Offers advice to administrators and faculty in small colleges on planning, building, and managing campus computer networks. Also included are observations about the network as a strategic asset, funding and staffing issues, and planning for unexpected results. (Author/MSE)

Focuses on questions about the Knowledge Age; surveys needed skills, theoretical supports, and main features of this new learning landscape. Examines three current models of reform and discusses a fourth alternative that arises out of new demands of the Knowledge Age. Discusses critical work to be done in bringing educational technology to the…

Discusses a few of the causes for less-than-optimum educational uses of the Internet. Highlights include problems with state-level plans; the fear of pornography and Web censorship; the location of computers in computer labs; unrealistic overvaluing of standardized tests; and the current poor quality of Web pages. (LRW)

The University of South Florida has successfully delivered its Symposium Series through the Internet to the desktops of individuals unable to attend the lectures, using streaming audio and video and IP multicast technologies. What began as a proof-of-concept prototype to test technological capabilities has become a valued service at the…

Discusses the state of library automation and the benefits and dilemmas of available operating systems. Presents an overview of six vendors selling online library systems (Ameritech, Endeavor, Data Research Associates, Sirsi, Innovative Interfaces, and Ex Libris). Provides sales figures based on the "Library Journal" articles published during the…

Discusses how collection-development librarians can customize their workstations by building a Web page to cover public service and outreach efforts to constituencies, links to tools to enable selectors to use the Web and work more efficiently, and selection of Web resources. Describes Web sites in the three categories of communication with…

Argues that the difficulty and expense of preserving digital information is a potential impediment to digital library development. Discusses the present state of digital preservation, articulates requirements for users and custodians, and suggests research topics in storage media, migration, conversion, and overall management strategies. (DSK)

Reviews the professional status of information scientists and reflects on the 40th anniversary of the Institute of Information Scientists. Topics include the information age in the United Kingdom, information services, essential personal competencies, intensifying competition, accelerating change, communication and information technologies, future…

Defines virtual documents and categorizes them, roughly, on how they are created, such as using templates, from computations, as composites, and as metadata. Describes the following information retrieval problems with virtual documents: search, revisiting, authentication, reference, version control, and annotation. (AEF)

Introduces the concept of the virtual library and explores how the increasing reliance on computers and digital information has affected library users and staff. Discusses users' expectations, democratization of access, human issues, organizational change, technostress, ergonomics, assessment, and strategies for success and survival. Contains 35…

The University of North Texas (Denton) and the African American Museum (Dallas, Texas) are partners in a program designed to produce expert managers of digital images and information. The class was divided into five teams assigned to five tasks relating to equipment, Web, database, image, and policy. The project design is described, and…

To facilitate an integrated 10-year development plan, a Colorado Girl Scouts council collaborated with an architecture firm to create computer-generated maps of its camp properties, with links to relevant information. Maps and software provided unprecedented accuracy and access, were easily updated, and facilitated funding presentations. Sidebars…

To make rational choices about educational technology, educators must examine the place of technology in institutional change. Technophiles predict a revolution in education, but it is important to separate this enthusiasm, and misconceptions that accompany it, from the realities of higher education. Democratic values should be allowed to operate…

Discusses three emerging trends on the affect of information technology on institutional research (IR), examining the following: information technology as a catalyst for change; pressures of access and accountability and challenges of open access to information, and the new informational professional. Offers a vision of technology's…

Discusses the merger of FARNET (Federation of American Research Networks), a clearinghouse for tracking the development state-by-state of an information infrastructure, and NTTF (Networking and Telecommunications Task Force), which helped colleges and universities identify strategic networking and telecommunications policy issues, into a new…