Heyward
-----------------------------
HELP FOR YOUR SICK PC
ZDNet and Symantec have launched a new site with advice on fixing your
PC and keeping it healthy. The HealthyPC.Com site has a dual
personality. On one side, you have the free services like sample
software, maintenance and tuning tips, expert advice and a
dealer/service finder put up by ZDNet. On the other side of the screen
is a paid subscription service called the Health Club where you can
get access to a live system check, virus and other software updates,
and more for $4.95 per month. <http://www.healthypc.com/>
MARK TWAIN
In NSD 1.18, we looked at a site devoted to Twain, from his literary
influence to his presence in contemporary culture. The site has moved
and upgraded to include weekly features, an events calendar, and Twain
-specific bulletin boards and live chat.
<http://marktwain.miningco.com/>
3. Voices from the Gaps: Women Writers of Color
http://www-engl.cla.umn.edu/lkd/vfg/VFGhome/
The University of Minnesota offers a growing source of information on women
writers of color in the US, aimed at high school and college students.
Pages have been created for seventeen writers; contents include
biographical and bibliographic information, annotated lists of Internet
resources relating to each writer, and, when available, images and audio
files. Writers, including Sandra Cisneros, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Alice
Walker, can be browsed by name, birthplace, racial or ethnic background,
and significant historical dates. However, no search option is available at
this time. Visitors to the site can interact with each other in the
Discussion Room, a forum for posting and responding to questions about the
individual writers. Teachers, students, and independent scholars are
encouraged to contribute research and writing about authors not already
covered. [AG]
6. Contemporary Philosophy of Mind: An Annotated Bibliography
http://ling.ucsc.edu/~chalmers/biblio.html
David Chalmers, Professor of Philosophy at the University of California,
Santa Cruz, has provided a massive bibliography of "recent work in the
philosophy of mind, philosophy of cognitive science, and philosophy of
artificial intelligence...(mostly of papers and books from the last 35
years)." Its 2,395 items are categorized into four major topics:
Consciousness and Qualia; Mental Content; Psychophysical Relations and
Psychological Explanation; and Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence. In
addition, 220 entries fall under Miscellaneous Topics. Two powerful
features make this bibliography stand out. One is the meticulous
subgrouping of topics (there are 55 main subtopics). The other is that many
of the items are annotated. The lack of a search engine is a small price to
pay for an extensive, organized portal on the subject. [JS]
8. Two Federal Communications Commission Mailing Lists for Educators
FCCsend is a one-way (non-interactive) mailing list that provides the
latest FCC updates and suggestions for preparing your school or library to
get the most out of communications technology. FCCshare is an interactive
mailing list for communicating with teachers, parents and others using
education technology. [JS]
FCCsend
To subscribe send email to:
subscribe@info.fcc.gov
In the body of the message type:
sub FCCsend yourfirstname yourlastname
FCCshare
To subscribe send email to:
subscribe@info.fcc.gov
In the body of the message type:
sub FCCshare yourfirstname yourlastname
9. American Treasures--Library of Congress
http://lcweb.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trupscale/
No-frames version:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/
To celebrate the treasures in its over 110 million item collection, the
Library of Congress simultaneously opened an ongoing exhibition and this
website on May 1. The site is divided into three parts: memory (history),
reason (philosophy), and imagination (fine arts). At present there are 61
treasures, including the items found in President Lincoln's pocket after
his assassination, Alexander Graham Bell's notebook entry for March 10,
1876 ("Mr. Watson--Come Here--I want to see you"), and an example of
imaginative book design from the Janus Press. The top treasure is a rough
draft of the Declaration of Independence. Each treasure is briefly
introduced, and the user can then click on a thumbnail image to retrieve a
much larger image and more detailed explanation. The online exhibition will
provide a "cumulative record of many items that have been on display." [JS]
13. Kasparov vs. Deep Blue: The Rematch [Java]
http://www.chess.ibm.com/
Less graphical entrance:
http://www.chess.ibm.com/home/html/b.html
Site index:
http://www.chess.ibm.com/guide/html/j.1.a.html
Last year world chess champion Gary Kasparov defeated Deep Blue, the IBM
Chess playing computer, three games to one, with two draws (discussed in
the February 16, 1996 Scout Report). This year's rematch, held under the
auspices of the Association for Computing Machinery, begins May 3, and
interested Internauts can follow it at this IBM site. The highlight of the
site, of course, will be the live Java-based coverage of each game, which
will allow users to follow the game in progress, go to any move, watch the
chess clock, and follow commentary. Complete game coverage will also be
available for those without Java. Information on the players and the
technology, including biographies of and interviews with Kasparov and the
Deep Blue team, are provided. For neophytes, there is a chess primer and
glossary. Games are scheduled for May 3,4,6,7,10, and 11. [JS]
15. Updates to Two Subject Directories
BUBL LINK--Previously BUBL
http://bubl.ac.uk/link/
Librarians Index to the Internet--Previously Berkeley Public Library's
Index to the Internet
http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/InternetIndex/
BUBL (The BUlletin Board for Libraries, discussed in the January 19, 1996
Scout Report) has moved its UDC (Universal Decimal Classification) Internet
subject directory to BUBL LINK. The site, one of the better collections of
its type on the Internet, is searchable, and has changed to a Dewey Decimal
Classification, making it one of the largest DDC Internet subject
directories available. It is a well organized site, with briefly annotated
educationally oriented pointers. The well known Berkeley Public Library's
Index to the Internet has migrated to the Berkeley Digital Library Sunsite
(discussed in the February 9, 1996 Scout Report). It contains annotated
searchable and browsable pointers in over 40 major subject categories from
arts to law to women. Compiled by California librarians, it contains over
2,500 pointers at present. These are two of the best selective subject
indexes to the Internet. [JS]
17. PhotoTools--An Adobe Photoshop plug-in
http://www.extensis.com/products/PhotoTools/
PhotoTools, a product of Extensis, is an excellent plug-in for Photoshop
3.0.4 and later. Webmasters can dress up their pages with high quality drop
shadows, bevels, glows, and embossing effects that can be easily added to
images or text. Users can create 3-D effects and more with a touch of a
button. All features can be adjusted in order to create a unique look. In
addition, there is a WYSIWYG text module for creating and formatting text. A
demo version of this commercial software product is available for Macintosh
and Windows. [TB]
The first Scout Report annotation pointed to a Z39.50 Information page
maintained by InterNIC Directory Services. It was a no-nonsense page of
pointers to resources related to this information retrieval standard. The
page still exists, but now points to the official Library of Congress
Z39.50 page. While the LOC page contains much information, the InterNIC
page is still useful for its pointers. In the same issue there was an
annotation of a pointers page to American universities maintained by Mike
Conlon at the University of Florida: it contained the astounding total of
annotation of a pointers page to American universities maintained by Mike
Conlon at the University of Florida: it contained the astounding total of
145 university home pages. This page now connects to over 1,150 home pages,
but has been overtaken in scope by Christina DeMello's massive index of
international university home pages, which points to some 3,000 sites, and
is mirrored at nine other sites. Conlin's site also points to a list of
Canadian universities, and US community colleges. [JS]