The World Book has four principal sections – Articles, Atlas, Dictionary and Timeframe. A useful
feature of the Article section is that it gives the list of all related
Articles available on the CD or Online. This is desirable, if one is doing research on a particular topic. Thankfully, the search menu is simple and easy to use. The Dictionary and the Atlas are standard features – no complaints there. The Time Frame
allows one to choose a given year or a given time period, and search the entire enclycopedia for any refernces to that time period. A very useful feature for the sudent of history, or even of current affairs.
There is another section called Just Looking, that allows one to browse for information using any combination of category and content. Along with the usual content (audio, video and pictures), World Book has another interesting feature – Bubble View. This gives the viewer an in depth, 360 degrees
View of any picture; say, the Oval Office in the White House!
If there are complaints, they are of a nature endemic to this format, nonetheless two that must be noted. First, every time one starts the program, the CD must be inserted into the disk drive – surely this could have been avoided! Second, the process of
registration (a cumbersome one, involving sending registration details by mail) is essential for the proper utilisation of this encyclopedia. Any CD
encyclopedia is only as good as the backup resources available Online. Without registration, one does not have access to the various updates (article updates, the month in brief and special reports), without which this or any other encyclopedia would become rapidly dated.
There are two special features available – Back in Time ( which allows one to search the archives Online), and Surf the Milleniuum (which gives one a period perspective of historical events that occurred in the past). This is an interesting feature, as more often than not one tends to take a contemporary view of past events…
One last word on the utility of a CD encyclopedia as compared to an Online encyplodia such as MSN Encarta. While the number of articles – the articles database - available in MSN Encarta is much larger, unfortunately (from the customer’s viewpoint) many of these articles are accessable only to the Premium users.
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