Volume 8, Issue 3, 1994
News from the CTI Centre for Computing in Economics
Access to CTI Centre Information
Information on the activities of the CTI Centre for Economics is now
available on Janet via the World Wide Web. To use the Web you need to
have a client program such as Mosaic or Cello running on your PC or
Workstation. Information leaflets are available from the Centre on how
this works and how to obtain the client software. To access the
information use the URL (Uniform Resource Locator).
http://savage.ecn.bris.ac.uk/cticce/welcome.html (now changed to
http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/ctiecon/ -web editor)
The information base includes a searchable copy of the Economics Software
Catalogue which we are endeavouring to keep up to date, a task that is
impossible with the paper based version. If you are developing or have
developed software for use in teaching in Economics, no matter how modest,
we will be happy to add this to our list of titles.
With the collaboration of the British Publishers Blackwell, we have now
also mounted on the Web server the Blackwell Economics Articles Index.
This searchable JEL Classification index lists all the Economics related
articles published in Blackwells' jour nals during calendar year 1993 and
the first quarter of 1994. While back issues of this Index are not
available to us, we do plan to add the annual indices as these are
released by the publisher. The full 1994 index should be available in
January 1995.
Training Workshop Programme
We propose to run yet again a series of workshops for social scientists who need to use computers in their research and teaching. The workshops will be one or two day "hands-on" courses that will allow participants to acquire additional skills from a giv
en package. The workshops will be given either by the author(s) of the package or an acknowledged expert.
Currently we are in the process of compiling the workshop programme and it would help us considerably if you would email to us suggestions of which software packages that you would like to see covered. This will help us to design a programme that more ac
curately reflects the needs of the community. Courses covered in the past that have proven to be popular include: Gauss; PC-Give; Microfit; Limdep; and Stata.
Social Science Information Gateway
The ESRC Networked Information Support Officer Nicky Ferguson and his
assistant Debra Hiom have created a "one stop shop" entry point via Janet
on the World Wide Web for social science researchers and teachers to
access much of the global resources on the Internet from one UK entry
point. It goes by the name of the Social Science Information Gateway or
SOSIG (pronounced "sausage"). For those of you familiar with WWW the URL
is:
http://sosig.esrc.bris.ac.uk/ (now changed to
http://www.sosig.ac.uk/)
If you are unfamiliar with WWW or wish to know more, then Nicky Ferguson
and Debra Hiom may be reached at the CTI Centre, or by calling 0272
288443.
2nd Annual UK Toolbook Users Conference
In early September the 2nd UK Toolbook Users Conference was held at the
Hilton Hotel Bristol and was hosted by the Bristol Educational Technology
Service and the Centre for Computing in Economics. It attracted
participants from as far away as the USA, Australia, and Italy. The
conference themes included: Educational issues of Courseware Design,
Curriculum Integration, Human Computer Interfacing; Project Management
issues; and an exploration of Toolbook Applications covering MultiMedia,
Graphics, Hypertext and Hypermedia, and the use of Authoring Templates. A
set of proceedings are being published and will be available to all.
Caleco Conference
A strong contingent from the CTI Centre and the TLTP Economics Consortium
were present at the annual Caleco Conference Portsmouth held on the 12-13
September.
ALT Conference
The first international conference of the Association for Learning
Technology was held at the University of Hull 19-21 September. This
featured displays by many of the UK TLTP projects.
TLTP Economics Consortium
The Economics Consortium have now reached the stage of Beta testing the
WinEcon Introductory Economics CBL package. Over 60 Associate Members
from as far afield as South Africa, Australia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden
and the USA have signed up to assist wit h the Beta testing programme and
the first phase of this is expected to be completed by year end. It's not
too late to sign up to participate in the Beta testing programme, to do so
send an email message to beta@ssa.bristol.ac.uk and you will be sent a p
assword in order to access the modules. If, however, you would like to
simply find out more about WinEcon and its potential place in the
curriculum then contact Phil Hobbs Director TLTP Economics Consortium here
at the Centre for Computing in Economics.
Computers in Teaching Initiative Centre for Economics
The Computers in Teaching Initiative is funded by the Higher Education
Funding Councils to promote, through a number of subject based centres,
the use of computers in teaching. The Centre for Computing in Economics is
one of twenty such subject based centres. Each aims to publicise the
resources that are available to lecturing staff who would like to make
greater use of computers in their teaching. Amongst the services provided
by the Centre for Computing in Economics are: A catalogue of economics
teaching software, a bulletin board and a series of workshops on the use
of computers in economics. Informal enquiries are always welcome.
CTI Centre for Economics
Department of Economics
University of Bristol
8 Woodland Road
Bristol BS8 1TN
Tel: 0272 288478 Fax: 0272 288577 Email: cticce@bristol.ac.uk
URL= http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/ctiecon/
