UAE website upgraded

No more sifting through the shelves of libraries to collect information for your Masters or Ph.D. on the United Arab Emirates. Everything any one could need need is a mere mouse click away – on the revamped official website of the Ministry of Information and Culture.

The ministry recently upgraded and expanded its official website uaeinteract.com to make it more user-friendly. It now has additional topics and more advanced search engines.

The new features include special links for students and teachers, a visit to a cyber museum, access to the ministry's and other publications, and free downloads of a number of titles.

The site is one of the most comprehensive about a country, allowing access to every subject – from basic information on the country and its government to official statistics, to tourism and choice of accommodation and bookings.

Two of the most interesting and unique features are the 'Speak to the Minister' and 'Teachers and Students' pages.

On the 'Speak to the Minister' page surfers can address the UAE Minister of Information and Culture, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, to discuss local and international issues.

The answers by the minister will be displayed on the 'Speak to the Minister' forum box, as well as e-mailed to the questioner.

'Speak to the Minister' is proving very popular among visitors, who have already filed a number of questions for the minister to answer.

'What is the UAE doing to enhance the international image of the Arabs?', was one of the questions put to the minister by an international visitor to the site on March 3.

The page has already received about a dozen questions addressed to the minister on national, regional and international issues.

According to an official source, the website has been redesigned under the directives of Sheikh Abdullah to make it one of the most comprehensive sites giving all information about the country that people around the world wish to know.

"It is the first proper UAE site launched in 1996, and has been upgraded to accumulate huge amounts of data. Now it is a massive site providing A to Z information about the country," said the official.

He added: "The minister himself has encouraged this facility to initiate a new level of information. With the website the ministry is also acting as a conduit to link the information from other ministries, departments and other sources of information."

The site, even before the revamp, had become so famous that it stood at the top of search lists of Internet engines such as Google and Yahoo. It is the number two site on Yahoo's search results of 20 pages, and number three on Google.

According to statistics the site receives on average half a million hits every week.

According to the site statistics for the week of February 17, it served 18,528 sessions; received 647,729 visitors in a duration of 962 hours with 73,445 pages viewed. The statistics also show that the site was the most favoured among the top international websites visited during the period in the country.

Statistics also show the site is becoming the most favoured in the U.S., where analysis for the week revealed 31.63 per cent of the traffic visited the site.

At about noon yesterday, 40 active sessions were recorded simultaneously from different parts of the world, some of the visitors being linked to the site for about two hours.

The most viewed pages of the site are about history, culture and education, where students mainly visit to prepare their studies.

The site holds 3,000 pages of information on all aspects of the country, the most important being pages on 'Teachers and Students', which include subjects such as Arabic Language, archaeology, history and tradition, geography and geology, science, social studies, nature study, sport, news and current affairs, and books.

Visitors can download entire books published and brought out by the ministry in PDF files. They can also visit the virtual museum of the UAE, where ancient artefacts can be viewed from all angles.

The history page takes visitors on a detailed journey through UAE history and archaeology, while the arts centre exhibits the work of local artists.

People can also take an online tour of the UAE to the major cities and islands, while 'Natural Emirates' covers all aspects of the UAE's diverse wildlife and natural history.

Another important page features information on business and tourism trips to the country. The pages give visitors the choice of selecting accommodation and making online bookings of their choice.

The pages provide other important data for visitors to the country, including visas and the weather.

The quick search engine of the site has been updated to be user-friendly and highlights search results faster than any search engine on the Internet. Its search engine is modified to automatically re-index new information and entries after every 24 hours.