rhaller@oregon.uoregon.edu (Rich Haller) (07/23/89)
USENET and the programs used to interact with it are one example of a computer based bulletin board or conferencing system. Others include CoSy (BIX was develped from CoSy), COM/PortaCOM, VAX Notes, Listserv, et cetera. I would like to know how wide spread the use of such communication tools is at Universities and other degree granting educational institutions. If you will respond to me privately via email, I will summarize the results and post them here later. 1. Please list the conferencing systems/bbs that are provided on computing systems on your campus including USENET (and Listserv if one is running on one of your own BITNET nodes). If you don't know the answers to all the questions below, please answer those that you do. I am mostly interested in whether such communication tools are available on your campus and to what extent they are used than in details like OS, so if you are in a hurry, just give me a quick and dirty response. 2. For each such system give: a. the hardware and OS of the host it runs on. b. name of the software product (e.g., we use ANU NEWS to interact with USENET and also run Portacom locally) and who the vendor/distributor is. c. whether the software in question provides for communication among restricted groups of individuals (e.g, USENET does not; anyone can read the messages in any USENET group that the host supports). d. whether the general student population on campus can have access to that communications system (e.g., some campuses exclude students or restrict access to grad students). e. whether access from outside the university via network is possible (e.g., USENET is a distributed system while many local BBS require an account on the local system to access). f. what restrictions are placed on the content of messages that can be posted. g. your estimate of how many faculty, staff and students make use of it, both in absolute numbers and as a proportion of that group (e.g. 25% of faculty). h. while I can probably figure it out from your email address, it will help if you tell me the name and location of your university and what networks it has hosts on. Thanks in advance. Rich Haller, Postmaster and BITNET Inforep, University of Oregon Internet: rhaller@oregon.uoregon.edu Bitnet: rhaller@oregon