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Current Cities Volume 02 Number 10
_Current_Cites_
Volume 2, no. 10
October 1991
Library Technology Watch Program
University of California, Berkeley
Edited by David F.W. Robison
Contributors:
Teri Rinne, Vivienne Roumani, Lisa Rowlison, Mark Takaro, Roy Tennant
Hyper- and Multimedia
Herther, Nancy K. "Interactive Multimedia at Philips: CP Interviews
Philips' Bert Gall About CD-ROM, XA, CD-I and Their Future." CD- ROM
Professional 4(5) (September 1991):34-37. An up-to-date look at
the settling of standards for Compact Disc-Interactive (CD-I) and
the development of the bridge between PCs and CD-I. This interview
provides an insider's perspective on the market viability of the
technology and the approach to its development for the future. With
the MPEG standard in place, companies such as Philips can begin
introducing their own units in a unified context within the industry,
leading to a more cohesive future market for their products. -- MT
Bajarin, Tim. "Everyone You Know Doesn't Use A Computer" Computer
Currents 9(9) (September 24, 1991):16-19. A short column about
future computing with pen-based and multimedia technologies. The
increasingly digital world can become more accessible to those who
do not now own a computer through developments like these. -- MT
Information Transfer
Ingebretsen, Dorothy and Steven Tice "Searching Los Angeles Times
Dialog On Disc: The Times Editorial Library Experience" CD-ROM
Professional (September 1991):86-90. Dialog provides the full text
of the Los Angeles Times from 1986 to the present on CD-ROM. This
article discusses searchable fields, Easy Menu interface geared to
the end user, and the more sophisticated Dialog command search for
experienced searchers. -- VR
King, Alan. "Full Text & CD-Rom: Variations on a Theme." Online 15(5)
(September 1991): 107-108. King describes the benefits of full text
databases on CD-Rom albeit the limitations of this technology. -- VR
Miller, Carmen. "End-Users: From Which Menu Should You Order?"
Online 15(5) (September 1991): 26-33. This article reviews D-S
Business Focus and Dialog Business Connection databases, two
menu-driven approaches to business databases on competing
systems. -- VR
Williams, Robert F. "Is optical storage legal?" ASIS 17(5) (June/July
1991): 14-15. "Are optically stored records legally admissible in
court and administrative hearings?" This article covers some of the
legality issues of optically stored information, and the implications
for the future. -- VR
Networks and Networking
Barlow, John Perry "The Law Comes to Cyberspace" BYTE (October
1991):332. Here Barlow recounts the events in May of 1990 that led
he and Mitch Kapor to found the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
See the General section below. -- DR
Cerf, Vinton "The Internet Society" reprinted through
LISTSERV@BITNIC.BITNET (GET INTSOC CERF_V) from EDUCOM Review
26(3/4) (Fall/Winter 1991). Cerf explains why the Internet Society
was founded, what it is, what its goals are, what its membership is
and how one can get involved in this new organization that is
expected to be fully operational by the end of the year. -- DR
Kapor, Mitch "Building the Open Road: The NREN as Test-Bed for the
National Public Network" Network Working Group RFC 1259
(September 1991). This paper is an excellent update on the NREN
and NII. Kapor suggests first that the NREN will stimulate
technological advances yet to be imagined, and the at the NREN
should be thought of as a prototype for the National Publia Network.
This is a must read. Available via anonymous ftp from nnsc.nsf.net
(128.89.1.178) with pathname rfc/rfc1259.txt.
Nielsen, Brian. "The Coalition for Networked Information: Realizing
the Virtual Library." Online 15(5) (September 1991): 96-97. Nielsen
enthusiastically describes a relatively new group, Coalition for
Networked Information (CNI), and its role in the development of
NREN. -- VR
Roberts, Michael M. "Positioning the National Research and Education
Network" reprinted through LISTSERV@BITNIC.BITNET (GET POSNREN
ROBERT_M) from EDUCOM Review 26(2) (Summer 1991). Roberts
explains where he believes the NREN and National Information
Infrastructure (NII) is heading as a cooperative venture between
government, educators, and industry. He also points out that
technological advances in the last decade have outpaced related
political and legal advances. -- DR
Thompson, Tom "Networking with System 7.0" BYTE (September
1991):337-340. Thompson has worked with the new Macintosh
system for several months, and despite "some snags" he feels the
benefits of changing over to the new systems are worth it in the
networked environment. With the new system, file sharing becomes
almost transparent, without the need for a server. The combination
of interapplication communication (IAC) and the Mac's publish and
subscribe application allows users to share data while operating
different applications. And that's no mean feat! -- DR
Optical Disc Technologies
Bonime, Andrew "The Promise and the Challenge of CD-I" CD-ROM
Professional 4(5) (September 1991):17-30. This article provides a
fairly complete overview of CD-I, which is slated for release this
fall, with its target audience being the mass consumer market. CD-I
is a subset of CD-ROM which includes an international set of
standards for encoding and integrating audio, video, still pictures,
and text. Consumer players will be priced at $1,000 initially, with
an anticipated drop to around $500 within two years. -- TR
Brooks, Martin "Multimedia and the Future of CD-ROM" CD-ROM
Professional 4(5) (September 1991):8-10. Martin Brooks, vice-
president of electronic publishing at R. R. Bowker presents his
concerns regarding the hype surrounding multimedia. He fears that
hype generated might shift the interest from high-quality,
extremely important research databases to any product that has
sound and graphics in it. He poses the question: "For the researcher,
should it not be more important to have a hypertext system that
works intuitively than a database that plays back the mating calls of
certain selected bullfrogs?" -- TR
Brueggeman, Peter "Memory Management for CD-ROM Workstations,
Part I" CD-ROM Professional 4(5) (September 1991):39-43. In this
series of two articles, Brueggeman presents a "crash course" on
memory management in the DOS environment. In the second part of
the series, he will give readers specific tips and ideas on how to
maximize your hardware/software investment and more effectively
run your CD-ROMs. -- TR
Harvey, David A. "CD-ROM Drives: How Good is the Third Generation?"
BYTE 16(9) (September 1991):268-276. Harvey boldly suggests that
"the winter of our discontent with CD-ROM may be over," citing the
new "third generation" of CD-ROM drives with faster access times,
improved data transfer rates, and lower prices than their
predecessors. He reviews six external CD-ROM drives by Chinon,
Hitachi, PLI, Texel, and Toshiba. -- TR
Rizzo, John "Double Duty Drives: Multifunction Optical Storage"
MacUser 7(11) (November 1991):108-114. This article features
reviews of multifunction optical storage drives recently released by
Hewlett-Packard, Pioneer, and Panasonic. These drives utilize both
erasable optical and WORM (write once/read many) cartridges. A
multifunction drive offers more flexibility than any other optical
storage device. In erasable mode, a multifunction drive is slower
than a hard-disk drive but offers nearly unlimited capacity and
greater data security. In WORM mode, the drive can create permanent
archives (up to 100 years) with the convenience of random access. -
- TR
General
Kapor, Mitch "Current Legislative and Policy Efforts" Effector Online
[eff-news@eff.org] 1(11) (September 20, 1991). Among other
actions, the EFF is involved in the NREN and fiber optic planning
activity on Capitol Hill, supporting communications privacy in the
face of federal actions against secure encryption, joining with the
ACLU, library organizations and IIA to oppose legislation that would
allow the government to copyright software it produced in
cooperation with a private firm, and the EFF also opposes legislation
that would allow the government to charge royalty fees for
"accessing a government electronic data base of public information."
-- DR
Special note: with this issue, Current Cites is now being published
electronically on the Public Access Computer Systems list (PACS-
L@UHUPVM1.BITNET)--Welcome to our new readers!
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Current Cites 2(10)(October 1991)
Copyright (C) 1991 by the Library, University of
California, Berkeley. All rights reserved.
Copying is permitted for noncommercial use by computerized
bulletin board/conference systems, individual scholars, and
libraries. Libraries are authorized to add the journal to their
collections at no cost. This message must appear on copied
material. All commercial use requires permission from the editor,
who may be reached in the following ways:
drobison@library.berkeley.edu // drobison@ucblibra // (510)642-7600
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