Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 17:10:16 -0800

03 00050 61 01103001

Mr. Pat Lincoln
Director
Lincoln@csl.sri.com
Computer Science Laboratory
SRI International
333 Ravenswood Avenue
Menlo Park, CA 94025

Subject:

SDS Evaluation Pilot Test

Dear Pat,

I could provide my notebook computer for a week or so for you to play around with SDS when time permits, to get a better feel of functionality.

Recently on September 17, 2001 Eric Armstrong was amazed by SDS, then pulled back worrying that only Rod can do it.

This reflects fear that prevents progress. People are afraid of learning something new. That is understandable, but needs to be addressed with evidence from respected voices that anyone can use SDS.

A simple, effective solution is for a few SDS records to show up on the Internet with "Pat Lincoln" on them instead of Rod Welch; that would help dispel the excuse that only Rod can do it.

We recently got a report from Wayne Wetzel who has been using SDS since about 1992. Wayne has just retired as Deputy Director of DNRC in the State of Montana. A few others like Wayne have learned SDS who are not primarily computer folks, so I am pretty sure anyone can do it. My sister Kathleen learned SDS, and she was a secretary, before falling ill with cancer and had to retire.

For this experiment, you can use my SDS records that have stuff relevant to OHS/DKR, and our back and forth the past year. Having an existing body of work makes SDS a lot easier to test functionality, rather than having to start from scratch.

This could position you to move forward on the endorsement we have been discussing, or justify standing down on that initiative. If we continue to wait, you will be writing another letter worrying about lack of collaboration, per your letter on January 11, 2001.

Using SDS on a notebook computer is not ergonomically efficient for production work; but, it is probably good enough to discover the magic of the SDS design. Since it only takes a click to create stuff for the web, this is not rocket science.

If this sounds doable, I can bring the thing down and give you a 20 minute lesson on how to fire things up, with one simple requirement. If you get stuck, don't give up, call and ask how to do thus and so. Everything in SDS is simple, but the basic process is counterintuitive, so people get stuck on little things that only take a second to resolve.

Hopefully this is a way to make progress within your time parameters.

Please let me know what you think.

Thanks for thinking about this.

Sincerely,

THE WELCH COMPANY

Rod Welch
rowelch@attglobal.net