News 04-03-2001
CREN Tech Talk Live from Syllabus
The CREN Tech Talk "Do e-Books Sit on e-Shelves at Your University?" will be
transmitted live from the Syllabus spring2001 conference in Cincinnati Thursday,
April 5th at 4:00PM EST. Technology anchor Howard Strauss and co-host Judith
Boettcher will interview guest experts Calvin Lowe, President of Bowie State
University, and Karen Coyle of the California Digital Library about the e-books
that might already be sitting on e-shelves at your institution. Participants
will consider the question: Is it too early or too late to start paying attention
to e-books? In the fast-paced information world of the year 2001, it could be
both at the same time! Tune in Thursday for the free, live audiocast sponsored
by Adobe, and find out what two experts think.
For more information and a link to the live broadcast, visit http://www.cren.net/know/techtalk/events/ebooks.html.
Back-to-School Time for Astrobiologists
This fall, NASA will join NATO in sponsoring a NATO Advanced Studies Institute
(ASI) entitled "Perspectives in Astrobiology" to be held in Crete, from September
29 through October 10, 2001. The Institute will bring together distinguished
lecturers from around the world who will share what they have learned about
astrobiology in recent years with students and with one another. The preliminary
list of speakers includes astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle; Nobel Prize winning biochemist
Baruch Blumberg, head of the NASA Astrobiology Institute; and David S. McKay,
who pioneered the study of microfossils in the Martian meteorite ALH84001. During
the ASI advanced students will present scientific papers detailing their own
research, which may be published after peer-review in the NATO ASI Volume "Perspectives
in Astrobiology." The application deadline is April 15, 2001. To apply, visit
http://ntf-2.msfc.nasa.gov/natoasi.nsf/regform.
Internet Security Conference presents Security by the Experts
The Internet Security Conference (TISC), to be held June 4-8, 2001 in Los Angeles,
offers presentations from experts in the Internet security field. TISC's 5-day
curriculum on secure computing and Internet-working offers recognized experts
in the industry who provide attendees with the tools needed to help protect
their networks, and to conduct successful forensic analysis should they fall
prey to attackers. The 2001 TISC faculty includes: Phil Cox, author of the "Windows
2000 Security Handbook"; Lance Spitzner, director of the Honeynets project and
author of the "Know Your Enemy" paper series, describing the motives and methods
of the hacking community; Marcus Ranum, co-inventor of the firewall; and Stuart
McClure, anti-hacker, security columnist and co-author of "Hacking Exposed."
More than 65 faculty members will be presenting at TISC 2001.
For more information, visit http://www.tisc2001.com.
PeopleSoft Launches Internet Campus Portal
PeopleSoft recently unveiled the PeopleSoft Campus Portal, a pre-built, role-based
enterprise portal for higher education. Using its own portal technology developed
on PeopleSoft's new Internet architecture PeopleSoft 8, the Campus Portal turns
an institution's Web site into a virtual campus delivering targeted content
to all campus constituencies -- students, staff, faculty, alumni, suppliers,
employees, visitors, and prospects. Each user, whether student or faculty, outside
vendor, or alumni, has access to information specifically geared toward his
or her interests and needs--from admissions information to financial aid data
to distributed learning.
For more information, visit http://www.peoplesoft.com.
McGraw-Hill Offers Digital Texts through netLibrary's Metatext
McGraw-Hill Higher Education, a provider of electronic learning solutions for
the college market, recently announced its alliance with MetaText, netLibrary's
digital textbook division, to develop electronic versions of its college textbooks
that will be ready for review this spring. McGraw-Hill will make its digtal
textbooks available through classroom Web sites created with its PageOut course
management software, which is free to professors who use McGraw-Hill materials.
Through PageOut, a student can view a professor's instructions and notes, take
tests prepared by instructors, and directly link to a MetaText e-text-book and
other electronic tools, such as McGraw-Hill's Online Learning Centers, exercises,
and links to related Web sites. MetaText will convert about 30 McGraw-Hill market-leading
text- books, covering a variety of subject areas and make them available throughout
the spring and summer for review and adoption by in-structors at colleges and
universities throughout the North America. Instructors will be able to begin
using the McGraw-Hill Metatext editions in the fall semester of 2001.
For more information, visit http://www.mcgraw-hill.com.
Faster Connection for eCollege's eLearning Environment
eCollege, an eLearning software and services provider, today announced that
new advancements in its technology infrastructure enable a "peerless'' connection
among its users with different ISPs. The new technology greatly reduces the
need to transfer across networks within the Internet, as if eCollege and all
of its customers were on the same network. The new technology is expected to
improve the company's redundant Internet connectivity, ultimately improving
reliability and Internet access times. These advancements apply to customers
running the eCollege software in eCollege's hosted environment, or as an option
when they run the software on their own servers.
For more information, visit http://www.eCollege.com.
Community College Foundation Announces LearnSAT.net
LearnSAT.net, an affiliate of the Community College Foundation, a non-profit
educational foundation, was recently unveiled. LearnSAT.net is expected to bring
to rural and remote locations the broadband Internet connectivity that, until
now, could only be found in major metropolitan areas. LearnSAT.net is an Internet
Service Provider that uses satellite technology from Tachyon.net. Unlike other
satellite-based Internet access services, the service provided by LearnSAT.net
d'es not use phone lines. An inexpensive dish is placed at the subscriber's
location and, once aligned, is always on 24/7.
For more information, contact Christopher Edwards, Vice President of Technology
at the Community College Foundation 916/418-5121.
E-mail-Based Interactive Collaboration Platform
PaperFly Corporation recently announced the beta release of CollaborEdit, an
Interactive collaboration platform that allows multiple people to edit and comment
on Microsoft Word documents through standard e-mail and Web browser programs.
Because CollaborEdit documents are dynamically updated, participants can view
the tracked changes and comments made by other participants in real time. The
Web-based application is initiated when a user uploads a document, enters the
e-mail addresses of editors, sets an editing deadline, and writes a brief message
for participants. Each participant receives an e-mail message containing the
document and instructions. The document can then be viewed in a standard Web
browser and participants are able to make changes and add comments through the
browser. Each time a participant opens or refreshes the document, the participant
sees the most recent changes made by any other participants. The initiator of
the CollaborEdit session can view edits made by others and check the real time
status of a project--when a participant has opened the e-mail, started editing
the document, and completed their changes.
For more information, visit http://www.paperfly.com
or http://www.collaboredit.com.
Eastern Michigan Receives Business Software from Oracle
Eastern Michigan University's College of Business has received business software
valued at $7.3 million from Oracle Corporation. This gift expands on the $1.7
million in business software and technical support gifted to the university
in 2000. EMU is a partner in the Oracle Academic Initiative, which provides
software, curriculum, and training resources, solely for classroom teaching
and educational purposes, to several institutions throughout the country and
worldwide. The Oracle Academic Initiative is part of a lifelong learning network
that assists elementary through higher education with access to and understanding
of information technology. Eastern Michigan is the first university in the state
to receive a gift of this magnitude from Oracle.
Classes utilizing the browser-based Oracle software will include Systems Analysis
and Design, Database Management, and Advanced Database Management. Other courses
will be developed throughout the College of Business curriculum in E-Commerce
Development, Oracle Developer, and Enterprise Resource Planning.
For more information about Oracle or the Oracle Academic Initiative, visit
http://www.oracle.com.
