Newsgroups: bit.listserv.cdromlan
Date:         Thu, 7 Jan 1993 14:39:03 -0800
              <CDROMLAN@IDBSU.BITNET>
From:         meb@APPLE.COM
Subject:      Networking Macintosh CD-ROMs

I have refrained from commenting on the Mac vs. IBM discussion on this
listserv because I work as a librarian for the Apple Library and I feel
that my comments might be interpreted as totally partial to the Mac
platform.  So, I won't engage in a discussion of the benefits of one
platform over another, but I want to correct a misconception which seems to
be rampant in the library community.

Contrary to popular belief, there are many CD-ROM titles for the Macintosh,
both bibliographic and otherwise. I have witnessed misinformation on this
topic presented at conferences (the recent Online conference and past ALA
conferences) and in electronic form on this listserv (posting of Howard
Pasternack of 12/17/92).

I simply want to correct this information for accuracy's sake and I hope
this posting is viewed in that vein. Admittedly, there are not as many
CD-ROM titles for the Mac as for the DOS platform but this arena is
changing pretty quickly.  On 12/17/92, Mr. Pasternack posted this message
on CDROMLAN:

<<Since this list is about networking CD ROMs, let's be up front and admit
that at present networking bibliographic CD ROMs is pretty much of a DOS
game.  While things may change, most CD vendors with the notable exception
of SilverPlatter do not provide software for the Mac.  And even
SilverPlatter's Mac software is not multi-user.>>

We are running a large AppleShare CD-ROM network here at Apple Computer and
have been networking Mac CD-ROMproducts since 1989, when we first networked
Silver Platter products.  There are networkable CD-ROM products for the
Mac, including bibliographic ones.  These have been slower to be developed
and the selection for the Mac is more limited than for the DOS platform.
Many CD-ROM publishers have not really marketed their Mac products much at
all.  They sometimes don't even have them on display at conferences, even
when they are available.  So, there is a misconception about what really is
available for the Mac. In the last 1-1.5 years the offerings have really
improved.  Dialog, SilverPlatter and Disclosure all offer networkable
products for the Mac.  Dialog and SilverPlatter offer almost all their
titles on the Mac platform.  Ziff will be bringing out Computer Select for
the Macintosh soon.  We are currently beta testing this on a network and it
is working fine.

We are networking 9 titles from these publishers as well as other titles
from smaller publishers, such as the Boston Computer Society:

These are the Dialog OnDisc products we network:
ERIC
San Jose Mercury News (full-text)
Compendex
Standard & Poor's

Disclosure, Inc. product:
Compact D/SEC

SilverPlatter products:
OSH-ROM (SilverPlatter's Occupational Safety & Health databases)
MEDLINE
PsycLIT

Ziff product:
Computer Select (still beta)

We have these CD-ROMs mounted on servers (Mac IIci's and a few Mac II's)
and connected to the WAN at Apple.  Currently, about  8,000 employees can
access these titles directly from the server and search them on their
desktop.  In addition, many other employees can search the CD-ROMs with
remote, dial-in access.

How is this implemented? We have fileservers (MacII ci's) running System
7.0 with CD-ROM drives hooked up to them as SCSI devices.  The CD-ROM
drives are daisy chained together and connected to the server.  You can
have up to 6 cd-rom drives connected to a server.  We use Ethernet
connections and AppleShare 3.0 and it takes us approximately 1.5 hours to
install a CD-ROM server.

Each server has 8 megabytes of RAM. This would be what I would suggest, so
that you can run the AppleShare 3.0 Administrator software.  We have run
servers with as little as 4 mgs. but you have to turn off the AppleShare
File Server software in order to run the AppleShare 3.0 Administrator
software and this is inconvenient.

 In all cases, the employee at the remote site downloads the application
software to their hard disk from the server.  They then mount the CD-ROMs
which appear as volumes on their desktop.  They launch the application
software from their own computer and the data is accessed over the net on
the CD-ROM.  Here I want to mention that Mr. Pasternack is technically
correct that the SilverPlatter and Dialog OnDisc software is not
multi-user.  The application must be launched from the user's local
computer.  We cleared this method of implementation with the CD-ROM vendors
before we did this and they had no problem with multiple copies of their
software residing on local computers.  What they are very careful about is
the number of concurrent users searching the CD-ROMs, and AppleShare 3.0
allows you to limit the number of users on a server.

We have multi-user licenses for 2-10 users and that has been fine.  The
performance of the network has been excellent.  The access and data
transfer speeds are quite good.  I hope this helps explain that it is not
only possible, it is also easy to network CD-ROM products on an AppleShare
network.  I realize the implementation we use will not work for many
computer sites for various reasons.   The main point I want to make is that
networking CD-ROM with Macintosh is not only possible, it is being done.

If anyone would like more information about this, I am more than happy to
e-mail you or talk with you on the phone.  Please contact me.

Mary Ellen Bercik
Supervisor, Reference and Network
Apple Computer, Inc.
Apple Library
10381 Bandley Dr., MS 8-C
Cupertino, CA 95014
(408) 974-3058
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU