Langenscheidt has relaunched its online dictionaries. Now the dictionaries are available at the new URL

http://www.woerterbuch.langenscheidt.de/login/ip.html

We still have access to the following dictionaries:

• a set of bilingual concise dictionaries (German – foreign language)
• a set of technical dictionaries including physics and chemistry
• some titles of the Duden series
• dictionary ‘Deutsch als Fremdsprache’
• pocket dictionary English – Chinese

Unfortunately the new service is a bit slower so that it will take some seconds till the search field and the results appear. The search functionalities will be improved little by little.

Oxford has launched a newly redesigned website that includes two collections: Oxford Quick Reference consists of 125 core subject and language dictionaries. The Oxford Reference Library is made up of over 180 more specialized works.
Furthermore Oxford Reference offer over 300,000 new overview pages including free definitions and links to the full texts in the appropriate dictionaries. A new feature is the personalisation features. Now you may save searches and favourite books.

Oxford Reference is availalbe at http://www.oxfordreference.com.

Other available dictionaries [only for subscribers] are:

• Encyclopædia Britannica
• Oxford English Dictionary
• Langenscheidt

The Encyclopaedia Britannica has announced that they will discontinue their 32-volume printed edition when the current inventory is gone. The 2010 edition is the last print version. But the encyclopedia will live on in digital forms.

The Max Planck Society already has access to the platform Britannica online:
http://www.search.eb.com/

The Guardian asks:

“The paper edition of the encyclopedia ends its centuries-long run, but is it a victim or beneficiary of the digital age?”