By Kenneth S. Moser, CNA, CNSA

By the time you read this, the APICS Web site will have been operational for just a smidgen more than one year.This seems like a good time to sit back and review the mail.

One of the most frequently asked questions (second only to "What does 'APICS' stand for?") is "Which online provider do you recommend?" The short answer is that we don't recommend vendors or products because we're not allowed to do so. The long answer is that selecting an online vendor is a lot like selecting PCs — what's best for you will depend upon your needs and resources. As an MIS professional, I subscribe to three different online services and generally use each one for a particular purpose. Where online vendors and Internet service providers (ISPs) are concerned, moreover, location also counts for something. For what it's worth, I am allowed to note that PC Magazine just published a review of online vendors in its April 6 issue.

The biggest complaint about our site over the past year is that some areas on it require visitors to complete a registration screen and log in. All things considered, we haven't actually received many complaints. Given that we've seen registrations from Mr. Magoo, Elmer Fudd and certain other appellations that my editor won't allow me to print here, it's a good bet that some of you resent this. I probably shouldn't admit this, but I hate the darn thing myself. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to find a better way to collect this information, and it really comes in handy when we have to plan for the future. Please bear with us here.

Based on the kudos we've received over the past year, one of our site's best features is the Quick Index. For those of you who are not familiar with it, the Quick Index is a page with a series of links to every major section and all the most popular areas on our site, and it's accessible from just about every page as well. Given that our site is fast closing in on 200 individual Web pages, it's easy to see why this feature is popular — it saves time. I wish I could say the idea was mine, but credit for this feature actually belongs to our Web editor, JoAnna Battin.

The latest addition to our site is a new page that allows visitors to download brochures, application and registration forms and other information posted in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). You will need to have Amber or the Adobe Acrobat Reader if you wish to view these files, but both are available free from Adobe's Web site. This format allows us to provide you with highly formatted documents that can be read and printed from just about every mainstream computing platform with a graphics display. As time goes on and we become more comfortable with this medium, we hope to begin publishing SIG newsletters and other documents here as well.

Meanwhile, for those of you who missed it, the March 14 issue of the Scout Report mentioned a new site that might interest some of you — the Textile Dictionary, located at http://www.ntg-inter.com/ntg/textile.htm. As of this writing, I've not had an opportunity to visit the site, but the Scout Report describes it as follows:

"Are you tired of getting the same definitions for batiste, cambric and lawn in your regular dictionary when you're sure there must be a difference between them? You can now find detailed definitions to these and 179 other textile terms from the Textile Dictionary, produced by the Internet Centre for Canadian Fashion and Design. The entries are arranged under four main categories: Standard Cotton Fabrics; Standard Silk and Silk Imitation Fabrics; Standard Worsted, Wool and Hair Fabrics; and Other Cellulose Fabrics. Details on fiber, weave, characteristics and uses are given for most entries. The dictionary does not currently have a search capability, which would greatly enhance its usefulness." [AG]

I know that I've mentioned this publication several times before, but new readers are joining us every month so it bears repeating: For information on subscribing to the Scout Report, send e-mail to [email protected]