CD enables students to access campus info

CD enables students to access campus info

Bruin-produced multimedia guide is first of its kind

By Tatiana Botton

Imagine looking at your computer screen, clicking on a UCLA
building, then clicking again on a specific department and being
able to get into the academic services of that department.

This will soon be possible with the new CD-ROM about UCLA where
volumes of information will be available at the touch of a
button.

"For the moment we call it the Multimedia Guide to UCLA, but
it’s still a working title," said James Pitts, the leadership
advisor for the Bruin Interactive project, which is coordinating
the CD with the undergraduate government representative office.

The disk will be tested next quarter but a final release date
has not been set.

The CD-ROM ­ divided into five different areas ­
includes a guided tour, academics, sports, student life and student
services. From each one of these areas anyone would be able to
navigate to another one.

"It will be a great tool for UCLA. It will give you access to
all the information available, and everything is in just one little
CD," said Deana Morgan, one of the project’s writers and a senior
majoring in Russian and Spanish.

"CD-ROMs are very useful ­ they can store as much
information as at least four hundred computer disks in only one
CD," said Kash Sen, a senior majoring in computer and engineering
sciences.

As the coordinators explained, ideas for the project, the first
of its kind to be entirely produced by students, began last
summer.

"We started thinking about the project last summer. It was
important for us to see how the student media is going to be ready
to develop interactive things," said Pitts, also a member of the
ASUCLA Communications Board.

Many UCLA students will be participating in the project as
interns, specializing in video production, computer programming and
writing.

"We have room in this project for all types. We have talented
people working on the video project, and we also have people that
love writing," said Michelle Bonner, the Bruin Interactive’s
content coordinator and undergraduate student government general
representative.

"The project will allow UCLA students to get familiar with the
production of CD-ROMs, which many say will become the software of
the future.

"I think the project is great because it allows students to
learn about this new multimedia technology," Morgan said.

Others agreed that participation in the program will prepare
students for real world technology.

"This market is a multi-billion dollar business. The people that
will get the skills here, are the ones that are going to survive
out there," said Damon Seeley, the Bruin Interactive interface
coordinator.

To help in speeding production, the team hired a Cornell
University student who has already created various CD-ROMs, said
interim Publications Director Arvli Ward.

To develop the CD-ROM, Bruin Interactive split the project into
content (the information about UCLA) and interface (the graphic
presentations). Both content and interface will be totally
interconnected and will allow the user to take advantage of the
information in a user-friendly way.

"USAC wants to make sure that all the students can get access to
all the information on campus," Bonner said. "It is strange for the
student media to be allied with the government, but this is really
an ideal project."

In the process, the student body will benefit by having the
information readily available to them.

"We will be donating the CD-ROM to libraries and if students
don’t have access to CD-ROM drives, we will tell them where they
can access them," Bonner said.

All the coordinators expressed their enthusiasm in the idea and
in the future perspectives of the project.

"We always want to be at the front of the technological advances
as they relate to information. We want to create situations where
students can participate and learn a lot," Ward said.