Project DIANE
Encyclopedia
Project DIANE, an acronym for Diversified Information and Assistance NEtwork, was a very early videoconferencing
based community service
network created in the United States. DIANE was a grassroots driven regional videoconferencing consortium which promoted and supported cooperative electronic alliances in education
, community service
, and economic development
.
Created in 1992 in Nashville, Tennessee
, Project DIANE was in active operation as a centrally managed public service network until 2006 when funding issues prevented its further development and expansion. Portions of the network still remain in service, however, though no longer under the Project DIANE moniker.
Peak network membership consisted of more than 200 participating organizations and more than 350 program and technical coordinators, supporting live interactive video programming over a service region consisting of twelve U.S. states and five countries.
(TVA) and a small consortium of public and private universities located within TVA's six state service region. After a year of deliberations and two successful community based field pilots, Project DIANE was given startup funding
by the TVA.
The two field pilots, named the Nashville Pilot and the City Share Pilot were instrumental in demonstrating that videoconferencing technology was a viable and highly flexible mechanism through which to deliver a broad array of educational, economic development and public service resources to the general public. Both pilots were carried out with the participation of several dozen community service organizations, governmental agencies
and corporations.
Primary sponsors and underwriters of the two pilots included TVA, BellSouth
, IBM
, and PictureTel (later purchased by Polycom
). The Nashville Pilot was an intracity test of desktop videoconferencing
technology with application test sites in Nashville, Tennessee
constructed at Tennessee State University
, Cumberland Science Museum (later renamed the Adventure Science Center) and the Looby Public Library.
One month after conclusion of the Nashville Pilot, the City Share Pilot testbed was created by connecting the three Nashville video test locations to additional video sites constructed in Huntsville, Alabama
. A large portfolio of community oriented and educational test applications between Nashville and Huntsville were launched with a 40 minute discussion of intercity
cooperation between the mayor
s of the cities. It is believed that the City Share pilot was the first ever intercity videoconference link ever constructed for non-commercial purposes.
In the years following the project's pilot startup, many public and private organizations participated in the network's public service programming and donated both in-kind and financial resources. Network participants and supporters were also successful in securing a wide bevy of public and private grants to pay for different types of community applications which utilized the project.
There were two notable aspects about the network. First, the project was designed as a broad-based, rather than niche-focused, community telecollaboration
. DIANE membership reflected a wide spectrum of community organizations which came together online to jointly plan and carry out public programs and services.
The project was represented by most segments of the community, both in an organizational context (e.g., schools, community centers, libraries, business agencies, etc.) and individually (child through senior adult, families, handicapped, urban and rural, etc.). DIANE was inherently a "project of projects" with teleconferencing applications in the three target areas of education, community service and economic development.
A second key aspect of this project was that, from its inception, DIANE members worked diligently to include disadvantaged or neglected members of society in consortium program development activities. The avoidance of a two-tier cyber-society of "haves" vs. "have-nots" was a high priority. DIANE members took special care to include low income inner city residents, developmentally disabled children
, senior citizen
s, speech
and hearing impaired
individuals, and other potential information highway-have nots in program development activities.
, speech & hearing treatment centers, K-12 schools, zoo
s, museum
s, public libraries
, universities, language institutes, skill training centers, chambers of commerce, economic development agencies, healthcare groups, overseas military bases & dependents schools, and other service organizations.
Specific notable members of the project included the United States Small Business Administration sponsored Small Business Development Centers, the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute, the Adventure Science Center, Vanderbilt University
, the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute, Tennessee League for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing, the Nashville Zoo, the Metropolitan Action Commission, Urban League of Nashville, the Boys & Girls Club, the Girl Scouts
of Middle Tennessee, the Catholic Diocese of Nashville, the Tennessee State Library & Archives
, the Elephant Sanctuary of Hohenwald, the Nashville Public Library System, the Bank of America
Small Business Resource Centers, and the U.S. Department of Defense Overseas Dependents School System.
, remote application sharing
, electronic messaging, hi-speed file transfer and other means.
Examples of specific program activities within these general program areas included the following: The Tennessee League for the Hearing Impaired offered videoconferencing-based Deaf culture
workshops, sign language
instruction, and translation services
. Looby Metro Public Library supported a distance mentor
ship program called "Adopt-a-Grandparent" in which senior citizen library volunteers provide guidance and counseling to disadvantaged youth who called in from DIANE's community center locations. Therapists and physicians at the Bill Wilkerson Speech & Hearing Center and the Vanderbilt Child Development Center electronically assisted disabled children, including adolescents with autism
and related communication disorders. High school students and teachers regularly consulted online with the project's educational resources such as the Cumberland Science Museum (e.g., for science information, environmental workshops, etc.) and to Meharry Medical College
(e.g., to learn about viruses), etc.
to electronically and interactively take students to exotic and faraway places was pioneered by Project DIANE. An important supplement to in-class instruction, schoolchildren frequently were able to go on electronic field trips through the DIANE network for meaningful interactive real-world learning experiences.
The Nashville Zoo conducted videoconferences with area schools to bring students safe interactive experiences with rare snow leopards and other wild animals. Animal conservationists from the Elephant Sanctuary in Lewis County, TN provided teleconference-based seminars on elephants and the need for animal preservation
, even connecting video callers to remote cameras located in the elephant grazing pasture. Radnor Lake State Natural Area
offered students a wide range of teleconference activities involving environmental conservation, water ecology, and wireless video/underwater camera views of its wildlife residents.
Oftentimes, Project DIANE electronic field trips took the children to international locations such as France, England, Japan, or to meet interesting people such as jet pilots, film actors and corporate executives. The Tennessee Foreign Language Institute
conducted world culture seminars and foreign language instruction to DIANE participants, also providing students remote playback access to its 250+ international tape library. Tennessee's state information repository, the Tennessee State Library & Archives, provided interactive teleconference-based history seminars, library reference assistance, and live curator based video access to its rare manuscript collection, includes original American Civil War
photographs, historic architectural drawing
s, original letters of President Andrew Jackson, the 1796 Tennessee State Constitution
, etc.
's Small Business Resource Center and the Nashville Area Chamber for youth career planning and entrepreneurship programs, and with Meharry Medical College
for health and hygiene workshops. An advanced placement (AP) course shared curriculum was being developed for use by area high schools. Current AP course development included environmental science and biology.
Regarding business development programs, any area business with compatible technologies could access Project DIANE's online economic development member agencies, including SBRC business experts, SBRC library resources, SBDC business counselors, area chamber of commerce
program personnel, university business faculty, etc.
’s Exceptional Content Provider Award (8/03), a Top 5 Rating by the European Commission
's Global Bangemann Challenge (Stockholm, 6/99); 6 NII
Global Information Infrastructure award citations (12/96-2/98) including an AT&T Special Telecollaboration Award; a "national success story" citation by the President's National Information Advisory Council (2/96), and an Awards Laureate designation by the Smithsonian Institute Information Technology Awards Program (6/95).
Key invited presentations and demonstrations of Project DIANE programming include national conferences and forums hosted by the American Library Association
(Atlanta, GA, 6/02), National Science Foundation
(Berkeley, CA, 12/00), U.S. Dept of Commerce
(Washington DC, 4/98) and the White House
(Philadelphia PA, 4/97).
(ISDN) BRA based community network using desktop personal computers
deploying an H.320
codec
, which later evolved into a hybrid switched digital and Internet IP based H.320
/H.324
platform. It should be noted that the videoconferencing equipment used by Project DIANE in the Nashville and City Share startup field pilots were all OS/2
based videoconference units (PCS/1's) provided through a joint development partnership at the time between PictureTel
and the IBM Corporation
. These early video units were replaced during the startup phase with Windows OS
-based PC desktop units.
In later years, the project's infrastructure also included a large number of set top videoconference units, as well as several dozen videoconferencing units for conference rooms. In the late 1990s, a large corporate donation of more than a hundred new videoconference units more than doubled the size of DIANE to more than two hundred video locations.
Project DIANE also later acquired a Tandberg
Multipoint Control Unit
(MCU), sometimes referred to as a video bridge or gateway, which allowed the network to deliver its interactive programming to up to 16 separate locations simultaneously. Funding for the MCU's required network connections (a Primary Rate Access high speed digital telephone line and an IP
broadband access line
) was provided by Tennessee State University
and the Tennessee Department of Human Services, Rehabilitation Services Division.
Videoconferencing
Videoconferencing is the conduct of a videoconference by a set of telecommunication technologies which allow two or more locations to interact via two-way video and audio transmissions simultaneously...
based community service
Community service
Community service is donated service or activity that is performed by someone or a group of people for the benefit of the public or its institutions....
network created in the United States. DIANE was a grassroots driven regional videoconferencing consortium which promoted and supported cooperative electronic alliances in education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
, community service
Community service
Community service is donated service or activity that is performed by someone or a group of people for the benefit of the public or its institutions....
, and economic development
Economic development
Economic development generally refers to the sustained, concerted actions of policymakers and communities that promote the standard of living and economic health of a specific area...
.
Created in 1992 in Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
, Project DIANE was in active operation as a centrally managed public service network until 2006 when funding issues prevented its further development and expansion. Portions of the network still remain in service, however, though no longer under the Project DIANE moniker.
Peak network membership consisted of more than 200 participating organizations and more than 350 program and technical coordinators, supporting live interactive video programming over a service region consisting of twelve U.S. states and five countries.
History
Project DIANE was first proposed in 1992 as a regional diversity development project collaboration between the U.S. Tennessee Valley AuthorityTennessee Valley Authority
The Tennessee Valley Authority is a federally owned corporation in the United States created by congressional charter in May 1933 to provide navigation, flood control, electricity generation, fertilizer manufacturing, and economic development in the Tennessee Valley, a region particularly affected...
(TVA) and a small consortium of public and private universities located within TVA's six state service region. After a year of deliberations and two successful community based field pilots, Project DIANE was given startup funding
Venture capital
Venture capital is financial capital provided to early-stage, high-potential, high risk, growth startup companies. The venture capital fund makes money by owning equity in the companies it invests in, which usually have a novel technology or business model in high technology industries, such as...
by the TVA.
The two field pilots, named the Nashville Pilot and the City Share Pilot were instrumental in demonstrating that videoconferencing technology was a viable and highly flexible mechanism through which to deliver a broad array of educational, economic development and public service resources to the general public. Both pilots were carried out with the participation of several dozen community service organizations, governmental agencies
Government agency
A government or state agency is a permanent or semi-permanent organization in the machinery of government that is responsible for the oversight and administration of specific functions, such as an intelligence agency. There is a notable variety of agency types...
and corporations.
Primary sponsors and underwriters of the two pilots included TVA, BellSouth
BellSouth
BellSouth Corporation is an American telecommunications holding company based in Atlanta, Georgia. BellSouth was one of the seven original Regional Bell Operating Companies after the U.S...
, IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
, and PictureTel (later purchased by Polycom
Polycom
Polycom is a multinational corporation with approximately 3,200 employees worldwide and an annual revenue of approximately $1.2 billion in 2010. The company manufactures and sells telepresence and voice communications solutions.-Company History 1990:...
). The Nashville Pilot was an intracity test of desktop videoconferencing
Videoconferencing
Videoconferencing is the conduct of a videoconference by a set of telecommunication technologies which allow two or more locations to interact via two-way video and audio transmissions simultaneously...
technology with application test sites in Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
constructed at Tennessee State University
Tennessee State University
Tennessee State University is a land-grant university located in Nashville, Tennessee. TSU is the only state-funded historically black university in Tennessee.-History:...
, Cumberland Science Museum (later renamed the Adventure Science Center) and the Looby Public Library.
One month after conclusion of the Nashville Pilot, the City Share Pilot testbed was created by connecting the three Nashville video test locations to additional video sites constructed in Huntsville, Alabama
Huntsville, Alabama
Huntsville is a city located primarily in Madison County in the central part of the far northern region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Huntsville is the county seat of Madison County. The city extends west into neighboring Limestone County. Huntsville's population was 180,105 as of the 2010 Census....
. A large portfolio of community oriented and educational test applications between Nashville and Huntsville were launched with a 40 minute discussion of intercity
Intercity
Intercity or Inter-city means "between cities". It can refer to inter-city transportation by rail, bus, truck or airline. There are many transport companies with Intercity or Inter-city as their brand.* Inter-city rail services...
cooperation between the mayor
Mayor
In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
s of the cities. It is believed that the City Share pilot was the first ever intercity videoconference link ever constructed for non-commercial purposes.
In the years following the project's pilot startup, many public and private organizations participated in the network's public service programming and donated both in-kind and financial resources. Network participants and supporters were also successful in securing a wide bevy of public and private grants to pay for different types of community applications which utilized the project.
Project objectives
Project DIANE's primary objectives were to:- develop a successful electronic community service network that could be expanded and/or replicated by all interested members of the community,
- bring education institutions, business development agencies, and community service organizations closer together for cooperative sharing of scarce public and private resources and
- provide needy individuals and groups with free, or low cost, digital access to useful information, assistance and professional expertise.
There were two notable aspects about the network. First, the project was designed as a broad-based, rather than niche-focused, community telecollaboration
Telecollaboration
Telecollaboration refers to a set of software technologies that enable the integration and extension of personal desktop collaboration into high definition videoconferencing solutions....
. DIANE membership reflected a wide spectrum of community organizations which came together online to jointly plan and carry out public programs and services.
The project was represented by most segments of the community, both in an organizational context (e.g., schools, community centers, libraries, business agencies, etc.) and individually (child through senior adult, families, handicapped, urban and rural, etc.). DIANE was inherently a "project of projects" with teleconferencing applications in the three target areas of education, community service and economic development.
A second key aspect of this project was that, from its inception, DIANE members worked diligently to include disadvantaged or neglected members of society in consortium program development activities. The avoidance of a two-tier cyber-society of "haves" vs. "have-nots" was a high priority. DIANE members took special care to include low income inner city residents, developmentally disabled children
Developmental disability
Developmental disability is a term used in the United States and Canada to describe lifelong disabilities attributable to mental or physical impairments, manifested prior to age 18. It is not synonymous with "developmental delay" which is often a consequence of a temporary illness or trauma during...
, senior citizen
Senior citizen
Senior citizen is a common polite designation for an elderly person in both UK and US English, and it implies or means that the person is retired. This in turn implies or in fact means that the person is over the retirement age, which varies according to country. Synonyms include pensioner in UK...
s, speech
Speech disorder
Speech disorders or speech impediments are a type of communication disorders where 'normal' speech is disrupted. This can mean stuttering, lisps, etc. Someone who is unable to speak due to a speech disorder is considered mute.-Classification:...
and hearing impaired
Hearing impairment
-Definition:Deafness is the inability for the ear to interpret certain or all frequencies of sound.-Environmental Situations:Deafness can be caused by environmental situations such as noise, trauma, or other ear defections...
individuals, and other potential information highway-have nots in program development activities.
Participants
Online members of the consortium included family and community centersCommunity centre
Community centres or community centers or jumping recreation centers are public locations where members of a community tend to gather for group activities, social support, public information, and other purposes. They may sometimes be open for the whole community or for a specialised group within...
, speech & hearing treatment centers, K-12 schools, zoo
Zoo
A zoological garden, zoological park, menagerie, or zoo is a facility in which animals are confined within enclosures, displayed to the public, and in which they may also be bred....
s, museum
Museum
A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...
s, public libraries
Public library
A public library is a library that is accessible by the public and is generally funded from public sources and operated by civil servants. There are five fundamental characteristics shared by public libraries...
, universities, language institutes, skill training centers, chambers of commerce, economic development agencies, healthcare groups, overseas military bases & dependents schools, and other service organizations.
Specific notable members of the project included the United States Small Business Administration sponsored Small Business Development Centers, the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute, the Adventure Science Center, Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University is a private research university located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1873, the university is named for shipping and rail magnate "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided Vanderbilt its initial $1 million endowment despite having never been to the...
, the Tennessee Foreign Language Institute, Tennessee League for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing, the Nashville Zoo, the Metropolitan Action Commission, Urban League of Nashville, the Boys & Girls Club, the Girl Scouts
Girl Scouts of the USA
The Girl Scouts of the United States of America is a youth organization for girls in the United States and American girls living abroad. It describes itself as "the world's preeminent organization dedicated solely to girls". It was founded by Juliette Gordon Low in 1912 and was organized after Low...
of Middle Tennessee, the Catholic Diocese of Nashville, the Tennessee State Library & Archives
Tennessee State Library and Archives
The Tennessee State Library and Archives , established in 1854, currently operates as a unit of the Tennessee Department of State. According to the Tennessee Blue Book, the Library and Archives "collects and preserves books and records of historical, documentary and reference value, and encourages...
, the Elephant Sanctuary of Hohenwald, the Nashville Public Library System, the Bank of America
Bank of America
Bank of America Corporation, an American multinational banking and financial services corporation, is the second largest bank holding company in the United States by assets, and the fourth largest bank in the U.S. by market capitalization. The bank is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina...
Small Business Resource Centers, and the U.S. Department of Defense Overseas Dependents School System.
Real-time telecollaboration
Telecollaboration was inherently the method by which DIANE organizations educated and assisted one another. Real-time telecollaboration took place in all project activities through two-way electronic exchanges between a resource provider (such as a K-12 teacher, college professor, business counselor, social worker, therapist, or other expert professional) and a person in need (e.g., student, small/minority business entrepreneur, researcher, family member, handicapped person, senior citizen, etc.). Real-time multimedia information exchanges occurred during videoconferences via electronic whiteboardsInteractive whiteboard
An interactive whiteboard , is a large interactive display that connects to a computer and projector. A projector projects the computer's desktop onto the board's surface where users control the computer using a pen, finger, stylus, or other device...
, remote application sharing
Application sharing
Application sharing is an element of remote access, falling under the collaborative software umbrella, that enables two or more users to access a shared application or document from their respective computers simultaneously in real time...
, electronic messaging, hi-speed file transfer and other means.
Programs and applications
DIANE's program portfolio included various independent and inter-dependent telecollaborations, offering resources and assistance to both mainstream and disadvantaged community segments. In addition to the general program descriptions given in this section, interested parties were able to click to the Project DIANE Directory and read the "DIANE Program & Resource Profile" for each individual organization. General teleconference based program areas established by the project included: the Economic Development Partnership, Tennessee Child Development Partnership, Teachers' Teleconferencing Curriculum Forum, Internet Distance Training, Global Community Project, and others.Examples of specific program activities within these general program areas included the following: The Tennessee League for the Hearing Impaired offered videoconferencing-based Deaf culture
Deaf culture
Deaf culture describes the social beliefs, behaviors, art, literary traditions, history, values and shared institutions of communities that are affected by deafness and which use sign languages as the main means of communication. When used as a cultural label, the word deaf is often written with a...
workshops, sign language
Sign language
A sign language is a language which, instead of acoustically conveyed sound patterns, uses visually transmitted sign patterns to convey meaning—simultaneously combining hand shapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to fluidly express a speaker's...
instruction, and translation services
Video Relay Service
A Video Relay Service , also sometimes known as a Video Interpreting Service, is a videotelecommunication service that allows deaf, hard-of-hearing and speech-impaired individuals to communicate over video telephones and similar technologies with hearing people in real-time, via a sign language...
. Looby Metro Public Library supported a distance mentor
Mentor
In Greek mythology, Mentor was the son of Alcimus or Anchialus. In his old age Mentor was a friend of Odysseus who placed Mentor and Odysseus' foster-brother Eumaeus in charge of his son Telemachus, and of Odysseus' palace, when Odysseus left for the Trojan War.When Athena visited Telemachus she...
ship program called "Adopt-a-Grandparent" in which senior citizen library volunteers provide guidance and counseling to disadvantaged youth who called in from DIANE's community center locations. Therapists and physicians at the Bill Wilkerson Speech & Hearing Center and the Vanderbilt Child Development Center electronically assisted disabled children, including adolescents with autism
Autism
Autism is a disorder of neural development characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior. These signs all begin before a child is three years old. Autism affects information processing in the brain by altering how nerve cells and their...
and related communication disorders. High school students and teachers regularly consulted online with the project's educational resources such as the Cumberland Science Museum (e.g., for science information, environmental workshops, etc.) and to Meharry Medical College
Meharry Medical College
Meharry Medical College, located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States, is a graduate and professional institution affiliated with the United Methodist Church whose mission is to educate healthcare professionals and scientists. Founded in 1876 as the Medical Department of Central Tennessee...
(e.g., to learn about viruses), etc.
Electronic field trips
The use of videoconferencing technologyVideotelephony
Videotelephony comprises the technologies for the reception and transmission of audio-video signals by users at different locations, for communication between people in real-time....
to electronically and interactively take students to exotic and faraway places was pioneered by Project DIANE. An important supplement to in-class instruction, schoolchildren frequently were able to go on electronic field trips through the DIANE network for meaningful interactive real-world learning experiences.
The Nashville Zoo conducted videoconferences with area schools to bring students safe interactive experiences with rare snow leopards and other wild animals. Animal conservationists from the Elephant Sanctuary in Lewis County, TN provided teleconference-based seminars on elephants and the need for animal preservation
Wildlife
Wildlife includes all non-domesticated plants, animals and other organisms. Domesticating wild plant and animal species for human benefit has occurred many times all over the planet, and has a major impact on the environment, both positive and negative....
, even connecting video callers to remote cameras located in the elephant grazing pasture. Radnor Lake State Natural Area
Radnor Lake State Natural Area
Radnor Lake State Natural Area is a popular state natural area in Nashville, Tennessee.The 1,200+ acre nature preserve lies in the heart of Nashville, unusual for a major American city...
offered students a wide range of teleconference activities involving environmental conservation, water ecology, and wireless video/underwater camera views of its wildlife residents.
Oftentimes, Project DIANE electronic field trips took the children to international locations such as France, England, Japan, or to meet interesting people such as jet pilots, film actors and corporate executives. The Tennessee Foreign Language Institute
Tennessee Foreign Language Institute
The Tennessee Foreign Language Institute is an agency of the State of Tennessee created in 1986 to address the language needs of the state. The Institute is the only state government supported organization of its kind...
conducted world culture seminars and foreign language instruction to DIANE participants, also providing students remote playback access to its 250+ international tape library. Tennessee's state information repository, the Tennessee State Library & Archives, provided interactive teleconference-based history seminars, library reference assistance, and live curator based video access to its rare manuscript collection, includes original American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
photographs, historic architectural drawing
Architectural drawing
An architectural drawing or architect's drawing is a technical drawing of a building that falls within the definition of architecture...
s, original letters of President Andrew Jackson, the 1796 Tennessee State Constitution
Tennessee State Constitution
The Constitution of the State of Tennessee defines the form, structure, activities, character, and fundamental rules of the U.S. State of Tennessee....
, etc.
Connecting students to experts outside the classroom
Connected schools and community centers teleconferenced with the local public library for story telling hour and puppet shows, with NationsBankNationsBank
NationsBank was one of the largest banking corporations in the United States, based in Charlotte, North Carolina. In 1998, it acquired BankAmerica to become Bank of America.-Corporate history:...
's Small Business Resource Center and the Nashville Area Chamber for youth career planning and entrepreneurship programs, and with Meharry Medical College
Meharry Medical College
Meharry Medical College, located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States, is a graduate and professional institution affiliated with the United Methodist Church whose mission is to educate healthcare professionals and scientists. Founded in 1876 as the Medical Department of Central Tennessee...
for health and hygiene workshops. An advanced placement (AP) course shared curriculum was being developed for use by area high schools. Current AP course development included environmental science and biology.
Regarding business development programs, any area business with compatible technologies could access Project DIANE's online economic development member agencies, including SBRC business experts, SBRC library resources, SBDC business counselors, area chamber of commerce
Chamber of commerce
A chamber of commerce is a form of business network, e.g., a local organization of businesses whose goal is to further the interests of businesses. Business owners in towns and cities form these local societies to advocate on behalf of the business community...
program personnel, university business faculty, etc.
Awards and recognitions
International recognitions of Project DIANE included: Polycom CorporationPolycom
Polycom is a multinational corporation with approximately 3,200 employees worldwide and an annual revenue of approximately $1.2 billion in 2010. The company manufactures and sells telepresence and voice communications solutions.-Company History 1990:...
’s Exceptional Content Provider Award (8/03), a Top 5 Rating by the European Commission
European Commission
The European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....
's Global Bangemann Challenge (Stockholm, 6/99); 6 NII
Necessary International Initiative
The Necessary International Initiative, often shortened to NII, was a Trotskyist international grouping formed in March 1976 by groups considered to the left of the Fourth International, which the NII characterised as "centrism sui generis", although the British section disagreed with this...
Global Information Infrastructure award citations (12/96-2/98) including an AT&T Special Telecollaboration Award; a "national success story" citation by the President's National Information Advisory Council (2/96), and an Awards Laureate designation by the Smithsonian Institute Information Technology Awards Program (6/95).
Key invited presentations and demonstrations of Project DIANE programming include national conferences and forums hosted by the American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
(Atlanta, GA, 6/02), National Science Foundation
National Science Foundation
The National Science Foundation is a United States government agency that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National Institutes of Health...
(Berkeley, CA, 12/00), U.S. Dept of Commerce
United States Department of Commerce
The United States Department of Commerce is the Cabinet department of the United States government concerned with promoting economic growth. It was originally created as the United States Department of Commerce and Labor on February 14, 1903...
(Washington DC, 4/98) and the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
(Philadelphia PA, 4/97).
Technology evolution
Project DIANE began as an all Integrated Services Digital NetworkIntegrated Services Digital Network
Integrated Services Digital Network is a set of communications standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the traditional circuits of the public switched telephone network...
(ISDN) BRA based community network using desktop personal computers
Desktop computer
A desktop computer is a personal computer in a form intended for regular use at a single location, as opposed to a mobile laptop or portable computer. Early desktop computers are designed to lay flat on the desk, while modern towers stand upright...
deploying an H.320
H.320
H.320 is an umbrella recommendation by the ITU-T for running Multimedia over ISDN based networks. The main protocols in this suite are H.221, H.230, H.242, audio codecs such as G.711, and video codecs such as H.261 and H.263....
codec
Codec
A codec is a device or computer program capable of encoding or decoding a digital data stream or signal. The word codec is a portmanteau of "compressor-decompressor" or, more commonly, "coder-decoder"...
, which later evolved into a hybrid switched digital and Internet IP based H.320
H.320
H.320 is an umbrella recommendation by the ITU-T for running Multimedia over ISDN based networks. The main protocols in this suite are H.221, H.230, H.242, audio codecs such as G.711, and video codecs such as H.261 and H.263....
/H.324
H.324
H.324 is an ITU-T recommendation for voice, video and data transmission over regular analog phone lines. It uses a regular 33,600 bit/s modem for transmission, the H.263 codec for video encoding and G.723.1 for audio....
platform. It should be noted that the videoconferencing equipment used by Project DIANE in the Nashville and City Share startup field pilots were all OS/2
OS/2
OS/2 is a computer operating system, initially created by Microsoft and IBM, then later developed by IBM exclusively. The name stands for "Operating System/2," because it was introduced as part of the same generation change release as IBM's "Personal System/2 " line of second-generation personal...
based videoconference units (PCS/1's) provided through a joint development partnership at the time between PictureTel
PictureTel Corp.
PictureTel Corp was one of the first commercial videoconferencing product companies. It achieved peak revenues of over $400 million in 1996 and 1997 and was eventually acquired by Polycom in October 2001.-History:...
and the IBM Corporation
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
. These early video units were replaced during the startup phase with Windows OS
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
-based PC desktop units.
In later years, the project's infrastructure also included a large number of set top videoconference units, as well as several dozen videoconferencing units for conference rooms. In the late 1990s, a large corporate donation of more than a hundred new videoconference units more than doubled the size of DIANE to more than two hundred video locations.
Project DIANE also later acquired a Tandberg
Tandberg
This article is about the video-conferencing vendor, a Cisco company. Other companies with the same name such as Tandberg Television or Tandberg Data for data storage: see here and here...
Multipoint Control Unit
Multipoint Control Unit
A Multipoint Control Unit is a device commonly used to bridge videoconferencing connections.The Multipoint Control Unit is an endpoint on the LAN that provides the capability for 3 or more terminals and gateways to participate in a multipoint conference...
(MCU), sometimes referred to as a video bridge or gateway, which allowed the network to deliver its interactive programming to up to 16 separate locations simultaneously. Funding for the MCU's required network connections (a Primary Rate Access high speed digital telephone line and an IP
Internet Protocol
The Internet Protocol is the principal communications protocol used for relaying datagrams across an internetwork using the Internet Protocol Suite...
broadband access line
Broadband Internet access
Broadband Internet access, often shortened to just "broadband", is a high data rate, low-latency connection to the Internet— typically contrasted with dial-up access using a 56 kbit/s modem or satellite Internet with inherently high latency....
) was provided by Tennessee State University
Tennessee State University
Tennessee State University is a land-grant university located in Nashville, Tennessee. TSU is the only state-funded historically black university in Tennessee.-History:...
and the Tennessee Department of Human Services, Rehabilitation Services Division.