Following the classification scheme adopted by AstroWeb, we will outline in this section the current status of the main categories of on-line astronomy resources, pointing to meta-resources (i.e. organized lists of resources) when they are available.
Most of the active astronomical organizations (institutes,
astronomy departments, etc.) now have
home pages on the Internet.
StarWorlds![[*]](/icons/foot_motif.gif){kind=icon}
is currently the most comprehensive searchable directory of
such resources; it can be queried by names, keywords,
or character strings.
For browsing lists sorted by alphabetical
order or by country, see AstroWeb (Sect. 2.2).
National or international organizations also maintain
useful lists.
It is now difficult to envisage an observational project without a web site. As they are more dynamic and often involve multiple organizations or institutions, the best way to find them may be to use one of the powerful commercial search engines that routinely index millions of web pages on the Internet.
The indexing system of AstroWeb may also be helpful, especially when it is important to limit the investigation domain to astronomy, or to keep track of new emerging projects.
Astronomy data and information centers are becoming increasingly interconnected, with both explicit links to other relevant resources and automatic cross-links that may be invoked transparently to the end-user. Section 5 describes current efforts to provide interoperability within astrophysics (Astrobrowse) and across the space sciences (ISAIA).
Here also a virtual network is being organized,
as exemplified by the
Urania
initiative, or by the coordinated efforts to
create links between ADS and other services
(Kurtz et al. [2000]).
Note that many of the bibliographical resources are
electronic journals for which a subscription may be
required.
Some databases
(RGO E-mail directory,
StarHeads)
follow the development
of electronic mail addresses and personal Web pages.
Directories from national or international societies
(e.g., AAS, EAS, IAU) are also
generally very carefully kept up to date.
The database of meetings and conferences maintained
by CFHT is very
complete and well organized. Astronomical societies also
maintain their own lists.
The Astronomical Software and Documentation Service
(ASDS)
is a network service that allows users to locate existing
astronomical software, associated technical documentation, and
information about telescopes and astronomical instrumentation
(Payne et al. [1996]).
ASDS originated as a service devoted entirely to
astronomical software packages and their associated
on-line documentation and was originally called the
Astronomical Software Directory Service. Much code is rewritten these days,
not because anyone has found a fundamentally better way
to solve the problem, but because developers simply don't know
who has already done it, whether the code runs on the
system they have available, or where to get it if it does.
That is the problem that ASDS was intended to solve.
In 1998 the scope of ASDS was expanded to include astronomical observing sites and their associated telescope and instrument manuals, taken from a listing maintained at CFHT. The service was renamed at this point.
Education and public outreach have always been a strong concern in astronomy, but the importance of this activity is growing at a higher rate, with the advent of the World Wide Web.
It is difficult to give general rules for such a wide field, going far beyond the limits of astronomical institutions. Let us just say that we expect to see in the future an increasing rôle of educational institutions (planetariums, or outreach departments of big societies or institutions), for conveying general astronomy knowledge, or news about recent discoveries, to the general public.
The yellow-page services mentioned above do keep lists of the most important education services.
Copyright The European Southern Observatory (ESO)