The Consortium for International Earth Science Information 
Network (CIESIN) attempts a lofty mission: 

     _to provide access to and enhance the use of information 
worldwide, advancing the understanding of human interactions in the 
environment and serving the needs of science and public and private 
decision making_. 

     In particular, CIESIN addresses global socioeconomic, 
climatological, demographic, and environmental information. They 
focus on the wide range of information related to the "human 
dimension of global change." Funded in part by a NASA grant and 
connected with organizations, such as the U.S. Global Change Research 
Information Office, the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental 
Change Programme Data and Information System, and the Third World 
Network of Scientific Organizations, CIESIN promises to be a 
majorsource for international social, economic, and environmental 
data. 
     However, be warned that the CIESIN data offerings are still under 
construction. One advantage to using the Internet for the dissemination 
of data is the ease in making a database accessible to a huge audience. 
Yet that also parlays into a disadvantage, in that the database can be 
made available before it contains much substantive information. 
CIESIN is at this stage now, with grandiose plans, but not much 
content. The user interface presents another advantage/disadvantage. 
A new search engine can be beta-tested by people around the world, 
but that also means that everyone has to put up with a not-quite-
ready-for-prime-time interface. The CIESIN catalog typifies that kind 
of interface. 
     To carry out its mission, CIESIN is involved in many projects. 
Collecting statistical data and data sets in the broad range of 
socioeconomic categories and providing the means to retrieve data 
easily are major focuses. They are gathering information in the areas 
of population dynamics, economic activity, environmental health, 
political structures, and agricultural metabolism. One project is 
bringing together basic information about data sets collected by 
various agencies into a program named the Information Cooperative. 
Entries for CIESIN's own data sets can be found alongside entries for 
electronic data available from other cooperating organizations. The 
intent is to provide a seamless interface to their own data archives 
and to other major collections. If the Information Cooperative is 
successful, it will be a one-stop shopping point for socioeconomic 
data available in electronic format. Other projects in which the 
Consortium is involved include developing analysis software, building 
a bulletin board system, and providing many kinds of Internet access. 

VARIETIES OF ACCESS 
     To its credit, CIESIN provides multiple avenues of access to its 
information. Its system, which includes a gopher server, a data 
catalog, and a BBS, is accessible with telnet and gopher protocols and 
by direct dial. The CIESIN gopher server can be reached with a gopher 
client at port 70 (typically the default gopher port) at 
gopher.ciesin.org. For those without ready access to a gopher client, 
CIESIN provides a public client: telnet to catalog.ciesin.org with the 
login of gopher. The gopher includes both links to CIESIN information 
sources and to resources available elsewhere on the Internet. 
     The CIESIN catalog provides another means of access to the 
Consortium's collection of information. Don't expect a typical library 
catalog or a standard Internet front-end for this catalog. With locally-
developed software, the catalog uses a GUI-style interface that is not 
a very intuitive search system. It can be reached by telnet to the same 
address (catalog.ciesin.org) with the login of catalog. 
     For students and educators, CIESIN offers another alternative: the 
Classroom Earth BBS. Targeting the K-12 education community, 
Classroom Earth joins a growing number of information nooks that 
offer shared lesson plans and a place for students and teachers to 
chat, electronically. The BBS uses a different telnet address than the 
gopher and the catalog: crearth.ciesin.org, port 2010. The BBS can also 
be reached by direct dial to 517/797-2737 (8N1, VT100 or ANSI/PC 
emulation). As the many warnings note, access via telnet should be set 
to character mode, instead of the common default of line mode. To 
make the change on a UNIX client, use the  key to get back to 
the telnet> prompt and enter mode character. 
     While the catalog, gopher, and BBS are the principal access 
methods, CIESIN also makes some of its data sets available via 
anonymous FTP. Their server can be reached at ftp.ciesin.org. Like the 
catalog and gopher address, this ftp address is just another name for 
their central address: infoserver.ciesin.org. For regular CIESIN users, 
the infoserver address may be easier to remember; however, it will 
not work for the BBS. The Consortium also plans to have a World-Wide 
Web home page available. At a guess, the Uniform Resource Locator 
(URL) will be something like http://www.ciesin.org. 

CIESIN CATALOG 
     The CIESIN catalog, still being developed, is the principal means of 
searching for records gathered from the Information Cooperative 
project. After connecting to the catalog, a prompt announces the 
availability of a new full-screen interface. Except for those who love 
cryptic command lines, try the full-screen version. It turns out to be 
cryptic enough. The command line option, designated by a plain gp> 
prompt, involves a basic Boolean search engine, but with syntax like 
search (keyword=ozone | keyword=aurora) ~ location=europe>italy, it is 
not a very intuitive interface. The help and help search commands 
provide more details on the gp search options. 
     The new full-screen approach offers a more intuitive interface 
with drop-down menus. At this time, there are very few categories 
that function under each category. The principal database currently 
available is "directory services," the database developing from the 
Information Cooperative project. It is located under the "directory" 
heading. Choosing this option with the arrow keys results in the data 
entry box. Choosing the "free text" search will result in the screen 
shown in Figure 1. 
     Moving between the search option lines is a tedious process. And 
the search fields themselves are not well explained. Looking at a few 
records is the best way to understand the differences between the 
fields, such as parameter and keyword, or organization and data center. 
MS-Windows, X Window, and Mac interfaces are under development. A 
mouse will help with the maneuverability problems to some degree, 
but the basic arrangement of the search input form could use work. 
     What becomes frustrating very quickly with the catalog is the lack 
of direct connections to the data itself. A search on "population" finds 
such common sources as the _County and City Data Book_ and the 1987 
_Economic Census_, but the data from these standard sources are not 
available through the catalog, only an incomplete reference to the CD-
ROM versions. While purchase information is included, helpful 
bibliographic elements, such as the Superintendent of Documents 
number, are not. Nor is there any mention of the ready availability of 
such items in depository libraries. In some records, numerous fields 
are blank. As they refine the process for gathering the information, we 
can hope that some of the problems will be resolved. 
     CIESIN can provide the actual data sets, at least for items from 
their holdings. Delivery is separate from the catalog and may involve 
FTP. However, as they readily admit, most of the current effort is 
going into what they call "analysis services," developing programs for 
interacting with the data sets. They are in a beta test phase for a 
program named Explore, which is designed to offer interactive 
searching of very large statistical databases. It is being used with the 
U.S. Census Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) database, but they 
expect to be able to use it with other data sets as well. 

CIESIN GOPHER 
     In contrast to the unusual catalog interface, CIESIN's gopher will be 
more familiar to the Internet traveler (Figure 2). Many menu items are 
links to other Internet resources or gophers. Like the rest of the 
Consortium's products, the server is at its beginning stage of 
development. Some menu options are pretty slim on resources, with 
perhaps just a single item under a specific heading. The gopher 
includes some locally-produced full-text documents, such as one 
entitled "Pathways of Understanding." There is also a telnet connection 
to the CIESIN catalog; however, some references from the catalog can 
be found within the gopher itself, under the "DIFs" menu heading. 
Interestingly, the names of individual records differ between the 
catalog interface and the gopher server. 
     One of the best gopher menu options is the "Environmental Internet 
Catalog" available on the top level menu. This choice presents a 
subject listing of gopher connections. While not as extensive nor as 
up-to-date as the gopher subject arrangements at Rice or the Gopher 
Jewels list (point your gopher client to riceinfo.rice.edu and 
cwis.usc.edu respectively), there are some interesting pointers. The 
title can be misleading, since many individual links are not directly 
related to environmental topics. 

CLASSROOM EARTH 
     The Classroom Earth BBS takes a different approach, although it is 
at a comparable level of development to the CIESIN catalog. 
Established as a standard bulletin board system, Classroom Earth has 
been designed for educators and students from "K-99." Figure 3 shows 
the main menu. The empty option under #7 is sort of an "under 
construction" sign. CIESIN warns that since Classroom Earth is still 
under development, down times are frequent and at irregular intervals. 
A regular maintenance time should begin soon, and maybe the menus 
will become more dependable as well. 
     The message area is typical of bulletin board systems, permitting 
messaging to other users. CIESIN is to be commended for providing an 
offline mail reader. For those active in the message areas, an offline 
reader requires only a brief connection to download or upload, an 
messages can be read offline. It is an important feature for those who 
pay a per-minute charge for Internet access or for long distance. 
Classroom Earth does contain three significant information sources 
that can be found under the "Files, programs and resources" menu 
heading: International Environmental Treaties, UNEP Fact Sheets, and 
an Online Acid Rain Experiment. 
     The treaties section includes full-text treaties and background 
papers from _World Treaties for the Protection of the Environment_ 
(Tullio Scovazzi and Tullio Treves, eds. Milan: Istituto per L'Ambiente, 
1992). Searches show a rather clumsy chopping of the book into files. 
For example, a search on "pollution" results in chapter introductions, 
tables, and at least three "Acknowledgment-terms_ of_use" files, 
listed in a rough alphabetical order (which is not the same as the order 
in the book). Still, the full-text availability of the treaties and 
accompanying background information can be a useful source; and, once 
again, continued development may provide a more ordered retrieval. 
     The fact sheets are brief full-text offerings from the United 
Nations Environment Programme. Covering a wide variety of research 
into climatological changes, the fact sheets include both historical 
and recent research, although none have a date later than 1992. The 
Online Acid Rain Experiment includes an introduction, a lesson plan, 
and the ability to enter results into a database and download other's 
results. 
     CIESIN shows potential for becoming a very useful source of 
statistical and background environmental and global change 
information. However, it still has a long hill to climb to fulfill its 
mission and to develop more user-friendly interfaces. Three offerings 
that make CIESIN worth a visit are the gopher Environmental Internet 
Catalog, the data analyses tools, and the International Treaties from 
Classroom Earth. CIESIN is also interesting as an example of the 
variety of information resources being developed for access on the net. 

Communications to the author should be addressed to Greg R. Notess, 
Montana State University Libraries, Bozeman, MT 59717-0332; 
406/994-6563; greg@notess.com ; http://www.notess.com.

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