The Scout Report

June 12, 1998

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

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 Report for Science & Engineering
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/sci-engr
Vol. 1, Number 19 of the Scout Report for Science & Engineering is available. It annotates over twenty new and newly-discovered Internet resources in the physical & life sciences and engineering. The In the News section annotates eight resources about the fading of El Nino. [JS]
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Nature Web Special: The Complete Genome Sequence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis [.pdf]
http://www.nature.com/
Select: Web Specials/M.Tuberculosis Sequence
Mycobacterium tuberculosis--Sanger Centre
http://www.sanger.ac.uk/Projects/M_tuberculosis/
This Nature Web Special (discussed in April 29, 1998 Scout Report for Science & Engineering) chronicles the discovery of the complete gene sequence of the bacteria responsible for the scourge of tuberculosis. Stewart T. Cole, et al., "present the complete, 4,000-gene, 4,411,529-base-pair DNA sequence of H37Rv, the best-characterized strain of the organism." In addition to the Letter to Nature: "Deciphering the biology of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from the complete genome sequence," (Nature 393, 537-544; 1998), the site also contains a commentary by Douglas Young of Imperial College School of Medicine, London, and information on the staggering prevalence of the disease by four members of the World Health Organization's Global Tuberculosis Programme. The highlight of the Letter is the availability of the sequence (an Adobe Acrobat [.pdf] file 27.35 by 10.24 inches). The Sanger Centre, a UK genomic research center, provides the sequence in a more useful format. [JS]
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Religion and the Founding of the American Republic--LOC
http://lcweb.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/religion.html
This magnificent companion site to a new US Library of Congress exhibit draws upon the holdings of the Library and other archives to illustrate the importance of religion in the founding and making of America during the 17th through 19th centuries. The site is divided into eight parts, including America as a Religious Refuge, Religion and the American Revolution, and Religion and the New Republic. Each section consists of background information and thumbnail images of manuscript fragments, portraits, book title pages, documents, or other artifacts. These images, which users can enlarge by clicking on the thumbnails, are contextualized by the accompanying detailed captions and bibliographical information. In addition to the over 200 images, the site contains a complete object list of the exhibition. [JS]
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Second International Harvard Conference on Internet and Society [RealPlayer]
http://www.events.broadcast.com/edu/harvard/conference/
This conference, recently held at Harvard University, brought together such Internet and computer luminaries as US Supreme Court Justice Steven Breyer, Louis V. Gerstner, Jr. (CEO of IBM Corporation), Scott G. McNealy (CEO of Sun Microsystems), Steve Ballmer (Executive Vice President of Microsoft), Esther Dyson (Chairperson, EdVenture Holdings), Kim Polese (CEO of Marimba, Inc.), and Ira Magaziner (Policy Development Advisor to President Clinton). RealPlayer Speeches and question and answer sessions are available at the site, as well as selected sessions and socratic panels. In addition, the entire three hour and 45 minute proceedings of the first day are available. Note that the most direct access to the audio content is via the day links on the home page. [JS]
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The Gateway to Educational Materials--NLE, US Department of Education
http://thegateway.org/
Spurred by President Clinton's 1997 call to prioritize education in the Information Age, the National Library of Education (NLE) and the US Department of Education collaborated to create this one-stop educational resource. Current sites listed provide information, lesson plans, and activities pertaining to all K-12 subjects. Users can browse sites by subject or keyword, or they can search by subject, keyword, title, or full-text of the site description. GEM sources are derived from a consortium that includes the AskERIC Virtual Library, the Eisenhower National Clearinghouse, Math Forum, Microsoft Encarta, the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, and the US Department of Education. Future plans include the ability to search by state and national curriculum standards. [JR]
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Annual Review of Population Law: Database on Law and Population [Java]
http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/annual_review/
The Harvard Law School and United Nations Population Fund provide this searchable database of "summaries and excerpts of legislation, constitutions, court decisions, and other official government documents from every country in the world relating to population policies, reproductive health, women's rights, and related topics." The database, taken from the 1974-1995 records of the print journal of the same name, allows users to search by country, keyword, or year, and Boolean, proximity, and truncation searching (see the help file) is supported. Java-based indexes ("word wheels") aid keyword and country searching. Retrieval includes relevant document title, source, and a summary. [JS]
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The Developmental Biology Cinema--SDB [QuickTime, VivoActive]
http://sdb.bio.purdue.edu/dbcinema/index.html
The Developmental Biology Cinema emerged after an inspired breakfast meeting at the 13th International Congress of Developmental Biology in Snowbird, Utah (July 1997). DBC's mission is "to get video sequences of developing embryos (organisms), and experimental techniques, from the developmental biologist's lab to the eyeballs of interested individuals in a user-friendly and inexpensive form." Current features include Thom Kaufman's Fly Morph-O-Genesis, Lionel Jaffe's Calcium Tsunami, and Jeff Miller's Dynamics of Thin Filopodia. The silent movies may be viewed in QuickTime or VivoActive formats, and are accompanied by brief thumbnail images and background summaries. Note that these digital video sequences are provided by the Society for Developmental Biology for educational purposes only. [LXP]
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Electronic Statistics Handbook [frames]
http://www.statsoft.com/textbook/stathome.html
StatSoft Inc. provides this electronic textbook on the use of statistics in laboratory research, business, social sciences, datamining, and engineering, among other fields. Its 24 sections deal with topics such as ANOVA/MANOVA, experimental design, process analysis, and survival/failure time analysis. There is also a detailed glossary and extensive bibliography. The book can also be downloaded as one large .zip file for local use. [JS]
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US Decennial Life Tables 1991-1989--CDC NCHS [.pdf]
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/pubs/pubd/lftbls/decenn/1991-89.htm
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics has recently released this series of publications (Adobe Acrobat [.pdf] format only) that provide death rates calculated using "data from the 1990 Census of Population and deaths occurring in the United States to residents of the United States during the 3-year period, 1989-91." At present, 46 volumes are available (the US, the District of Columbia, and 44 states). Data are broken out by age, sex, and race. For each age, the tables list the proportion dying, the number living and dying per 100,000, the stationary population, and the average remaining lifetime. Complete documentation is available. What makes these publications so fascinating is the granularity of age breakdown, basically a year-by-year breakdown from birth to age 110. [JS]
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They Still Draw Pictures: Drawings Made by Spanish Children During the Spanish Civil War, Circa 1938--UCSD MSCL
http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/tsdp/index.html
Mandeville Special Collections Library, University of California, San Diego, presents this exhibition of 609 drawings made by school children in Spain and in refugee centers in France during the Spanish Civil War. Images of war through children's eyes predominate, but some drawings show scenes unaffected by the war. The Spanish Board of Education and the Carnegie Institute of Spain collected the drawings and, in 1938, published 60 in a book entitled They Still Draw Pictures, with a forward by Aldous Huxley, to raise funds for children's relief efforts in Spain. Visitors to the site can view the black and white plates from the book by clicking on published drawings. The hundreds of additional pictures from library collections are arranged by location, and are reproduced in color. Captions include title, artist's name and age, school, and some description. [DS]
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Federal Trade Commission About Privacy
http://www.ftc.gov/privacy/
Privacy Online: A Report to Congress
http://www.ftc.gov/reports/privacy3/index.htm
The US Federal Trade Commission provides this site, highlighted by the availability of its Privacy Online: A Report to Congress. This 43 page monograph "provides an assessment of the effectiveness of self-regulation as a means of protecting consumer privacy on the World Wide Web,... based on a comprehensive online survey of the information practices of commercial Web sites, including sites directed to children, conducted in March 1998; an examination of current industry guidelines governing information practices online; and the record developed in Commission hearings and workshops held since 1995." In addition, the site offers tips on how to protect personal information, transcripts of relevant congressional testimony, useful information about protecting your privacy while you "travel" the Net, and FTC pamphlets on consumer protection and privacy information, among other features. [JS]
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Best Places to Live in America 1998--Money
http://pathfinder.com/money/bestplaces/
1997 Rankings
http://www.pathfinder.com/money/best-cities-97/index.html
1996 Rankings
http://pathfinder.com/money/best-cities-96/index.htm
Money magazine has added a new wrinkle to its annual Best Places to Live rankings. The controversial, yet fascinating, rankings no longer provide one single list. Lists are now broken out by size within geographical area, ending the possibility for any one city to create billboards claiming itself the best place to live. In this way, the rankings hope to "narrow the scope and rank each place within its own region and population group," while also guaranteeing that no city can finish lower than 50th. Each city ranking is accompanied by a statistical snapshot, and there is an explanatory paragraph for the winners. The site also allows users to compare costs of living between any two cities and find the best city for them based on 63 factors in nine categories. Rankings for 1997 and 1996 are still available. [JS]
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Chemistry Societies Network
http://www.chemsoc.org/
Users gain access to the heart of CSN's site through the site gateway which leads them to CSN's information arcade, education arcade, societies, chembytes, and conferences and events. The information arcade provides links to experts and specialists, and chemistry societies. The education arcade contains a wealth of information for educators in the chemistry arena. Societies lists chemical and chemistry-related societies, divided alphabetically by country. Chembytes provides access to a variety of news, including recent findings and discoveries, business updates, and news from around the globe. Chembytes also features a continuing series which looks in-depth at a topic recently in the news. Currently featured is NASA's attempt to return to the moon. Conferences and Events is searchable and browseable and contains a submission form so visitors can list an event. CSN's site also includes Useful Links, a listing of sites categorized and reviewed by Chemsoc and Science Park, which links to four companies offering chemistry related resources on the web. [KH]
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This Week in Business--PBS
http://cgi.pbs.org/weta/twib/
PBS, in association with Business Week magazine, provides this site, as a companion to the weekly show broadcast by WETA TV in Washington, DC. Each show features a roundtable discussion of pertinent business and economic issues with participants who are economics, business, and technology writers and editors for publications such as the New York Times,Fortune,Forbes,Business Week,USA Today, and the Economist. The site allows users to browse or search transcripts of each half hour broadcast, all of which are available in text. Selected transcripts are available via RealPlayer. [JS]
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Apache 1.3.0 Available
http://www.apache.org/
The Apache Group has made available version 1.3.0 of its HTTP server. It is "the most stable version of Apache currently available." The 1.2.X implementations will not be supported in the near future. 1.3.0 offers numerous enhancements including experimental support for Windows NT/95 and Dynamic Shared Object (DSO) support. [JS]
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TechShopper--CMPnet
http://www.techshopper.com/
CMP Media, Inc., supplies this site, which reviews and recommends computer products in twelve major areas, including desktops, servers, CPU/memory, monitors, storage devices, digital cameras, and network hardware. The site uses the considerable power of fourteen of CMPnet's publications to compile product information which may include, in addition to the reviews, specifications, reader comments, and the ability to buy online (though this last feature is very much a work in progress at this time). In some cases, product specifications may be compared side-by-side. Note that where price information is not explicitly given in the product tables, it is usually available in the reviews. [JS]
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Java Boutique--Mecklermedia
http://javaboutique.internet.com/
Mecklermedia's Java Boutique is a one-stop shopping site for the Java afficianado. The site provides the latest news, FAQ's, reviews, instructional articles, and integrated development environment demos. The highlight, as might be expected, is the applet library, with 200 applets. Each applet comes with a demo, download site, and/or code that created it. [JS]
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Volume 2, Number 7, June 9, 1995
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/archive/.html
Peace Corps
http://www.peacecorps.gov/
Peace Corps Essays
http://www.peacecorps.gov/www/dp/africa/potusinafrica.html
When the Peace Corps site was first annotated, it did not even have its own server (that was provided by ClarkNet, now Verio Mid-Atlantic). The site now has its own server and is a recruiting tool for "the toughest job you'll ever love." It provides information about becoming a Peace Corps volunteer, the countries that the Peace Corps serves, programs for those who have completed Peace Corps service, and World Wise Schools, a Peace Corps K-12 learning resource. Perhaps the most subtle and powerful part of the site is the collection of over 50 essays by volunteers covering their experiences in all areas of the world. Writers range from John Coyne, who served in Ethiopia from 1962-64, to Lorena Alvarez, one of the first Peace Corps volunteers in South Africa. [JS]
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Copyright Susan Calcari and the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents, 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 Internet Scout Project provides information about the Internet to the US research and education community under a grant from the National Science Foundation, number NCR-9712163. 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 or the National Science Foundation.

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

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The Scout Report - June 12, 1998

The Scout Report

June 12, 1998

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