For students, ringing in the new year and quarter means finding new books, classes and professors — decisions that are frequently a shot in the dark.

Students can turn to www.uwtools.com, a Web site designed by UW computer science majors, featuring free tools tailored to the needs of UW students.

The features include a textbook exchange, "course wikis," "UW B-Board," professor reviews and a closed-class tracker. It is also possible to request a tool, leave feedback and offer suggestions.

Textbooks can be searched by course name, book title or book ISBN number. Search results show student sellers as well as online vendors.

Sophomore Angela Jin found a music theory book for $50 listed for $80 at the U-Book store. She found out about the Web site from an online advertisement.

Jin said she plans to use the site to sell a piccolo on the UW B-Board.

The B-Board is advertised as "a Craigslist for the UW community" where students can post anything within reason, from items for sale to personal ads.

Besides finding and selling products, students can get and give information about classes and professors as well.

Professor ratings provide everything a student would want to know that the regular UW Web site doesn't offer, Jin said.

"I definitely looked up my teachers and scheduled teachers that looked better than others," she said. "I am very satisfied with my teachers this fall quarter, and they were all recommended and had high ratings on UWTools."

Course wikis are designed for students to be able to "share notes and discuss homework for any course," according to the Web site. General course information, a discussion board and notes can be posted for each class.

A feature called the "closed-class tracker" helps students find spots in closed classes by allowing them to enter a SLN number for the class. The program immediately alerts students with an alarm when a spot opens.

End-of-the-quarter course evaluations are tallied on the Web site, and students can contribute written comments about particular classes.

"Professor evaluations directly correlate to the grade a student received, how entertaining the instructor is and the ease of the text," said Leroy Searle, professor of English and Comparative Literature. "It would be more helpful if students also completed course evaluations one, four and 10 years after taking a class."

Searle recently received a letter from a student he had in 1990, who said, "not a day goes by that I don't think about that course."

The student's response at the end of the quarter, however, may be much different than what they will think of the course years later, Searle said.

Although Jin said the Web site is easy to navigate, she offered a suggestion to improve it: "Get more people on it, so there is more information."

Reach contributing writer Sonia McBride at development@thedaily.washington.edu