NCMS's requirements are best described in two categories: general motivations,
and specific functional requirements.
General motivations
- Attractive, easy-to-use interface
- Users dislike the user interface provided by the current system.
Its non-graphical interface is unattractive and uncompelling,
and the general nature of the interface changes significantly as
users navigate through gateways between the bulletin board
and other services such as the document search/retrieval system.
- User interfaces decoupled from information resources
- Administrators dislike the close coupling between information
resources and the particular user interface that is provided for
each resource.
- Improved service for Internet access
- Originally, the current system was designed for dial-up access. Problems
have been encountered when accessing the system via telnet.
- Client-server architecture to support increased Internet usage
- In the current system, users log in to NCMS's host and execute the
user interface programs directly. A client-server model would scale more
efficiently.
- Modular architecture to support new service offerings
- Adding new services to the current system is difficult, and that
has limited the number of new services which can be offered practically.
Specific functional requirements
- Access controls
- Several concentric levels of access controls:
general public, non-members who have established billing accounts,
three classes of members differentiated by how they are charged
for usage, and administrators.
In addition to the general access control levels, members who participate
in working groups are granted access to bulletin boards which support
those working groups.
- Document search/retrieval
- A forms-based interface for free-text and fielded
searches of local WAIS databases, individually and in combination.
Certain user conveniences are provided, such as highlighting search
terms in returned documents, and returning large documents in multiple
parts with easy navigation between parts.
- Bulletin board
- A simple bulletin board system with a hierarchical presentation
of bulletin board categories. Basic features include composing new
messages, posting follow-up messages, and forwarding and replying to
messages via electronic mail.
- E-mail
- A simple electronic mail system provides basic features such as
composing new messages, forwarding and replying to messages, saving
and deleting messages, and accessing messages which were previously
saved or sent.
- Order entry
- A forms-based interface for ordering physical library materials,
requesting research services, and purchasing publications. In the first
implementation, orders are formatted and delivered to respondents via
e-mail.
- Access reporting
- In addition to the usual WWW server activity statistics,
access is reported by service, by individual user, and by
document copyright holder.
- Support for graphical and character-oriented clients
- Many users will continue to use dial-up access, and others may use
relatively slow Internet access. Server contents are designed to accommodate
character-only interfaces, and an optional filter can be invoked which
provides a text-only interface for graphical clients.
- Online help system
- Unlike most WWW sites, both a general help system and help-per-page
is provided.
