Al's Picks |  | by Al Massey |
Navigate!: http://ephraim.vmedia.com/zine/
"Official Netscape Navigator 2.0 Book":
http://www.vmedia.com/books/offnet/cover.htm
Netscape Press and Ventana Communications Group offer Navigate!, a monthly
on-line magazine for Netscape Navigator (and other) users. The April 1996 issue
contains an article on Mark Pesce, developer of Virtual Reality Modeling
Language (VRML), software, plug-in and site reviews, and tips on electronic
publishing, including a tutorial on applying transparency to ..GIFs (for
Windows), a review of HVS Color Photoshop plug-in, and an article on CGI
programming. The March Issue contained a tutorial on frames and an article on
network security. Ventana also offers full text on line access to its Official
Netscape Navigator 2.0 Book, (Windows Edition), by Phil James.
http://www.benton.org/KickStart/
http://www.niiac-info.org/~niiac/
The National Information Infrastructure Advisory Council (NIIAC)
has produced two final reports with respect to the KickStart Initiative
for connecting America's communities to the Information Superhighway. They are:
"KickStart Initiative: Connecting America's Communities to the Information
Superhighway," and "A Nation of Opportunity: Realizing the Promise of
the Information Superhighway." "KickStart Initiative" contains
sections on Connecting People and Communities to the Information Superhighway, A
Leadership Guide to Getting There, A Resource on Intellectual Property, Privacy,
and Security, and Resources for Communities, including print resources, on-line
resources, and examples of acceptable use policies. "A Nation of
Opportunity" sets forth the mandate and mission of the NIIAC. It includes
sections on America on the Information Superhighway, Impact on Key Areas of
American Life and Work, Ensuring Access for All, Rules of the Road, and Key
Roles. Both reports are available via ftp, gopher, and the Web. The ftp and
gopher sites contain both ASCII and Microsoft Word 6.0 versions of the reports.
http://sunsite.anu.edu.au/
The Australian National University and Sun Microsystems recently launched
Australian SunSITE. The site provides a wealth of pointers to Australian and
oceanic resources of all types, and is particularly strong with respect to
Australian government information sites. It also provides Questacon -- the
Australian National Science and Technology Center -- "Australia's premier
hands-on science and technology centre," which features a number of
children's hands-on science activities, as well as a virtual tour of the
Questacon galleries. Australian SunSITE also provides a South Pacific
Information Network (SPIN), with further information and links to South Pacific
Resources, as well as a developing "Women's Network for the Vocational
Education and Training Sector in the Asia Pacific Region (WINVET)."
Questacon and WINVET can be found under "Education" on the home page.
SPIN can be found under "What's on this SunSITE." Australian SunSITE
also provides pointers to 25 other worldwide SunSITEs.
http://www.sscf.ucsb.edu/anth/netinfo.html
UCSB Anthropology Department Home Page: http://www.sscf.ucsb.edu/anth/.
The University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) Anthropology
Department Web site provides a pointers page to literally hundreds of
Anthropology related sites around the world. The pointers are arranged by
subject (cultural anthropology, archeology, physical anthropology), geography,
departmental and museum, pointer sites, and miscellaneous sites. Sites are
annotated, and the annotations are searchable. The volume of links, as well as
the care taken in annotating them, makes this one of the first places to visit
for anthropology pointers on the Net.
http://www.pulitzer.org/
1995 awards, exhibits, and biographies: http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/1995/.
The Pulitzer Prize Board recently presented 1996 Pulitzer Prizes
for achievements in American journalism, letters, drama, and music. A list of
winners, finalists, and the Prize Board and Juries is available at the Pulitzer
Web site. At present, winning exhibits are available for the editorial
cartooning and photography categories. Full text exhibits, as well as
biographies of winners, will be available by June, so interested readers might
want to bookmark this site and check back periodically. Complete 1995 awards are
available, along with full text exhibits and biographies of winners. A past
prizes section is in the works at this time.
http://cartalk.com/
Car Talk
(Click and Clack), the National Public Radio (NPR) show and syndicated column by
Tom and Ray Magliozzi, is now available via the Web. Included are: selected
excerpts from the radio show (via RealAudio); a weekly car problem puzzler; a
searchable archive of four years of "Click and Clack" newspaper
columns; a searchable directory of both radio stations and newspapers that carry
"Car Talk" and "Click and Clack"; classified ads; a "Virtually
Useful Data" section, with an interactive survey, detailed reports
including National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) report
citations on recalls, complaints, and crash tests on hundreds of models (with
links to previous columns on those models), and test drive notes; and an
electronic "post card" rack that allows you to send a personalized
email postcard to a friend. (Of course, as Tom and Ray say, "No stamp is
required. Please do not try to lick the screen.") Behind the light hearted
humor of this site lies a large amount of useful information about cars and car
repair.
http://www.biostat.wisc.edu/bca/bca.html
Breast Cancer Answers, provided by the University of Wisconsin
Comprehensive Cancer Center, is a "two year pilot project for the
dissemination of Breast Cancer information using the Information Superhighway."
It is funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The site features a set of
questions you should ask your doctor regarding such topics as biopsy, diagnosis,
treatment, and surgery, among others; frequently asked questions about bone
marrow transplant, screening, and unconventional cancer treatment, among others;
and pointers to resources in more than 15 categories from bone marrow
transplants to types of breast cancer. Breast Cancer Answers also offers an
opportunity to ask questions of trained NCI information specialists via email.
Note that this email feature is available only to residents of Wisconsin,
Minnesota, Iowa, North Dakota, and South Dakota at this time.
http://www.theeastvillage.com
Internauts with time and bandwidth to spare might want to try out the new
cyber soap opera from Marinex Multimedia, The East Village. In addition to
photographs and audio and video clips, this soap allows you to join the "cyber
clique" of a favorite character (after registering, of course). Once in a "clique,"
you will receive "secret e-mail" from that character that gives you
information not in the story line. Chat rooms are also available.
http://www.caso.com/
The
Internet University, provided by Cape Software, is an annotated listing of over
300 college and university distance learning courses available via the Internet.
Course information is arranged by subject from Arts to Sociology. Information is
provided about the institution offering the course, as well as tuition, fees,
and contact information. A "Providers" section organizes information
by college or university. A "Research" section provides links to
mailing lists, ftp sites, Usenet newsgroups, and telnet and Web sites with
information about "on-line college and university study resources." In
the future Cape Software plans an "Internet High School," with on-line
high school and equivalency providers, and an "Internet Pilgrim," with
on-line spiritual resources.
http://www.vdolive.com/
Text
only: http://www.vdolive.com/textonly.html/.
PBS Life on the Internet: http://www2.pbs.org/internet/video/
VDOnet Corp. provides VDOlive, a Windows platform video streaming software
product that offers real time "TV" over the Internet. This technology
offers immense promise as a tool to evolve the Internet into a true multimedia.
It works much like RealAudio does for sound streaming. That is, it plays the
audio and video as it is downloading, rather than making the user wait for huge
files to be downloaded before playing. This results in significant time savings.
Complete configuration instructions for several Web browsers are available in
the FAQ for the product. Note that this technology is in its infancy, so do not
expect TV quality when you use it. The main problem at this time is frames per
second (fps), which varies from 2 to more than 20, depending on your connection
(see the FAQ-video quality). However, if you have a fast Internet connection,
this product is definitely worth trying, to see what the future of multimedia on
the Internet might be. VDOlive is a commercial product, but the 1.0 version is
freely available for evaluation. Demo videos are available on the VDOlive page,
and you may also want to use VDOlive to view programs from the PBS Life on the
Internet series.
Al Massey is a HAL-PC member.
E-mail me at webmaster@hal-pc.org with any comments you have and tell me what you want to see here.
Back to the User Journal Home Page