For those of you who use either of the Waterman Computer lab teaching
areas (113-T and 113-Q), or incorporate computer technology as some facet
of your curriculum or instructional process, you should read this notice
about the changes to the CIT Computer labs in Waterman and in the
Bailey-Howe Library.

At the beginning of 1997, we announced planning to upgrade both the
DOS/Windows PC's and the Operating System used by this family of computers
for these labs.  At that time, the considerations involved either
retaining Windows 3.1 or moving to either Windows 95 or Windows NT.

As the spring semester proceeded, we obtained test units to ensure the
viability of Windows 95 or NT in a lab environment.  After a number of
months of tests, we began to move in the direction of 95 after extensive
but unsuccessful effort was made to implement NT.  Our final choice, then,
was to implement Windows 95.

Along the way, we tested many of the older DOS based applications that had
been resident on Nirvana for a long time. We anticipated that some of
these applications would no longer run on either 95 or NT, and contacted
the owners of these software packages to let them know that things were
changing.

I'm happy to announce that, as of August 1st, both the Waterman and
Bailey-Howe computer labs are fitted with new Dell Pentium 200 PC's
running Windows 95.  The Internet software suite has been updated to the
current distribution offered by CIT.  We have placed Microsoft Office 97
and the Lotus Smart Suite 97 on all machines.  Both SAS and SPSS for
Windows are available on any machine (these particular applications,
though, are licensed for less than the total number of actual seats than
are in the lab).  Each machine is 'refreshed' when powered off, ensuring
that the same configuration will be available to the next client.

One of the results of this change is that older DOS applications-and this
includes some of the older Nirvana server applications-will no longer
function.  If you have DOS based applications, you should take the time to
pretest them on this new configuration.  Owners of the pre-existing
applications were notified of the impending change, and have received word
of this new configuration.

In addition to PC changes, we have also upgraded the server to Netware
4.12.  This has produced an extraordinarily robust environment.  We have
already determined that when the PC's are unable to locate the server,
they are still fully operational except for printing services and that
print jobs sent in the interim are dutifully remembered by the local PC
and may be released for printing after the server is back on line.
Overall, the lab environment is far faster and measurably more robust than
in the past.

While we have not upgraded the hardware on the Macintosh end, all the
Power PC Macs in both labs will receive a memory upgrade, software updates
including Internet suite and MS Office 4.21.

If you have any questions or concerns, I am happy to discuss them at any
time.  Let me know via e-mail, or give me a call at 6-2013.

        David Houston
        CIT Client Services Coordinator