X. Reference

62 links Last update June 3, 2004 Last full URL-check August 20, 1999

1. General and gateways (0 links)

2. General reference
a. Encyclopaedia's (0 links)
b. Language tools and dictionaries (1 link)
c. Coversion tools and tables (5 links)
d. Other general reference tools (2 link)

3. Subject specific reference for geography etc.
a. Glossaries, dictionaries and encyclopaedias (9 links)
b. Bibliographies (18 links)
c. Topographic reference, gazetteers (8 links)
d. World almanacs (4 links)
e. Acronym lists (5 links)
f. Geographical tools, geological timescale (4 links)
g. Geographical events and news services (1 link)

for statistics see GEOSOURCE VII: Statistical agencies and resources

4. General subject guides to geo-resources, print and electronic  (2 links)

5. Image collections (2 link)

2. General reference

a. Encyclopaedias

b. Language tools and dictionaries

Ethnologue, languages of the world
Database of almost 7000 languages, with maps and search facilities, 19980908

A dictionary of units
Extensive list of units of measurement (SI and many other, including regionally used and historical units) provided by Frank Tapson of the University of Exeter, UK, 19980910
Foreign exchange rates by US Federal Reserve
Current exhange rates and archive of daily exchange rates from 1996 onwards, 19980910
Full Universal Currency Converter
Exchange rate service with some 180 cuurencies, provided by Xenon Laboratories, US, 19980910
Local times around the world
Local times in cities and countries around the world against universal time (UTC), 19980910
The currency $ite
Currency converter, current rates, charts and forecasts by Olssen & Associates, 19980910
World Time Zone
Helpful simple map of actual time in world time zones, current world map of daytime/nightime. Somewhat slow-loading. 20000908

Guinness World Records

Online database of fascinating and boring record facts. It includes an earth and space category with all kinds of geo-relevant facts. It is always good to know the extremes, since eveythingl else must fall somewhere in between. 20001027

Xrefer

Metareference tool that allows searching the full text of some 40 subject dictionaries, among which quotation dictionaries, the Penguin dictionary of places, a dictionary of sociology, the Bloomsbury thesaurus, the Oxford paperback encyclopaedia. Handy for quick general reference. Unfortunately there are no advanced search options (yet), so search results may be crowded by art and literary references. Xrefer has updated its contents with the 2001 MacMillan Encyclopadia. 20000616, updated 20001027

a. Glossaries, dictionaries and encyclopaedias
 

Cartography - A glossary of catographic terms
List of cartographical terms by the Perry Casteneda  map collection curators at the University of Texas, Austin, 19980910
Earth Sciences - gateway - Global Change master directory of glossaries
Gateway to lists of acronyms and to glossaries, part of the Global Change master Directory, a NASA initiative, 19980910
EEA Multilingual Environmental Glossary

Multilingual glossary for environmental science and policy. It translates hundreds of terms from 20 European languages and gives brief definitions. By the European Environment Agency, 20040227

Environment - Terms of Environment
Glossary with hundreds of environment related terms provided by the US Environmental Protection Agency; also includes a lsit of environment acronyms, 19980910
Environmental Economics Glossary
By Environmental Damage Valuation, a US consultant firm, 19990507
Geographical Information Systems - GIS Dictionary
This on-line dictionary of GIS terms Association for Geographic Information and the University Of Edinburgh Department of Geography. The dictionary includes definitions some 1,000 terms compiled from a variety of sources. The dictionary is also supplemented by 52 diagrams, 19980910
Hydrology -  Encyclopedia of water terms
List of definitions of hydrological terms by the Texas Environmental Center, 19980908
Hydrology - WQA Glossary of terms
List of terms provided by the US Water Quality Association, with many terms referring to water quality, purification, treatment, general water management etc., 19980910
Physical Geography - Online glossary for terms of physical geography
Short definitions of hundreds of physical geography terms with cross-references, 19990212
Snow and Avalanche Glossary
Some 200 snow and avalanche terms explained, by the non-profit Cyberspace Snow and Avalanche Center (CSAC), 19990222

General - Current Geographical Publications (CGP)
Free access to the 10 most recent issues of Current Geographical Publications, a general bibliography of monographs and journal articles based on the acquisitions of the American Geographical Society library, avaibable considerably quicker than the print version, 20030203
Arctic Studies - ASTIS = SISTA
Bibliographica database with 45,000 records on the Canadian Arctic. Maintained by the Arctic Institute of North America at the University of Calgary. References are mainly to grey literature and journal articles from 1978 to present. In French and English. 20000127
Cold Regions Bibliography
This project is an integral part of the Science & Technology Division of the Library of Congress and is sponsored and financially supported by the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory (CRREL) and the Office of Polar Programs of the National Science Foundation (NSF). Its mission is to disseminate information on Antarctica and cold regions science and technology. It contains over 208,000 bibliographic records - many with abstracts - and is increasing by approximately 6,000 accessions annually, 19981201
Demography - Population Index
Population Index presents an annotated bibliography of recently published books, journal articles, working papers, and other material on population topics. It provides a searchable and browsable database containing over 40,000 abstracts of demographic literature published in Population Index in the period 1986-1998, free access, 19980908
Development Studies - BLDS Bibliographic database
This is the web searchable version of the library catalogue and journal articles database of  the British Library for Development Studies at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), UK.The database contains records of over 116,000 documents held by the Library (5000 journal subscriptions) - all serial titles held, monographs acquired since 1987 and journal articles selectively indexed since 1990, free access 19980908
Earth sciences - Georef preview
Searchable database of new additions to the largest earth sciences bibliographical database. Titles are replaced during the weekend. By the American Geological Institute. 20020114
Energy - Nederlandse Energie Literatuur (in Dutch)
Free access to the Dutch contribution to the international ENERGY database, containing Dutch titles added from 1995 onwards, by the ECN, Petten , Netherlands,19980908
Fieldwork in geography
Fieldwork in the Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences Higher Education Curriculum is an annotated bibliography. It is at the Geography Discipline Network website and currently lists some 100 post-1990 titles. By Claire Cottingham, Mick Healey and Phil Gravestock. 20001218
Gender in geography bibliography
Gender and feminism in geography bibliography. Simple listing, aranged alphabetically by author. Made by members of the discussion list for Feminism in Geography and managed by Ellen Hansen of Emporia Sate University, KA, USA. 20010122
GEODOK TOPSOURCE
Large (> 60,000 entries) bibliography of journal literature in human and physical geography. Holds author, title, source, topic keywords in a fully clickeble interface. Indexing started in 1980 and currently covers some 250 English (12%), German (80%) and French (5%) language journals and some others (3%), while the full jounal list shows alsmost 400 titles. Although the overall number is much less than that covered by the large commercial bibliographies, GEODOK is indispensable for German language geography, and indeed for geography of German language countries. Unfortunately GEODOK has no abstracts, but then, it's free! By the library of the Geographical Institute of the University of Erlangen, Germany. 20010206
Geographical Information Systems - ESRI Virtual Campus Library
Searchable database of substantial percentage of GIS literature. Many references link to full-text articles.  Begun by Duane Marble, Eric Miller, and Jim Saunders at the Ohio State University Dept. of Geography, the bibliography is now on ESRI's online learning site. 20011101
GEOPHOKA: literature database GEOdesy, PHOtogrammetry and CArtography
Bibliographical database containing nearly 40,000 records, begun in 1984, developed by the German Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie, 19981130
Human/cultural geography The Anthropological Index Online
Free access to this database of anthropological literature, being the index to current periodicals in the Museum of Mankind Library, formerly The Royal Anthropological Institute, UK; years available: 1970-1994, 19980908
Hydrology - Ground water online
A database containing some 80,000 groundwater literature citations, restricted access, by the National Ground Water Association, Ohio, US, 19980908
Landslide bibliography
Searchable bibliography of over 10,000 documents in the field of landslide research. By the USGS. 20040603
Riparian Bibliography
Long list in 4 parts (only 4 is available at the moment) of literature relevant to riparian research, compiled by R. Herness and maintained by M.J. Furniss of the  Interagency Watershed Analysis Center, USDA-Forest Service, Six Rivers National Forest. 20020114
Transport- Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS Online) TOPSOURCE
Transportation bibliography. Covers material from the 1960s to present. In all some 400,000 bibliographic records with abstracts (yearly addition 20,000), available without cost or registration. By the (US) Transportation Research Board, the (US) National Research Council, (US) National Academies, and the (US) Bureau of Transportation Statistics, U. S. Department of Transportation. Inevitably there is a US bias, but the sheer size makes this service the premier transportation literature tool available. Full text (links), will become available (mostly not free of cost). 20000118.

America's Roof - World High Points
Provides high points for all major countries in the world an much additional information for US peaks, 19980910
Canada's geographic names
Provided by Resources Canada, this gazetteer permits querying a databese of 350,000 names by names or geographical coordinates and returns names, corodinates, basic maps, other places within a given radius, a 'how-far-is-it service' and information on the origin of placenames. 20000131
Gazetteer of Australia
A compilation of over 210 000 geographic names of Australia provided by members of the Committee for Geographic Names in Australia, provided by the Australian Surveying and Land Information Group, 19990909
GEOnet Names Server (GNS)
The GEOnet Names Server (GNS) provides access to the National Imagery and Mapping Agency's (NIMA) database of foreign geographic feature names. Approximately 20,000 of the database of 3.5 million features are updated monthly with names information approved by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names (US BGN), 19980910
List of independent states in the world
Listing of all 190 independent states by and according to the U.S State department. It includes short and long names and the capital. It does not include some countries not formally recognised as sovereign states by the US: Taiwan, Serbia and Montenegro and the Palestine Authority. There is also a link to a comparable listing of 63 dependencies and areas of special sovereignty. 20001020
Orbis Latinus: Graesse's Latin placenames list of 1909
Cross-reference of Latin placenames and current names, with search facility. 20000128
The Global Gazetteer
Fully commercial gazetteer, claimed over 2.5 million entries by producer, 19981119
List of independent countries
List of independent countries with full name and capital provided by the US State Department, 19980910
Thesausrus of geographic names (TGN)
The TGN is an automated source of hierarchically arranged geographic data that is global in scope. The TGN comprises records for approximately 900,000 places; these records contain information supplied by several Getty Center contributors. It provides vernacular, English, and historical names, as well as additional information about the places, such as latitude and longitude and hierarchical geographical position, 1990910

Background notes
General country information provided by the US State Department and updated every 2-3 years, 19980910
CIA World factbook 1999
General country information with information on the geography, people, government, economy, communications, transportation, military and international issues. With goods reference maps. 20000606
Quid TOPSOURCE
Online version of the respectable world almanac from France. Apart from the general subjects, there is a wealth of geo-information. Most of it is in the light-yellow column on the right. There are general country 'fiches', flags, maps (click on the map to get more detail) and many, albeit somewhat stereotypical, photographs. What sets this site apart however is the country data service, with the possibility to compare up to ten countries. The geography data include many not found elsewhere: country circumference, lenght of coastal and land frontiers, lenght of frontiers shared with neighbouring countries, height and name of highest point, height and name of lowest point, short geographical description, climate data, disaster listing. The unique database of information at the commune level in France (there are 36,511 of them!) is worth mentioning as well. 20000606
World Wide Gazeteer
Country reference and links. Holds the obvious country links such as CIA world factbook pages, maps (Expedia, MapQuest, MapBlast, Atlapedia), links from BUBL, a link to the Britannica, local papers and business links, but also has own content: articles on world affairs and some comparative country graphs. There are also direct country links to books at Amazon, and to the apporpriate categories of Yahoo, GoTo and Alta Vista. Lay out and navigation is clear, content mostly up-to-date. Handy for a first country exploration. By Chris Allen, St Martins, Guernsey. 20000704

Earth Sciences - gateway - Global Change master directory of glossaries
Gateway to lists of acronyms and to glossaries, part of the Global Change master Directory, a NASA initiative, 19980910
Environment - Compendium of Environmental Acronyms (CEA)
Long list of environmental acronyms provided by the US Association of Engineering Geologists (AEG), 19980910
Environment/geography/geology - 'yet another acronym list'
Provides the meaning of hunders of acronmys of a.o.organisations, projects, concepts and companies, 19980908
GIS/Cartography/Remote Sensing - Dictionary of Abbreviations
Over 1,000 acronmys by Philip Hoehn and Mary Lynette Larsgaard, Univ. of Berkeley, US, 19980910
Quarternary - A dictionary of quaternary acronyms and abbreviations
Almost 1,200 acronyms and abbreviations related to quaternary studies provided by Alwynne B. Beaudoin of the Canadian Association of Palynologists, Univ. of Alberta, Canada, 20020111

How far is it?
This service uses data from the US Census and a supplementary list of cities around the world to find the
latitude and longitude of two places, and then calculates the distance between them (as the crow flies); it
also provides a map showing the two places, 19980910
Geological Time Machine
Annotated and illustrated timescale by the University of California Museum of Paleontology. 20001219
Geological Timescale
Timescale provided by the University of Calgary, Canada, with short explanation and refrences, 19990222
Magnetic Information Retrieval program
The Magnetic Information Retrieval Program (MIRP) uses the CGRF to calculate values of magnetic declination , or any other component of the magnetic field, over Canada and adjacent areas. Outside the region of Canada, MIRP automatically uses the International Geomagnetic Reference Field (IGRF) to calculate magnetic field values, with somewhat less accuracy. Provided by the geological Survey of Canada, 19980910

g. Geographical events and news services

Disaster Relief
The Disaster Relief website is a cooperative effort between the American Red Cross, CNN Interactive and IBM.
It aims to faciliate the exchange of disaster information on the Internet, 19980910

Geographical and Environmental Studies Library Resource Guides

Extensive resource guides for 25 different topics by the Univeristy Library, Adelaide, Australia, listing a.o. handbooks, reference books, websites, databases. Very valuable, despite the fact that listing of printed material is restricted to sources available in the Adelaide University Library, 19990325

Guide to geographical resources

Resource guide for geography, covering print and electronic sources, by the Geography Library of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, 19990222

Degree confluence project
Ongoing project distributing protographs of intersections of integers of latitude and longitude. There are still thousands of pictures to be taken. Most of the pictures come with a short description or with a story about hardships of the photographer in reaching the place. It has a nice world map of pictures already available. Anyone can contribute. The three pictures of intersections in the Netherlands are especially interesting. 20010125
Geo-Images Project
A collection of collections of geographical images, mostly photographs, freely available for use in geographical education, in total over 1,000 images; subjects are California, Morocco, Pacific Coast, the American West, Alaska, Papua New Guinea, Afghanistan , Suadia Arabia, Yemen and others, 19980910
UNESCO Photobank
Searchable database of over 10,000 photographs covering the fields in which UNESCO is active: culture, education, social development. There are howver also some categories outside that range: industry, agriculture, environment. Searchable by region, country, place and theme. Photographs are available for online consultation, but not yet for reproduction. That service is envisaged for the near future. 20000602