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Date: Wed, 21 Feb 1996 13:25:15 -0600
Reply-To: H-NET LIST FOR MULTIMEDIA AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN HUMANITIES TEACHING
Sender: H-NET LIST FOR MULTIMEDIA AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN HUMANITIES TEACHING
From: "John F. Reynolds"
Subject: Re: Dissertations on Cd-rom (long reply)
Comments: To: Kersti Krug
Comments: cc: "William E. Grant"
To: Multiple recipients of list H-MMEDIA
In-Reply-To:
Status: RO
> This is in response to your question about who out
here is actively > working on CD-ROM dissertations.
>
> I'm an interdisciplinary doctoral student at The University of British
> Columbia and the first student at UBC and across Canada permitted to
> produce a dissertation entirely in electronic form (hypermedia). I'm
> currently preparing my proposal (also entirely in hypermedia) for defense
> in spring, and should complete my dissertation a year later. My research
> question is: Can hypermedia technology help us to wrote about
> organizational cultures in a way that acknowledges the complexities and
> uncertainties inherent in such studies, and what are the intended and
> unintended implications of using this technology in human science
> research? I'm conducting an ethnography of one organization, using text,
> audio, and video to compile my dissertation.
>
> Over the past year, I've been exploring how I, my readers, and libraries
> can cope with this new medium. The big issues I had to resolve were the
> following: * finding the simplest possible compiling/linking software
> which would allow most of the content to be created in word processing
> programs with which I and the majority of scholars are familiar (as I and
> most academics have PCs, I wanted to stick to this platform); * finding a
> software that could be read by either Macs or IBMs and that didn't require
> paying for reading versions in addition to authoring versions; * finding
> software that readers could annotate (dissertation committee members could
> hardly be expected to make notes on paper then try to figure out where
> they were when they had those thoughts); * finding hardware to transport
> huge networks of files (my thesis will run to 100 mgs) from the author's
> computer to those of all readers (in my case, up to 9 people); * finding
> transporting hardware that works on both platforms, doesn't require
> readers to have anything beyond mainstream computer configurations, and
> allows me to also back up my work; and * in the end, deciding on what to
> turn over to the library for easiest access by their readers.
>
> To be more specific, I'm doing all my compiling of text, graphics, audio,
> and video in WordPerfect for Windows 6.1. My compiling software is
> Novell/WordPerfect's Envoy (same as Adobe Acrobat in that it produces
> hypertext links, then "prints" the network to anyone's screen, but Envoy
> is cheaper and doesn't charge extra for reader software). My
> transportation/backup hardware is a ZipDrive which uses a computer's
> parallel port for entry (requiring conversion cables for Macs which don't
> have parallel ports) and stores data on read/write floppy zip disks. And,
> though I'm not yet at that point, I'll be converting the final defended,
> corrected, blessed dissertation to CD-ROM for submission to the library.
>
> In the process of seeking solutions to all these requirements, I found
> that an unexpectedly huge number of hypertext/hypermedia users are
> choosing special software, often with very high learning curves and
> marginal combatibility with the already powerful word processing software
> we're all using. This makes the transfer of hypermedia dissertation
> "drafts" to readers difficult and expensive, and significantly slows the
> progress of doctoral research conducted in hypermedia. My goal has been
> to keep it simple, familiar, and cheap.
>
> Because my doctoral committee is drawn from different disciplines (and
> because all people have different comfort levels with computers), mine is
> a particularly rich and perhaps useful learning experience (we have lively
> discussions about "standards"), though the actual readings haven't yet
> occurred. If you like, I'd be happy to keep you informed of my progress
> -- and perhaps invite my advisor (who passed this message on to me) and
> other committee members to comment. Let me know.
>
> Kersti Krug
> The University of British Columbia
>
> PS: I should tell you that when Grad.Studies was considering my case, one
> committee members was reported to have said that the only reason I must be
> asking to do this was to avoid work (!!!). Perhaps because I was one of
> the first in the social sciences to venture in this particular direction
> and therefore had to not only answer questions but ask them as well, I
> conclude that hypermedia has added about a year to my PhD timetable.
>
>
> > x HUMANIST From: "William E. Grant"
> >
> > Is anyone on this list involved in, giving thought to, or
> > actively working on CD ROM dissertations. University Microfilms
> > Inc will begin this spring to accept dissertations in electronic
> > format. Here at Bowling Green State University we have approved
> > a student proposal for a multi-media dissertation on CD ROM. I
> > understand a couple of other graduate schools are at the same
> > point. I would be interested in hearing from anyone who has
> > opinions on opportunities and problems that are likely to result
> > from this innovation. Particularly I would like to hear from
> > anyone actually directing or doing a CD ROM diss, or anyone
> > involved in developing standards for CD ROM submissions.
> >
> >
>
