From the AVI Newsletter Editor
The cover of this issue of the AVI Newsletter features a new logo contributed by Dr. Cheryl Dhein <crd@vetmed.wsu.edu>. Cheryl chairs the AVI's Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI) Working Group and is also active in CONVINCE (Consortium of North American Veterinary Interactive New Concept Education). Cheryl is especially interested in creating an onine veterinary image database for educational use.
Applications for membership, accompanied by a check for $35 payable to
the AVI, should be sent to:
Dr. James T. Case; Secretary Treasurer, AVI; 1590 Augusta Ct., Dixon, CA
95620
Phone: 916/752-4408; FAX: 916/752-5680; e-mail: JimCase@aol.com
Dr. Case is responsible for distribution of the hardcopy version of the
AVI Newsletter.
Newsletter items can be sent to:
Dr. Ronald D. Smith, Newsletter Editor, AVI; UI College of Veterinary Medicine;
2001 South Lincoln; Urbana, IL 61801.
Phone: 217/333-2449; FAX: 217/333-4628; e-mail: rd-smith@uiuc.edu
If you are an AVI member and would like to be on the AVI Newsletter electronic
distribution list, send an e-mail message to the Newsletter Editor. Although
the electronic version is only an ASCII (text) file, it's faster, searchable,
easier to store and retrieve, and environmentally friendly.
Current and past issues of the Newsletter on the Web at the following URL:
http://netvet.wustl.edu/avi.htm.
Search MEDLINE for Free on the Web
Posted to: epidemio-l@cc.umontreal.ca
From: "Andreas Stang MD, MPH" <andreas.stang@uni-essen.de>
There were still some people who strongly believed that we cannot access Medline for free! Try it!.
Reported by
DR.GARY MALET
Medical Informatics Fellow, Family Physician
Oregon Health Sciences University
3181 S.W. Sam Jackson Park Road, Portland, Oregon
gmalet@healthtel.com, (503)494-6734
The AMIA Fall Symposium is an annual event that brings together more than 2500 of the world's medical information specialists to explore new research and developments. This year's meeting took place from October 26-30 at the Washington Sheraton in Washington, D.C. and had the theme "Beyond the Superhighway: Exploiting the Internet with Medical Informatics". The following reflects my interpretation of important developments in "Internet Medicine" at the conference's academic and commercial venues....gm
FULL TEXT MEDICAL ARTICLE ACCESS EMERGES!
Displays in the AMIA exhibit hall suggest that medical information providers will soon be offerring links to full text articles from their historic archives. Most of the premiere medical journals will be included. Ovid is introducing a proprietary subscription intranet interface to Medline with integrated hyperlinks to selected full text from a core collection of journals. MD Consult(TM) will deliver a package of forums and access to full text archives in Spring of 1997. MD Consult's database will be built from major journal articles and graphics from a consortium of major medical publishers including Raven Lippencott, Appleton Lange, and Mosby. Healthgate will offer fee based intranet medical information services that will include free Medline. It will offer a faxback of full text articles. Traditional Medline providers confronted with an onslaught of free NLM services over Internet will emphasize quality and natural language query features and focused searching based on medical subject terms to maintain their customer database. Many resource providers will establish hourly or transaction based services for on-line resources. An example is Mosby which will offer access to its drug prescription database, GenRx, as a distinct internet based service.
VIDEO CONFERENCING ON THE BRINK
A large number of video conferencing and telemedicine technologies were displayed. These are offerred in an expanding number of niche applications. Software incompatibities and slow bandwidth have inhibited use in the past. Internet add-ons like MBone require that users' networks must be configured with multicast routing. Nonetheless, these videoconferencing formats promise to improve on the limited success of clinically oriented messaging. A critical number of users for these forums is anticipated as Internet is introduced nationwide at clinicians' desktops.
GLOBAL DYNAMIC HYPERLINKED MEDICAL TEXTBOOKS
On line specialty based text books were a subject of discussion in the meeting's poster sessions. Emerging projects include the Virtual Anesthesia Textbook, a textbook of obstetrics and gynecology initiative from ObGyn.net, and a European Oncology Reference intended to serve as an evidence-based treatment reference source for cancer therapy. The hope is that well supported and constantly updated reference sources for clinical practice with online peer review will emerge in each of the medical specialties.
MEDICAL DIRECTORIES, IMPROVED SEARCHING AND PEER REVIEW
Polytechnic University of New York announced its Medical World Search which is a UMLS enabled webcrawler search of 30,000 selected medical sites. The University of North Carolina introduced a global medical resource directory in a database format that allows for interactive filtering for full text and subject categorization. Its interface integrates access to proprietary full text databases over its campus intranet.
A GLOBAL CASE DATABASE?
Numerous academic institutions offerred their database of clinical cases at the AMIA conference including the Dermatologic Image Project from Dr Bittdorf at Erlangen in Germany. The quality and breath of these resources suggests the potential of a disease subject categorized listing of clinical cases that will encourage clinicians use of "evidence base reasoning". A model for this growing collaboration is the Human Genome Project that is attempting to establish the gene sequences for human chromosomes. The Internet based project has flowered into a comprehensive effort to collaborate online in the form of full text articles hyperlinked to graphics of the DNA sequence, decision tools and software modules.
POINT OF CARE INTERNET APPLICATIONS
Dr. Richard Rathe of the Informatics Department of the University of Florida offerred a novel way in which his institution is implementing Internet based applications. By downloading web pages to the portable Newton his residents are bringing Internet resources into the exam room for decision support and patient education. A number of papers were delivered that addressed HTML specifications for practice guidelines and other types of decision support.
THE FUTURE
It was evident from the presentations at the American Medical Informatics Association's 1996 Fall Symposium that Internet is taking hold in clinical medicine and is demonstrating an ability to present multimedia medical resources at the point of care to affect clinical decision making. Innovative programs designed for hypertext multimedia access are linking information across geographic boundaries and medical disciplines. An integration of knowledge is being promoted that may revolutionize medical practice as clinical internetworking is adopted around the world.
Dr.Gary Malet, Medical Informatics Fellow, Family Physician
Oregon Health Sciences University
3181 S.W. Sam Jackson Park Road, Portland, Oregon
gmalet@healthtel.com, (503)494-6734
Co Chair AMIA's Internet Working Group,
"MEDICAL MATRIX"- Hypertext Internet Clinical Medicine Resources
Veterinary Histology CD-ROM
From: doctorc@vt.edu
The CD "VM 8054: Veterinary Histology, Version 1.0" is teaching software developed for use at the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine. It is a self-contained histology course, including several hundred pages of text and more than 600 full-color illustrations with accompanying extended captions. Keyed to the slide set in use at the VMRCVM, it nonetheless is a good general guide to the microscopic anatomy of domestic animals. Its intended use in the course VM8054 is to replace the printed text-only laboratory manual and syllabus with an interactive image-rich version. Links embedded in the exercise pages take users to the images.
The software is written in the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) for use with Netscape (version 1.0 and higher) and other WWW browsers. A connection to the WWW is not needed to run it; the CD is entirely self-contained and can be used on a stand-alone computer. However, if the computer is connected to the WWW, the capacity to send mail to the author is included. The disk will run on any CD-ROM player, and can be used with both PC and Mac versions of Netscape.
A text-only Adobe Acrobat version is also included, as is the Acrobat Reader program. This version does not include images or captions and is provided as a convenience for those wishing a "hard copy" of the bulk of the text (about 165 pages).
The cost of the disk is $15.00 plus $2.00 for shipping. Please make checks payable to Dr. Thomas Caceci and send orders to:
Department of Biomedical Sciences & Pathobiology VMRCVM
Phase II Building
Duckpond Drive
Virginia Tech
Blacksburg VA 24061-0442
Orders will be filled in the sequence received and are subject to availability of blank recordable CD's. (Recordable CD's are sometimes hard to get. Unless otherwise advised, we will back-order if they're not immediately available.)
CatLab
From: dan@itgworld.com (Daniel Harrington)
CatLab is a multimedia program developed with David Kerley, Ph.D of Eastern Oregon State College, and is the complete cat dissection.
Info is available at: http://www.itgworld.com
Dan Harrington Ph.D.; Interactive Technology Group; 541 Willamette Street,
Suite 414
Eugene, Oregon 97401
541-465 8818
fax:465 1685
email:Dan@itgworld.com
http://www.itgworld.com
Veterinary Informatics and Epidemiology Web
Site - Correction
From: POPMED NEWS 4/22/96 - PopMed@ncsu.edu
(Population Medicine Program)
Here is a correction for the new worldwide web site for the Veterinary Informatics and Epidemiology unit at Glasgow and Strathclyde Universities. The new URL is:
USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference
Web Site
From: FSnet Oct. 18/96
What was once available by looking up tables in Agriculture Handbook No. 8 is now accessible online! The USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 11 (SR11) is available through the Nutrient Data Laboratory home page on the Internet at
and through the Nutrient Data Laboratory Bulletin Board at 301/734-5078.
SR11 has more than 5,600 foods in 22 food group categories and over 337,000 values for more than 70 food components. SR11 is offered in two relational file formats: ASCII and DBF. An online data search program is offered through the NDL home page on the Internet which allows unique data queries; no personal software search program needed!
This new release includes:
-new data on beef and lamb cuts trimmed to 1/8" external fat,
-updated values for breakfast cereals,
-new food items such as infant formulas, brand name candies and ethnic foods,
-and new sodium values for canned vegetables and soups.
The Nutrient Data Laboratory is the recognized source of authoritative U.S. food composition data. USDA nutrient data serves as the core for most commercial and many foreign databases.
Questions regarding electronic access? Contact the Nutrient Data Laboratory; U.S. Department of Agriculture; 4700 River Road, Unit #89; Agricultural Research Service; Riverdale, Maryland 20737
Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center 301-734-8491 / Fax: 301-734-5643
Nutrient Data Laboratory e-mail: ndlinfo@rbhnrc.usda.gov
USDA's Animal Care Goes Online
From: FSnet Oct. 22/96 (from a USDA press release)
RIVERDALE, Md., --The U.S. Department of Agriculture's animal care program now has a home on the internet.
"The new website is a step in the right direction," said Michael V. Dunn, USDA assistant secretary for marketing and regulatory programs. "Now, we can make large amounts of important information available to the public with the push of a button."
"Animal care is jumping feet first into the 21st century," said Dale F.Schwindaman, deputy administrator for animal care with the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, a part of USDA's marketing and regulatory programs mission area. "Our new website will open lines of communications between concerned organizations and individuals worldwide."
The AC homepage, found at www.aphis.usda.gov:80/reac, contains announcements, missing and found animal lists, annual enforcement reports, lists, factsheets, press releases, congressional bills, and links to similar sights.
The AC homepage also contains a link to the Horse Protection Act homepage. The HPA site contains a list of suspended designated qualified persons, the HPA fiscal year 1995 enforcement report, horse owner and protection organization, and general information concerning the HPA.
Online Journal of Veterinary Research
From: newjour-digest@ccat.sas.upenn.edu
This electronic journal will be published three times a year and will include full-text orginal research articles. The journal will focus primarily on comparative pathobiology, pharmacology-pharmacokinetics, toxicology and parasitology. These subjects are inter-related and basic mechanisms of pathological processes, disposition of toxins and drugs in normal and pathological processes, would be considered well within the parameters of the Online Journal of Veterinary Research (OJVR). The journal will focus on original research work either as full text reports or as short communications and will also publish review articles. OJVR will post the relevant key words of articles throughout the World Wide Web.
Editor: V.H. Guerrini
MDINFO - New Medical Informatics Discussion
List
From: asaguiar@opus.com.br
(Alexandre Aguiar)
MDINFO on MAISER@usa.net Medical Informatics
MDInfo is an open, 'almost' unmoderated discussion list on Medical Informatics topics. The moderator will only appear in case of illegal actions in the list.
To subscribe, send the following command in the BODY of mail to
subscribe mdinfo
Owner: Alexandre Aguiar asaguiar@opus.com.br
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/aguiar/
Call for Papers - Special Issue of AI in Medicine
Journal
From: M.Ramoni@open.ac.uk (Marco Ramoni)
Special Issue of Artificial Intelligence in Medicine - Distributed Artificial Intelligence in Medicine over the World Wide Web
Call for Papers
It is hard to believe that, less than five years ago, the World Wide Web (WWW) did not even exist. In such a short time, the WWW has dramatically changed the way in which knowledge is produced, delivered, used and - most of all - regarded. Artificial Intelligence (AI) could not be left aside by this revolution: several efforts have been undertaken to explore the opportunities and accept the challenges offered by the WWW revolution. Medical applications have always played a leading role in the development of AI research and it is therefore not surprising that some of the pioneering efforts to exploit the potential of the WWW for AI research are coming from the Artificial Intelligence in Medicine community. Time is now up for a check point.
The Artificial Intelligence in Medicine Journal invites submissions to a special issue devoted to Distributed Artificial Intelligence in Medicine over the World Wide Web. The aim of this special issue is to summarize the current state of the art in the field in order to provide future reference and a firmer ground for further developments: we want the issue to be an up-to-date and authoritative source of information about the main results achieved so far in the field.
The issue will include papers investigating aspects of the enabling potential of the WWW to support the development of distributed AI applications in Medicine, such as:
o Distributed AI architectures in medicine over the WWW.
o Interaction, integration, and negotiation of AI applications over the WWW.
o Distributed access to medical knowledge and data bases.
o Intelligent medical terminology servers over the WWW.
o Agent-based medical applications using the WWW.
o Distributed medical reasoning systems over the WWW.
o Distributed medical ontologies over the WWW.
Papers addressing broad interest methodological issues - supported by at least proof-of-concept applications - and papers describing cutting-edge applications with highly innovative content are especially welcome. Manuscripts will be evaluated by originality, technical quality and clarity of presentation by at least two independent referees who are authorities in the field.
Papers should be submitted by March 30th, 1997 in one of the following
ways:
Surface Mail: Send 5 (five) copies of the manuscript to the guest editor
at address below.
Electronic Mail: Send an electronic version to M.Ramoni@open.ac.uk.
Ftp: Upload an electronic version to:
ftp://kmi.open.ac.uk/pub/marco/projects/wai/aimj/submissions
Login as ftp using your email address as password. Then, notify your submission via email to the guest editor at the address below.
Electronic versions of papers can be submitted in any format, including LATEX, Postscript, MSWord, RTF, and should be preferably compressed in .Z, .zip, or .gz format. If you submit a compressed file via Electronic Mail, be sure to uuencode it for proper transmission.
Prospective authors are strongly encouraged to contact the guest editor at:
Marco Ramoni; Knowledge Media Institute; The Open University; Walton
Hall, Milton Keynes; United Kingdom MK7 6AA
Phone: +44 (1908) 655721; Fax: +44 (1908) 653169; Email: M.Ramoni@open.ac.uk
Important dates are:
March 30th, 1997: Submission of full paper.
July 15th, 1997: Notification of acceptance or rejection.
September 15th, 1997: Submission of final manuscript.
The Special Issue is expected to appear by mid 1998. Until the publication of the Special Issue, a WWW site will report information about the submission, review, and publication process at:
Guidelines for the preparation of manuscripts are available from the WWW site or from the guest editor.
Prodigy Reinvents Itself as Web Service
From: Edupage, 17 October 1996
Prodigy Inc. has decided what it wants to be when it grows up -- another Internet service provider. The company is scrapping its proprietary online service and relaunching itself as a route to the World Wide Web. "As of today, we are a new animal. We are a value-added Internet service and no longer an online service," says Prodigy's chairman. The company plans a $100 million ad campaign over the next year to build its new image. (Wall Street Journal 17 Oct 96 B11)
Look Down at Your Computer
Edupage, 8 August 1996
Health writer Jane Brody says you should position your computer so that the center of the screen is four to nine inches below eye level and a little farther away than the normal reading distance, and should keep reference material close to the screen, perhaps on a screen mount. Wipe the screen often with an antistatic cloth; minimize glare on the screen; and reduce the brightness of the room lighting or use a three-sided computer or filter. (New York Times 7 Aug 96 B6)
First Int'l Virtual Conference on Infectious Diseases of Animals
A World Wide Web based scientific conference will be held April 20 to May 2, 1997 through the home page of the National Animal Disease Center, USDA-ARS, Ames, Iowa, USA. The goal of this conference is to improve international collaboration and communication among researchers of infectious diseases of animals. For more information visit our Web site at...
Online Training Poised for a Boost
From: "EDUCOM Edupage Mailing List" <edupage@elanor.oit.unc.edu>
As the costs of bricks-and-mortar-based learning experiences skyrocket, companies increasingly are turning to technology to deliver training and education. Quality Dynamics Inc. predicts that by the year 2000, half of all corporate training will be delivered via technology. A separate study by the Gartner Group projects the demand for technology-based training rising 10% a year for the next two years, to $12 billion. "Corporate America spends $50 billion a year on continuing education to improve their employees' skill sets and retrain them to deal with the rapid pace of change in the workplace," says the CEO of The Home Education Network, affiliated with UCLA. "More and more of that funding is going to go into distance learning." (Information Week 4 Nov 96 p32)
See the informatics section of NetVet for a more complete and current list of informatics-related activities at <http://netvet.wustl.edu/info.htm>
January 18-22, 1997
Classification and Concepts Conference; Jacksonville,
FL
The International Medical Informatics Association is sponsoring its Fourth International Conference on Medical Concept Representation in Jacksonville Florida, during January, 1997. Following the traditions of Ottowa 1984, Geneva 1988, and Vevey 1994, the conference will represent the state of the art thinking and developments in healthcare classification, terminology models, cognitive evaluations of interfaces and term navigation, and medical language processing. The conference will be held at the Ponte Vedra Inn & Club, along the Atlantic coast of Florida just below Jacksonville. It will run Sunday, January 18, 1997 through Wednesday, January 22. Meeting details and registration are available at:
Speakers are by invitation only. Participating observers are strictly limited to 75, on a first come, first serve basis.
We expect the final proceedings to be published as either a monograph (as in '84 and '88) or a special journal issue ('94). The program committee is: Christopher G. Chute, USA, Chair; Robert Baud, Switzerland, for Natural Language Processing; James Cimino, USA, for Clinical Classifications; Vimla Patel, Canada, for Cognitive Evaluation; and Alan Rector, UK, for Terminology Models. Professor J. R. Scherrer, Geneva, will keynote the conference. Dr. Edward Sondik, new director of the National Center for Health Statistics in Washington, has been invited to deliver the dinner address.
The conference secretariat is:
Karen Elias; Department of Health Sciences Res.; 200 First Street, HA
675; Mayo Foundation; Rochester, MN 55905, USA
Tel: 507 284 5541; Fax: +1 507 284 1516; Email: elias@mayo.edu
April 20 - May 2, 1997
First International Virtual Conference on Infectious
Diseases of Animals
A World Wide Web based scientific conference to be held through the home page of the National Animal Disease Center, USDA-ARS, Ames, Iowa, USA. The goal of this conference is to improve international collaboration and communication among researchers of infectious diseases of animals. Format will include both Abstract Displays and Poster Presentations. For additional information visit our Web site --
April 23-25, 1997
1997 Computers in Healthcare Education Symposium;
Philadelphia, PA
(See the July-August, 1996 AVI Newsletter for details)
September 10-14, 1997
Veterinary Informatics at the 5th World Equine Veterinary
Association; Padova, Italy
(See the July-August, 1996 AVI Newsletter for details)
Veterinary Technology Distance Education Program
From: "Hancock.Guy" <hancockg@EMAIL.SPJC.CC.FL.US>
I am pleased announce the Web site for the Veterinary Technology Program and Veterinary Technology Distance Education Program of St. Petersburg Junior College.
The Health Education Center web site is at:
The Veterinary Technology Program pages are at:
And the Distance Education Program page is at:
We offer the Associate in Science Degree in Veterinary Technology by distance education to students who work for veterinarians. The major method of communication is America Online and the Veterinary Information Network. The Distance Program received provisional accreditation from the AVMA Committee on Veterinary Technician Education and Activities in November of 1995. Graduates of the distance program will be eligible for licensure or certification by their state. There are 52 students enrolled at present, from Florida and four other states. Thank you for your interest and support of the Program.
Guy Hancock, DVM; Veterinary Technology Program Director; St. Petersburg
Junior College
P. O. Box 13489; St. Petersburg, FL 33733
813-341-3653
hancockg@email.spjc.cc.fl.us
University of Pittsburgh Medical Informatics Training Program
The University of Pittsburgh expects to have openings for up to five funded predoctoral and postdoctoral informatics traineeships beginning in the summer of 1997. The Pittsburgh Training Program has a core and affiliated faculty numbering over 50, with expertise in:
* Decision support and medical artificial intelligence
* Computer-based medical records
* Computational biology
* Clinical multimedia, telemedicine, and medical applications of the Internet
* Education, information, and cognition
* Health services research and information system evaluation
* Dental informatics (in collaboration with Temple University)
Trainees may enroll for masters or doctoral degrees in the Intelligent Systems Program, the School of Information Sciences, the School of Public Health, or other degree-granting programs as directed by their individual interests. The program admits individuals with and without health professions training. Research fellowship training experiences that do not lead to academic degrees may also be arranged.
The training program has become part of the new Center for Biomedical Informatics at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and is situated in new space dedicated to the program.
The target date for receiving applications is February 1, 1997. Interested individuals are invited to visit the program's web site at http://www.cbmi.upmc.edu
Send e-mail to training@cbmi.upmc.edu, or call (412) 647-7113 for further information.
Columbia University Medical Informatics Training Program
Postdoctoral Training Program in Medical Informatics
Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons
Department of Medical Informatics
The Columbia University Department of Medical Informatics invites applications for fellowships in medical informatics starting in July, 1997. The goal of the program is to train medical informatics scientists for careers as productive researchers and teachers. The fellowship is funded by the National Library of Medicine, an agency of the National Institutes of Health, and is open to U.S. citizens or permanent residents with an M.D. Ph.D., or other appropriate doctoral-level degree. The Department is located at the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City. Columbia University is an equal opportunity employer and takes affirmative action. Women and minorities are especially encouraged to apply.
The Department of Medical Informatics has seventeen faculty members with diverse backgrounds and an active research program. Areas of special interest include clinical information system development, clinical decision support, computer and network-based curriculum design and delivery, database design, natural language processing, medical vocabularies, medical knowledge representation, information retrieval strategies, physician data entry, genome mapping, molecular modeling, and high performance computing and communication. The Department has close ties and joint appointments with the Departments of Computer Science, Biochemistry, Medicine, Radiology, and Pathology and the Schools of Dentistry, Nursing and Public Health. Opportunities also exist in the areas of computer applications in medical librarianship and computer aided learning. A particular strength of the Department is the ability to provide research opportunities in the context of working production systems. We are seeking applicants who want a "hands on" experience while carrying out innovative research and mastering a strong curriculum.
Notable features of our environment include the Integrated Academic Information Management System (IAIMS) Phase III implementation funded by the National Library of Medicine, the full partnership of the Columbia University Office of Scholarly Resources in IAIMS and in the Department of Medical Informatics, responsibility for the clinical information systems at Presbyterian Hospital, and close collaborative relationships with basic and clinical science departments.
The training program includes a stipend and tuition support for course work in medical informatics, computer science, evaluation study design, and biostatistics. Educational programs will be individualized to address the needs and interests of each fellow. In addition, each fellow will be expected to develop, conduct, and report on an original research project. Opportunities exist for a masters degree in Medical Informatics. Support for each fellow will be for three years in most cases. Stipend levels are in keeping with NIH post-doctoral guidelines. Fellows who wish to maintain their clinical skills will be given opportunities to do so.
Applicants should send a letter of not more than two pages describing their background, relevant experience, and motivation; transcripts from medical or graduate school and from college; and a curriculum vita. Letters of reference from three referees should be sent directly by the referees. All materials must be received no later than January 1; acceptance decisions will be made by March 1.
Application materials should be sent to:
James J. Cimino, M.D.; Atchley Pavilion 1310; 161 Fort Washington Avenue; New York, NY 10032.
Additional information may be obtained by calling Dr. Cimino at 212-305-8127
or by e-mail to James.Cimino@columbia.edu.
More information about the Department and it's programs can be found at:
Fellowships in Pubic Health Informatics at CDC
Two year fellowships in public health informatics are competitively available to candidates with either a) a public health background and a strong interest and/or experience in computer systems or b) prior training and/or experience in informatics and an interest in applying that knowledge in the public health arena. A master's degree (or doctorate) in a relevant discipline is required.
Further information is available at
For application materials, please write:
Cheryl Guthrie; Postgraduate Research Program - CDC; Education and Training
Division; Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education; P.O. Box 117; Oak
Ridge, TN 37831-0117
(423) 576-8503
CDC Contact:
Division of Public Health Surveillance and Informatics; Epidemiology
Program Office; MS C-08; 1600 Clifton Road NE; Atlanta, GA 30333
(404) 639-3761; soib@epo.em.cdc.gov
Please forward this message to anyone else who might be interested. If you received this message as a forwarded message and would like to be placed on our e-mail list for future updates, please write to soib@epo.em.cdc.gov
S.W.J. Reid, D.J. Mellor, T. Irwin, S. Love and G. Gettinby. 1996. A hypertext knowledge base medium for the delivery of epidemiological models and expert systems. Preventive Veterinary Medicine. Vol. 26, No. 2:97.
The Top 20 Reasons Dogs Don't Use Computers
From: LKFrank@aol.com
20. Can't stick their heads out of Windows '95.
19. Fetch command not available on all platforms.
18. Hard to read the monitor with your head cocked to one side.
17. Too difficult to "mark" every website they visit.
16. Can't help attacking the screen when they hear "You've Got Mail."
15. Fire hydrant icon simply frustrating.
14. Involuntary tail wagging is dead giveaway they're browsing <www.pethouse.com>
instead of working.
13. Keep bruising noses trying to catch that MPEG frisbee.
12. Not at all fooled by Chuckwagon Screen Saver.
11. Still trying to come up with an "emoticon" that signifies
tail-wagging.
10. Oh, but they WILL... with the introduction of the Microsoft Opposable
Thumb.
9. Three words: Carpal Paw Syndrome
8. 'Cause dogs ain't GEEKS! Now, cats, on the other hand...
7. Barking in next cube keeps activating YOUR voice recognition software.
6. SmellU-SmellMe still in beta test.
5. SIT and STAY were hard enough, GREP and AWK are out of the question.
4. Saliva-coated mouse gets mighty difficult to manuever.
3. Annoyed by lack of newsgroup, alt.pictures.master's.leg.
2. Butt-sniffing more direct and less deceiving than online chat rooms.
and the Number 1 Reason Dogs Don't Use Computers...
1. TrO{gO DsA mM,bN HyAqR4tDc TgrOo TgYPmE WeIjTyH P;AzWqS,. *
Q: How many Windows programmers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: 472. One to write WinGetLightBulbHandle, one to write WinQueryStatusLightBulb,
one to write WinGetLightSwitchHandle,...
Q: How many managers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: We've formed a task force to study the problem of why light bulbs burn
out, and figure out what, exactly, we as supervisors can do to make the
bulbs work smarter, not harder.
Q: How many MIS guys does it take to change a light bulb?
A: MIS has received your request concerning your hardware problem, and has
assigned your request Service Number 39712. Please use this number for any
future reference to this light bulb issue. As soon as a technician becomes
available, you will be contacted.
Q: How many WordPerfect support technicians does it take to change a light bulb?
A: We have an exact copy of the light bulb here, and it seems to be working fine. Can you tell me what kind of system you have? OK. Now, exactly how dark is it? OK, there could be four or five things wrong...have you tried the light switch?
Q: How many Microsoft technicians does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three. Two holding the ladder and one to screw the light bulb into a
faucet.
Q: How many Microsoft Vice Presidents does it take to change a light
bulb?
A: Eight. One to change the bulb, and seven to make sure Microsoft gets
$2.00 for every light bulb ever changed anywhere in the world.
Q: How many software testers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: We just noticed the room was dark; we don't actually fix the problems.
Q: How many software developers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: The light bulb works fine on the system in my office....
Q: How many C++ programmers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: You're still thinking procedurally. A properly designed light bulb object
would inherit a change method from a generic bulb class, so all you'd have
to do is send a light bulb change message.
Q: How long does it take for a DEC repairman to change a light bulb?
A: It depends on how many burned out bulbs he brought with him.
Q: How many Windows users does it take to change a light bulb?
A: One, but he'll swear up and down that it was JUST as easy for him as
it would have been for a MacIntosh user.
Q: How many Apple Newtons does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Foux! There to eat lemons, axe gravy soup.
Q: How many Microsoft engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None, Bill Gates will just redefine Darkness (TM) as the new industry
standard.