Cyberspace is the set of digitial common carriers which unifies all media. This new column focuses on life in cyberspace and on the computer practitioners who reside there: the cybernauts.

The user-sensitive theme runs through the articles you'll find in this issue, as we focus on "intelligent Applications." Our Feature Article ("AI at Microsoft" by Lisa Lewinson) shows you how one of computing's greatest corporate entities is putting Artificial Intelligence to work. A heavy backer of AI research, Microsoft is banking on intelligent technology to make its support staff and its software more responsive to its customers. Daniel Rasmus ("Intelligent Agents") reports on software that watches you, discerns patterns in your interactions with your computer, and has the potential to automate those patterns so that you work faster and smarter. Both articles make the point that user-sensitive software will ultimately help us manage the mega-glut of information piling up all around us.

Chuck Williams introduces a series on "Smart Front-Office Applications" -- client-server packages which help businesses bring information, products, and services to their clientele, thus increasing corporate responsiveness to customer needs. Harlequin founder and President Jo Marks, in an interview with PC AI publisher Terry Hengl, relates how his company builds smart software that assists people as they solve crucial everyday problems. Marks emphasizes that it's now important to sell solutions, not technology.

As befits an issue whose focus is "Intelligent Applications," we bring you an article on expert systems. Damond Benningfield's "AI and Space-Based Experiments" tells you how a knowledge-based system works with astronauts to carry out experiments during space shuttle flights.

We start the new year with a new regular -- Technical Editor Hal Berghel's "Cybernautica." In each issue, Hal will tell you about Internet-related issues, services, and tools. The first installment presents his views about the information superhighway and how it will affect our lives. Hal also reviews WinGopher, and Windows-based Internet browser.

To keep in step with the emphasis on responsiveness, solutions, and cyberspace, I've added still another new feature: I've gone online. My Internet address is jspcai@unf.edu

Feel free to email me comments, questions, trivia, esoterica, attaboys, and flames. Whether you're a neonet newbie, an infobahn intermediate, or a seasoned cybernaut, I look forward to hearing from you.

Joseph Schmuller