patth@dasys1.UUCP (Patt Haring) (08/10/87)
- - *UNITEX United Nations Information Transfer and Exchange (Access free of charge exept for dial up charges) (212-764-5912) Accessing the Global Village is demonstrated through UNITEX, an electronic Bulletin Board System. UNITEX provides an electronic meeting place for U.N. staff, technical experts, and the global community at large. UNITEX is a spin off of the microcomputer based intractive program the "Simulated World 2001" developed by Dr. M. Whithed, Ms. D. Nicklus, and Robert Osband. In the "Simulated World 2001", student participants role play, in teams, the Head of State, Finiancial Minister, Citizen etc. Students learn to make decisions on managing their country's activities (such as resource allocations) which are interactively exercised until the year 2001. Participants learn the cause and effect reactions, based on their decisions, can effect future developments in the Simulated World. Skills in telecommunications, word processing, and data base management are developed through working with this microcomputer based gaming exercise. PLAN OF IMPLEMENTATION The Programme consists of an educational, microcomputer and satellite com- munication-based environment, utilizing an instructional simulation-gaming context to structure the participants' learning activities and to direct them to particularistic instructional modules, mainly provided through CAI (Computer Assisted Instruction) approaches. Simulated World 2001 Programme Implementation Procedure Contexts: A: the Simulation-Game B: the data communications environment C: the CAI modules A. The Simulation-Game: Simulated World 2001: Simulated World 2001 is a mixed man-machine instructional simulation-gaming exercise, based on SW-3, the microcomputer adaption of a family of international resources allocation simulation models developed by Professors Marshall H. Whithed and Clifford N. Smith. The original models derive from the Guetzkow Inter-Nation Simulation tradition. Student role-players occupy one of three generic roles in each nation-state modeled: HS for Head of State, ED for Enterprise or Business Director, and CZ for Citizen or Society as a whole (with more players, each of these three roles may be further subdivided; i.e., Minister of Internal Affairs, Minister of External Affairs, under HS, etc), but the irreducable number of generic roles is three in each country. In the PTP, 10-12 young players will act as a regional team. Seven to twelve countries are operated in the PTP simulation session. These countries may be modeled on specific real world (referent world) countries, or based on hypothetical data and countries. These countries will be run by the PTP regional teams. Participants are given scenario data on their particular countries and roles, along with specific financial and resource level data. Based on their understandings of their role environments, and that of their countries and the international environment, role-players develop strategies to achieve their goals and attempt through negotiation and alliance-building to build outsider support to these ends. In the Simulated World 2001 environment, their negotiations will not be face- to-face as has been the case in earlier simulation-gaming, but rather, through the medium of electronic mail based on microcomputers (direct keyboarding, and more preferably, off-line composition of messages in wordprocessing program mode, and then uploading/downloading of message traffic to other participants through a central operations site store and forward message switching mode microcomputer). Textual Message Traffic will be continuous throughout the operation of the exercise. Budgetary allocation determination data will be uploaded by the participants at the end of each simulation year (approximately two days of calender clock time) to the Programme's Central Operations site. This will be in the form of screen formatted data, with the present choice being dBASE. Specialized spreadsheet programming may alternatively be utilized. The resultant files will be transmitted to Central Operations and run into the simulation programs. The resultant output, in tabular form, ASCII text files, will be returned via the microcomputer and satellite network to the remote sites, to constitute the basis of the teams' decision-making for the succeeding year. The third form of transmission will be the remote data access of international data banks; this exercise will be encouraged to enhance the participants simulation planning. B. The Data Communications Environment The data, both textual and budgetary, will be prepared by student participants at the remote sites, uploaded via the satellite communications network to the Programme's Central Operations Site in Vienna, Austria, reviewed and interpreted by the simulation computer programming, and the resulting new material forwarded to the recepient teams at the various regional sites. Transmissions The data will be in ASCII text format, and/or data in such standardized formats as DIF (Data Interchange Format), or the dBASE II SDF (Standard Delimited Fields) form. Programme team personnel have experimented with transmission of dBASE II files over electronic mail systems such as the New Jersey Institute of Technology Electronic Information Exchange System (EIES). Vienna, Austria (location of the Central Operations site), and the locations of the regional sites world-wide have similar requirements, therefore most data communications will probably be to CCITT standards. We presently are analyzing CCITT V.22bis standards, as a possible alternative to earlier planning to utilize as appropriate for each location 1200 and/or 300 baud CCITT standards. Computer Utilization The computer communications network will be of a star design, with all communications from the regional sites transmitted through the Central Operations Site in Vienna for analysis and association by the Programme staff, and then forwarded to the target recepient team. This implies a store and forward computer at the Vienna Operations Site to receive incoming traffic, route to designated electronic mailboxes, etc. Preferably this facility could accomodate multiple incoming calls simultaneously. This computer would not be required to also handle the simulation computer programming; that could, if necessary, be done on a separate machine which would link into the store and forward machine. The Regional Site computers must have requisite communications capabilities, and also be able to operate standard available, special adaptions of standard-available and specially designed (by Programme personnel) stand- alone CAI packages. For the most part, this dictates MS-DOS capabilities. LAN (local area networking) at the Regional Sites is planned. This will enable a full differentation, technically, of the three major generic roles of the simulation model in each country (HS/ED/CZ), as well as illustrating LAN at the Regional Sites. This nested Star network -- Regional Site Star, with central node from Regional Site will be feeding in to the Central Operations Site in Vienna, Austria. Special arrangements with INTELSAT, have provided free satellite communications time. We are also working closely with the heads of the communications ministries (PTTS) in the participant countries, relative to free ground station (receiving/sending antenna) and ground line time. The Austrian PTT is providing the main link at the Vinenna International Center where the United Nations is providing the central site location. The "standard" problems of approval and clearances, licensing fees, importation problems, and long lead times for administrative approvals, will not constrain our Programme. These issues have been addressed by the PTP team. It should be noted that while we originally planned to utilize CCITT standards (and in a few instances, American modem standards for US communications), at 300 and 1200 baud depending upon coms line quality, it is now our tentative plan, pending further testing on-site, to utilize the new CCITT v.22 bis standards, at 2400 baud. If so, the hardware in the communications loop should be able to put out a 2400 baud signal either to a built-in modem able to handle those standards, OR to the RS 232 port, to drive an external modem. C. CAI Instructional Modules: The Simulation experience is a structuring, agenda-setting facilitator for participant interactions. A significant aspect of the simulation instructional experience is that it taps peer group learning initiatives, and leads participants to perceive the necessities for further instruction in structured areas. This leads, in our Programme, the participants into a battery of CAI (Computer Assisted Instruction) learning modules. These will consist of: a) Off-the-shelf CAI packages b) Special modification of off-the-shelf CAI c) New programming of CAI by Programme staff Most of these will be in PC/MS-DOS format, and for single user environments. The hardware for instruction at the Vienna Training Center for Tier One, and the training hardware for the Regional sites in Tier Two, will thus be required to run PC /MS-DOS software. Ability to run most IBM PC programs (PC-DOS 2.0 and above) is important. Ability to run other operating systems opens up additional flexibility. UNITEX, Suite 600, 22 West 38th St., New York, New York, 10018 (300/1200 baud, 24 hours: 212-764-5912). *UNITEX is a trademark of the Pilot Training Programme for Computer Literacy and Management Skills (PTP), "Simulated World 2001". It is sponsored by the International Federation of Business and Professional Women, a UN Class Nongovernmental Organization [NGO]. This page is available in machine readable form via UNITEX. It is UNITEX.TXT in File Area 2, the Global Community Lab area. - -
hjh@hpldola.HP.COM (Heather Hubbard) (08/27/87)
It would be interesting to hear some of the comments/lessons learned by participants in this simulation. For example, what were the advantages/disadvantages of having the electronic communication available to the Head Of State or the Citizen? Did it make a <big/med/small> difference to the Citizen to have access to the communications? Heather Hubbard