With the relaunch of Juilliard’s public Web site (www.juilliard.edu) in June, the summer seemed like a good time to rethink Juilliard’s Intranet site.

Are you asking what an “Intranet” is? Allow me to explain. It’s a kind of private Web site, available only to a specific community, such as a corporation or educational institution, containing information and applications aimed at that community’s interest and needs. If you’re now asking how a Web site can be private, that’s a good question. After all, what’s less private than cyberspace, where online activities can be monitored (usually without the user even knowing it)? When it comes to the Intranet, however, privacy (perhaps “exclusivity” is a better word) is more assured, because in order to access an Intranet, the user’s computer must be connected to a designated network (in our case, the Juilliard network). This ensures that the materials on our Intranet remain for the Juilliard community’s eyes only.

The previous incarnation of the Juilliard Intranet was a kind of neglected afterthought of a project. It had its champions among staff from time to time, but remained largely static, underdeveloped, and unused. The new Intranet boasts better-organized information, a more transparent navigation scheme, and a design that is consonant with Juilliard’s public Web identity. Additionally, the new Intranet is more data-driven in nature. This means that instead of tediously editing computer code, members of staff can simply enter information into a database or fill out an electronic form and voilà! Said content appears on the Intranet: up to the second, relevant, and reaching the people it needs to reach. Implementing this kind of functionality required me to become more of a “real” programmer than I consider myself to be. With that in mind, I must thank my office mates, Gil Hennessey and Jonathan Soons, for their help and advice.

While the Intranet is not the answer to all the School’s internal communications needs (yet), it does provide a few very attractive solutions to staff, students, and faculty. Three of these include:

Speed in communicating to large numbers of people: Announcements on the Intranet can be published instantly, reducing the need for those dreaded “global” e-mails.

Reduction of Paper: By using electronic forms, we can decrease the amount of paper we use, making everyone’s desk neater.

Reduction of redundant tasks: Let’s say you work in an office that answers the same question 500 times a day or hands out the same form 500 times a day, only to have the same 500 people come back the next day for the same form. This can be maddening. Digitizing this information serves the people on both sides of the desk. Sure, someone is going to have to repeat “Go to the Intranet” until they’re sick of saying it, but over time people will get the message. Further, for folks simply trying to get some information without making pests of themselves, the Intranet offers that information 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, as long as that person can log onto the Juilliard network.

So, think of ways the Intranet can be useful to you. Are you a faculty member? Would you like to post your syllabus, giving your students instant access to it? Do you have an announcement pertinent to one or more sections of the Juilliard community? Would you like to have people fill out an electronic form and store the results in a database? We can do all this, and more.

In the meantime, I invite everyone to visit the Intranet at http://intranet.juilliard.edu. Remember, you must be logged onto the Juilliard network to do so. I welcome your questions and comments. I can be reached at chillelson@juilliard.edu. (And keep your eye out for the debut of the new, improved Bookstore site, coming very soon.)

Craig Hillelson, a member of the I.T. Department, graduated from Juilliard in 1998 with a master’s degree in guitar.