Some Reference Sources

Access Information: "Here are some handy Internet resources that you may want to bookmark or add to your favorites folder.

Dictionaries

OneLook Dictionary Search http://www.onelook.com/ 6,189,689 words in 993 dictionaries have been indexed covering such subjects as sports, business, slang, medicine, computers, technology, and religion. You can search by word or phrase or try out the reverse dictionary feature.

Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary and Thesaurus http://www.m-w.com/ The Online Dictionary is based on the print version of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate ? Dictionary, Tenth Edition . The online dictionary includes the main A-Z listings, abbreviations, foreign words and phrases, biographical names, and geographical names.

Abbreviations and Acronyms

Acronym Finder http://www.acronymfinder.com/ According to the Acronym Finder an ?acronym is a pronounceable word formed from each of the first letters of a descriptive phrase or by combining the initial letters or parts of words from the phrase.? This database contains abbreviations, acronyms, and initialisms. No distinction between the three categories is made in this database.

Abbreviations and Acronyms of the U.S. Government http://www.ulib.iupui.edu/subjectareas/gov/docs_abbrev.html provides an alphabetical listing of acronyms and includes the full name of the agency the acronym comes from as well as an active link to the official Web site of the agency.

All That JAS: Journal Abbreviation Sources http://www.public.iastate.edu/~CYBERSTACKS/JAS.htm is a ? categorized registry of Web resources that list or provide access to the full title of journal abbreviations or other types of abbreviated publication titles (e.g., conference proceedings titles).?

Quotations

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations http://www.bartleby.com/100/ offers searchable quotations from the tenth edition with an alphabetical and chronological index of authors as well as a concordance index of quotations browsable by keyword.

The Quotations Page http://www.quotationspage.com/ has more than 21,000 quotations browsable by author and subject.

Creative Quotations http://creativequotations.com/ has 50,000 quotations searchable by keyword or by month or birthday. It is also organized into special collections.

Statistics

Facster.com http://www.facster.com The focus of this Web site is to make the facts underlying the political issues of our society easier to retrieve and use in discussion. To that end, Facster has compiled statistical data from a variety of sources including the current Statistical Abstracts of the United States, foreign governments, state agencies, and private organizations. All of these sources may be searched individually or globally by keyword. An added bonus of the site is that it has provided contact information for all of the Federal agencies with major statistical programs, including phone numbers – a major plus when you need to speak to an actual person for verification or clarification of data presented.

General Reference Sources

Internet Public Library Ready Reference

http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/ref00.00.00 is a good starting place with links to sub-headings from almanacs, calendars, census data, genealogy, geography, grammar, and style and writing guides with brief annotations.

Librarian's Index to the Internet Ready Reference and Quick Facts http://lii.org/search/file/reference links to airport codes, area codes, atlases, baby names, holidays, foreign exchange rates, statistics, and zip codes, to name a view.

[and of course, my fave RefDesk.com]