Electronic consulting
The increasing use if computing resources by ‘casual’ users places a severe load on the traditional model of consulting. Some problems can be alleviated by conducting minicourses for some of the more popular packages and techniques. However, access to consultants, especially the special.ists for a popular package, could still become difficult. Phone consultation is difficult for complex problems, since the user often has difficulty in recognizing and explaining the actual cause of the problem. In addition, both the walk in desk and special appointments are inconvenient for the remote user, and may fail to solve a problem in a timely fashion.