Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!wugate!uunet!zephyr.ens.tek.com!tekgen!robertj From: robertj@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM (Robert Jaquiss) Newsgroups: comp.ivideodisc,tek.misc Subject: SIGCAT (SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP ON CD-ROM APPLICATIONS AND TECHNOLOGY) MEETING Message-ID: <4997@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM> Date: 30 Oct 89 19:28:15 GMT Reply-To: robertj@tekgen.BV.TEK.COM (Robert Jaquiss) Followup-To: comp.ivideodisc Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR. Lines: 380 I know the meeting is long past but there is useful information hre. I head the following material with an OCr machine. I have corrected some misread words. I apologize for any mis- takes. Robert S. Jaquiss Jr. robertj@tekgen.bv.tek.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Special Interest Group on CD-ROM Applications& Technology August 30,1989 Moding Welcome to Washington's summer doldrums. To help bring you oust of them and into the Augut SIGCAT meeting, we're offering a little incentive beyond that nor- mally provided by our agenda. Each attendee at this month's meeting will receive a copy (please, only one per attendee) of the CD-ROM disc that resulted from the recent GRIPS '89 meeting. In case you missed it, this seminar was held last month to put together some of the country's best government-developed image-processing software running in both the PC and Mac environments. The latest versions of these packages, together with hundreds of megabytes of actual image data, were placed on a CD-ROM that by vir- tue of the ISO 9660 format, are not only accessible but also executable from both computing platforms. Meridian Data and Philips Dupont Optical (PDO) cosponsored the project, and the resulting disc should be very useful to those wish- ing to explore state-of-the-art raster image processing on a personal computer. Until the price of CD-ROM drives drops a bit more (al- though this situation may be right around the corner--see the SIGCAT Recap for the June 28,1989 meeting) or until some of the commercial CD-ROM products provide more attrac- tive quantity discounts, there will be a continuing need for accessing a CD-ROM drive over a local area network. Several companies have developed technologies for doing that and this month's SIGCAT Technology Tutorial will focus on the options currently available in the marketplace. On hand to present an overview of the characteristics, con- siderations and pricing of networked CD-ROM solutions will be Martin Ennis, technical editor of the CD-ROM End- User. Martin has hands-on exponence with many of the products that he will be discussing and should provide a wealth of practical information for those considering using CD-ROM on networks. One of the exciting things about CD-ROM is how it can significantly enhance projects and programs that deal with large scientific databases. Such is the case with the Side- &"g Airborne Radar (SLAR) program within the U. S. Geological Survey. This activity roughly deals with in- dividual image files typically ranging up to 150 megabytes in size. Until discovering CD-ROM, the SLAR folks used minicomputers and the wonderful world of nine-track tape for their image processing and analysis. In addition, the limitations inherent in photochemical processing often hid suttle features in associated photographic output. Now, CD- ROM allows the manipulation of multiple SLAR images on a desktop PC. Clark Cramer, SLAR Program Analyst, will provide some insight into how the use of CD-ROM has im- proved access to and processing of valuable remotely sensed information. CD-ROM industry periodicals continue to tell us that we are rapidly moving in the direction of multimedia applica- tions. Microsoft is apparently convinced of this trend and has recently formed a new Multimedia Division to further advance the technology. But the real proof of progress is in the applications we're beginning to see emerge. CD-ROM products are now delivering imagery that rivals the printed page (see for yourself at this month's meeting). We're for- tunate in having one of the more innovative developers in the industry with us to discuss several new low-cost multi- media CD-ROM products. In addition to demonstrating ap- plications ranging from medical journals to the works of Sherlock Holmes, Chris Kitze, president of CMC Research, will announce several brand-new titles, including one that might prove to be a very popular 'horizontal' product. Chris will also discuss multimedia database design and prepara- tion considerations, including 'notes from the field" anec- dotes from CMC's experience in pioneering this area. His perspective on the economic driving force behind electronic publishing in the technical fields should be of interest to anyone looking to develop the next generation of CD-ROM applications. And finally, the "Kitze Crystal Ball" will make a rare appearance to deliver its riot annual forecast of fu- ture CD-ROM events. How would you find out how many Navy contracts in- volve ceramics and communftdons, except antennas, were being carried out in Virginia and California? Well, if you had a disc called the Federal Prime Contracts on CD- ROM, you could have that answer in a few seconds. The Federal Government with approximately 400,000 prime products every year to over 30,000 companies. The General Services Administration (GSA) maintains a compilation of each Federal agency's contractual dealings in the GSA's In- dividual Comment Action Record database. Each record in this database contains information on the contractor, pur- chasing office, name of the work or service, place of per- formance, type of business, contract competition, and amount of obligation. An enterprising organization called MSRS recognized the potential value of such records and set about producing a CD-ROM disc containing this infor- mation in a highly indexed form. The result was a disc that allows users to locate all of the contract records for any given product or service within a specified State, county, or city. MSRS has developed a simple, 'get-to-the-facts" user interface that supports context-sensitive help, pop-up win- dows, and extremely flexible output data formats. Paul Mur- phy, President of MSRS, will present the latest disc and, in the process, relate yet another success story of how the private sector is using CD-ROM technology to add value to publicly available information. More and more organizations are realizing the benefits of placing their technical documentation on CD-ROM. The advent of affordable high-resolution monitors and as- sociated video cards, along with the growing number of retrieval packages that handle both text and imagery, now allows many more applications to be considered for CD- ROM. One such application is the massive technical documentation produced by the U.S. Army Corps of En- gineers for use by its engineers throughout the world. The Corps recently decided to place some 17,000 pages of en- gineering manuals, regulations, specifications, and other textual and graphic material onto a two-disc CD-ROM set. Ron Kercheval, chief of the Printing and Distribution Management Branch, will provide an overview on this project, which included converting those 17,000 pages of material from paper into machine-readable form. The func- tions of full-text inputing, image decompression, and dis- play will be demonstrated by using concurrent windows--an image can be viewed in one while text is scrolled in another. Ron will also describe a related effort in which the Corps has elected to store and distribute many of its forms on CD- ROM. This effort is intended to produce significant cost savings in the handling, printing, distributing, and storing of large quantities of printed forms. The experience of the Corps on this project should be watched very closely by the entire Federal sector. After all, how many copies of the Paperwork Reduction Act do we have to keep printing before people begin to see the (Lua) light? As the Nation's factfinder, the Bureau of the Census provides government, academia, private organizations, and the general public with exhaustive statistical information about subjects ranging from demographics to foreign trade. The agency has always been directly involved in the dis- txibution of its collected statistics and is a leader in the use of electronic dissemination technologies. This past month, the Bureau released its fourth CD-ROM disc, the 1988 County/City Data Book on CD-ROM. Two of its discs are being distributed to the Federal Depository Libraries. In the near future, the Bureau plans to release data from the 1987 Economic and Agricultural Censuses, and it is now a well- known fact that they also plan to release the 1990 Decen- nial Census on CD-ROM (perhaps 20 to 25 discs). In a recent announcement, the Bureau made known its plans to produce CD-ROM discs containing digital mapping infor- mation. These discs will support the Topologically In- tegrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing system and will contain various map features such as streets, roads, waterways, and power lines, as well as political and statis- nationwide database is important to the many firms and agencies that must maintain computer mapping capabilities or geographic information systems. Updating the SIGCAT audience on all of this activity will be Forrest Williams, chief of the Systems Programming Branch at the Census Bureau. Forrest will also be making an additional an- nouncement that will further underscore the leadership role of the Census Bureau as the first Federal statistical agency to incorporate this significant new medium into major, agency wide publication programs. When most industry pundits are asked about how many commercially available CD-ROM titles there are "out there," the response usually falls somewhere between 400 and 600. However, a statistic that is not so well known is the number of titles that have been actually made to date. It turns out that one mastering and replication facility--Digital Audio Disc Corporation (DADC)--alone has produced over 1,300 CD-ROM titles. Although DADC is the largest CD plant in the United States, this figure seems to indicate a rather significant amount of "behind-the-scenes" CD-ROM activity. Onhand to offer some insight into these figures as well to as provide an overview (including a video tour) of the vast DADC facility will be Cliff Brannon, Disc Produc- tion Manager at DADC. Cliff will also discuss the success that DADC is having with its recently instituted statistical process control procedures, which help DADC maintain its recognized high levels of quality assurance while produc- ing over 8 million compact discs a month. One of the problems government agencies have had with CD-ROM is that the information and associated indexes that are placed on a disc are usually tied to proprietary vendor software. This limitation makes it difficult to reuse the in- formation with another application, another publishing medium, or another computer and operating system. Ibis situation exists even though there is a great deal of stand- ardization in the CD-ROM industry. Some feel that what the electronic publishigg industry lacks is an overall architec- ture or frame of reference for publishing and delivery func- tions. Consequently, the concept of an Open Electronic Publishing Architecture (OEPA) has been proposed to help put existing standards in perspective and target those func- tions that still require standards development. Current standards-related efforts like those of the CD-ROM XA Development Group, the CALS committee, and the SIG- CAT ISO 9660 Working Group all fall within the framework of OEPA. Network Technology Corporation is documenting the OEPA concept and acting as a clearin- ghouse for information regarding OEPA. Amy Kovarick is the Optical Publishing Manager for Network Technology and the author of 'A Tutorial on the Open Electronic Publishing Architecture.' She will provide an overview of the OEPA and how it might help the CD-ROM industry grow. Amy will also introduce Barbara Rose for an update on the activities of the ISO 9660 Working Group. If you're a Federal type and you have a CD-ROM project growing questions about Federal CD-ROM activity, we are now establishing a database in the U.S. Geological Survey Library to keep us of this type of information in an or- ganized manner. We plan to make this information public- ly available in our library as well as through the various SIGCAT channels. Parking is unrestricted as long as you use only the desig- nated roadside areas. As always, the meeting will be held in the main auditorium of the U.S. Geological Survey, 12201 Sunrise Valley Drive, Reston, Virginia. If you need direc- tions, please call (703) 649-4452 for verbal instructions. I once again invite you to use the Survey's revered cafeteria facilities and help yourself to one of the few proven remedies for the doldrums--frozen yogurt. For questions, I can be reached at (703) 648-7126 or FIS 959-7126. E. J. (Jerry) McFaul Computer Scientis4 USGS SIGCAT - August 30,1989 - AGENDA 9:30 am. - 10:30 a.m. Mam Eruns, Technical Editor CD-ROM EndUser Magazine - 703/237-0682 10:35 am. - 11:05 a.m. Clark Cramer, SLAR Program Analyst SLAR Program - U.S. Geological Survey - 703/648-5465 1 1: 10 am. - 11:40 a.m. Chris Kitm, President CMC Researck Inc. - 503/639-1796 11:45 am. - 12:15 p.m. Paul Muorphy, President MSRS, Iw. - 703/687-6777 12:15 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. Lunch 1:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. Ron KerchavaL Chief, Prbdng & Distr. Mgmt. Branch U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 1:35 p.m. - 2:OS p.m. Dr. Forrest Williams, Chief, Branch of Sys. Programming U.S. Census Bureau - 301fl634677 2: 10 p.m. - 2:40 p.m. Ms. Amy Kovarick, Optical Publishing Manager Network Technology, Inc. - 703/866-9000 2:45 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. Mr. Chi Brannon, Disc Production Manager Digitd Audio Disc Corporation (DADC) - 812/462-8286 -- Active SIGCAT Working Groups SIGLIT Special Interest Group on Library Information Technology 'This SIGCAT working group focuses on CD-ROM ap- plications in the library and information sciences. SIGLIT is very active and very often holds field trips to libraries in the metropolitian area. Contact: Susan David, Library of Congress- (202) 707-7169. SIGACE This SIGCAT working group was formed to examine, review, and demonstrate CD-ROM discs appropriate for use in training and education. SIGACE meets at the Technol- ogy Resources Center which houses a variety of CD-ROM discs and players. Contact: Sheldon Fisher, Department of Education- (202) 357-6699 ISO 9660 This SIGCAT workin group tracks the progress the ISO 9660 logical format standard as it is being implemented across a wide variety of computing forms. Since this standard is critical to the world-wide proliferation of CD- ROM technology, the activities of this group are very im- portant. Contact: Barbara Rose, Army Corps of Engineers- (202) 355-3029 SIGACE UPDATE SIGCAT LAB MERGES WITH TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES CENTER The Technology Resources Center at the U.S. Department of Education Research Library is the one place in Washington to see what is new in educational applications of technology and especially what is new in CD-ROM. For the past several years it has been building a collection of hardware and software to provide professional educators with demonstrations on the effective use of technology. Visitors have come from all over the country, from every level of education, and from over 30 different foreign countries. During the past year, the Center has expanded its CD-ROM collection and can demonstrate 21 educational discs in the MS/DOS mode and 10 on the Apple HFS system. This month, the Technology Resources Center will be absorbing hardware and software from the SIGCAT CD-ROM Lab which has been located at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Due to a reorganization within the NIST, it became necessary to find a new "home" for the SIGCAT Lab. With the addition of these discs and CD-ROM players, the Technology Resources Center is expanding and will have CD-ROM units on two new IBM PS-2 systems, and an Amiga 2000 in addition to CD ROM's already installed on a Apple IGS, Macintosh IIx, Tandy 3000, and a complete Bibliofile Intelligent Catalog work station. The Center plans to standardize on ISO 9660 discs and is seeking demonstration copies of new products. Especially needed are materials useful in vocational education, bilingual education, and English as a second language. The Center also collects for distribution to visitors floppy disk samples of CD-ROM programs, print materials, and general information pieces. The Technology Resources Center is located in the Research Library of the U.S. Department of Education at 80 F Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20208-5725. For further information contact Sheldon Fisher at (202) 357-6699.