Course Catalog Computerized

A computerized University-wide course catalog will be available to students this fall for the first time in Harvard's history, school officials said yesterday.

While the course catalog for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences has been available on computer disks for the past few years, the new catalog will contain course listings from every faculty and will be available over the computer network, according to Provost Jerry R. Green, who has helped to put the project together.

The new catalog, which will list between 3000 and 4000 courses, was designed by the Office of Information Technology, the University Library and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

"This was one of the first projects I started when I became provost--I probably spoke to the registrars about this last October," he said. "I'm just waiting for a demonstration myself, but I'm very enthusiastic about this."

While one prototype for the system was slated to run through HOLLIS, the catalog will run through a new system called GOPHER which was developed at the University of Minnesota, Green said.

GOPHER, which Green described as faster and more powerful than the HOLLIS system, will be accessible to anyone with access to the Harvard system within the University or through the network, said Office of Information Technology Project Manager Amy K. Lozano, who was heavily involved in structuring the new catalog.

"You can log onto your Harvard account on one of the Harvard systems and type in 'gopher,'" she said. "Then you use the series of menus just to navigate through the Internet through anywhere in the nation."

Lozano said that other University systems, including the Veritas Information Network (VINE), will probably eventually be put onto GOPHER for more sophisticated use.

The only software that will be needed for the course catalog would be that necessary to connect to HOLLIS, and any connection software needed will be provided free to students.

Once installed, GOPHER will allow user to do keyword searches of the course catalog much like the ones possible on HOLLIS.

Students can type in a keyword denoting a subject that interests them and get a list of all courses relating to that topic.

The on-line nature of the catalog will also allow for updating as needed, which Green said was one of his priorities.

"There are a lot of changes...made in the course catalog," he said. "Every year, a supplement is issued and the course catalog really needs to be updated much more frequently. Certainly by the spring term it's out of date."

Lozano said that all of the faculties should have their courses included for use in the catalog by the end of August or beginning of September except for the Law School, which is doing some course reformatting.

The new catalog could also be used to help students make scheduling decisions earlier.

"One of the reason, I pushed so hard on this project is that I'm hoping that students can use this to plan their program over the summer, even in advance," Green said

"You can log onto your Harvard account on one of the Harvard systems and type in 'gopher,'" she said. "Then you use the series of menus just to navigate through the Internet through anywhere in the nation."

Lozano said that other University systems, including the Veritas Information Network (VINE), will probably eventually be put onto GOPHER for more sophisticated use.

The only software that will be needed for the course catalog would be that necessary to connect to HOLLIS, and any connection software needed will be provided free to students.

Once installed, GOPHER will allow user to do keyword searches of the course catalog much like the ones possible on HOLLIS.

Students can type in a keyword denoting a subject that interests them and get a list of all courses relating to that topic.

The on-line nature of the catalog will also allow for updating as needed, which Green said was one of his priorities.

"There are a lot of changes...made in the course catalog," he said. "Every year, a supplement is issued and the course catalog really needs to be updated much more frequently. Certainly by the spring term it's out of date."

Lozano said that all of the faculties should have their courses included for use in the catalog by the end of August or beginning of September except for the Law School, which is doing some course reformatting.

The new catalog could also be used to help students make scheduling decisions earlier.

"One of the reason, I pushed so hard on this project is that I'm hoping that students can use this to plan their program over the summer, even in advance," Green said