Geography, Environment, Maps

This site provides information on the history of the Australian Aboriginal flag.

An index to over two thousand periodicals on a broad range of subjects including arts, business, humanities, social sciences, medicine and the sciences. Many of the articles are available in full text. It is produced in the USA.

Academic Search Premier is an academic multi-disciplinary database which provides full text for nearly 4,600 scholarly publications, including full text for more than 3,500 peer-reviewed journals, offering information dating as far back as 1975. This database is updated on a daily basis via EBSCOhost.

This site from Land and Property Information NSW provides aerial photographs of New South Wales towns and suburbs that can be searched, viewed and ordered.

This site provides a comprehensive search engine for Middle Eastern links, travel and business information and services, up-to-the-minute news reports and in-depth articles on a variety of Middle Eastern topics including business, politics, tourism, culture, health, entertainment and sports.

The Australian Antarctic Division is the lead agency for Australia's Antarctic program. This site provides details about the Australian Antarctic scientific research program, information on going south, virtual tours for the armchair traveller and resources on the Antarctic environment including information on Antarctic wildlife.

As the Cocky Flies from Geoscience Australia calculates the distance between two places in Australia. It uses the Gazetteer of Australia 2004 a compilation of over 310 000 geographic names provided by members of the Committee for Geographic Names in Australasia.

News, profiles and reports relating to the countries of Asia. Divided into four categories: arts and culture, business and economics, policy and government and society and history. Under Profiles, the Country Comparison allows one to compare Australia statistically with other countries in the Asia-Pacific. Compiled and updated daily by the Asia Society ( www.asiasociety.org).

This site provides information on the Asian Development Bank and its mission to reduce poverty in the Asia-Pacific region. It contains country and regional reports, press releases, statistical data and the full text of publications which the State Library of NSW receives on deposit in hard copy.

This site provides information on Australia's coats of arms and each state's coat of arms and their emblems.

This site provides information about Australia's national colours.

This site provides information about the Wattle — Australia's national floral emblem.

This site provides information about Australia's national gemstone — the opal.

A database of more than 20 000 historic, natural and Indigenous places in the Register of the National Estate, the National Heritage List, the Commonwealth Heritage List, the World Heritage List, and places under consideration for any one of these lists. Information includes a place's values, its legal status, its significance, physical condition, history and photographs if available.

The Australian Heritage Places Inventory contains summary information about places listed in State, Territory and Commonwealth Heritage Registers.

Australian Public Affairs - Full Text (APA-FT), is an indexing and full text database that provides Internet access to the scanned images of journal articles from published material on the social sciences and humanities. Australian Public Affairs - Full Text is based on the journal indexing of the database Australian Public Affairs Information Service (APAIS), which is produced by the National Library of Australia and published by RMIT Publishing.

Of the 320,000+ records indexed from 2,000+ journals in APAIS, approximately half are derived from 223+ comprehensively indexed journals. The scanned images of journal articles in Australian Public Affairs - Full Text are sourced mostly from these comprehensively indexed journals. Images are provided in PDF format.

This site provides links to Australian cartographic resources available on the Internet such as links to publishers, map societies and map retailers.

The Australian Hydrographic Service of the Royal Australian Navy is responsible for publishing and maintaining the Australian national chart series. You can view thum-nail images of Australian charts with the Australian Chart index as well as find out some detail about each chart. For an index of placenames refer to the Maritime Gazetteer of Australia

This site provides contact details of Australian embassies and other representative offices throughout the world. The site also includes links to Australian embassy web pages where available.

This site provides information on the history of the Australian flag, other Australian ensigns, and state and territory flags.

Information about Golden Wattle (Acacia pycnantha), Australia's national floral emblem.

The Australian National Shipwrecks Database covers all known shipwrecks in Australian waters and can provide details of the ships voyage, the wreck location, the features of the vessel, crew and passengers. The number of shipwrecks listed totals 7664 including: NSW (2047), VIC (797), TAS (1116), QLD (1244), SA (774), WA (1466), NT (153) and Cocos Islands (2).

The database was developed by the Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology ( AIMA ), was maintained by the Western Australian Maritime Museum and is now maintained by the Federal Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts. The Department website has a contact list for the State, Territories and Federal Agencies responsible for the Historic Shipwrecks Programme and these agencies - and AIMA - may provide further information on a particular shipwreck located in their State or Territory. The Department's photo database to its Australian heritage photographic library also details photographic collections for 108 shipwrecks.

Shipwrecks and their associated relics - that are older than 75 years - are protected through the Historic Shipwrecks Act 1976. The Act applies to Australian waters that extend from the low tide mark to the end of the continental shelf and is administered in a collaboration between the Commonwealth and the States, Northern Territory and Norfolk Island. Some Australian shipwreck sites lie within protected or no-entry zones - see Historic shipwreck protected zones map.

Information about the official and unofficial state animals and birds.

A guide to the history, politics and economic background of countries.

CAB Abstracts® (1973 to present) is produced by CABI Publishing. It covers international research and development literature in the applied life sciences, including agriculture, forestry, human nutrition, veterinary medicine and the environment.

It also includes molecular biology, genetics, biotechnology, breeding, taxonomy, physiology and other aspects of pure science relating to organisms of agricultural, veterinary or environment.

This database offers full text for over 30,000 journal articles, reports, conference papers, abstracts and indexing for journals, serial publications, conference proceedings, books, published theses, annual reports, patents and standards, and dates back to 1973.

This site provides information about countries and has been compiled by the CIA. The fact book includes information about population, government structure, the environment, industry and communication of each country.

This site provides information on the history of the Christmas Island flag.

This site provides information on Australia's coat of arms.

This site, produced by the Economist magazine in partnership with the Economist Intelligence Unit, provides news, profiles, forecasts, and statistics on countries worldwide.

This site provides contact details of a number of foreign embassies in Australia.

Environment Index offers coverage in areas of agriculture, ecosystem ecology, energy, renewable energy sources, natural resources, marine & freshwater science, geography, pollution & waste management, environmental technology, environmental law, public policy, social impacts, urban planning, and more. It contains records from U.S. and international titles going back to the 1940s.

Previously known as Environmental Issues and Policy Index.

This site provides information on the history of the Eureka flag.

Facts on International Relations and Security Trends (FIRST) is a free-of-charge service for politicians, journalists, researchers and the interested public. FIRST is a joint project of the International Relations and Security Network (ISN) and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). The database contains information from research institutes around the world in areas such as international relations and security, armed conflicts and peace keeping, arms production and trade, military expenditure, armed forces and conventional weapons holding, nuclear weapons, chronology, statistics and other reference data.

This site provides images of flags from most countries.

Australian floral emblems with botanical information and images at the Australian National Botanic Gardens website.

A database of place names throughout history. Contains information on places of significance in art and architecture, and provides geographic coordinates and variant names.

Google Earth combines satellite imagery, maps and the power of Google Search to put the world's geographic information at your fingertips. Note: May not operate with some computer systems. Please check system requirements. Subscription fee required for advanced version.

This site provides an index that lists cities, towns, suburbs and places in Australia with links to web pages that give the history of that location.

This site finds the latitude and longitude of two places and calculates the distance between them (as the crow flies).

This site provides the full text of some International Monetary Fund staff country reports. These reports are available in PDF and require Adobe Acrobat to read them.

An index to Surveyor General's maps and plans, 1792-1886 and Index to Surveyors' letters, 1822-55 held at State Records New South Wales.

Informit is the leading provider of online access to indexes and full text databases of Australasian scholarly research. A product of RMIT Publishing, databases can be divided into the following major subject areas: Agriculture, Arts, Asian, Business, Education, Engineering, Health, History, Indigenous, Law, Media, Reference, Sciences, Social Sciences and Technology.

An online collection featuring a small number of the Library of Congress's 4.5 million-item maps collection. Images include maps of Antarctica, Australasia and the world.

MAPCO's aim is to provide genealogists, students and historians with free access to high quality scans of rare and beautiful maps. Featuring digital images of maps of London and Adelaide. Maps currently online include London 1767 and 1850 and Adelaide 1880. More maps will be added over the next few months.

Scanned images of complete nineteenth century atlases and maps, such as Bromme's, Alison's and Cornwell's atlases.

Online maps of select towns in New South Wales.

Street maps from all over the world

A National Library of Australia maps database that searches over 100,000 maps of Australia held in Australia's libraries, from the earliest mapping to the present. To date, there are about 4,000 map images (digitised maps) on Maps of Australia.

Maps of Australia provides 'Define Area' search to find maps. By drawing your area of interest on the overview map, catalogue records and images may be found for that area. 'Define area' search uses map coordinates and other information included in the map catalogue record. A keyword search is also provided to allow searching on known topics or place names.

Limit to scale

Since maps are often defined by the scale of the map, an optional limit is provided to include only maps of a certain scale in the results. This can be useful when searching for more detailed maps, such as those used by a bushwalker planning a route.

The scale of a map is the ratio between the distances on the map and the corresponding distances in reality. For example a topographic map of scale 1:50,000 shows a distance of 50,000 cm (500m) on the ground as 1 cm on the map.

You can select one or more map scales to limit your results, as below:.

> 1:1,000,000 [large area with limited detail on map, eg a world map]

< 1:1,000,000 > 1:500,000

< 1:500,000 > 1:250,000

< 1:250,000 > 1:100,000

< 1:100,000 > 1:50,000

< 1:50,000 > 1:25,000

< 1:25,000 [small area but highly detailed map, eg a planning map]

Limit to map type

You can also limit to map type, using the following categories:

* Agriculture, forestry and natural resources [national parks, land use]

* Coastal and nautical charts [maritime, aeronautical charts]

* Discovery and exploration [exploration routes and surveys]

* Earth sciences [geology, soils, water resources, minerals & mining]

* Industry and power supply [industries, power, water supply]

* Land use and divisions [property or cadastral maps, town plans, boundaries]

* Military [armed forces, conflicts]

* Social geography [social mapping, demographics, statistical]

* Topographic [land surface features]

* Tourism, transport and communications [travel, touring, recreation]

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The NSW Department of Lands Parish Map Preservation Project is converting the NSW's rapidly deteriorating parish, town and pastoral run maps to digital images that can be viewed online at Parish Map Search.

If you don't know the parish name of an area, use the Geographical Names Register to search by locality or suburb. The result of the search will include the parish name.

Copies of land records and historical maps, title deeds and land grant documents can be obtained from the NSW Department of Lands Head Office and online enquiries can be sent to Map sales enquiry .

This website provides an online User Guide - The Parish Map and Crown Plan in Family History and Genealogical Research and a Discussion Paper on the Parish Map Preservation Project, which is a joint project of Land NSW, the NSW Department of Land and Water Conservation, the Land Information Centre and NSW State Records.

This NSW Geographical Names Board provides a searchable register of over 80,000 place names in NSW, detailing location as well as origin, history and meaning if available. Discontinued names are retained in the register.

The Board is empowered by the NSW Geographical Names Act 1966 to assign names to places; to investigate and determine the form, spelling, meaning, pronunciation, origin and history of any geographical name; and to determine the application of each name with regard to position, extent or other reference.

The state heritage register online database lists items of particular significance to the state. It includes items subject to an Interim Heritage Order under the NSW Heritage Act.

Current information on geography, science and the environment.

This site provides information on the history of the New South Wales flag and includes links to information on New South Wales historical flags covering the periods from 1867 to 1870 and 1870 to 1876.

This site provides information on the history of the Norfolk Island flag.

This site provides information on the history of the Northern Territory flag.

A joint project of the Ordnance Survey (the national mapping agency of Great Britain) and digital mapmakers Landmark Information Group. This site provides online access to an extensive archive of historic British maps.

This important indexing service provides global coverage of public affairs and world issues, including references to sources from more than 120 countries in English, French, German, and other languages. The service indexes more than 1,200 journals and 8,000 monographs each year. PAIS also identifies relevant web sites of which there are now around 4,300 included.

A portal of maritime resources on the Internet, covering a wide range of topics: archaeology, exploration, careers in the shipping industry, environment, fisheries, law, engineering, migration, museums, galleries and aquariums, navigation, safety at sea, shipbuilding, inland waterways, international trade and more.

Periodicals Archive Online (formerly Periodical Contents Index) is a leading humanities and social sciences indexing service which provides access to bibliographic records of articles from more than 4,000 journals published from 1770 to 1995. Periodical Archives Online at present gives the full text of articles from 228 journals indexed by PCI.

This site provides more than 5000 images from the Perry-Castañeda Library Map collection. It includes maps of various regions of the world, historical maps and links to other online map resources.

Searches a database of more than 274 000 geographic names provided to the Committee for Geographical Place Names in Australia by each state and commonwealth authority. Many extra, unofficial homestead names are also added by Geoscience Australia.

Search for all localities and geographic features in Australia. Provides coordinates and map references.

Search full text and images for the leading periodicals in science and technology. Subject coverage includes computers, engineering, physics, telecommunications, and transportation.

This site provides information on the history of the Queensland flag and includes links to information on Queensland historical flags covering the periods from 1867 to 1870, 1876 to 1901 and 1901 to 1953.

An information resource for the humanitarian relief community. Covers emergencies and disasters around the world, UN appeals, financial data, and a large collection of maps of cities, towns and regions internationally.

Science Reference Center contains full text of science encyclopedias, reference books, journals, magazines, biographies, scientific images and videos.

Topics covered include: biology, chemistry, earth & space science, environmental science, health & medicine, history of science, life science, physics, science & society, science as inquiry, scientists, technology and wildlife.

Science Resource Center is an in-depth, curriculum-oriented science database that provides a one-stop resource for all science-related research needs. it comprehensively covers earth, life and physical sciences using Gale's user friendly interface.

This site provides information on the history of the South Australian Flag and includes links to information on South Australian historical flags covering the periods from 1870 to 1876 and 1876 to 1904.

This site provides information on the history of the Tasmanian flag and includes a link to information on Tasmanian historical flags for the period 1875.

This site provides information on the history of the Torres Strait Islander flag.

Find maps of Australia and the world. Includes printed sheets, atlases, globes, aerial photographs, star charts, nautical charts and tourist maps. Information sourced from Libraries Australia and OAIster.

Contains information about the population, economy, political life, history, and other aspects of each country. Has links within each article to other sites, including profiles from the UK Trade & Investment Office, which have market research and other trade-related data.

A portal site for information on the sustainable development of the oceans. Covers history, biology, maps, statistics and research, climatology and ecology; economic uses of the oceans; and issues from food security and climate change to governance and human health.

Fact sheets on the world's countries, provided by the US Department of State. Contains current statistical and demographic data, and briefings on the country's recent history.

This site provides a database of information about places in the USA. The database can be searched by place name, state and zip code and provides information such as location and population as well as links to maps of the area and census data about the place.

This site provides a database which converts currencies.

This site provides information on the history of the Victorian flag and includes links to information on Victorian flags covering the periods from 1870 to 1877, 1877 to 1901 and 1901 to 1953.

This site provides information on the history of the Western Australia flag and includes a link to information on Western Australia historical flags covering the period from 1870 to 1953.

This site provides street maps around Australia.

Maps and information on where to go, what to see, and where to stay in cities and towns in Australia.

This site provides a map of Sydney City centre, Sydney suburbs and the Sydney area, as well as maps of other cities and country areas in Australia.

This site contains a database of selected statistics from the biennial World Economic Outlook surveys. There are also full-text reports of the International Monetary Fund's staff analysis of economic developments globally.

This site contains basic information on individual countries, including formal name, capital city, area, population, currency, languages, and religions. The flags include the national and state flags, ensigns, and sub-national flags. Where countries have changed their flags in the last few years the old flag is also shown.

Heritage sites listed by the UNESCO World Heritage Commission.