EI VILLAGE IN AFRICA - TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER & CUSTOMIZATION: A Joint CSIR & Engineering Information Inc. Project

Stephanie Townsend
Rosemary McGillivray

CSIR Information Services
Pretoria, South Africa
E-mail: stownsen@csir.co.za
E-mail: rmcgilli@csir.co.za

Engineering Information (Ei) Village is an integrated service offering a pathway to premium scientific and technical sources of information for engineers, news and business information relating to engineering - using the Internet and World Wide Web technology. Ei Village is also a community designed to promote cooperation and communication between engineers. The service was designed by Engineering Information Inc, the primary provider of information to this market sector. CSIR have set up a mirror site for the service and will be adding South African content and service suppliers to customize it for the South African engineering community. The project provides an interesting model for cooperation and customization 1. INTRODUCTION

Ei Village Africa is the joint venture project between CSIR Information Services and Engineering Information Inc. Some of you will no doubt already know about this project which was launched last year in America - I want to talk about it in the context of a sophisticated targeted Internet service from a first world country which lends itself very well to translation here in South Africa and indeed into the rest of Africa. To understand the issues which need to be addressed let us define the environment into which the translation of the service must happen.

2. AFRICAN INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT

The problems to be addressed in making information available in South Africa are probably common to all of us from Africa and maybe to some from other countries too. They are:

• telecommunications problems - problems of reliability and availability or accessibility, making it difficult to network to international information resources

• weak local currency problems - these mean that paying in a foreign currency for information makes it complicated and relatively expensive

• the lack of local information in international resources means that appropriate information solutions are often difficult to find

• local clients seek local support and this is often not available from overseas services

 
  So in importing an international information service we seek to: • address telecommunication issues

• provide local content to complement the international offering

• provide local support and account management

• allow payment in own currency rather than in foreign currency

  3. Ei VILLAGE

3.1. What Is Ei Village?

Ei Village is an integrated pathway to news, business and technical information for the engineer using the Internet and World Wide Web technology. It is also a community, a cyber village designed to promote communication, productivity, information sharing and problem solving amongst the engineering fraternity. Designed by Engineering information Inc, the service was launched last year and provides a meeting place for professional engineers and practitioners across the entire range of engineering disciplines. Ei Village in Africa is the first mirror site of this service to be set up.

3.2. What Is the Structure of Ei Village?

Here is the first page of the village as visitors or residents enter and it offers an overview of the services, community and information available in the village. The buildings represent connec-tions or links onwards.

• The Chamber of Commerce - telling you what is available

• The Research and Industrial Park - technical information from diverse sources and arranged by engineering discipline or industry

• The Library - access to actual libraries on the Web and databases worldwide including Ei Connexion, a family of Online databases including Compendex Plus

• Travel Service - Ei Village guide book and Ei Village Directory, city and country guides and hotel information and plane tickets etc.

• Government Center - Professional and business information from governments worldwide

• Business and Financial District - corporate Web sites of value to engineers

• Ei Offices - to learn more about Ei products and services

• News and Weather Bureau - updates of daily AP and Reuters news service stories with a focus on technology and industry

• Career and Education Campus - direct access to over 1000 colleges and universities with engineering programs

• Shopping Mart - shopping mail services

• Entertainment Arcade - educational and fun things to do.

 
  Within these categories are services which are not available elsewhere on the Internet. These include:

Technical update services:

• Ei Spotlights - weekly updates in over 150 engineering topics - free

• Ei Tech Alerts - to set up your own customized alert service from Compendex and the news services - free

 Other supporting services: • A document delivery service for getting full text articles electronically

• Other articles on call - specially chosen and available for quick delivery

• Editors choices - the best web sites chosen by the Ei Editors

• Ask your librarian - to help you navigate within Ei Village
 

  Community • Ask your peers - focused discussion groups and forums in all Engineering disciplines and industries

• Senior Village Engineers - experienced engineers available for brief consultations.

 4. HOW DOES THE MIRROR SITE WORK?

A mirror site is very much a cooperative business partnership with the ultimate goal of information sharing in two directions where appropriate. Installation of the service is happening in two phases. In the first phase just the static pages of the service are installed on our local server. In the second phase customization happens through the addition of local information resources and services and community links. The rules which determine what lies on which server are as follows:

Service aspects which are held on the local server are:

• graphics intensive and slow to download

• are provided by the local business partner

• are specific to the country of the mirror site

• depend upon local support

Items which remain on the overseas server are those which : • change frequently

• are storage intensive

• depend upon international support

 For such services clients in South Africa are linked transparently to the international server via the Internet. We recently completed the first phase of the installation which is the service as it exists in America today. Second phase of the mirror project is the customization to tailor that unique combination of local content complemented by international offerings.

5. WHAT SERVICES WILL BE CUSTOMIZED?

In Phase II the following services will be customized:

• Senior Village Engineers

• Ask your librarian

• Ask your peers

• Document Supply

 Links will be built from these to local engineering information sources.
Ei village is a service which engineers will be able to access through the CSIR Worldnet Africa Service or via any other Internet Service provider.

6. SERVICES INTO OTHER AFRICAN COUNTRIES

Worldnet Africa is a Internet service which CSIR is taking into some other African countries. Thus we already have relationships in Botswana, Swaziland, Mauritius, Kenya and hence the potential to distribute there as well. The model lends itself to either a brokerage application or a fully distributed service.

The service provides an interesting model for cooperation between first world and developing nations for information and resource sharing in which the best of both worlds are integrated into a focused service.