ASSOCIATES (vol. 4, no. 1, July 1997) - associates.ucr.edu

Table of Contents


                      *THE INTERNET GURU*
 
                               by
 
 
                          Dr. Brad Eden
                Coordinator of Technical Services
                         beden@nhmccd.edu

Well, I just returned from an exciting ALA convention in San
Francisco.  From the many reports on the COLT conference and
other support staff meetings, it sounds as if many others also
enjoyed themselves.  I have put together a list of extensive
Internet reference sites on various and sundry topics for those
of you who are looking to explore and get your feet wet in the
universe of the World Wide Web.  As always, any suggestions for
future Internet Guru columns are always welcome.  Hope that your
summer is not as hot and humid as it is here in Houston!!
 
 
                           -- WORDS --
 
WWWebster Dictionary -
           Enter word and get meaning, pronunciation,
           function, origin, synonyms - can get similar words if
           not sure of spelling --- rated "Invaluable"
http://www.m-w.com/netdict.htm
 
OneLook -
           Searches more than 479,000 words in 81 dictionaries.
           Can use an asterisk to expand possibilities or if not
           sure of spelling, and you _realize_ it ... e.g.
           h*pocrit* works, but _not_ h*pocrit
http://www.onelook.com
 
Foreign Languages for Travelers
           For numerous languages, get basic vocabulary terms,
           pronunciation guides, translating dictionaries, slang
           guides, etc.
http://www.travlang.com/languages
 
Quotations
           Passages, phrases and proverbs traced to their sources
http://www.columbia.edu/acis/bartleby/bartlett
 
The Quotations Page
http://starlingtech.com/quotes
 
Thesaurus
           Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases
           Helps find synonyms for particular terms, or you can
           browse classes of words.  (Has a nice applications
           feature you can choose to cut out the exchange of
           cookies, which can cause problems/delays with some
           browsers)
http://www.thesaurus.com
 
                           -- FACTS --
 
The Old Farmer's Almanac
           Varied, useful, down-home and comfortable.
http://www.almanac.com
 
Ask An Expert
           A directory of links to experts in many fields,
           organized by categories.  (Best to use these rather
           than their search.  E.g., SQL, and Programming
           Languages are things their software-guy links can
           explain, but no luck on the search)
http://www.askanexpert.com/askanexpert/index.html
 
Findout -
           "Who - what- where - when - why - how".  "Ask Us" is a
           free reference service.  Professional Researchers will
           tackle the first 100 questions they get each day -
           The experts will only spend about 15 minutes on your
           question, so you should organize what exactly you
           want, what you want it for, and what sources you have
           already tried.  This can be a great starting point for
           difficult questions, or a great check on whether
           you've done all you can to find a tough answer.
http://www.findout.com
 
Dates -
           CalendarLand gives links to a variety of celestial,
           cultural, religious and historical calendars; points
           to interactive calendars and download sites for
           calendar software.  A really neat site with a lot of
           unexpected links, information and ideas.
http://www.juneau.com/home/janice/calendarland/
 
 
                      --General Reference--
 
The Electric Library -
           An unusual and invaluable research tool.  A question
           in plain English launches a comprehensive,
           simultaneous search through more than 150 full-text
           newspapers, hundreds of full-text magazines, two
           international newswires, two thousand classic books,
           hundreds of maps, thousands of photographs, as well as
           major works of literature and art.
http://www3.elibrary.com/search.cgi
 
The WWW Virtual Library -
           An enormous information resource, organized by
           categories from Aboriginal Studies to Zoos.  If
           you just like learning about things, you could
           disappear forever in here.
http://www.w3.org/pub/DataSources/bySubject/Overview.html
 
A Collection of Reference Resources,
           including weights and measures, newspaper links,
           search engines, and a bunch of other sometimes needed
           stuff.
http://www.refdesk.com/
 
           An intriguing site.  E.g., it has a nice list of links
           that the author implies he contemplates visiting first
           thing every day ...
           http://www.refdesk.com/first.html
 
How-To -
           Simple explanations for basic life activities, such as
           how to fix a leaky faucet.  Someone recently posted
           this site to Bweb, and it does have potential, but it
           needs a lot of growth.  There is so much basic
           activity in life, and we have so few a priori
           skills...
http://www.learn2.com/
 
                          -- PEOPLE --
 
White Pages
           A comprehensive e-mail, telephone and net phone
           directory with more than 10 million listings.
http://www.four11.com
 
           Information is not always up to date, but this site
           has another nice feature, Planet All, a smart
           interactive and very useful Address Book
           http://www.PlanetAll.com/splash2.htm
 
Who's Who -
           Searchable 15000 person database of present and past
           people supposedly worth knowing.
http://www.biography.com/
 
                        -- BUSINESSES --
 
Yellow Pages -
           BigBook lets you use a business name or type or browse
           categories, and gives complete contact information for
           more than 16,000,000 US businesses.
http://www.bigbook.com/
 
                       -- DESTINATIONS --
 
CityNet -
           provides destination information, with maps, a people
           finder and Yellow Pages.  World Wide.  Very slick, and
           now part of Excite.
http://www.city.net/
 
MapQuest -
           answers "Where is it and how do I get there?"  Driving
           directions in the US, plus an interactive worldwide
           Atlas.
http://www.mapquest.com/
 
                          -- POSTAL --
 
National Address Server -
           Don't know the Zip code?  Enter what you _do_ know of
           an address and this server will supply as much of the
           missing data, including parts of street names, as it
           can.  Mostly, this just means giving you the zip code,
           but it now can print postscript 11-digit (ZIP+4+2)
           barcodes , and the map resource can sometimes be
           useful.
http://www.cedar.buffalo.edu/adserv.html
 
                           -- MONEY --
 
Market Watch -
           Free at this time, but possibly this will change,
           Barron's provides market surveillance and critical
           company information, includingMarket Day analysis and
           looks at some online brokers.
http://www.barrons.com/
 
The Wall Street Journal -
           Subscriptions at $49/yr (two week free trial),
           provides news, market data, company briefing books,
           plus access to articles from the DJ publications and
           more than 3600 other resources.
http://www.wsj.com/
 
Currency -
           Xenon Labs:  The Universal Currency Converter.
           Speedy, easy and world wide currency options.  Offers
           free daily email updates on currencies you wish to
           track.
http://xe.net/currency/
 
                         -- COMPUTING --
 
Find a file on the Web -
           everything from software to multimedia files - with
           this smart search engine, even when you're not sure of
           the file name.  A great resource, e.g. try it with
           something like SQL, and then maybe with Virtual
           Library, to get an idea of its power.
http://www.filez.com/
 
Answers for IT professionals -
           An example of the growing support for specialized
           needs, InquireCom truly delivers.  Easy access to
           tech tips, "Ten-minute Solutions," vendor literature,
           discussion forums, and experts in Visual Basic and
           VRML.
http://www.inquiry.com/
 
Web Developers Virtual Library -
           From HTML validation to quality animation, this
           well-organized library help give you the resources
           necessary to create a standout Web presence.
           Interesting on-going features as well, such as
           Introduction to JavaScript, by Steve Thompson.  This
           is a _Must_ site if you do any Web page work, such as
           your own HomePage, for example
http://www.stars.com/