When I need some complex algorithm I first check if there’s anything relevant already published on the Internet. 10 times out of 10 I’ll find that someone already have figured out a solution much smarter than what I would have thought of.
Apart from a generic Google search, I use:
- Citeseer That has a lot of good theoric reports from Universities
- Dr Dobb’s Portal More practical than Citeseer but very often too specific to a particular technology or language
- Arxiv Even more theoretic contains draft and pre-prints (just in case I’m desperate 🙂 )
I’ve also found the J.UCS (Journal of Universal Computer Science) containing some interesting articles (but i’ve not really used any of the info I found there).
Do you know of any other place where good CS articles can be searched and read for free?
Google’s CS Curriculum Search might be useful. It’s a Google web search restricted to the CS departments of universities. It categorises the results into “Lectures”, “Assignments” and “Reference”.
Also Scholarpedia, which is like Wikipedia but with standards.