Web-Conferencing Now Within Reach at AUB

Web-conferencing is now available to AUB faculty and staff who want to share and discuss visual material with colleagues, students, or others separated from them by geographical distance.

The US-based National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education (NITLE) has given AUB access to a virtual web-conferencing 'room' with ten seats and a common whiteboard that supports the sharing of digital images (including video), PowerPoint presentations, and PDF or other files. Users can view, discuss, and manipulate these visual components, as well as hear and see one another during real-time meetings.

Dr. Rosangela Silva, director of the Academic Computing Center (ACC) and NITLE liaison, pointed out that the room has many potential users. Faculty can collaborate more effectively with overseas research partners or interact with PhD students when on sabbatical. Administrative and other staff who travel on business will have the option of supplementing email communications with Multipoint Interactive Videoconference (MIV), as the system is known. Perhaps more importantly, MIV will solve the problem of interviewing foreign applicants for faculty or staff vacancies. "Seminars, workshops, and conferences are also possibilities," Silva said, "so long as no more than five participants from AUB are on-line at any given moment." This restriction is owing to bandwidth concerns on campus. The other participants can be located elsewhere in Lebanon or, indeed, the world.

On-campus users must access the service through the ACC's computer lab, where internet connectivity is preconfigured to allow application access. Off-campus users must connect using 128 Kbps up/512 Kbps down broadband connections (available via ADSL in Lebanon) and a web address that the ACC will provide when the session is booked. The special software that is required downloads automatically less than five minutes after the address is accessed.

Although this service is still being tested, preliminary results have been extremely promising. Information Services Librarian Myrna Tabet was among the first to use MIV at AUB and was impressed by its speed, quality, and immediacy, particularly in comparison to another web conferencing experience of a few years ago. "I liked it because the resolution was very clear and I could interact and even interrupt," she said.

Faculty and staff who want to use the MIV room can make a reservation by visiting http://staff.aub.edu.lb/~acc/Services/webconference.htm. Be prepared to specify the purpose, date, time, and duration of your session. Active users who will be manipulating material during the web conference will also need to schedule a brief learning session at the ACC to familiarize themselves with the software.