Sometimes it's nice to have all the useful search tools and information sources on a single page. There are several versions of this idea on the web, but a couple of the best have been created by librarians.
The version from Albany University's library is better for people who can specify exactly what search technique they want to use: for instance, if you need to use Boolean searching. There's another similar thing at NoodleTools. It asks what you are trying to achieve and suggests the best candidates for your purposes. It's rather good, and introduced me to a few things I haven't seen before, including Researchville, which has now turned into HighBeam. On this site, you enter your query and then it searches a few search engines, notably AltaVista and AllTheWeb.
It also now acts as a front end for the venerable eLibrary collection of printed documents and journals, apparently 28 million strong. But for that you need to acquire a subscription to the site, which will cost you, groan, a substantial $19.95 a month. I liked it better the way it was before.
If you need language dictionaries, the web is good on quantity if not always on quality. The biggest site I have seen yet for finding what's available is Lexicool. Two drop-down menus allow you to specify your starting language and where you want to end up. Naturally you'll do better with English-French and German-Spanish than you will with Catalan-Malay, but the thought's there. What you arrive at when you reach the end of the process may not necessarily give you what you want, but that's not the site's fault. What is the site's fault, however, is the fact that you may not be able to see the essential "Go" button unless you have a wide browser window.
Finally, another attempt at the perennial problem of the lack of decent email directories. Unfortunately, Email-directory.com is nothing like as useful as it might be. It has links to several hundred email directories, ordered by country, group, profession and so on. Some of these links are verging on the bizarre (a directory of pot-bellied pig owners, anyone?") but others you can imagine might come in useful. I got very excited about "Volcanologists on the Internet" in the light of the Etna excitements, but it proved to be a dead link. Still, if people are prepared to contribute to this site, it could be very useful: those whose email addresses are included can expect an avalanche of spam, but that's a different question.
Of course, as people say, you can always ring people and ask for their email address, but that's defeatist. And besides, we don't always want to do things the obvious way.
A few more things before I close down for the summer holidays.
My list of breaking news sources is solidly British and American, but here's something based in Ireland. Electricnews is a technology news site based in Eire. It looks pretty convincing to me, but do remember that in this context a Cork manufacturer is not someone who manufactures corks.
I like dictionaries, and glossaries too, so I found this Australian site, the Glossarist very appealing. You can search through its numerous lists of glossaries and technical dictionaries via a search box or by category.
More serious in intention is the Multilaterals Project, which keeps the full text of masses of international agreements on everything from space exploration to culture. I looked up "subsidiarity" and scored a bulls-eye, but sadly drew a blank on the controversial Treaty of Nice. Perhaps it's on its way. Still on momentous historical matters, you might be amused by History and Politics Out Loud, a database of important political sound recordings run by North Western University in the US. It's one of those unique Internet experiences to be able to click a link and listen to Richard Nixon. But you will need the latest version of RealPlayer, and don't expect anything much that isn't American. I found one clip of Winston Churchill, but searchjng for Neville Chamberlain (and Adolf Hitler) drew a big blank.
Two more sites to let you search discussions that take place on and around web pages rather than in Usenet. These are both in their early stages and have a limited repertoire, but they work well. BoardReader and MessageKing are both good on technology at the moment, but may get better.
Finally, I'm off to France for a couple of weeks. The French government kindly provides a powerful site devoted to the state of its road system. Naturally, it is all in French, and rather slow. You soon learn that chargement means "loading". But take a look: the big pictures of traffic cones would seem to be self-explanatory. Otherwise, remember that chantier means roadworks and bouchon means jam, and you'll be well away. Bonne route!
All the web has always been a top-of-division-two type of search engine for me, but it's had a revamp and is well worth a look. The way it handles image searches is particularly clever: you can search by file type, which is useful.
In my page on finding people I mention that there is no overall email directory, nor likely to be, but some people in Germany have assembled a site that searches several email directories at once. Of course, it is true that you can always ring people and ask them their email addresses, but you don't always want to, do you? It's called MESA.
Sad at the demise of the free Britannica? Likewise, but some plucky souls are putting together their own online encyclopaedia, with all the commissioning, peer-reviewing and editing done online. Yikes! Nothing much there at present (a nice short piece on Foot And Mouth, though) but worth a look. It's called Nupedia, which sounds like an incontinence cure. But still.
Meanwhile, on agricultural matters, here's a farming search engine. I haven't really gone into specialised "vertical" search tools and portals in this site (one day...) but this is really rather impressive. It's called Web-Agri and it seems to do the job. Look up Foot and Mouth and it leads you straight to pages produced by the world's veterinary schools. Which has to be better than relying on the Daily Mail.