Preservation of chemistry instructional software

CHED 385

Jon L. Holmes and John W. Moore, jwmoore@chem.wisc.edu. Journal of Chemical Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 209 N. Brooks St., Madison, WI 53715-1116
Instructional software is continually being developed to more effectively convey key principles of chemistry. Unfortunately, much instructional software developed in environments that are now obsolete, is unusable in today's computer environments. Preservation of published materials, traditionally the purview of libraries, is difficult In the digital realm. To preserve some its best instructional software, the Journal of Chemical Education Software and the JCE Digital Library, a collection of the National Science Digital Library, have translated several titles to operate in the Internet browser environment. With the help of a dedicated team of undergraduate students, these programs have been reexamined and rewritten with modern programming methods and cross-platform compatible technologies such as HTML, JavaScript, and Java applets. As a result, these programs now run in a variety of environments. We will discuss how such preservation efforts are essential if we are to sustain the future use of today's software.