About INFOBITS
Infobits is an electronic service of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ITS Teaching and Learning's Center for Instructional Technology. Each month the CIT's Information Resources Consultant monitors and selects from a number of information and instructional technology sources that come to her attention and provides brief notes for electronic dissemination to educators.
The Future of Peer-Reviewed Journals
Humanities and Computing Articles
ERIC/HE Critical Issues Bibliographies
Avoiding the Pitfalls of Electronic Publishing
Books that Shaped Science
Directory of U.S. Educational Resources
The Internet and Higher Education Journal
The Decade in Computing
Recommended Reading
Infobits Subscribers -- Where Are We in 2000?
THE FUTURE OF PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS
In "Free at Last: The Future of Peer-Reviewed Journals" [D-Lib Magazine, vol. 5, no. 12, December 1999], Stevan Harnad (Professor of Cognitive Science, Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton) argues for the electronic archiving of scholarly writing as a means to wider-spread dissemination. He explains how, with the support of universities (primarily through librarians and networks) and the use of interoperability standards (such as the Open Archives Initiative), scholars could "self-archive" their work, and users could locate papers regardless of where it is stored. You can read Harnad's article on the Web at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/december99/12harnad.html
D-Lib Magazine [ISSN: 1082-9873] covers innovation and research in
digital libraries. The magazine is available, free of charge, only in
electronic format, either on the Web or via email. Subscription
information is available at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/subscribe.html
Back issues are available at http://www.dlib.org/back.html
D-Lib Magazine is published eleven times a year by the D-Lib Forum, which is based at the Corporation For National Research Initiatives (CNRI) and is sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). For more information about D-Lib Forum see their Website at http://www.dlib.org/dlib.html
HUMANITIES AND COMPUTING ARTICLES
The theme for the latest issue of Surfaces [vol. XII, December 1999] is "Humanities and Computing: Who's Driving?" Articles include:
"Adapting Web Electronic Libraries to English Studies"
by Christopher Douglas, Dennis G. Jerz, and Ian Lancashire, Department
of English, University of Toronto
The authors argue that "academia needs to build local academic
content into electronic libraries by supplying faculty essays, notes,
lecture materials, and dedicated databases . . . [which] requires a
long-term institutional infrastructure with peer review, and coherent
goals -- a model not found in individual or commercial Web collections,
in purely administrative departmental sites, or on the World Wide Web
itself."
"Legitimizing Electronic Scholarly Publications: A Discursive Proposal"
by Rod Heimpel, Department of French, University of Toronto
Heimpel asserts that "electronic publication of scholarly work
is not merely a paper publication in disguise. Legitimizing electronic
scholarly publications calls for a new understanding of institutional
underpinnings of the scholar's world."
"La Toile fait-elle autorité?"
by Sylvain Rheault, Department of French, University of Regina
Rheault compares the work of putting humanities information on
the Web to that of an encyclopedist. "Can modular accumulation, which
is encouraged by the Web change our writing practices, and eventually
our modes of thought? As for organization, even more crucial, it calls
for a reengineering of the refereeing process."
The entire issue of Surfaces is available at http://pum12.pum.umontreal.ca/revues/surfaces/vol8/vol8TdM.html
The articles are in Adobe Acrobat's PDF format. You can download the Acrobat reader from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html
Surfaces [ISSN : 1188-2492] is an annual, refereed electronic
publication of Les Presses de l'Université de Montréal, Université de
Montréal, C.P. 6128, succ. Centre-ville, Montreal (Quebec) Canada H3C
3J7; tel: 514-343-5683; fax: 514-343-5684;
email: surfaces@ere.umontreal.ca;
Web: http://www.pum.umontreal.ca/revues/surfaces/
ERIC/HE CRITICAL ISSUES BIBLIOGRAPHIES
The ERIC Clearinghouse on Higher Education (ERIC/HE) recently completed the quarterly update of all its Critical Issues Bibliographies (CrIB) Sheets. Each CrIB Sheet is a brief ERIC bibliography on a topic of interest in the field of higher education. Topics of particular interest to Infobits readers include assessment, distance education, collaborative learning, technology in higher education, and technology in the classroom. All the CrIB Sheets are available on the Web at http://www.eriche.org/Library/index.html#cribs
AVOIDING THE PITFALLS OF ELECTRONIC PUBLISHING
In "Looking Good" [The Journal of Electronic Publishing, vol. 5, no. 2, December 1999], Thom Lieb briefly examines the "sad plight of electronic publishers caught up in the struggle to produce uniform pages in spite of browsers' variations in supporting Java and Javascript, frames, style sheets, dynamic HTML (DHTML) and tables." Lieb believes that the "best content is far more important than having the latest technology," but he offers some practical advice on getting the technology to show your electronic publication at its best. The article is available on the Web at http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/05-02/lieb0502.html
The Journal of Electronic Publishing [ISSN 1080-2711] is published free of charge on the Web by the University of Michigan Press, 839 Greene Street, P.O. Box 1104, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106-1104 USA. For more information contact JEP: email: jep@umich.press.edu; Web: http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/
In the "Scientists' Bookshelf" (American Scientist, vol. 87, no. 6, November-December 1999) Philip and Phylis Morrison have compiled their list of the "100 or so Books that shaped a Century of Science." The titles include "memorable and influential English-language books" supplied by readers, reviewers, and editorial staff at the American Scientist. The list is organized in nine sections, including: Biography, Field Guides, the Physical Sciences, History of Science, The Evolution of Life, The Nature and Rise of Our Own Species, and Novels. You can browse the compilation at http://www.amsci.org/amsci/bookshelf/century.html
American Scientist [ISSN: 0003-0996] is published bimonthly by Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society, P.O. Box 13975, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709-3975 USA; tel: 919-549-0097; fax: 919-549-0090; email: subs@amsci.org; Web: http://www.amsci.org/
DIRECTORY OF U.S. EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
The U.S. Department of Education's Education Resource Organizations Directory (EROD) is a free, online resource intended to help users identify and contact organizations that provide information and assistance on a broad range of education-related topics. The Directory includes information on more than 2,400 national, regional, and state education organizations. You can search EROD at http://www.ed.gov/Programs/EROD/
For more information on other U.S. Department of Education resources, see their Website at http://www.ed.gov/
THE INTERNET AND HIGHER EDUCATION JOURNAL
The Internet and Higher Education: A Quarterly Review of Innovations in Post-Secondary Education is a refereed journal "targeted at those faculty, administrators, and librarians charged with the responsibility of fostering the use of information technology and the Internet on their respective campuses."
Themes for upcoming issues include:
Designing collaborative learning environments
Developing online learning communities and community forums
Connecting IT strategic planning to organizational strategic
planning
Devising guidelines for developing hypertext courses
Surveying good design practices for online trainers and
educators
Changing instructional models (from traditional to
constructivist)
Distance learning administration in higher education
The future of online learning environments
Human-computer interaction considerations for online distance
learning
The Internet and Higher Education (IHE) [ISSN: 1096-7516] is published
by Elsevier Science; Web: http://www.elsevier.com/
For more information about IHE, including subscription costs, see
http://www.elsevier.com/inca/publications/store/6/2/0/1/8/7/index.htt
The editors of CNET, a publisher of technology news and producer of television shows about technology, have prepared a report on the people, products, trends, and companies that shaped computing in the 1990's. Sections are devoted to people whose ideas changed the face of technology, products that made a difference in how we compute, dominant high-tech trends, and the companies that made the products and spurred the trends. The report is available at http://www.cnet.com/specialreports/0-6014-7-1494819.html
"Recommended Reading" lists items that have been recommended to me or that Infobits readers have found particularly interesting and/or useful. Send your recommendations to kotlas@email.unc.edu
Paper recommended by Lori Mathis, Courseware Coordinator at the UNC-Chapel Hill Center for Instructional Technology (email: mathis@email.unc.edu):
"Asking the Right Question: What Does Research Tell Us About Technology
and Higher Learning?" by Stephen C. Ehrmann, Director of Flashlight,
American Association of Higher Education
http://www.learner.org/edtech/rscheval/rightquestion.html
"It takes just as much effort to answer a useless question as a useful one. The quest for useful information about technology begins with an exacting search for the right questions. This essay discusses some useless questions, a few useful ones (and the findings that have resulted), and one type of question that ought to be asked next about our uses of computing, video and telecommunications for learning."
Infobits subscriber Arun-Kumar Tripathi (email: tripathi@statistik.uni-dortmund.de) recommends the following two books:
The Robot in the Garden: Telerobotics and Telepistemology on the
Internet, edited by Ken Goldberg, Associate Professor, Industrial
Engineering and Operations Research, University of California at
Berkeley
Publisher: MIT Press, March 2000. ISBN: 0262072033
For details about the book and a list of contributors, see
http://queue.ieor.berkeley.edu/~goldberg/art/mitpress.html
Book editor's note:
"Remote control technologies permeate our daily lives: we have remote
controls for the garage door, the car alarm, and the television (the
latter a remote for the remote). Global networks extend these
capabilities with cellular phones, teleconferencing, and telecommuting.
In this book, we focus on a new technology that permits cameras and
mechanical robots to be remotely operated over the Internet."
The Social Worlds of Higher Education: Handbook for Teaching in a New
Century, edited by Bernice A. Pescosolido and Ronald Aminzade
Publisher: Pine Forge Press, February 1999.
ISBN: 0-7619-8613-8 hardcover; ISBN: 0-7619-9045-6 paperback
Table of contents and sample chapters are available at
http://www.pineforge.com/pesco/pesco_aminz_highereducation.htm
Publisher's note:
"This is the first comprehensive guide to teaching in the social
sciences ever published. 'Two complete works in one' provides a survey
of the larger institutional context and alternative perspectives on
current debates in higher education, as well as a comprehensive and
practical guide to teaching. . . . The accompanying Fieldguide for
Teaching in a New Century includes an additional 80 articles, excerpts,
teaching tips, exercises, checklists, and overheads covering a complete
spectrum of teaching concerns." The Fieldguide is available online at
http://www.pineforge.com/pesco/pesfg00.pdf
INFOBITS SUBSCRIBERS -- WHERE ARE WE IN 2000?
Each January issue of Infobits includes an annual subscriber tally listing the countries represented by our subscribers. As of January 29,2000, there were 5,164 subscribers. Here are some brief statistics about our current subscribers:
The majority of the subscribers are in the United States (2,825) and other English-speaking countries: Canada (384), Australia (210), and the United Kingdom (151).
Each of the following countries has between twenty and fifty subscribers: Brazil, Germany, Israel, New Zealand, and Singapore.
The following countries have nineteen or fewer subscribers: Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, China, Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Venezuela.
In addition to subscribers that we can positively identify by a geographic location, 721 subscribers are from commercial sites and 451 subscribers are from .org or .net sites, none of which have been attributed to a particular country.
Thanks to all the subscribers for your support in 1999!
-- Carolyn Kotlas, CIT Infobits Editor