Stands4.com is an extensive online repository of acronyms and abbreviations. Site design is very clear. Users can browse alphabetically or search within categories. The categories include: computing, Internet, science, business, medical, government, community (which includes topics such as famous people, sports, media, law, film), regional (information about different countries), international (acronyms in languages other than English), and miscellaneous. There is also a search engine feature for keyword searching. When browsing alphabetically, each entry will show the abbreviation or acronym, what it stands for, and a link to its category within the site.
The site features a listing of the five most popular searches and a random acronym of the week. Users can subscribe to receive the acronym of the week by e‐mail. The top five searches at time of review were for FUBAR, ASP, ACE, SQL and WYSIWYG. Stands4.com is particularly useful for computer‐related acronyms. The Internet category contains listings of HTML error codes, emoticons, and popular shortcuts used in chat and e‐mail (e.g. BTW = by the way; LOL = laugh out loud). The computing section includes a listing of file extensions, networking terms and other useful information. The government section is filled with acronyms from the United States government and the United Nations. Military, transportation and NASA terms are also included in this category. Some categories seem a bit less useful, such as the famous people category, which informs the user that AG could be Al Gore or Alan Greenspan.
Help, statistics and other information about the site and its creator are available. Note that a section called “References” does not document the sources the site used to compile its content, but rather lists sites and search engines that include Stands4.com. With its wide array of content and ease of use, Stands4.com will be a useful addition to reference librarians’ bookmark lists or Web toolboxes.
