Hamilton.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA@sri-unix.UUCP (08/20/83)
I raised this issue on Human-nets nearly two years ago and didn't seem to get more than a big yawn for a response. Here's an example of what I had to go through recently: I saw an interesting-looking CMU tech report (Newell, "Intellectual Issues in the History of AI") listed in SIGART News. It looked like I could order it from CMU. No ARPANET address was listed, so I wrote -- I even gave them my ARPANET address. They sent me back a form letter via US Snail referring me to NTIS. So then I phoned NTIS. I talked to an answering machine and left my US Snail address and the order number of the tech report. They sent me back a postcard giving the price, something like $7. I sent them back their order form, including my credit card#. A week or so later I got back a moderately legible document, probably reproduced from microfiche, that looks suspiciously like a Bravo document that's probably on line somewhere, if I only knew where. I'm not picking on CMU -- this is a general problem. There's GOT to be a better way. How about: (1) Have a standard directory at each major ARPA host, containing at least a catalog with abstracts of all recent tech reports, and info on how to order, and hopefully full text of at least the most recent and/or popular ones, available for FTP, perhaps at off-peak hours only. (2) Hook NTIS into ARPANET, so that folks could browse their catalogs and submit orders electronically. RUTGERS used to have an electronic mailing list to which they periodically sent updated tech report catalogs, but that's about the only activity of this sort that I've seen. We've got this terrific electronic highway. Let's make it useful for more than mailing around collections of flames, like this one! --Bruce