Subject: The Scout Report -- June 27, 1997 -- HTML Version Sent: 27/6/97 08:36 pm Received: 27/6/97 11:05 pm From: Scout Project, scout@CS.WISC.EDU Reply-To: The Scout Report (HTML Version), SCOUT-REPORT-HTML@internic.net To: SCOUT-REPORT-HTML@LISTS.INTERNIC.NET The Scout Report - June 27, 1997

The Scout Report

Volume 4, Number 9
June 27, 1997

A Publication of Internet Scout Services
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.

Visit the Scout Report web page at: http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/

Send comments and contributions to: scout@internic.net

In This Issue:

Research and Education

General Interest

Network Tools

Where Are They Now

Research and Education

US Agriculture By the Numbers and in the Fields Agricultural Statistics 1997--USDA [.pdf]
http://www.usda.gov/nass/pubs/agstats.htm
Sustainable Farming Connection
http://sunsite.unc.edu/farming-connection/
The latest volume of the United States Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Statistics is a detailed compilation of statistical charts and tables covering all aspects of the US agricultural economy. Most of the available tables aare based on a short (three and ten year) time series, and many are updated through 1996. The previous two Agricultural Statistics volumes are also available, and tables from the 1995-6 version can be viewed in plain text comma separated values (CSV) format for easier statistical manipulation. Data users can also request CSV formatted tables for the 1997 volume. Sustainable Farming Connection, provided by the University of North Carolina SunSITE and the Committee for Sustainable Farm Publishing, is an information clearinghouse for sustainable agriculture that contains news stories and features such as "17 Mistakes to Avoid with Electric Fencing" in addition to several discussion groups. There are still construction signs behind some of the links at this site. [JS]
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Multimedia Components of a Scholarly Article--IOP [.pdf, postscript, mpeg]
http://www.iop.org/EJ/Info/bin/featabs/na0800301/
Nanotechnology Multimedia Research Papers Announcement
http://www.iop.org/Journals/na/
The article in the Institute of Physics' (IOP) Nanotechnolgy entitled "Molecular dynamics simulations of carbon nanotube-based gears" offers a glimpse into the future of what scholarly publishing could be. Concepts "come alive" in the multimedia appendices. The eight page article (available in Adobe Acrobat [.pdf] and postscript format) is tailored for specialists and includes some photos, but all scholars can appreciate the eight mpeg movies (ranging from 375 KB to 2.25 MB) that show these tiny gears in action. Note that this article is one of a rotating set of free Nanotechnology articles, and may be removed in the future. [JS]
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Views of the Famine--The Irish Famine as it Happened
http://www.emory.edu/FAMINE/
Steve Taylor of the Faculty Information Technology Center at Emory University has posted an excellent collection of contemporary British newspaper articles and illustrations relating to the Great Irish Famine. The site features several contemporary newspapers, including the Illustrated London News, the Pictorial Times, and Punch, which demonstrate the range of opinions on the famine and the Irish people held by the British press and their readers. Some of the over 100 contemporary illustrations are in a high-resolution format suitable for printing. The site also includes a section entitled 150 Years Ago Today, which posts short articles from the Cork Examiner (updated one to three times a week). Additional features include a full text narrative of a journey in 1847 Ireland and links to other Famine sites. [MD]
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Dr. Felix's Free Medline Page
http://www.docnet.org.uk/felix-frames.html
US Mirror
http://www.beaker.iupui.edu/drfelix/
If you need to search the National Medical Library's Medline database, Dr. Felix's Free Medline Page is a good place to start. Provided by DocNet (UK), this simple page is a comparison of twenty-eight web based services that offer free access to parts or all of Medline. For each service users can access information about database coverage, registration requirements, usage restrictions, and document delivery. Hypertext links are available from all of the services discussed. Dr. Felix is a quick and convenient way to launch a Medline session that can inform users of the possible limitations of their search right from the start. [JS]
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Journal of Memetics--Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit/
Bibliography of Memetics:
http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit/biblio/
This new peer-reviewed academic journal, sponsored by the Centre for Policy Modelling, the Prinicipia Cybernetica Project, and the Faculty of Systems Engineering, Policy Analysis, and Management at Delft University of Technology (Netherlands), "offers a forum where theories and the philosophy of memes and evolution are in the centre, not just at the edge of the issues journals want to cover." The evolutionary perspective in many different disciplines is addressed in articles such as "Cultural R/K Selection," "The Origin and Evolution of Culture and Creativity," and "Macromemetics: Towards a Framework for the Re-unification of Philosophy." At this site interested users can also consult a large (over 180 works) bibliography, a history of memetics, and a lexicon of its terms. [JS]
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Three Current-Awareness Mailing Lists From Prism Express
The folks at Prism Express have added a new list, SCIENCE-WEEK ("A Free Weekly Digest of the News of Science"), to their two older lists, NEW-ARTICLES and NEW-BOOKS. Each issue of SCIENCE-WEEK offers nearly a dozen abstracts of current articles in a range of scientific disciplines, along with citations to the original sources. NEW-ARTICLES and NEW-BOOKS list recent additions to the literature of several disciplines. Announcements are organized into general categories such as Literature and the Arts; Culture, Social Issues, Psychology; and History, Politics, Economics, and Philosophy. With these free services, users can stay current simply by reading weekly email. [ML]

To subscribe to the Prism Express lists, send email to:
prismx@earthlink.net
with any of the following in the body of the message:
SUB SCIENCE-WEEK
SUB NEW-ARTICLES
SUB NEW-BOOKS
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General Interest

Supreme Court Overturns CDA, Decides Two Other Major Cases
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/supct.June.1997.html
The Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School has posted opinions, syllabi, and related documents for three major Supreme Court cases decided on June 26: 96-511 (Communication Deceny Act), 96-110 (physician-assisted suicide), and 96-1671 (line-item veto). Non-Java and WordPerfect versions are also available. [MD]
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Earth Summit +5--United Nations
http://www.un.org/dpcsd/earthsummit/
Agenda 21 Reports--United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (1992 Earth Summit)
Gopher access:
gopher://gopher.un.org:70/11/conf/unced
gopher to: gopher.un.org
select: United Nations Conferences/UNCED 1992
The first Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992, concentrated on "address[ing] urgent problems of environmental protection and socio-economic development," and produced Agenda 21, a "plan for achieving sustainable development in the 21st century." A Special Session of the UN General Assembly met in New York from June 23-27, 1997 to assess the implementation of Agenda 21; the Earth Summit +5 site records that session. Highlights include selected country profiles that document progress in the implementation of Agenda 21 goals (provided by those countries), and geographically arranged Agenda 21 success stories. This site also contains pointers to all the documents related to the session, including intergovernmental organizations (IGO) reports and UN reports on Agenda 21 implementation. [JS]
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Culinary herbFAQ
http://sunsite.unc.edu/herbmed/culiherb.html
Readers interested in herbs and the culinary arts can explore Culinary herbFAQ, a site maintained by Henriette Kress that provides information on a wide array of herbs for eating, drinking, gifts (potpourri, bath salts, etc.), ground cover, and shade. Composed of long and short contributions from listserv members, herbFAQ offers useful advice on herb-related topics that spans from seeding to transplanting to harvesting and documents discussions on a variety of herb problems. Readers may need to look a bit for a particular herb as items are randomly arranged within the seven sections of this FAQ. Links to Medicinal herbFAQ can also be found at this site. [ATW]
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LIFE Magazine Photo Essays
http://pathfinder.com/Life/essay/photoessay.html
LIFE Magazine
http://pathfinder.com/Life/lifehome.html
The sixteen full text photo essays presently available at Pathfinder's LIFE Magazine site are excellent examples of American photo journalism, a genre forged by LIFE Magazine, one of the oldest American photo journalism print publications. Recently added essays include "Star City: Comrades in Space," "Miracle Zoo Babies," and "The Healing Revolution." Older photo essays are available on an eclectic array of subjects including Prince Charles and Diana, Bosnia, and the race horse Seattle Slew. Cover photos from the magazine going back to the 1930's are incorporated into many of the other features at the main LIFE site. [JS]
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Birdfeeder--Birdwatching Mailing List
Wild bird enthusiasts can consult the Birdfeeder mailing list to learn how to attract birds to their property, feed them, provide housing for them to nest in, or just find out what to look for when watching wild birds as they go about their daily business. While many other birding lists discourage discussing the feeding of wild birds, the birdfeeder list makes a point of encouraging it, hence the name. Many other aspects of birding are open for discussion as well. [JS]

To subscribe send email to:
birdfeeder-request@userhome.com
In the body of the message type:
SUBSCRIBE
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Network Tools

RealPlayer 4.0 Final Release
Information:
http://www.real.com/
Download site:
http://www.real.com/products/player/index.html
The 4.0 release version of Progressive Networks' RealPlayer (discus sed in the February 21, 1997 issue of the Scout Report) is available for downloading from the Progressive site. Both Windows and Macintosh users can enjoy stereo sound features (for machines that support it) and "dynamic stream thinning" that "adjusts the video frame rate for both live and on-demand content in real-time." As with all streaming audio and video products, quality is dependent on many factors, including the speed of your connection and processor. "Destination buttons" allow RealPlayer users to select programs provided by over 35 Progressive content partners including ABC, CNN, ESPN, and ZDnet. A more full featured RealPlayer is available for a fee. [JS]
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Dummies Daily--The Online Resource for the Rest of Us
http://www.dummiesdaily.com/
Provided by PC World Online and IDG Books Worldwide (publishers of the popular "for Dummies" series), Dummies Daily allows Interested Internauts to subscribe to any of six electronic newsletters (Microsoft Word and Excel, Quicken, The Internet, Web After Five, and Computing Basics), and recieve a quick, simple tip every business day. These friendly and informative tips, written with a keen awareness of how intimidating computers can be to new users, are excellent for beginners. [JS]
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Where Are They Now

Volume 1, Number 9: The Scout Report for June 24, 1994
http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/report/archive/6-24-94.html
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
http://www.ieee.org/
National Library of Canada
http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/
UNICEF
http://www.unicef.org/ainfo/
gopher://hqfaus01.unicef.org/
gopher to: hqfaus01.unicef.org
These three major organizations were announced as gopher sites in the June 24, 1994 issue. All three now have web sites and one organization (UNICEF) is also keeping its gopher site current. IEEE is a clearinghouse of information on the engineers' organization. Contents include jobs listings, standards information (including a recent standards status report), publications, technical societies, and student activities. The National Library of Canada site is a gateway to Canadian information that extends beyond the Library and its holdings to meta-pages on Canadian government and several Canadian digital information projects. UNICEF maintains its gopher and web site in parallel and offers access to full text publications. One of the more important of these is the recently released State of the World's Children 1997, which concentrates on the issue of child labor. [JS]
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Copyright Susan Calcari, 1994-1997. 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 -- Managing Editor
Jack Solock -- Editor
Jeannine Ramsey -- Production Editor
Teri Boomsma -- Contributor
Michael de Nie -- Contributor
Aimee D. Glassel -- Contributor
Matthew Livesey -- Contributor
Amy Tracy Wells -- Contributor

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