* Redesign and expansion of the Penn Web, an on-line repository of University information and services. From the "Home Page," (http://www. upenn.edu), members of the Penn community and others on the Internet can access University policies, directories, library resources, course materials, a new integrated calendar, departmental and personal home pages, and more. The recommended graphical "browser" software for Macintoshes, Windows PCs, and X-Windows is Netscape, available free for educational use. The Penn Web is also accessible via telnet, albeit in text-only format.
* Phase out of PennInfo and Gopher as supported information access tools. Residual information in PennInfo or Gopher databases is available via the Penn Web. Public kiosks* formerly providing access to PennInfo will be converted to Web access.
* Expansion of the remote access modem pool to 420 lines, reconfigured into three separate pools: (1) the familiar 14.4 Kbps modem pool (215 898-0834) still supports both command line and SLIP/PPP access; (2) the new 28.8 Kbps pool (215 573-4PPP) supports only PPP; (3) and New Bolton Center's new 14.4 Kbps service supports command line and SLIP/PPP access. All three modem pools require a PennNet ID and password.
* Integration of PennNet ID name assignment with the major e-mail systems on campus (MAIL.SAS, ENIAC.SEAS, MAIL.MED, WHARTON, DOLPHIN, POBOX, and others) to ensure that all new IDS will be unique across campus. A process will be announced later to resolve existing userID conflicts.
* Addition of 1,300 new ResNet (PennNet Ethernet, voice, and video) connections in Dubois, Hill, Mayer, Stouffer, and Van Pelt Houses.
* Support for IPX protocol routing to most buildings (subnets) on campus, to facilitate access to remote Novell Netware servers.
* Support for PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol) for Macintoshes.
* Upgrading Penn's Internet gateway bandwidth from 4 megabits per second to 10 Mbps.
* Consolidation of the former PennNet and Computing Resource Center help lines into ISC First Call, (215 573-4778 or F-IRST; help@isc).
More information is available in the third edition of PennNet Passport, for sale in the Bookstore, as well as on the Penn Web (http://www.upenn.edu/computing/).
-- Daniel A. Updegrove
Associate Vice Provost
Information Systems and Computing