Encyclopedia Britannica Comes To Android - In a Concise Version

Remember when we were kids and had to do a research project for school?  If you're old enough to have had to do this before the Internet could be used as a resource, there's a very good chance you used one of the massive volumes from Encyclopedia Britannica as a part of your studies.  They've been around forever, and are considered one of the top resources of information and knowledge in the world.

Fortunately, in our new age of readily accessible information, we no longer have to visit the library, or pull one of those boat anchor sized books off of the shelf at our mother's house to locate the information we need.  The world renown knowledge compilation is now available on your Android smart phone or tablet in a concise, easy to use format.

More details after the break.

The newly released app is available in the Market as a free trial.  However, once the trial period is over, it will set you back about $20US to keep using it.  That may seem pretty expensive for an Android app, but when compared to the cost of a chiropractor after lugging around a hardback edition of the encyclopedia, its pretty much a steal.  This is especially considering the wealth of information available to you on your phone.

The app does not require a constant internet connection.  Once it's installed, it will need to download a 113.9 MB file to your SD card that contains the data.  At first pass, that didn't seem like a very big file to me for the vast data contained within Britannica until I remembered that this isn't actually the full compilation of articles.  Instead, it's a concise version.  However, it does include over 35,000 articles on a enormous variety of topics.

Using the app is pretty straightforward.  The expected search feature is there.  Also included are some bells and whistles, such as an "On This Day" section, as well as the ability to shake your phone to have it produce a random article for your reading enjoyment.

The app looks nice and seems well pu together.  I did not find any major issues in using it.  The articles are relatively brief, but very informative and easy to access.  If you're a student, I would not hesitate to recommend adding this to your arsenal of research sources.  It's great for quickly locating a topic and getting the gist of it without having to scramble down to the library.

Main Features:

• Britannica Concise Encyclopedia 2011 contains over 35,000 articles and 2,700 images covering just about every aspect of human endeavor.
• No internet connection required
• ‘On this Day’ feature
• Share articles with friends via e-mail
• Receive random articles by shaking device
• Favorite articles
• Suggested Searches

Britannica Encyclopedia 2011 for Android on AppBrain

Britannica Encyclopedia 2011 for Android on AppBrain