Sandra Carden, Technical Editor

Editing for Engineers and Scientists

We here at Carden Works extend a special welcome to our colleagues in the world of editing, and we offer this list of some of our favorite online resources. Let us know if there are others you would like to see on this list.

Dictionaries and Other References

One Look Dictionary
993 dictionaries indexed; includes wildcard search and reverse dictionaries features

YourDictionary.com
Dictionaries and glossaries in more than 100 categories

Merriam-Webster Online
Dictionary and thesaurus

Bartleby.com
Dictionary, encyclopedia, thesauri, usage, quotations, and more

Glossarist
A searchable directory of glossaries and topical dictionaries

Acronym Finder
Dictionary of acronyms, abbreviations, and initialisms; more than 400,000 definitions

The Quotations Page
More than 26,000 quotations from more than 3,100 authors

Refdesk
Reference, facts, news: the single best source for facts

Interactive Help, Style Guides,
and Professional Associations

Copyeditors’ List
E-mail list (subscription page)

Technical Writers’ List
E-mail list for all facets of technical communication, including technical editing

Technical Editors’ Eyrie
Resources for technical editors

Project Wombat
Formerly Stumpers, this e-mail list is for librarians and others to discuss reference questions that they are unable to answer using available resources, including the Internet and local interlibrary loan capabilities

IEEE Computer Society Style Guide

U.S. Government Printing Office Style Manual 2000 Edition

NASA SP-7084 Grammar, Punctuation, and Capitalization: A Handbook for Technical Writers and Editors
Links to Table of Contents. Download PDF of this handbook at NASA SP-7084

The Elements of Style by Strunk and White

The Chicago Manual of Style’s Q&A by topic

Society for Technical Communication

The Editorial Freelancers Association

Grammar, Usage, Punctuation, and Spelling

Guide to Grammar and Writing
Sponsored by the Capital Community College Foundation

The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation
By Jane Straus

Purdue University Online Writing Lab
Handouts and exercises on grammar, spelling, and punctuation; PowerPoint presentations related to grammar; and a section of handouts and resources for ESL learners

Grammar Bytes!
Grammar terms, exercises, handouts, tips, and rules

Common Errors in English Usage
By Paul Brians

The Word Detective on the Web
The online version of The Word Detective, a newspaper column answering readers’ questions about words and language

Fun with Words
Explains whether you should use affect or effect, imply or infer, practicable or practicle, and more

Online Etymology Dictionary
Explanations of what our words meant and how they sounded 600 or 2,000 years ago

The American Heritage Book of English Usage: A Practical and Authoritative Guide to Contemporary English

EEI Communications Standard Proofreading Symbols

University of Colorado at Boulder Style Guide
Professional proofreading and editing marks

GlobalSpec: The Engineering Search Engine

MatWeb Material Property Data
Metals and alloys abbreviations and acronyms

Periodic Table of the Elements

Microsoft Word Information Sources

MVP Word Site
Tutorials, a FAQ, and downloads by credible technology experts known as Microsoft’s Most Valuable Professionals

Woody’s Lounge
Discussion forum about Windows and Office

Allen Wyatt’s Word Tips
Arranged by topic; a free weekly e-mail newsletter

The Editorium
Microsoft Word add-ins; Editorium Update, free weekly e-mail newsletter

Word-PC
Discussion list (subscription page)

Word-PC
Discussion list (archives)

The Electric Editors
The Internet community for editors, proofreaders, indexers, translators and publishers; includes subscription information to free e-mail lists

Microsoft Knowledge Base

Unit Conversions: Offline

Conversion Buddy
We frequently need to convert Imperial (American/British) units to SI (International) units. When working offline, we use Conversion Buddy Version 4.1.3 (free software by James E. Presley) (Windows). More than 1700 conversion factors are included, and you can add your own. It is easy to learn and use. It is available at several internet sites including this link.

Unit Conversions: Online

ConvertIt.com, Inc.
Conversion & Calculation Center
Measurement Conversion
World Time Zones
Currency Exchange Rates
Calculators
Reference Information

ASCO Valve Conversion Calculators
With this utility, you only need to know the original unit; its calculations are displayed in all of the converted units. For example, when you click on “Area,” enter a number, and click “Convert,” the calculator yields results for square inch, square feet, square yard, square centimeter, square meter, and acres.

eFunda Engineering Fundamentals
This utility provides results in many categories: geometrics (angle, length, area, volume), kinematics (time, velocity, acceleration, volume flow rate), kinetics (mass, density, force, moment/torque, pressure, energy, power), miscellaneous (temperature, viscosity, electric, luminous, magnetic, thermal, permeability, wire gages, sheet metal gages, hardness, and more), currencies (updated daily), and fundamental constants.

Universal Currency Converter
You can perform interactive foreign exchange rate calculations, using live, up-to-the-minute currency rates.

Economic History Services
You can find the exchange rate, for any year or range of years, between the United States Dollar and 40 other countries.