Spotlight

Technology:

Zope

I must admit that I am still a nonbeliever when it comes to the Open Source movement - quite possibly one of very few at this moment. However, one of the goals of this newsletter is to report on exciting new tools appearing on the horizon of Community Technology, regardless of whether they come from one of the powerful software vendors, a crazy startup with a wacky business plan, or a bunch of idealists banging on their keyboards for the love of code and humanity. Well, the time has come for me to give some credit to the latest group, so far neglected in this publication. (In my defense I would like to point out that I did spotlight a number of free tools, albeit none from the Open Source lode....)

Zope is, regrettably, not as widely known or popular as Linux or Apache, but from what I have learned about it, it is at least as exciting as either of these darlings of the Open Sourcerers. (It is also quite different from both.) It is a Web application server - a suite of components that work together to form an environment for creation of highly dynamic, customizable Web applications, such as portals and intranets. These components include: a Web (HTTP) server, an object database, a search engine, and page templates. A powerful mixture that could cost tens of thousands of dollars when put together from commercially available components, but here comes absolutely free and with a source code open to extensive customization.

Zope is pretty agnostic in regard to operating systems: it runs on Linux, Solaris, and Windows NT/2000. It supports a dizzying array of Web standards and protocols: FTP, HTTP, LDAP, HTML, SQL, ODBC, RSS, XML, WebDAV, CSS, CGI, and more. If this is just an acronym soup for you, let me put it in more practical terms; support for these standards means, for example, that Zope will interoperate with other standard-compliant tools, potentially making it very flexible and extensible. (Do you like to create your content in Dreamweaver? Keep doing it - Zope will not mind a bit!). It also means access to legacy data that resides on third-party databases: as long as they support basic standards like ODBC or SQL, you can crack them open for Zope.

Zope (click on thumbnail):

Creating folders	Database management

For more information please visit the Zope.org site or search the ACT database of Groupwork Tools.

Online event:

Overview of ACT's Current Projects

Public briefing and question-and-answer session
Held from 9 A.M. EST to 10 A.M. EST, Friday, October 13, 2000 in the Auditorium Maximus of ACT/Placeware Conference Center
In this first public briefing I will describe a few of the current practical engagements of ACT:

Course on Global Product Realization (in collaboration with the Technical University of Delft, Seoul National University, and the University of Michigan)
Reprolatina Project (in collaboration with the Population Council and Reprolatina.org in Brazil)
Distributed Virtual Library for Tribal Colleges (in collaboration with AIHEC)
Knowledge Portals initiative

This is a free, open event, and no registration is necessary.
Important note: in order to participate in this live event a Java enabled browser is required (version 4 or newer of Netscape Navigator or Microsoft IE). Fast Internet connection (ISDN, ADSL, LAN) is recommended, but a 56K modem may be sufficient. Audio for the event will be provided via call-in phone-conferencing (long distance charges may apply) and, optionally, the Internet (through a free plugin, available for Wintel and some Unix platforms only). Please keep in mind that to receive/send audio via the Internet your computer must be equipped with a sound card, speakers (or headphones) and a microphone. Fast connections are highly recommended - the quality of the sound on a 56K modem cannot be guaranteed. You will also need to download and install the required plugin prior to the event. The telephone number for those audience members who prefer to call in will be provided in the Auditorium Maximus 10 minutes before the event. For more information about Placeware and its audio capabilities, please visit the How-To page.

Online reading:

Virtual Reality on a Desktop Hailed as New Tool in Distance Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education, October 6, 2000. (HTML format)

This article describes some of the research projects that grew out of the initiative of Activeworlds.com, which donated its technology and server space to educators around the world in order to let them test the applicability of interactive 3D environments (a sort of "virtual reality") to online teaching and learning. ACT - not mentioned in this article - is one of many participants in the above initiative and ACT "world" (see screenshot below) is available for public access. (Please contact wlodek@umich.edu for more info.)

Conference:

WebNet 2000

World Conference on the WWW and Internet
Held October 30-November 4, 2000 in San Antonio, TX
This annual conference, organized by the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE), serves as a multi-disciplinary forum for the exchange of information on research, development, and applications of all topics related to the Web. This encompasses the use, applications and societal and legal aspects of the Internet in its broadest sense. This conference is a must for all who plan to use the Internet to access information, communicate or conduct transactions or, who are developing applications for the Internet, including the WWW, Intranets, and Extranets.

She said, he said:

"The Ark was built by an amateur. Professionals built the Titanic" -- Anonymous

No. 26