Keeping a uniform, basic arrangement of the school library is essential if students are to be comfortable finding resources in other libraries. Two questions that must be answered if a new system were to be devised are: Who would decide on the particulars of that system? What criteria would be used to make the decision to ensure that use of the…

Paying for employee turnover costs, data storage, and multiple layers of benefits can be difficult for fiscally constrained institutions, especially as budget cuts and finance-limiting legislation abound in school districts across the country. Many traditional paper-based systems have been replaced with automated, software-based services, helping…

This paper presents a practitioner's view on student system implementations in the Australian university sector. A student information system is a core system of any university and integral to its operations and services to students. These systems are constantly on the list of major projects and at any point in time, a university is either…

Most UK universities can trace their current management information systems back to significant investments made in the 1990s, largely fuelled by concerns about the millenium bug and a change from character interfaces to graphical user interfaces following the introduction of the personal computer. It was during this period that institutions also…

Approved in 1999 by the Swiss Parliament, the Swiss Virtual Campus (SVC) project debuted in 2000 with the goal of promoting an information society in Switzerland. The University of Geneva has been actively involved with building the SVC and the European virtual campus e-LERU, a two-year project in which eight European countries partnered to…

Systems analysis and design is a standard course offering within information systems programs and often an important lecture topic in Information Systems core courses. Given the persistent difficulty that organizations experience in implementing systems that meet their requirements, it is important to help students in these courses get a tangible…

Provides overview of Ergonomics Abstracts Retrieval System (EARS), an online bibliographic search and retrieval system in the area of human factors engineering. Other online systems are described, the design of EARS based on inverted file organization is explained, and system expansions including a thesaurus are discussed. (Author/LRW)

Describes an interactive data retrieval system which was designed and implemented for casual users and which incorporates a user-friendly interface, aids to train beginners in use of the system, versatility in output, and error recovery protocols. A 14-item reference list and two figures illustrating system operation and output are included. (JL)

The International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI) President (1999-2000) reports on the State of the Profession. Part I compares the profession of human performance technology (HPT) to other professions. Part II discusses the nature of HPT and examines critical classes of variables affecting the mission of HPT. Part III illustrates…

Examines the role of human information processing and decision-making capabilities and limitations in the design of effective human-computer interfaces. Several cognitive engineering principles that should guide the design process are outlined. (48 references) (Author/CLB)

Describes performance alignment--ensuring that all things work together in an organization to achieve its external goals--as the ultimate goal of the human performance technologist's profession. Discusses the three areas where performance is in business, three dimensions of performance alignment, and how to achieve performance alignment. (AEF)

Discusses the impact of research in artificial intelligence and human computer interaction on the design of bibliographic information retrieval systems, and presents design principles of a prototype system that uses semantically based searches and a knowledge base consisting of conceptual frames. (10 references) (CLB)

Human Performance Technology (HPT) consists of a few principles and a host of applications. The power of HPT comes from the fact that it is fundamental to an understanding of all forms of purposeful activity, ranging from the actions of an individual to the actions of an international organization. As a practical discipline, HPT began some 40…

Redesign of human-computer interface for users of computerized information systems can make substantial difference in training time, performance speed, error rates, and user satisfaction. Information and computer scientists are using controlled psychologically oriented experimentation, and evaluations during system development and active use to…

Five papers discuss factors affecting human interactions with online information systems. Topics covered include the use of discourse analysis for interaction functions specification; the impact of optical data disks; the need for research into the search process; user access to data dictionaries; and the development of full text systems. (CLB)