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Knowing how to find the information you want is important. The problem is there seems too many places to find information. We will attempt to make your search a little faster and a little easier. Plus we'll add a few other information sources in as well.
Dictionaries / Encyclopedias
Want to know what Boolean logic means? How about LAN, SQL or Sans? Internet developers love to use technical jargon and abbreviations like none other. These links will help you find the definitions on any term whether it relates to the internet or the offline world.
Internet & Technical
Webopedia.com Need to find out a specific internet term or definition? This site contains an encyclopedia and search engine dedicated to computer technology.
Whatis.com Got a question? Information from acronyms to Y2K issues. Whatis.com includes a dictionary and other resources for computer, Internet, and reference queries.
Standard Dictionary
Onelook.com will search various dictionaries to get the definition of nearly any word.
Merriam-Webster has a searchable on-line dictionary and thesaurus, word games, a word of the day, and many other English language and vocabulary reference tools and resources
Acronymfinder.com - With more than 500,000 human-edited entries, Acronym Finder is the world's largest and most comprehensive dictionary of acronyms, abbreviations, and initialisms. Combined with the Acronym Attic, Acronym Finder contains more than 3 million acronyms and abbreviations. You can search or filter terms from many categories:
Foreign Dictionaries & Reference
A Web of On-Line Dictionaries is The place to go to find definitions of words in other languages. 170 languages are currently supported.
Babelfish is a translation page. Here you can convert English to French, German, Italian, Portuguese or Spanish and vice-versa.
FreeTranslation.com allows users to obtain free translations of both text and web pages. If you need soemething more demanding or a professional translation, you can get that here as well.
Give it a try, this box below will translate your text instantly :
Encyclopedia
Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference Web site on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, and is written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This Web site is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link (with a few minor exceptions, such as protected articles and the main page).
Britannica.com - includes the complete Britannica encyclopedia, a searchable guide to the Web's best sites, articles from the top magazines, editorials, news and special features
MSN Encarta has more than an encyclopedia. You'll find a dictionary, atlas, access to historical documents, literature guides and even homework guides.
Other Online Research
Libraryspot.com gives you a quick starting point to a number of Web reference resources. It has stats, current events and links to everything from acronyms to ZIP codes.
Refdesk.com bills itself as "The single best source for facts on the Net". I can't vouch for that, but it's got to be close.
Search Engines
Google Arguably is one of the best known and used search engines and is my second most used search engine after Ixquick (see below under mega search engines). Since Ixquick does not search Google for search results, I will usually search on both of these sites for the information I am looking for.
Yahoo is the next obvious chouice when looking for information. Yahoo is not actually a search engine, it is a directory of sites listed category. Use this engine when you are searching a topic or category.
I rarely use Yahoo or any other search engine than Ixquick or Google these days, but now Yahoo has introduced a new search feature called Yahoo Mindset that I might be using a bit in the future. It is still in beta stage at this time. What it does is to allow you to control whether you want your results based on research or on shopping. There is a slider bar that you move on the top of the page to control how much research vs. shopping you want to look for. I don't know how much I'll utilize the slide bar. I think I'll want either all research results or all shopping results, not a mix of both
Other search engines to check out :
AltaVista repeatably delivers good results for our keyword queries.
Hotbot has not performed as well for us as some of the other search engines. However, reviews by others have often rated it as one of the best search engines so we have included it here as well.
Froogle which is run by Google (notice the similarity) is used to search for products only. So if you are searching to buy a particular product you might want to use Froogle. My initial results are marginal.
Finally check out these search engine resources:
AllSearchEngines.com lists all the major search engines PLUS topic specific directories and search engines.
SearchEngines.com is a comprehensive resource center for both web searchers and webmasters. They provide tools and techniques for search engine optimization, submission and maintenance . They also have an extensive list of search engines and directories as well as tips for effective searching.
Mega-search Engines
There are search engines that will search many other search engines. Start here when looking for general information on a keyword or topic. Can't find what you're looking for? Use the individual search engines to get more results from your queries.
Ixquick.com bills itself as the world's most powerful metasearch engine. I don't know if that's true or not, but I know I love it. In fact my homepage is set to Ixquick because I am always searching for some kind of information. Ixquick searches all the major search engines and uses stars to rank the web page results by how often they appear in the top ten results of the othjer search engines. Each star refers to one top-ten listing.
The reason I choose Ixquick over all the other search engines is because any link you click on will open up in a new window. No more hitting your back button to get back to your search results to check out the next website that might have the info you are looking for. What I usually do scan the search results it gives and click on all the intersting website links at once. I may launch 4 or 5 webites in different windows at the same time.
Ask Jeeves is a special type of search engine that allows you to type in a question such as "Where is Atlantis?". Ask Jeeves will search it's data base and other search engines to come up with the most relevant sites. Take advantage of this search engines ability to find specific information. I used to use ask-jeeves a lot, but have not in a long, line time. It seems like the quality of the search results have really gone down in time.
Here are some other mega-search engines to consider:
Dogpile.com will search many other search engines displaying the top results listed by each search engine.
Metacrawler will allow you to choose whether to search the web or newsgroups for on the keyword(s) you enter. It will eliminate the duplicate responses and list them in order of relevance. Next to Ask Jeeves, this is our favorite mega search engine.
Discussion Groups
Discussion groups are great places to find information on specific topics. From aviation to zoology, people gather to discuss their favorite subject.
Discussion groups can be in different forms such as bulletin boards, chat rooms, forums, newsgroups, and Usenet.
Delpiforums has forums on all topics. You can also start your own forum here.
Google Groups gives you access to thousands of Usenet newsgroups and discussion forums.
Topica The leader in Email discussions and publishing solutions. Search thousands newsletters and discussions on any subject.
Research - General Info
Below we list some of our favorite sites to get general information. Another good place is on the home pages of search engines. They often break down subjects into popular categories. Another good place to look for information on any topic is in e-zines or newsletters. Check out out marketing page for some directories of ezines
About.com provides information on a diverse group of subjects. They also have some great discussion groups and newsletters worth checking out.
Infoplease.com is a total information resource. Information can be found on such diverse topics as: business & economy, education, entertainment, sports, science, other countries, and more.
Newsindex.com is the place to find the latest news on any topic. Here you can search current news stories from around the world at a touch of the button. These are current news stories. You can also have news delivered daily to your email on your selected topic. In addition, you can add a customized news page and news feed ticker to your website - Free
WorldWideLearn searches online courses and learning resources which are available from around the world and in almost every topic you want.
50states.com If you are looking for information on any of the 50 US States then this site will helpyou find your answer. Whether you need to know the State capital or the State bird you'll find it here. They also have informational links and State resources as well the yellow pages.
Research - Internet
Developer.com is a great informational resource for technical information on the internet and web design.
Gartner Group is another resource of internet and technology information. They have a newsletter you can sign-up for to stay an top of the ever changing world wide web.
Internet.com is a network of numerous websites, newsletters, and discussion forums providing Internet news and information. This site is a "must visit". Some of the information available on their various websites and forums cannot be found elsewhere.
Internet Stats.com also has a boat load of internet research information. They have many useful links, a top ten list of visited websites and more. Definitely worth checking out.
Jupiter Communications is one of the leading internet commerce research companies. Hardly an article is written about the internet that does not include statistics provided by Jupiter.
PC Data Online lists the 1500 most visited websites and has useful charts showing Internet buying volume . They also offer a subscription service which has more in-depth information and reports.
Research - E Commerce
NUA Internet Surveys is filled with internet statistics on e commerce
eMarketer also provides e commerce statistics that you will find useful.
US Government E Commerce Policy has the latest news and views on their interest into electronic commerce.
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