RFC 369 (rfc369) - Page 2 of 11

Evaluation of ARPANET services January-March, 1972

RFC 369              EVALUATION OF ARPANET SERVICES            July 1972


      SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT
         Software.......................................  6
         Community Spirit...............................  7
      CONCLUSION........................................  8
      APPENDIX A
         Sample of Survey Questionnaire................   9
      APPENDIX B
         Grades and Comments for Specifics Sites.......  10


BACKGROUND

Approach

   The test group was organized from a group of Electrical Engineering
   graduate students in Computer Science.  Within the group was
   represented a substantial degree of experience with high level
   languages and time sharing systems (such as the Dartmouth BASIC and
   UCSB mathematical graphics systems).  However, no one had experience
   in exercising ARPANET, and few knew what resources the ARPANET
   represented.  After two weeks of presentation from Jim White and
   Roland Bryan, the group was turned loose for open experimentation.

   Enthusiasm was high as each group managed to locate and decode the
   login procedures for various nodes and began to learn how to use the
   available resources.  In fact, half of the weekly seminar time was
   devoted to sharing learned experiences and procedures.  Interest,
   however, lagged some as the quarter progressed due to poor network
   site reliability, few active nodes, and hard to locate documentation
   (only five out of fourteen students remained active after the first
   quarter).

Goals

   The primary goal of the group was to learn how to use and to evaluate
   network resources.  It was decided to be fair but direct in
   evaluating each site, including UCSB.  Since the level of networking
   experience was initially low, the evaluation criteria was dictated
   mostly by gut feelings.

   At the conclusion of the first quarter's effort, a questionnaire was
   given to the students (a sample of which is included in Appendix A).









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