Encyclopaedias
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If you need a one-line definition of an unusual term in a story, it is best to check an authoritative encyclopaedia. Several are available online.
Microsoft's Encarta Encyclopedia has compact articles available via the Internet, but some content is only available to paying subscribers, and this may turn out to be exactly the item of information you need at that moment. Another compact encyclopaedia that provides a wealth of online information is the Information Please On-Line Dictionary, Internet Encyclopedia & Almanac Reference. Greater detail is available in the Encyclopaedia Britannica which has been reborn as an Internet portal. You may find however that download times for Britannica articles are too slow if you are in a hurry to file.
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Handbooks
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dpa generally adopts the titles of the public officials and the spellings of their names as printed in the latest edition of The Europa World Yearbook but this may not always be up to date. Many governments have their own websites, which can be consulted. Websites for a selection of world organizations are listed in this Style Guide. dpa's own archives - the "Dokumentation" in Hamburg provides a database (in German) of 1,500-plus people in the news, but this is only accessible to those registered to use the dpa intranet. Another useful online resource for titles and spellings is the CIA World Factbook which contains cabinet lists for every country in the world and is regularly updated. The same publication also contains country factsheets
that are extremely useful if you are looking for English translations of the names of parties and institutions in foreign countries.
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Crimes
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Crime often makes news, and it can be difficult translating accurately the names of criminal offences in jurisdictions that do not use English-type legal systems. The World Factbook of Criminal Justice Systems was compiled some years ago with funding from the U.S. Justice Department and provides English names for criminal offences, courts and procedures in 42 countries. It is not particularly easy to use: each country is dealt with in one very long text file, but the translations by law professors can be relied on.
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Books & Films
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The English names of books and films should always be checked for accuracy. (See the Punctuation page for the rule on using quotation marks.) Books in print or recently in print are listed by the hundreds of thousand on the sites of Internet bookstores such as Amazon.Com. Both the English and foreign names of major films can be checked on the Internet Movie Database which sometimes has typos in the names but is generally reliable.
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