CD-ROM Union Catalog and State Library Network

Progress report to the UCLC Council and the Assistant Commissioner for Higher Education. Documents technical specifications for the union catalog and costs. Reports the libraries connected to the state network.

TO: UCLC Council FROM: Wayne Peay RE: Ariel Test DATE: August 30, 1991 On Tuesday, we completed a test of the Ariel software from RLG. This software makes it possible to send a fax over the Internet. Our test used a beta version of the software, which we understand will be upgraded in September. Not surprisingly, we encountered some problems with both the software and the hardware installation. The folks at RLG proved to be very helpful. In order to conduct the test, we had to borrow an HP Scanjet scanner and a HP Laserjet III printer. As a result, we were very limited in the time we had available for the test. Once we had everything up and running, we were able to send test pages, taken from current issues of Science and New England Journal of Medicine, to ourselves over the network and to receive a test page from RLG. We were able send and receive pages in compressed and uncompressed format. The results of the test were most impressive. The quality of the transmitted documents was excellent. Given that the scanning of the pages takes place at 300 dots per inch versus the 100 dots per inch of telefax machines, the quality was at least three times better than regular telefax copy. Scanning the test page took 15 seconds. An uncompressed scanned page took up slightly more than 1MB of disk space and a compressed image was about 1/4MB of disk. Sending an uncompressed page took one minute and twenty seconds and a compressed page proportionately less. The time requirements are mitigated by the fact that the HP Scanjet does come with a sheet-feed option. The transmission time is not really a factor since once you begin the transfer, it just goes. The problems we encountered were certainly related to the fact that we were working with a beta version. The documentation is not yet complete. One thing that did cause some delays was that when they say HP Laserjet III, that's exactly what they mean. The JLaser5 accelerator card does not work with the variations of Laserjet III, like the IIId, IIIp, or IIIsi. I have tried to figure what it would cost to set up an Ariel station and the costs are listed below: 386sx Microcomputer 1,600 105MB hard disk 500 Monitor 400 JLaser5 accelerator card 350 3Com Etherlink card 190 HP Laserjet III 1,375 HP Scanjet 540 HP Scanjet interface card 340 HP Scanjet document feeder 340 DOS 4.01 65 Ariel Software (discount) 149 total $5,849 One of the interesting features of Ariel is the offer of print only software. With this software and the appropriate hardware configuration, it would be possible for faculty and/or departments to receive faxes directly. In summary, I would recommend that UCLC pursue the installation of an Ariel network in the State of Utah. I would also like to thank the Paul Jordan and his team at BYU who made it possible for us to do this test. Listed below are comments about Ariel. They were collected and posted to the PACS-L listserv by Dan Lester, Associate University Librarian, Boise State Univeristy. This report has been prepared as a summary of responses to a note I originally posted to the libadmin and ill-l lists on 8 Aug 91. I have identified the bitnet or internet address of each person whose comments I quote or summarize, so they can be contacted for additional details if necessary. I am posting separately some extracts of additional information from RLG regarding their Ariel product. Mary Jackson at U of Pennsylvania was a beta tester. Penn sent the first Ariel transmission last October, and has since been working with Dartmouth, Colorado State, Michigan, Berkeley, and Davis, as beta testers. They have sent and received some 1400 documents since that time. The document quality is the most impressive feature, even for things that have formulae, tables, graphs, etc. It is better quality than the best fax machines. She is anxious for the pool of Ariel users to grow so that they can do more of their ILLs this way. Mary also commented that interested individuals should read her article in the "Library to Library" column of the April 1991 Wilson Library Bulletin. She has some additional articles in press at this time. Overall, they "have encountered some minor problems" but "have been very pleased with Ariel and are most anxious to see other libraries purchase it." She will be happy to answer additional questions. bb.mej@rlg Karen Hatcher, Library Dean at Montana, reported that she is ordering the software, but is unsure when they can afford the scanner. [n.b., Montana is suffering severe budget cuts in all state agencies, and the universities are being hit particularly hard] She hopes that other institutions in the Northwest will also participate. [e-mail] Berry Richards at Lehigh is also ordering the Ariel software before the price increase. He will be pleased to do ILL business with any other Ariel libraries. He also mentioned that Lehigh is an information provider for Engineering Information, and has been doing a scanning experiment with them. [e-mail] Bonnie Ryan at Syracuse was impressed with the Ariel demo at ALA. They will acquire it sometime this year or next. libbcr@suvm Mark Beatty expressed concern about getting locked into any proprietary system, since presumably competing products will not be able to communicate with each other. He pointed out that WILS (Wisconsin ILL System) had received an Apple Library of Tomorrow Grant to develop a competing system using Macintoshes and existing faxes to send over the Internet. He also reminded us of the CIC system being developed at Ohio State (Wisconsin is also a CIC member, interestingly enough). He counsels waiting longer to see what happens. mbeatty@wiscmacc Dan Lester commented that something that is available now and that uses standard equipment could earn its cost back well before other potential systems are available, particularly when most of the hardware is standard, available stuff that can be used elsewhere in the library if it were no longer useful for Ariel. He also suggested that since it is now possible from almost any graphics format to any other, it SHOULD become possible to convert the scanning and/or transmission protocols used by one of these systems to that of any other. That does NOT mean it is possible to do that at this time. [e-mail] Several others sent general notes expressing interest and requesting more information. [e-mail] [e-mail] mick@unoma1 skmartin@guvax [e-mail] Jay Poole suggested that the problem will be getting enough to do it at one time to make it feasible. The same thing happened with fax, changing quickly from an experimental method to something that everyone has to do now. k026jp@tamvm1 Beth Shapiro added information about the CIC project. It is being developed by computer people at Ohio State under contract to CICnet, the group of Big Ten universities, plus Chicago. She suggested that their system is supposed to work on "lowest level hardware configurations" and will thus save money. [e-mail] Karen Newsome added more information about the CIC project, as her library (U of Illinois, Urbana) is a member of CIC. The biggest benefit claimed of the CIC system is low cost, using a PC with a fax card and software, or about $2000 per workstation. This will be standard Group III fax, with resolution identical to that of standard fax machines. They do expect to save some $900 per month in phone bills, as have been faxing all articles since September 1989. In Illinois it will also be beneficial to them to have the machine able to dial regular faxes in their cooperating regional libraries, or other smaller, non-internet libraries. She promises to report regularly to the ill-l list. newsome@uiucvmd Alan Hogan at Toledo pointed out some additional comparisons between the Ariel and CIC systems. He said that in addition to the CIC schools that Miami and Cincinnati were participating. He did note that at the ALA demonstration the small type looked much better from Ariel than it did from a plain paper fax machine. [n.b., "regular" fax is about 100 dots per inch (dpi), "fine" fax on most machines is ca. 150-200 dpi, and Ariel/Laserjet/Laserscanner is 300 dpi....that is the difference. dan] Alan says that the Ariel technology looks superior, although he can't compare any differences in transmission management. Ariel may cost $1000 to $2000 more. CIC is promoting using their system on hand-me-down old plain PCs (8088, etc.) instead of new 386 machines. He also points out that both systems require an Internet connection in the ILL area, something that some libraries or computer centers are not ready to deal with yet. [e-mail] Howard Pasternack indicated that his library faces problems similar to those mentioned above, by Alan. They just bought two fancy Canon faxes at $8000 each and don't have money for Ariel at this time. Also, there is no ethernet or tcp/ip in the library and they have no HP printers, just Apple Postscript printers. Also, their total number of faxes sent out last year was 176, they won't save much on phone bills. blips15@brownvm