，"tip service"這個詞組所在的句子由分號分為了兩個部分，"Instead, the best strategy is to use the agent as a kind of tip service to keep abreast of jobs in a particular database；when you get E-mail，consider it a reminder to check the database again"（最好的辦法就是將軟件代理當成一種提示服務，通過它來掌握某個數據庫中的求職信息；收到電子郵件的時候，就當它是提醒你再去那個數據庫里看一看），可以將兩個部分視為兩個意義相同的并列分句，或者也可把后半部分視為前半部分的補充說明。后半句的reminder顯然就是對應于前半句的a kind of tip service，因此D為正確選項。A選項advisory（咨詢的）與tip表面意思接近，起到了干擾作用，要注意辨別，根據文章的意思做出正確理解。B和C選項在文中則并沒有談及。

[題目譯文]

"tip service"（第三段第四行）這個詞組的意思可能是          。
[A] 報告
[B] 補償
[C] 相互作用
[D] 提示