Computer-mediated intercultural communication (CMIC) is an important activity for many students at Notre Dame Women's College of Kyoto. When we began to plan our Computer Center, which opened in 1992, we integrated CMIC into the system. Although we have several types of computers, our network environment is based on Unix, currently Solaris (http://www.sun.com/solaris/). We manage user accounts on a central Unix server. All students receive Unix shell accounts. We use free (http://www.fsf.org/), open source (http://www.opensource.org/) software which has good support on the Internet. This system allows us to administer more than 1500 user accounts with little effort.
Our main information systems are e-mail and the Web. Mail transport is managed with Sendmail (http://www.sendmail.org/). Class mailing lists are made with SmartList (http://www.procmail.org/). Some mailing list messages are converted to Web pages with MHonArc (http://www.mhonarc.org/). For Web services we use the Apache HTTP server (http://httpd.apache.org/). Personal Web pages are kept in users' directories, so they can edit their Web files directly or upload them from PCs with FTP. Default HTTP access to personal Web pages is limited to our campus; however, students may allow greater access, for example, to see their Web pages from home.
Computer-mediated communication (CMC) at Notre Dame is based on text processing with GNU Emacs (http://www.fsf.org/software/emacs/). Students actively use e-mail and the Web, with some News and work in TeX, an advanced document typesetting system (http://www.tug.org/). We emphasize document production rather than passive browsing, so Emacs provides an excellent work environment. It can run as an X Window client or as a text-mode application. The X interface includes pull-down menus for beginners, and students can use the text-mode interface at any computer terminal that has Internet access. Emacs includes emacs-lisp, a powerful programming language, so it is easy to extend it to any writing task. It has special modes of operation for different text formats. For example, students manage e-mail with mh-e, read News with GNUS, and write LaTeX documents in tex-mode.
Good HTML documents for the Web encourage universal access by people who use many kinds of systems, including text-only systems, mobile devices, and speech synthesizers (http://www.w3.org/WAI/). For HTML we use PSGML (http://www.lysator.liu.se/projects/about_psgml.html), an integrated environment for SGML editing within Emacs. Combined with onsgmls (http://openjade.sourceforge.net/), an SGML parser, it helps users create valid HTML documents and find their errors easily. Since PSGML can edit any SGML or XML file, it will remain useful as the Web moves from HTML to more powerful XML applications.
We support students with both information and human resources. Information services include books, magazine, printed reference materials, online manuals, teachers' Web pages, Computer Center information (http://www.notredame.ac.jp/cc/), and POETS language and communication services (http://www.notredame.ac.jp/POETS/).
Our Computer Center is small, and friendly help is usually available. We have "Unix Day" tutorials and discussions each Tuesday to teach more advanced learners, and we encourage students to help each other. We work hard to help students enjoy computing, and we hope that our Unix environment helps them become smarter, wiser, and more confident.
NDWC Resources:
- Notre Dame Women's Collge of Kyoto (http://www.notredame.ac.jp/)
- NDWC Computer Center (http://www.notredame.ac.jp/cc)
- NDWC POETS language and communication services
(http://www.notredame.ac.jp/POETS/)- NDWC Extension Center (http://www.notredame.ac.jp/extension/)