ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

New Technology

•INFORONICSnow offers updated literature describing DB-EDIT, software that helps to create and revise online catalogs. DB-EDIT: The On-line Editorial Assistant describes the feature, which is available as part of ILIAS, Inforonics’ Library Automation Service that starts with cataloging data and produces online and printed products. For a copy, contact Nancy Dennis, Coordinator, Library Services, Inforonics, Inc., 550 Newtown Road, Littleton, MA 01460; (617) 486-8976.

• Kurzweil Computer Products, Cambridge, Massachusetts, has developed an advanced version of the Kurzweil Reading Machine for the blind. The new Series 200 incorporates recent technological advances that bring the machine, which reads printed material out loud, closer to the reading and speech capabilities of humans. The new machine voice is more pleasant and easier to get used to. New software offering more powerful character recognition allows the machine to scan successfully the low-quality print characteristic of many photocopies, paperbacks, and periodicals. The Series 200 capabilities are being made available to current reading machine owners. By November 1982 the Kurzweil Reading Machine was in use in approximately 300 libraries, schools, and employment and rehabilitation settings. An additional 200 machines are being awarded to colleges and universities by Xerox in a year-long corporate contributions program which began in July 1982.

• The Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine’s Health Sciences Library, Fort Worth, installed a Rapicom 6350T/6300R digital facsimile network in May 1982 that provides clinicians with immediate long-distance access to medical reference sources. The product configuration permits simultaneous transmission of hard copy information over standard telephone lines at speeds approaching 15 seconds per page. The college placed compatible Rapicom 1000 transceivers at several of its affiliated hospitals—Stevens Park Hospital in Dallas, Dallas-Fort Worth Medical Center in Grand Prairie, and Carswell Air Force Base in West Fort Worth. The digital facsimile devices can receive information automatically, eliminating the need for hospital staff to operate the machine. Both printed and handwritten material can be transmitted, including journal articles, charts, diagrams, computer printouts, and memos. During the first two months of operation the TCOM Library network exceeded 1,000 document transmissions per month.

•The Washington Library Network (WLN) and the California Library Authority for Systems and Services (CLASS) have signed an agreement making CLASS the exclusive broker for WLN’s retrospective conversion services in California, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah. The service complements the RLIN shared cataloging services offered by CLASS. WLN will accept tapes with formatted search arguments which will then be matched against the WLN bibliographic database. Libraries also have the option to access WLN directly via Telenet to key search arguments into a file stored on the WLN computer for later batch matching. WLN also expects to have the capability to accept floppy disc in the future, which will allow libraries to create search arguments on an in-house microcomputer.