I hear you on del.icio.us — pretty random sometimes. I find that to be the case for most social bookmarking and I use it mostly at this point to help promote sites that I think are great.

I’m working on a post about websites, and I’ve added some to the Resources section, but that will grow as time goes on. I definitely second all of your choices, with the typical caveat about Wikipedia. I use it, but people become a little too reliant on it sometimes. You should try a hand at editing the Classical Chinese Medicine wikipedia page that Michael (in my year) and I have been working on.

More later and thanks for reading,

Eric

here are my top five first year student must-haves:
http://www.zhongwen.com
http://www.wikipedia.org (need i even mention this?)
http://www.itmonline.org
http://www.pubmed.gov
http://www.chant.org

I’ve already put a few in the “Resources” section of this site.

As far as making notes from textbooks is concerned, I think it can be an ok practice. I start with my class notes, then I work through the books for that course and fill in any information that seems relevant in the book and a little thin in my notes… that way I have a full picture. If I’m reading a book that isn’t directly related to a class I will sometimes make notes, but I find I rarely refer to them so don’t usually use my time that way.

Eric

What do you think about making notes from your textbooks? I normally do that when I have assigned readings. First I read, then highlight, then make notes based on what I’ve highlighted.