The Scout Report

February 27, 1998

A Publication of the Internet Scout Project
Computer Science Department, University of Wisconsin

A Project of the InterNIC

The Scout Report is a weekly publication offering a selection of new and newly discovered Internet resources of interest to researchers and educators, the InterNIC's primary audience. However, everyone is welcome to subscribe to one of the mailing lists (plain text or HTML). Subscription instructions are included at the end of each report.

An Acrobat .pdf version of this report is available for printing and distributing locally. For information on Adobe Acrobat Reader, visit the Adobe site.

Scout Reports for Social Sciences and Business & Economics
Scout Report for Social Sciences
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/socsci/
Scout Report for Business & Economics
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/bus-econ/
The eleventh issues of the Scout Reports for Social Sciences and Business & Economics, each of which annotate over twenty new and newly-discovered Internet resources, are available. The In the News section of the Social Science Report annotates eleven resources on the crisis in Iraq. The Business & Economics Report's In the News section annotates eight resources related to currency boards. [JS]
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Pursuing Excellence: A Study of US Twelfth Grade Mathematics and Science Achievement in International Context--NCES TIMSS
http://nces.ed.gov/timss/
The third portion of the US Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics Initial Findings from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) (discussed in the December 13, 1996 Scout Report) has been made available at the TIMSS site. The report discusses the dismal performance of US twelfth grade students compared to their international counterparts. Of 21 countries participating in the study, the US finished 19th. The report contains two chapters on achievement and one on the international context of learning. It is accompanied by seven appendices and 29 figures. The report joins similar reports for fourth and eighth grade students at the site. [JS]
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Digital Libraries Initiative - Phase 2--NSF (NSF 98-63 New)
http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/1998/nsf9863/nsf9863.htm
Eight US institutions are sponsoring this recently-announced initiative including the National Science Foundation, the Library of Congress, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Phase 2 of the Digital Libraries Initiative is designed to extend research, accelerate development, and create new capabilities for digital libraries, as well as investigate the study of the interaction between people and digital libraries in various contexts. The initiative is divided into the areas of research, and testbeds & applications. Further information, along with proposal due dates and award amounts are available at the site. [JS]
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Monetary Policy Report to the Congress Pursuant to the Full Employment and Balanced Growth Act of 1978--FRB
http://www.bog.frb.fed.us/boarddocs/HH/9802Report.htm
The latest version of the semi-annual Monetary Report to Congress..., also known as the Humphrey-Hawkins Report, has been released by the US Federal Reserve Board. It claims that the US economy "turned in another excellent performance in 1997," with strong growth and low unemployment and inflation. It attributes this performance to US monetary and fiscal policy. The report is divided into two parts: Monetary Policy and the Economic Outlook, and Economic and Financial Developments in 1997 and Early 1998. Available in HTML, text and Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format, this report is accompanied by FRB Chairman Alan Greenspan's testimony of February 24, 1998. [THN]
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"Integration and the Black Muslims"--Malcolm X [StreamWorks Player]
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/audiofiles.html#malcolm
Online Audio Recordings--BLC MRC
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/audiofiles.html
The Berkeley Language Center and the Media Resources Center of the University of California, Berkeley, have collaborated to provide a StreamWorks Player version of this 29 1/2 minute speech delivered by Malcolm X on the Berkeley campus on October 11, 1963. The speech is preceded by a four minute introduction. A nearly seventeen minute question and answer session is also available. The site provides no background to the speech, but the program itself speaks volumes to the problem of race in America, both then and today; it also helps to illuminate the thinking of Malcolm X at the time. This speech is part of a larger speech archive that is being put together by the two sponsoring agencies. Included at this time are a one hour lecture, "The Culture of Self" by Michel Foucault in 1983, a one hour lecture, "On Atomic Energy, Problems to Civilization," by J. Robert Oppenheimer in 1946, and several speeches from a Berkeley Free Speech Movement 20th anniversary celebration. Note that a connection to StreamWorks is available at the site. [JS]
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Lunar Phases Web Tool [Java]
http://www-astro.physics.uiowa.edu/~lam/teaching/moon/
The phases of the moon have interested people for thousands of years. Although often appreciated, they are not as often understood. Professor Lawrence A. Molnar of the Physics & Astronomy Department at the University of Iowa provides this Java based tutorial that demonstrates lunar phases clearly and logically. It includes sections on time of day, time of month, and apparent direction of the moon. The Java demonstrations are meant to complement the simple yet elegant and powerful explanations of concepts. A typical demonstration involves a stick figure human on the earth's surface who can be interactively moved as the rotation of the planet is moved, to show how the phases change relative to time and direction. A quiz and teacher information are also provided. [JS]
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National First Ladies' Library
http://www.firstladies.org/
Developed and maintained by the Stark State College of Technology in Canton, Ohio, this new site is the first virtual library devoted to the history of America's First Ladies. At the heart of the site is a comprehensive bibliographic database containing 40,000 books, articles, letters, manuscripts, and other works by and about the 43 First Ladies. Both the site and the new physical library aim to bring materials together to fill a longstanding informational void in both American women's studies and the history of the presidency. [MD]
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The Genetic Algorithms Archive
http://www.aic.nrl.navy.mil/galist/
The Genetic Algorithms Archive, maintained by Alan C. Schultz at The Navy Center for Applied Research in Artificial Intelligence, is a repository for information related to research in genetic algorithms. The archive contains past issues of the GA-List mailing list. The list is a moderated mailing list of announcements and discussions about genetic algorithm-related issues. The site also contains a well-documented archive of genetic algorithm source code. Beyond archival information, the site includes annotated links to upcoming events, other genetic algorithm information, and various evolutionary computation research groups. As is typical of computer science sites, The Genetic Algorithms Archive offers no searching and a simplistic structure; nevertheless, the information contained is quite powerful. [CL]
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Linguistics Resources on the Internet--SILS
http://www.sil.org/linguistics/
This site is provided by the Summer Institute of Linguistics, located at the International Linguistics Center in Dallas, Texas. The focus of the whole site is the study of minority languages and cultures around the world. The Academic domains represented include linguistics, anthropology, translation, literacy, language learning, and computing. The Linguistics Resources on the Internet section contains annotated listings of resources of interest to the linguistics, computational linguistics and natural language processing fields of study. The page is divided into eight sections including computing resources (including links to text and speech analysis, morphology and phonology, and lexical software); journals and newsletters; conferences and meetings and electronic texts, dictionaries and data. The individual sections contain extensive lists of links, many of which are briefly annotated. [MR]
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Correction: Graduate School Rankings--US News Online
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/archive/.html#8
Last week's Scout Report email versions contained an incorrect annotation. The annotation for Americas Best Colleges 1998--US News Online, was supposed to have been for Graduate School Rankings--US News Online. The correct annotation can be found at the above URL. We regret the error. [JS]
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Secretary-General's Mission To Iraq--UN
http://www.un.org/NewLinks/mission.htm
The United Nations has posted relevant information about Secretary-General Kofi Annan's mission to negotiate an agreement with the government of Iraq on the issue of compliance with UN resolutions 687 and 715, concerning elimination of certain of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, along with compliance monitoring. The site is highlighted at this time by the Memorandum of Understanding negotiated between the UN and the Republic of Iraq, and transcripts of two press conferences by the Secretary-General. [JS]
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The Inspector General's Survey of the Cuban Operation--GWU NSA [.zip]
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/19980222.htm
After spending 36 years locked in a safe in the CIA director's office, this highly critical report of the CIA's handling of the Bay of Pigs Invasion was made public on February 22, 1998, after a two year Freedom of Information Act effort by The National Security Archive at George Washington University (discussed in the September 20, 1996 Scout Report). The top secret report, officially known as The Inspector General's Survey of the Cuban Operation, strongly criticizes the CIA for misinforming Kennedy administration officials, poor planning and intelligence, treating rebel leaders as "puppets," and conducting an overt military operation beyond "Agency responsibility as well as Agency capability." Note that the report is available as a series of large .zip files of scanned images. They may be available as HTML files in the future. [MD]
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Information Please
http://www.infoplease.com/
Information Please LLC provides this site, a cyber-ready reference library of information derived from its well-known publications, The Information Please Almanac,The A&E Information Please Entertainment Almanac,The ESPN Information Please Sports Almanac,The Information Please Kids' Almanac, and The Information Please Girls' Almanac, as well as the Columbia Encyclopedia, and the Random House College Dictionary. Users can search or browse by topic. Clicking on "Home" takes users to what amounts to an Almanac table of contents. Content at the site is current through 1997, except for the Columbia Encyclopedia, which has a 1993 copyright date. [JS]
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Nolo's Legal Encyclopedia
http://www.nolo.com/encyclopedia/
This site, provided by Nolo Press, a publisher of self-help law books and software, is a handy compendium of brief advice on fifteen topics, including small business, patent, copyright & trademark, legal research, wills & estate planning, and real estate. Content is composed of excerpted articles from Nolo books on the topics. Also provided are annotated lists of links related to each topic. While the purpose, of course, is to sell Nolo books and software, there is much useful content here. [JS]
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South China Morning Post
http://www.scmp.com/
The South China Morning Post has provided Hong Kong based English language news since 1903. The site is highlighted by its Internet Edition, with full text articles from today's and yesterday's newspaper (free registration required). In addition, SCMP offers fifteen special report sections, most recently adding sections on the Asian economic crisis and the 1998 Hong Kong Budget, the first since the hand-over of power to the Chinese government. Selections of other SCMP publications are also available. A six month archive may be searched, although there is a fee for retrieving articles. [JS]
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Africa Online [RealPlayer]
http://www.africaonline.com/
This site, provided by Prodigy's Africa Online, Inc., a provider of Internet communication services in Africa, is a gateway to information about that continent. Its' ten major sections include news, business & finance, computing, music, and women. Sections contain either original Africa Online content or pointers to relevant sites. The music section offers brief RealPlayer selections of contemporary music from five areas. Five English, one French, and one Swahili discussion forums are available. The site also connects to Africa Online sites for Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast, site is in French), Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. [JS]
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Learn2.com
http://www.learn2.com/index.html
The idea behind Learn2.com was to create an online resource where people could "learn to" do things that "make life easier and/or more interesting." Produced by Panmedia Corp., Learn2.com provides original, step-by-step, illustrated tutorials (locally referred to as "2torials") for attaining practical knowledge and skills that can be applied in everyday life. Coverage includes self-help, house and car fix-its, as well as food and entertaining how-to's. Many of the 2torials include cross-references to related 2torials. Access to the 2torials is possible by either browsing the twelve broad categories, browsing by title, or by a local Excite keyword/concept search. Another way to find out about 2torials is via the LearnLetter, an email newsletter that informs subscribers of new 2torials as they are made available. In addition to the 2torials, the Learnlets section lists tidbits of useful information, many of which are contributed by readers. [AG]
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Mozilla.org
http://www.mozilla.org/
This site was created by Netscape Communications Corporation in order to "provide a central point of contact and community for those interested in using or improving [Netscape] source code," which is due to be made freely available on March 31, 1998 (discussed in the January 23, 1998 Scout Report). The site is a work in progress at this time; it contains information about the mission of the organization and its efforts to provide information for developers. Current site highlights include free Navigator and free source FAQ's. Mozilla.org plans to release technical documentation on the code in the near future, as well as a list of download site sources. Other upcoming features include a section for bug reporting and a database of bug reports. [JS]
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BBEdit Lite--Text Editor
http://web.barebones.com/press/41litepr.html
Download area:
http://web.barebones.com/free/free.html
BBEdit Lite, a product of Bare Bones Software, has recently been upgraded to version 4.1. It is available for Macintosh users as freeware and is recommended for use with System 7.5 or later, including 8.1. BBEdit Lite is a less powerful version of BBEdit, a text and HTML editor popular among web developers. BBEdit Lite features include multiple file find and replace, drag and drop, the ability to open multiple files from multiple folders at one time, pattern or "grep" searching, and more. The download comes with quick start documentation, which covers how to use BBEdit Lite and how it compares with BBEdit 4.5. Note that download times can be very slow. [TB]
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VMS-UTIL--OpenVMS Utilities Mailing List
http://LISTSERV.UTA.EDU/archives/vms-util.html
VMS-UTIL is an open, unmoderated discussion list that is intended to be used as a means of sharing useful and interesting utilities for the OpenVMS platform. Archives of the discussion are available at the above URL. [JS]

To subscribe send email to:
LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UTA.EDU
In the body of the message type:
SUB VMS-UTIL YourFirstName YourLastName
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Volume 1, Number 43, February 24, 1995
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/archive/.html
CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse
http://www.cdc.gov/nchstp/hiv_aids/hivinfo/nac.htm
The US Centers for Disease Control's National AIDS Clearinghouse was originally announced in the February 24, 1995 issue as a gopher site. It has developed into an effective information resource on the topic. The site features seven searchable databases, covering funding opportunities, and descriptions of thousands of AIDS-related organizations, educational resources and abstracts of AIDS-related news and journal articles. The site has recently added a link to the CDC's 1998 Guidelines for the Treatment of STD (sexually transmitted diseases). [JS]
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Copyright Susan Calcari, 1994-1998. Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of the Scout Report provided the copyright notice and this paragraph is preserved on all copies. The InterNIC provides information about the Internet to the US research and education community under a cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation: NCR-9218742. The Government has certain rights in this material.

Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the University of Wisconsin - Madison, the National Science Foundation, AT&T, or Network Solutions, Inc.

The Scout Report (ISSN 1092-3861) is published weekly by Internet Scout

Susan Calcari
Jack Solock
Jeannine Ramsey
Teri Boomsma
Michael de Nie
David Flaspohler
Aimee D. Glassel
Kathryn Harris
Matthew Livesey
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Thiam Hee Ng
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The Scout Report - February 27, 1998

The Scout Report

February 27, 1998

New From Internet Scout

Research and Education

General Interest

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