Student Competition – top price $10,000

The IEEE Presidents’ Change the World Competition recognizes students who develop unique solutions to real-world problems using engineering, science, computing and leadership skills to benefit their community and/or humanity.

Identify a global or local problem, develop a solution, then tell us how you have made a positive impact in the world. You could win US$10,000 and attend the 2009 IEEE Honors Ceremony in Los Angeles, California, USA.

Submissions accepted 1 September 2008 through 28 February 2009.

Find out more at www.ieee125.org/change-the-world/index.html

10 Great Tech Books

Veteran technology writer Steven Levy names his picks for the top 10 tech books in the July issue of IEEE Spectrum. The list was created to appeal to lay readers and engineers alike, taking into account the actual reading experience along with the impact and significance of the title. This is one top 10 list that engineers, programmers and technology professionals won’t want to miss. For the complete story go to the July issue of IEEE Spectrum at www.spectrum.ieee.org/jul08/6354

All these books are in the UT library catalog. Click on the title to see location and availability.

1. The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance, Henry Petroski
2. Mirror Worlds; or, The Day Software Puts the Universe in a Shoebox…How It Will Happen and What It Will Mean, David Gelernter
3. A New Kind of Science, Stephen Wolfram
4. Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, Douglas R. Hofstadter
5. Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age, Paul Graham
6. The Design of Everyday Things, Donald A. Norman
7. The Soul of a New Machine, Tracy Kidder
8. The Codebreakers: The Story of Secret Writing, David Kahn
9. Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time, Dava Sobel
10. The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Richard Rhodes

IEEE will perform planned maintenance On Wednesday, 28 May,

On Wednesday, 28 May, IEEE will perform planned maintenance to the IEEE Xplore digital library.

During this maintenance, the system will be unavailable for up to one (1) hour beginning at approximately 2:00 pm EDT. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. A message will be also posted on the IEEE Xplore home page to alert users.

We appreciate your patience and thank you for being a subscriber to the IEEE Xplore Digital Library.

IEEE Xplore will be unavailable on Saturday February 2

An upgrade of the IEEE Xplore Digital Library is scheduled for Saturday, 2 February. During this deployment, the system will be unavailable for up to eight hours beginning at approximately 9:00 AM EST. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

As a result of this new release, the IEEE Xplore digital library will be enhanced with:

Conference Proceedings weekly update alerts
- Enables a user to receive weekly update alerts for every conference title via either email or RSS whenever a new conference proceeding title is added to IEEE Xplore.

Scitopia.org search from the IEEE Xplore home page
- The IEEE Xplore home page will feature a quick search box enabling users to easily search scitopia.org, the free federated search portal to the digital libraries of leading science and technology societies.

Draft standards search
- Users will be able to limit their search to IEEE draft standards only from the Advanced Search page in IEEE Xplore.

IEEE will implement an upgrade to the IEEE Xplore digital library on 11/10/07

On Saturday, 10 November, IEEE will implement an upgrade to the IEEE Xplore digital library.

As a result, users will experience approximately 2-4 hours of downtime on that date, between 9:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. EST.

This update includes the following features:

· Tabbed search results, including a beta test of Application Notes, practical content for working engineers

· Citation (Known Item) search, RefWorks/BibTeX citation download, and improved author search

· Subscriptions to IEEE Expert Now educational courses available through the IEEE Xplore platform

IEEE Ehances Display of Standards in IEEE Xplore

The IEEE Xplore digital library has been enhanced to include an improved navigation to help you find standards faster; the ability to search and browse draft standards in IEEE Xplore; clearer distinction between active, archived and superseded standards; availability of standards email alerts to keep you up-to-date on standards revisions; and the inclusion of links to standards interpretations, errata and other related documents.  For more information http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/guide/g_infoac_stds.jsp

For UT students, faculty and staff to gain access to the digital library you need to go through the UT Libraries site:

• Under Research Tools
• Click on Databases & Indexes to Articles
• Click on I (under Databases Alphabetical by Title)
• Click on IEEE Xplore

Now Online: First IEEE Journal from 1913

IEEE Xplore: Proceedings of the IRE

The IEEE this week made available to its online subscribers the earliest issues of its first technology journal, dating back to 1913.

Currently known as “Proceedings of the IEEE,” the journal was titled “The Proceedings of the IRE” when it premiered in January of 1913.

The IRE (

Institute of
Radio Engineers) was one of two predecessor organizations which merged to form the IEEE in 1963.

This week’s update brings the first seven years of the title online (1913 – 1919). “Proceedings of the IEEE” issues from 1963 forward were previously available online through the IEEE Xplore digital library. Issues from later years will follow in the coming months.

Papers in the first issue included “A Discussion on Experimental Tests of the Radiation Law for Radio Oscillators,” “High Tension Insulators for Radio Communication,” and “Recent Developments in the Work of the Federal Telegraph Company.”

“IEEE has made a commitment to digitizing our entire journal backfile, along with past editions of many of our conference publications,” said Barbara H. Lange, Director, IEEE Publications Product Line Management and Business Development. “This is a small part of a two-year plan to bring our historic, scholarly content to new generations of researchers and practitioners.”

Issues of “Proceedings of the IRE” from 1913 to 1919 can be found online through the IEEE Xplore digital library at: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=10933

IEEE will continue to digitize the historic backfile of its journals over the coming months.