A3O-Unc«sW Farming, Saturday, January 3, 1998
GEORGE F. W. HAENLEIN
Extension Dairy Specialist
University of Delaware
Dairy Farmers and
the Internet
I used to answer questions
that came into my office by
phone and mail with informa
tion from my own files and from
books and journals. Now, the
electronics age has crept up on
me, rendering obsolete many of
the tools I used to use.
Who still uses a slide rule? Or
a desk calculator with a big key
board and a noisy carriage? Or
an IBM typewriter with its
revolving letter font? Today we
couldn't give away these one
essential and expensive pieces of
equipment. Instead, we carry
pocket calculators and portable
computers, which do all the
chores of those tools and much
more, much faster. It's like
changing from riding a bicycle to
driving a Lincoln Towncar.
Learning to handle the bicycle
was easy, but these new elec
tronic things! It takes a lot of IQ
and more than a little patience.
But we cannot go back to the
bicycle; we must move forward
to keep up with the more com
petitive world.
In addition to my old-fash
ioned address and phone num
ber, I now have a fax number, an
e-mail address and a Worldwide
Web address. Who knows what's
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Dairy Management Column
next? Whether I like it or not,
"traffic" is coming in on these
new addresses and I have to
respond. A few years
ago we changed the Delaware
DHIA over to an electronic sys
tem. So far, the transfer to com
puters has gone smoothly, and it
is so much faster for input and
turnaround results. We no
longer mail papers; the only
sending we do now is shipping
samples. With electronic milk
meters in the milking parlor,
milk-per-cow-day data on the
UD dairy herd can be trans
ferred monthly without a techni
cian or tester. And it's legal and
tamper-proof. We need a tester
only four times a year for sample
taking. Soon that too may
become electronic.
Yet only a minority of DHIA
herd producers have desk com
puters. I'm surprised at the slow
pace of adoption. It reminds me
of the changeover years ago
from cooling and shipping milk
in cans to installing a cooling
tank at the farm and shipping
by tank truck. Many farmers
were slow in seeing the advan
tages of that advancement, but
today there are few can-shippers
left.
So, did you get a computer
this Christmas, or are you in the
market for one in the New Year?
I can't wait to see all our dairy
farmers with computers. The
options are many, depending on
uasisisuasi
Farmers
the capacity of the computer
memory. A typical desk comput
er will cost between $1,500 and
$5,000; the convenient, but more
sensitive, portables about 50
percent more. Our DHIA testers
take portables into the milking
parlor for recording of data
directly; however, this has
necessitated more repair,
because computers and cow
environments in the parlor or
bam do not mix well.
There is a new language
associated with computers.
People who talk about comput
ers often sound as if they are
from another planet. A desktop
computer is a "PC," a portable is
a "laptop," and both are "hard
ware." Programs that run on
computers are "software." Don't
asked me why traditional
English is not good enough.
Most computers operate using a
"mouse," a device that moves
the"cursor" across the computer
screen.
The word processing function
of my computer has replaced my
typewriter. It's faster, and it
makes storing, sorting and edit
ing much easier. Spreadsheet
software has replaced the old
columnar pads,making financial
bookkeeping, multiple data
records, statistical analyses and
graphic displays simpler. I used
to keep a 3-ring binder with me
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that contained single pages for
each cow and calf and their con
tinuous health, reproduction
and production history. A laptop
does this much better. And when
I connect the computer to the
phone using a modem, I can get
data from the DHIA computing
center.
I now use the computer to
send information instead of
mailing it. With the Internet
and the World Wide Web, I can
search for information, even
from technical journals that is
otherwise accessible only visit
ing a university library. A
modem, preferably one with
high speed, is needed for this as
well as a lot of computer memo
ry capacity. For me, e-mail is no
friend, yet it has become a
necessity. So many people are
using it, it may replace tradi
tional mail. World Wide Web
and e-mail are part of Internet,
which is a worldwide connection
of computers, that allows you to
get information on virtually any
topic from around the world.
The Internet even provides
bulletin boards called Listserv,
where people can read and reply
to messages. For dairy farmers,
consultants, veterinarians and
processors, Dairy-L is popular
and used by more than 3,000
people from 40 countries.
"Browsing" is the term
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applied to searching the World
Wide Web, via a "search engine,"
such as Yahoo, Lycos and Web
Crawler. This allows users to
access documents and texts from
around the world, including
home pages of organizations.
Home page is like a catalog of
the many departments, person
nel and products of an organiza
tion as big as a university or as
small as a dairy farm.
For example, if you want to
find information about mastitis
in goats, select a search engine
and the topic ’mastitis." The
search will yield many, maybe
thousands, of "hits," which then
have to be narrowed down by
adding the subordinate topic
"goat" or any other species.
"Bookmark" is a term for
going directly to a frequently
used web address or "site."
There are many web sites relat
ed to the dairy industry, univer
sity extension and research,
expert consultants, weather
channel, feed prices, dairy mar
kets for milk, cheese, butter,
non-fat dried milk, future prices
for milk and grain. Even maga
zines such as "Hoard's
Dairyman," "Dairy Herd
Management" and "Dairy
Today" have web sites, which
have articles from current and
(Turn to Page A3l)
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Shippensburg, PA 17257
717-532-6139