Collier's Encyclopedia 1998

A review by Michael Santovec for KEGS (Komputer Enthusiasts of Greater Seattle) - January 1998

Introduction

Collier's makes a late entry into an already crowded CD-ROM encyclopedia market (Britannica, Compton's, Grolier's, IBM World Book, Microsoft Encarta). Sierra developed and markets this 3 CD-ROM multimedia encyclopedia which includes an atlas, dictionary, and several interactive simulations.

Netscape Communicator 4.0 is used as the interface. The toolbar at the top of the screen is from Netscape and provides the useful forward and backward buttons, as well as bookmark and printing functions. If you are already familiar with a web browser, the basic operation of the program is straight forward. But most of this toolbar is irrelevant to the encyclopedia.

Down the left side is a toolbar specific to Collier's. This lets you access the major parts of product: Encyclopedia, Atlas, Dictionary, Simulations, Timeline, Internet, and Help for Collier's (the Help menu at the top of the screen is specific to Netscape).


The rest of the screen is for the content you are viewing. The remaining figures in this review just show the content window without the Netscape and Collier's toolbars.

Encyclopedia

The encyclopedia includes about 21,000 articles, 18,000 photographs and other images, 150 videos and animations and 6 hours of sound and music clips. There are several ways to access the information. You can do a keyword search, select articles through an alphabetic index, use the topic finder which organizes information into 10 major categories and numerous subcategories, use the timeline, or have the program pick a random article for you. You can also search through specific multimedia types. A minor annoyance is that the search results page doesn't include the option to enter a new search item. You have to back up a screen to do that, which gets tedious and time consuming due to the overall sluggishness of the product.

Each displayed article uses 3 resizable frames. The right frame has the article text. The upper left frame has a article outline. Clicking on a topic there will advance the article text to that point. The lower left frame lists associated multimedia items with thumbnail images and Internet links. A major short-coming is that there are very few links in the article frame to other articles. It appears that unless the printed version explicitly included a reference to another article, there isn't one in the CD-ROM version. For example, if you are reading about the city of Dallas, the state of Texas is mentioned. But you can't just click on the word Texas to go to its article. You have to go to the search screen, then type or copy/paste Texas, then search, then select the article. And to return to Dallas, you have to back up through the search screens. That's no way to run a computerized encyclopedia.

Multimedia items, when selected, open in a new screen. A nice feature of the photographs is that they use fractal technology. This allows you to do several levels of zoom in any area of the image without the severe pixelation of a typical bitmap image. It is even interesting to see the image go from fuzzy to clear as the fractal data is loaded. Unfortunately, this is slow. Some larger images took 20-30 seconds to finish loading, not counting the time to fetch it from the CD-ROM. It would be nice, if instead of zooming in on a piece of the image in a fixed size window, the whole image expanded to fill the screen, possibly with scroll bars to examine part of the image. However, I suspect that this would be difficult with the browser technology as well as unbearably slow.

Atlas

The Atlas opens on a world map. You can search for a site by name, or you can click on a spot on the map to go to a more detailed map, if one exists. But there is no linking from one detailed map to an adjacent one. If you want to move over, you need to use the back button to go to the more general map. The maps include links to related articles and articles include links to related maps. Unfortunately, unless you enter the Atlas from the world map, there is no linking amongst the maps. The atlas needs much better integration within itself and with the encyclopedia in general.

Dictionary

Included is a bare bones 100,000 word dictionary. The definitions are brief. A top notch dictionary would include audio pronunciations. This one lacks even a printed pronunciation guide. There is no integration whatsoever of the dictionary with the rest of the product. It might as well be a separate program. After a few times of switching through multiple screens, and possibly CDs, to look up an unfamiliar word, you'll find a pocket dictionary more convenient and informative.

Simulations

The interactive simulations cover 9 general areas, with a variety of activities. This is the flashiest, and in many cases most interesting part of the product. Unfortunately, they are shallow with limited educational value. Boredom may quickly set in. Most of them lack any overview or summary as to the point of the simulation. There are links from the simulations to the encyclopedia, but not in the reverse direction. And articles don't address the content of the simulations.

The Music simulation lets you select any combination of the 6 musicians to play your choice of 5 song segments. You also select one of the instruments to display its musical notation. A bouncing ball shows the notes as they are played.

The Economics simulation uses a lemonade stand to cover supply and demand. This one makes the greatest attempt to be educational. But the presentation is so fragmented as to be more confusing than informative.

The Archeology simulation lets you explore the ancient Mayan city of Palenque. It uses wrap around images that let you scroll up, down or around. You can move to a variety of places within the jungle and various buildings, as well as take close-up looks are a number of artifacts. This is the most engrossing of the simulations.

A Chemistry simulation gives you a lab to mix pairs of chemicals from a selection of 13, in order to see a brief video of the interaction. But out of a possible 78 combinations, you can mix only 7. For the others you are told to try something else. There is also a display of the Periodic Chart that lets you look at the details of each element.

The Physics simulation has two parts: Color Mixing and Gravity. The Color Mixing should hold your attention for about 30 seconds. The Gravity portion is more interesting. You use different forces to shoot your choice of livestock into space from various planets in order to see how high they go. If only they splattered on reentry (they don't) Beavis and Butt-Head would be entertained.

There are additional simulations in the areas of Geology (earthquakes), Geography (map jigsaw puzzles), Physical Fitness (nutrition and exercise) and Trivia Adventure (search the encyclopedia in order to try to find the answers to 50 obscure questions).

Internet

The encyclopedia doesn't require an Internet connection, but readily uses one. Many articles include links to Internet web sites. Since you are already using a web browser, it's an seamless link. Depending on the web site's use of frames, you may lose the Collier's toolbar. If you haven't reconfigured Netscape with a different home page (e.g. your ISP), then you can use the Netscape home button to get the toolbar back. Otherwise it's a good idea to bookmark the encyclopedia opening page so that if you get lost on the Internet, you can easily find your way home.

Sierra periodically makes free program and content updates available on the Internet. Unlike some other encyclopedias, there is no particular schedule of content update. You need to use Sierra's Auto-Update program for this, which requires that the PC with the encyclopedia installed have an Internet connection. Otherwise there is no way to get the updates.

Collier's also offers some Internet based research services at an additional monthly charge.

Installation and Other Nightmares

Collier's requires the use of Netscape 4.00, which is included on the CD-ROM, and automatically installed just prior to the main part of the encyclopedia. Although the Netscape install screen gives you the choice of a typical or custom install, that choice is ignored and the full product, including mail, news, web editor, etc. is installed. If you already have Netscape 4 on your system, you can cancel its install and use your existing version. However, there are potential problems with that, and you may be better off with a second copy in its own directory just for the encyclopedia. If you use an existing copy, you may have to tweak its settings, such as making sure it starts in online mode, turning off some toolbars, and not having it automatically dial your ISP and download mail and news messages. If you let the program install its own copy of Netscape, it should set the correct options. On the other hand, if you want to use the Internet links, you may have to tweak the encyclopedia's version for your ISP. An additional problem, Collier's, as delivered, it is not compatible with any newer version of Netscape (e.g. 4.01 - 4.04 which include a variety of security and other updates). Sierra has recently released an fix for compatibility through version 4.04 of Netscape. You'll need to use the Auto-Update program to get the fix.

You also need Microsoft Internet Explorer (MSIE) version 3 installed. That's because the fractal image viewer uses the MSIE ActiveX technology. Collier's CD-ROM includes software for the AT&T Worldnet Internet service which includes MSIE. When you install the encyclopedia, it will automatically install shortcuts on the desktop for an AT&T install. But it doesn't install the AT&T software itself. If you don't already have MSIE, you can use the AT&T shortcut to install it, then uninstall if you don't want to keep it. That will leave the ActiveX components installed.

Notice that I said MSIE version 3. That's because the fractal image viewer isn't compatible with MSIE 4. If you have version 4 installed, you can view a given image only once. The second time, Netscape will freeze, even if you have rebooted the PC in between. If that happens to you, do an Alt/Ctrl/Del to kill Netscape and start over. Apparently, the viewer has problems if the image is already in the MSIE browser cache. The workaround is to clear the MSIE cache, or at least the PH*.FIF files there, before you try to view an image a second time. As of this writing, Sierra doesn't have a fix for this.

If your browsers are configured to use a proxy server with your ISP, you'll also have problems. Fortunately, there is a simple fix. You need to add 127.0.0.1 to the proxy exception list in each browser. Use a semicolon to separate it from any existing entries in MSIE, or a comma with Netscape.

Many of the compatibility problems come about because the browser doesn't access the CD-ROM directly. Instead, Collier's installs a web server program named HTTPD32 on your PC. This acts as an intermediary between the browser and CD-ROM. When you start the encyclopedia, it actually starts two programs: the web server and Netscape. The browser talks to the web server program as if it were elsewhere on the Internet. The browser isn't even aware of the CD-ROM. This gives more control and functionality than simply accessing web pages from the CD-ROM. But in addition to the compatibility problems, it adds overhead, making the product more sluggish than other encyclopedias.

An additional complication is that the Auto-Update program has some compatibility problems with MSIE 4. So if you have that installed, you might not be able to use the Auto-Update function.

Sierra includes some installation notes in a Readme file on the CD-ROM. Unfortunately, you can't read the file until after you install the product. Oops! It's not a separate file on the CD, but embedded in the installation files. However, this information is available on the Sierra web site. Check it out before installing. Unfortunately, as of this writing, it hasn't been updated to address some of the above issues.

System Requirements

The minimum requirements include: Win95 (not compatible with Win/NT), 486/66 (Pentium recommended), 16 MB of RAM (32 MB recommended), 50-75 MB disk space (25 MB for Netscape, 15-40 MB for encyclopedia files, 10 MB for browser caches), CD-ROM, mouse, 640x480x256 color video (800x600x65000 (16-bit) high color recommended). Downloaded content updates will take several more megabytes of disk space.

The product was tested on a Pentium/133 with 32 MB of RAM and a 16x CD-ROM.

I didn't see any significant performance difference between the minimal (15 MB) and full (40 MB) install. The main difference appears to be that the full install places the thumbnail images (about 22 MB) on the disk. If you have a slow CD-ROM drive, that may help. You also have the option to turn thumbnail display off.

Unfortunately, like most multi-CD products, there is no support for CD-ROM changers or multiple CD-ROM drives.

Availability and Pricing

I found few stores that carried this product. The competition was much more in evidence. Your best bet for finding it is mail order. The price is about $10-20 more than most other deluxe versions, but somewhat less than Britannica. Collier's is available for purchase from the Sierra web site for $79.95 plus shipping. A $50 mail-in rebate is attached to the packages, which is valid through January 31st, 1998. This brings the final price somewhat lower than other encyclopedias.

Recommendations

The browser incompatibilities are sufficient to prevent me from recommending this product. Even as Sierra fixes problems, new ones can be expected whenever you upgrade your browsers for Internet access or switch ISPs. It's not worth the problems.

Although the browser interface looks slick, the inherent limitations of a browser make the interface clumsy. The strength of a browser is that it allows a wide variety of people with little effort to publish content that looks reasonably well on a number of platforms. As a generic interface, it is never the ideal one for a specialized product. Sierra needs to scrap the browser approach and do a custom interface. That should also speed up the performance.

The product also needs much better integration within the elements and between them. Just copying a printed work to a CD-ROM fails to take advantage of a computer's strengths.

This is a first generation product, and it shows. If this were the only CD-ROM encyclopedia on the market, it would be worth having. The content itself is reasonably good, although not remarkable. But the competition is generations ahead of Collier's. Unless Collier's makes a vast improvement in the interface in their next attempt, they won't be around for a 3rd try.

A cumbersome tool doesn't get used, particularly when better ones are readily available.