The ResNet service is 10 years old this term!

We think Bristol was the first University in the UK to provide Internet access to study-bedrooms in all halls. ResNet started as a small pilot in one block of Hiatt Baker Hall in the spring term 1998. Over the summer vacation a team of university staff and students installed hardware, wrote the docs, set up the servers, designed a logo, stuffed envelopes and did everything else so that ResNet went live across all nine halls of residence for Freshers Week, 1998. The student houses followed soon afterwards. We haven't looked back since!

10 years ago things were very different:

• Only about 30% of students had a computer, and most of those were desktops with Windows 95, or even Windows 3.1
• Fast, always on Internet like ResNet was almost unheard of - at home people had dialup if they had Internet access at all
• Computers didn't have a network adapter built-in: you had to open the case and fit a special ethernet adapter.

We are very proud of ResNet. It's been great fun working on something that provides a real service to students and people seem to appreciate (even the Epigrump column likes ResNet )

If you'd like to wish ResNet a happy anniversary, say what you think about the service, or suggest what you would like to see from ResNet in future, please leave a comment below. Here's to the next ten years!

The ResNet team.

ResNet will be ten years old in 2008! It all started with a small pilot at Hiatt Baker in the spring term 1998.

To celebrate the ten years we are planning a reunion event and trying to get in touch with everyone who has worked for ResNet over the years. If you will be anywhere near Bristol at the end of February we hope you can join us. If you can't we'd still love to hear from you and find out what you're up to.

Please get in touch by emailing resnet-help@bristol.ac.uk and we'll send you an invitation.

cheers,

Nick.

This time last year, we took some time out from our hectic pre-freshers-week schedule to do a Jaffa Cake blind tasting. It's a year on, and technology has advanced, so we thought it was time to investigate another of the big scientific mysteries of our age. Namely Jelly Babies.

We assembled a crack team of 14 researchers, 4 types of Jelly Baby from local confectionery merchants, a pile of postits, and got tasting!

Any serious scientist will tell you, if it doesn't have a pretty graph, it's not worth publishing it.

Key:
A - Sainsburys own Brand
B - Half Pounders Brand sourced from a local newsagent
C - Bassetts
D - Haribo

As you can see from our graph, Our researchers found it very easy to identify the genuine Bassetts Jelly Babies, which were option C. Although they were more split about which was their favorite, voting equally for A and C.

We took a short break from preparing for the start of term today, just long enough to conduct some serious scientific research into one of lifes most important questions. Namely - "Who makes the best Jaffa Cakes?"

We staged a blind taste test of 5 brands of Jaffa Cake, and a decent sized sample of tasters assembled from ResNet staff.

During the taste test, one person forgot to vote and Nick was disqualified from voting (He bought the Jaffa Cakes, and as he knew which was which it didn't seem fair to let him vote!) So the total sample size was 10 people.

We asked our testers two questions, "Which one is the genuine McVities?" and "Which is your favourite?" Somewhat surprisingly, there was a clear winner!

As no scientific research is complete without a graph, we plugged the results into Excel...

Key:

1. Tesco Value
2. Tesco Standard (With Real Fruit Juice!)
3. McVities
4. Sainsburys Basics
5. Sainsburys Standard (With Real Fruit Juice!)