Websites of Knowledge?

AvantLegion asks: "Every now and then, I stumble upon a website that is just a veritable tome of knowledge - be it of a certain theme (like Snopes.com) or more general information (Everything2.com). Free documentation databases are invaluable, but rarely seem to come up very early in Google searches. What websites out there do you consider to be indispensable sources of knowledge? (save the obvious Slashdot jokes). Where do you look up information besides combing through search engine results?"

Comments

The Straight Dope

[slacy]

The Straight Dope

They've got a good search engine, and answers to all kinds of interesting questions. I've spent many an evening browsing through the archives...

Old School Technology - Newsgroups

[dthable]

I still look at groups.google.com (mainly because I can't get access to an NNTP server at work). I still find answers on newsgroups that I really can't find anywhere else. (Try using a MS JDBC client....good luck finding anything on MSDN.)

MSDN

[CokoBWare]

For a M$ junkie like me, I do find MSDN to be invaluable for developer reference when I need some definitive answer for an API I don't have handy.

Two

[fredrikj]

I use dictionary.com a lot. It's not only useful for translating words (I'm not a native English speaker) and looking up synonyms, but also has a decent scope of information about technical terms.

Then there's of course Eric Weisstein's World of Science for everything related to physics, chemistry and mathematics.

The All Music Guide

[miket01]

AMG is my first stop for anything pop music related, excepting lyrics. I'd be interested in hearing about a good lyrics database that doesn't bombard me with pop-ups.

Re:The All Music Guide

[mishac]

Maybe you should just use a better browser, like Mozilla or Firebird, so you don't have to see the popups.

Re:The All Music Guide

[N1KO]

This site has lyrics and lets people post comments on what they mean. I'm not sure about the popups since my browser kills them.

Security Tome

[servicepack158]

If information assurance is ur bag, www.infosyssec.com is a pretty great resource. Lots of links to good stuff. Their news site www.snpx.com is good too. and Funny.

IMDb

[epsalon]

The Internet Movie Database has everything there is to know about movies and TV series, and the people involved in them. An invaluable resource to all movie viewers.

Re:IMDb

[Otter]

Seconded -- IMDB is a must, especially when you're, say, watching Independence Day and wonder, "Hey, isn't that Lieutenant Getraer from CHiPs?"

For a more specific entertainment niche, I got to Setlist.com for (duh) setlist information.

The best geography/government site: the CIA World Factbook. I'm not sure how the CIA landed that responsibility but it's very well done.

And, of course, for Americans the IRS forms site is a must.

Re:IMDb

[rute20740]

On the same token, but for music, there's All Music Guide. I've found lots of information about even the most obscure bands on there. They also link you to other similar bands, or other projects the members have been in. A must for anyone who is into music.

Re:IMDb

[mattsucks]

Seconded -- IMDB is a must, especially when you're, say, watching Independence Day and wonder, "Hey, isn't that Lieutenant Getraer from CHiPs?"

IMDB wouldn't really help, because at that point I'd be paralyzed with the shame of my intimate knowledge of CHiPs and thus unable to get to the computer.

Re:IMDb

[Otter]

Yes, well, I watch TV with the TiBook on my lap for precisely this sort of lookup: "The grandmother on Gilmore Girls looks familiar -- hey, isn't that the mother from Happy Days?"

Re:IMDb

[mattsucks]

Well, dammit, now I'm thinking. I was just trying to be funny before (time will tell if i succeeded).

As the TV becomes the computer becomes the home theatre becomes the DVD player becomes ... this kind of data integration will be a killer app. Want to know what other shows a cast member has been in? Move the cursor over the person on the screen and mash the Info button. Since everything is integrated, a little bit of pattern recognition goes into effect, a request to some webservice is generated, and you get a popup with a list of that actor's other roles. Heck, you wouldn't even need pattern recognition. The digital video stream could include "what actor is where on screen at what time" info, kinda like a big dynamic <map>.

Now if Microsoft would hurry up and get all this done we'd truly be in multi-media heaven (aaahahaha, i kill me ;-)

Re:IMDb

[GimmeFuel]

TV Tome has a ton of useful TV show info also.

Re:IMDb

[FlexAgain]

And once you've looked up that film and decided you want to buy it on DVD, look at Rewind to see which region produces the best version.

Yaxay.com

[executebusiness.com]

I happen to like yaxay.com for images and PHP info. If you're into culture, although sometimes annoying, I like Kuro5hin.org.

How Stuff Works

[Dfiant]

I like browsing articles at howstuffworks.com. I go there looking for something specific and end up spending hours reading the articles. They're not overly technical, but not so simple as to be inaccurate either. It's something I can share with others and not confuse them right out. ;-)

Wikipedia

[Anonymous Coward]

From their homepage:
Wikipedia is a multilingual project to create a complete and accurate open content encyclopedia.

All the articles are under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Re:Wikipedia

[i_am_nitrogen]

I've contributed a minor correction or two to Wikipedia, mostly missing or misplaced punctuation. It's really pretty cool how anybody can modify the articles. It records the IP address of the person making the modification too, so if somebody puts something they shouldn't, well... Heheh.

You're missing the obvious ones

[eggstasy]

Wikipedia
How Stuff Works

I remember a while back...

[theIG]

I find that the old references are still the best, like old NeXTstep or System V books, like OpenComputing's Best Unix Tips Ever.

Mathworld

[Ann Coulter]

has everything you want to know about math. Scienceworld has some cursory scientific information as well.

Re:Mathworld

[saforrest]

Through it's younger PlanetMath is also quite a good reference for math, largely because it's maintained by the general public instead of a small team. Plus, all the content is distributed under the GNU FDL.

Topography

[digitect]

Just discovered a fantastic one this morning: TopoZone. In an age where everybody everywhere is trying to make a buck on information, it's refreshing to find an government/academic grade information store accessible (digitally at least) for free.

Re:Topography

[dhaines]

Another useful map site is Terraserver.

It has USGS aerial photos as well as topo maps of most of the contiguous United States. There are commercial applications, such as ExpertGPS, that use Terraserver to support some pretty cool features.

Yeah it's "sponsored" by M$, but if you're a map geek like me this site is great.

arXiv.org e-Print archive

[asa]

http://arxiv.org/ is invaluable if you're interested in scientific publishing. It's been around for more than a decade and I know of no better research archiving and dissemination project. I imagine that it was designed for a specific community (researchers) but, as nothing but a spectator, I've found it to be a great source of information and worth visiting regularly.

--Asa

hyperphysics

[hitchhacker]

I like hyperphysics because they link the different areas of physics graphically. A map to knowledge is sometimes more helpful than the actual knowledge.

-metric

Don't confuse knowledge with information

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the examples I've seen in the comments so far are full of information. It is up to you to turn that information into knowledge. I'd say that websites containing actual knowledge as opposed to information are few if not nonexistent.

Sorry to be so pedantic, but the speaker at my college graduation said something along the lines of, "seek knowledge, not information" and it's the one thing from his speech that has stuck with me. Use information to gain knowledge, and use knowledge to gain wisdom. It is only through the power of the willing human mind that each transforms into the next.

But anyway, back to your regularly scheduled links full of cool information...

if I want to know "How much is inside?"

[thilmony]

I visit

http://www.cockeyed.com

Drugs

[mmdurrant]

http://www.erowid.org
Not just fun drugs, either. All kinds of information about all kinds of pharmaceuticals (too lazy for spell check)

Re:Drugs

[Mprx]

And http://rhodium.ws for information on the chemistry and synthesis of drugs.

investing

[atastypie]

www.investopedia.com for everything investing...

They're even tech sites!

[Asprin]

webopedia.com
whatis.com

http://lokarnos.com/

[doug]

But then again, much of what I look up is pretty specialized.

- doug

Re:When I look for stuff...

[orangesquid]

(Hah. thehun is a blessing and also a curse, because there are a million imitators that suck.)

But yeah, for information, there's TONS of stuff out there. I've actually found that the best way to find a really cool page is to start with something specific, punch in a very careful and exact google query, look at the first 10 or 20 hits, and find the one that seems to be the most all-around informative, and bookmark it. If you're really clever, you can categorize your bookmarks, but I'm lazy and I don't (grep is my friend).

The "Beginning of knowledge"

[superyooser]

or "the principal and choice part of knowledge [its starting point and its essence]," as stated here, would be the best place to start learning. I have three buttons for reference sources in my Mozilla PrefBar: Google, Dictionary, and the Bible. I have found the third to be the most valuable of all.

Every now and then, I stumble upon a website that is just a veritable tome of knowledge

There are 66 veritable tomes of knowledge in this single online compilation. It's completely searchable by word or numerical reference and available in many languages and versions. Five languages are offered in audio, too. It's all free.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[xutopia]

http://www.skepdic.com/ http://www.2think.org/ May I recommend you also read Shadows Of Forgotten Ancestors by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan. It's the missing 67th book.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[chriso11]

Amusing. Of course, that reference also states that pi=3.0 (1 King 7:23). It also condones slavery and misogony, and is biased against handicapped (e.g. Leviticus 21:16-21; also see Exodus 4:11). Limited use in scientific (Deuteronomy 14:7, 1 Chonicles 16:30, Isaiah 13:10), mathematical, legal, and ethical (Genesis 19:8) analysis. That is problem with most reference over 300years old. I would say it is of limited use overall. Don't waste your time on it.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[chriso11]

Exodus 4:11 is interesting because god basically says he makes everyone, exactly the way he wants them to be. So he makes people crippled. Quite nice then, to reject the people he made for service to him.

As for Isaiah: So the bible predicts that when the messiah comes, the moon will generate light, not merely reflect it? What mechanism will that be? Antimatter-matter conversion? The materials the moon is made from would not be able to undergo fission, and fusion will not be very effective. Also, what will turn off the stars? Since the stars are years to thousands+ lightyears away, this means that the furthest away have already been shut off.

I don't know if you have time, or an open enough mind to realize that the bible is really simply a primitive tribe's attempt to find meaning in the world. A decent work of fiction, no doubt, but all in all I would put Homer and Shakespeare a peg above it.

As for the recommendation. It actually looks quite interesting. The irony alone...

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[superyooser]

So the bible predicts that when the messiah comes, the moon will generate light, not merely reflect it?

Well, Isaiah 13:10 mentions the sun right before the part about the moon: "The sun will be dark when it rises." Whoah! The sun doesn't rise! The earth is just spinning on its axis so that half its surface is facing opposite the sun. Does that make the verse wrong? Of course not. It's just a description of how the sun appears.

And how can the sun rise and be dark? There's no need for wild speculations involving quantum physics. Ezekiel 32:7 provides some more information about this prophecy. In this verse God says, "I will cover the sun with a cloud." A very dark cloud. Simple.

Moving on to the part of the verse actually questioned, common literal translations read, "the moon will not shed its light." The Complete Jewish Bible reads, "the moon will no longer shine." Isaiah is describing what a person will see, and light does in fact normally shine from the surface of the moon. The moon does not emit light; it does shine light in the same way that light shines from a bald head. It's like a TCP packet hopping from node to node from its source address to its destination address. There are many sending and receiving nodes along the way. From the moon to the earth is the second of two hops that "moonlight" makes. When the light shines (emitted) from the sun to the moon, it is sunlight. When it shines (reflected) from the moon to the earth, it is moonlight. If you were on the moon, you would see light shining from the earth ("earthlight"). Since light shines from the moon, that light is its own light for that route of its journey. It's not the original source, but it is the light source as far as most people are concerned. We know that moonlight is light reflected from the sun, but describing a prophetic vision in that way would have awkwardly avoided the common, straightforward, everyman expressions for describing visual appearances of such daily realities and would not have enhanced the prophetic picture of earthly conditions that Isaiah is trying to paint here for people to be watching for.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[tcopeland]

> So he makes people crippled.

God made man perfect, but then man fell in the Garden of Eden.

> Quite nice then, to reject the
> people he made for service to him.

Why would God _owe_ us salvation?

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[The Bungi]

The moon does not emit light; it does shine light in the same way that light shines from a bald head. It's like a TCP packet hopping from node to node from its source address to its destination address.

Religious geeks - god save us.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[vadim_t]

Doesn't make sense. Perfect means perfect. Something that fails isn't perfect.

Related to that, if God is perfect, how come Satan appeared? Woudln't that be because God isn't perfect after all?

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[AvantLegion]

Related to that, if God is perfect, how come Satan appeared? Woudln't that be because God isn't perfect after all?

How does Satan have any bearing on the perfection of God?

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[vadim_t]

Well, how come Satan appeared from one of his angels? Couldn't he just have done it so that it didn't happen? For now the conclusion I'm coming to is that God isn't 100% good.

Why put the tree there at all? Since he knows it all he would already know what would have happened.

Why flood the whole earth and punish innocent people when he knew it wouldn't work?

And the original sin comes from God as well. After all he created the angel who turned evil, and created Adam and Eve who fell to the temptation. Again, this doesn't seem fair. If he couldn't just avoid creating Satan, then he probably isn't perfect. Very powerful maybe, but not perfect.

Of course that all can be dismissed with the magical "God works in misterious ways", but I don't like that explanation.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[AvantLegion]

You mistake "couldn't" for "wouldn't".

God created imperfection. The existence of Satan is pretty much in keeping with the fact that God created imperfect beings and then gave them "free will".

Consider it akin to a video game. When I "create" a video game, bad stuff gets introduced to the good guys in the game. To do any less would make the system pretty pointless.

The point of life on Earth is that it falls well short of Heaven.

Re:The "Beginning of knowledge"

[vadim_t]

Well, I'll explain the problem I see with all this. God knows everything. He knew what would happen. Yet he punishes his own creation for something it couldn't avoid doing.

Imagine I'm some biologist that manages to create a new specie of animal. It's fairly intelligent, let's say smart enough to understand simple statements and orders, but also very aggressive. Now, I come to this creature and tell it "Sit here quietly and don't hurt anybody". Then my student, who I knew who was a moron since a long time ago, goes and kicks it.

Of course, it gets angry and fails to follow my orders, and even though I knew it couldn't obey them, because I just made it that way. Then I go and punish the creature for something that wasn't really its fault.

Now, this experiment might make sense if you have a twisted mind, or want to set a cruel experiment about psychology, but there's no way I can see it being done by an infinitely good creator.

Alternative dictionary site

[larien]

As an alternative for dictionary.com, try www.m-w.com

Obvious Slashdot jokes

[bmckeever]

Does that include ridiculing the poster for using words they don't understand? Did you mean trove?

My favorites

[fm6]

The Portland Pattern Repository is a fascinating reference site, even if you're not a programmer. It's also of interest as the very first WikiWiki site.

Then again, it's sort of redundant to mention the PPR in this story, since it tends to turn up in Google searches.

Bartleby.com has all kinds of reference books available, and lots of other stuff online. Like all of the Harvard Classics.

I'm suprised I'm the first to mention Project Gutenberg. Maybe people don't think of it as a reference site, since mostly it's good for downloading whole public-domain texts. But various volunteers (including me) are now in the process of proofreading the famous Britannica 11th Edition for inclusion in the Gutenberg set. At the current rate, it'll be done in about a year. But perhaps with more volunteers...

Re:My favorites

[fm6]

I forgot to mention the http://www.instantweb.com/foldoc/>Free Online Dictionary Of Computing (FOLDOC). Lots of good material. Seems to be a little undersupported right now though.

Movies and maths

[xyrw]

For movie reviews, rottentomatoes.com is pretty good.

Mathworld is great for maths- related information. A website from the makers of Mathematica-- one reason why ideologically I prefer Mathematica over Maple, even though my uni uses the latter. Wolfram is simply more involved in education.

Nobody's mentioned this one!

[dacarr]

How come I haven't yet seen a mention of the Linux more or less everything repository?

Re:sources

[Zarquon]

Yeah, but they are a pain to search; there are indexes and tables of content, but not much else. Often they are of little use.

All Music Guide

[CaptainStormfield]

I love the All Music Guide. This is a very useful database of artist bios, discographies, album reviews, and recommended albums for particular artists.

Re:All Music Guide

[angle_slam]

AMEN! All Music Guide is an incredible site and a great way to get "into" a certain artist.

Road geek sites

[dacarr]

California Highways website (not related to CalTrans) is a list that describes the routes and history of every numbered highway - past, present, and proposed - in the state of California, as well as a bit of information on the multi-numerical El Camino Real.

There is a Links page from the front that will provide a huge compendium of lists to other resources for the road geek in you.

Re:Road geek sites

[booch]

At first I read that as "every even numbered highway". I thought that was pretty weird to skip all the odd-numbered highways.

Basic and not so basic net lore.

[jedo]

searchlore.org
serachlores.org
Beware if you -- from Redmond
anywhere is this site. The firest pages are safe tho.

Another one

[spumoni_fettuccini]

I use several of those listed above and would like to add this one to the list. It covers a broad range of topics.

Answers.

[themassiah]

answers.google.com has EVERYTHING you need. Evar.

For finding acronyms

[MainframeKiller]

Acronymfinder.com

Great Source for free online computer books

[Alpha_Nerd]

Here are many free books related to math and computer science.

Some random links ..

[stevey]

There are several sites that I look at regularly for different programming things.

When I did windows development Code Project was a lifesaver, nowadays that's been replaced by the venerable Perl Monk

For online books I'd browse through The Assayer, and for zany reference nothing beats How Much Is Inside .. Stuff!

Sports information

[angle_slam]

Most of my favorite information sites have already been listed, so I won't provide links to them (Webopedia, allmusic.com, imdb.com). But I don't believe I saw any sports information sites. So here are a few historical statistic sites:

• Baseball Reference for historical baseball data. Want to see which career is most like Barry Bonds, find out here (the answer is Micky Mantle).
• Basketball Reference. Similar to the above site, but concerned with historical NBA data.
• Soccer has two excellent sites with historical and current data. The International Soccer Server and the Rec.sport.soccer Statistics Foundation. Both sites have details on which team won the league for all of history. And you should probably check out the UEFA European Cup Football Results and Qualifications page also. It doesn't contain historical results, but is a very detailed overview on how UEFA league qualifying is determined.

draw the line

[Hubert_Shrump]

(save the obvious Slashdot jokes)

are you implying that goatsex and tub girl are somehow reference works?

or does this have to do with grits? what the hell are you talking about?!

Slashdot.org

[seanthenerd]

What?! Nobody's mentioned Slashdot yet? Slashdot is my "website of knowledge"! Up-to-date news (well, mostly!) about computers really beats the encyclopedia articles made five years ago. Of course, Webopedia is good too...

General ones

[ArsonPerBuilding]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/ its like the Hitchhikers Guide, but for our real world.
www.howstuffworks.com has been stated, and is a staple of mine.

Citeseer

[sduff]

Citeseer is a great source of Computer Science related papers. Best feature is that it automatically lists along side each paper, each paper that it cites, as well as papers that cite it. (And also a frequency chart to show often the paper was cited in the years after its publishing)

Good way to keep track of the latest papers in different fields.

Telephone connection information

[Myself]

TelcoData.US is great if you want to find out what provider serves a particular prefix, or what switches are in an area, or what ILECs have presence in a city, that sort of stuff. Play with it!

The best thing is, there's a WAP interface so you can easily do such lookups right from your phone. :)

Re:Telephone connection information

[fm6]

I find the entry for Los Gatos, CA switch rather interesting. "Company Type" is given as "ICO", which I assume stands for "Independent Central Office". The most common value for this field is "RBOC", short for Regional Bell Operating Company. Thing is, the owner is Verizon, a company that was formed by merger between an RBOC (Atlantic Bell) and an ICO (General Telephone and Electronics, which used to be the biggest of the non-Bell phone companies). Does the distinction between RBOCs and ICOs mean anything in this case? Or any case, now that the Bell System is 20 years gone?

FAQs.org

[I Am The Owl]

FAQs.org is a large repository of USENET group FAQs. I find it indispensible when looking for an overview of particular topic, such as the comp.compression FAQ or the comp.graphics.rendering.raytracing FAQ. All kinds of interesting articles are to be had on that site alone, it's a fun read.

Also, I find that Security Focus has a huge backlog of very useful and interesting information for those concerned with computer security. In that same vein, dbaseiv.net [Google cache, the site seems to be down right now] is shaping up to be a huge repository of computer security knowledge.

The Linux Documentation Project is full of HOWTOs relating to Linux, if you've got a Linux problem that you need to work out (though HOWTOs make for really boring recreational reading).

This is just what I can come up with off the top of my head, I'll probably post a reply to this when I remember more.

Not pop, but...

[Stalemate]

The Original Hip-Hop Lyrics Archive is the best i've found for hip-hop lyrics.

people's homepages...

[quiddity]

i think there must be a good selection of useful user "home" pages. would make a good thread, or posting in itself. from mine:
--web

currency converter - findsounds.com

how stuff works - infoplease

about.com - librarian's index

rebecca's reference - tom mayo's links
-words:

acronym/abbr -lookup -finder -bm

trans -babelfish -worldlingo -google bm

bartleby

phrontistery

pseudodictionary

jargon file
--music

epitonic - pitchfork

sonomu - electraum

gnod - audioquarium --books:

amazon - abebooks - bookfinder

gutenberg & onlinebooks

loc.gov - lambiek comiclopedia - rebecca's books

I use...

[Bish.dk]

The All Music Guide for music references.
Merriam-Webster when I need help spelling in English.
DVD-Basen when I want to find a review of a DVD-movie.

Re:Best Website EVER

[Ciaran_H]

Erm. That would be http://web.archive.org/ . Don't bother clicking on the link in the post above, it's the age old goatse link.

two more

[btox]

These are information rather than knowledge.
www.discogs.com is useful for electronic music release information.
www.onelook.com is a good dictionary.

P.S. m-w.com has a toolbar (like the google toolbar) which I find very useful.

CIA World Factbook

[hether]

The CIA World Factbook at http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/ can give you pretty much anything you need to know about any country in the world. Invaluable, especially to me as a history-political science major.

Re:CIA World Factbook

[ader]

Incredible! Does George Bush know about this site?

Ade_
/

MOD PARENT UP !!

[Hal The Computer]

That is one heck of an extensive list. If I had any mod points, you'd get them.

Looking up at the sky

[FlexAgain]

If you want any info on the Sun, other stars, satellites, planets, Iridium Flares, etc ...

Heavens Above is a good place to start.

For DVD purchasing

[deblau]

Try DVD price search. I've found all the best deals there, and they have a lot of obscure stuff. Many times it will be cheaper to order from Canada and pay shipping than to run down to the Best Buy. (Canada is also region 1, for those of you who haven't already hacked your player.)

IMDB for games

[danila]

MobyGames tries to become for games what IMDB is for movies. They are not there yet, but overall it is probably the best source of factual information about games.

Also dict.org

[Anitra]

I was going to recommend dict.org, but then I went and looked at dictionary.com again. Seems they pull from pretty much the same databases/dictionaries (in English anyway), everything from Webster's to "WordNet" to the Free Online dictionary of computing. Heck, they even (both) have dictionaries of Biblical names & terms! Wow.

I can see why you'd prefer dictionary.com, though. They have better foreign language support, and a thesaurus; dict.org has several different algorithms for searching (that you can choose from), and you can also narrow your choice to a single dictionary with dict.org.

Perl Design Patterns

[scrottie]

Perl Design Patterns - one large document, in book form - or hit search.cpan.org and search for Object::PerlDesignPatterns

TVTome

[psionic]

TVTome is to TV series as IMDB is to movies. Its got pretty much anything you want to know about TV shows including epislode lists and guides.