Michigan State University Extension
Extenstion International Trade Res. - 09229501
03/31/96

National Trade Data Bank (NTDB) on the Internet

The Commerce Department took a major step forward in        
fulfilling its goal of creating a comprehensive Business    
and Economic Node on the Internet. The Department made      
over 300,000 documnets available to the public through      
the Internet.                                               

The data bank makes valuable trade information available    
to Internet users for the first time. Included in these     
information programs will be the Department's Foreign       
Trader's Index, the Export Yellow Pages, the Trade          
Opportunities Program, and Market Research Reports. The     
National Trade Data Bank will be available in three         
Intenet applications. These applications are File           
Transfer Protocol(FTP), Gopher, and World Wide Web (WWW).   

FTP allows the user to access files directly from the       
source's computer, similar to a computer network file       
service. Gopher is a system designed to allow the user to   
have access to electronically distributed documents on-     
line:  unlike FTP which views only file names, the user     
actually views the text of the document during a Gopher     
session. The most exciting of the options, however, will    
be the World Wide Web application. This service allows      
the user to not only transfer files as in either the        
Gopher or FTP applications, but will allow for              
incorporation of audio and full-motion presentations with   
the existing text. It will also allow for full-text         
searches of the data, where Gopher allows only for          
searches using file descriptions, and FTP allows only       
searches by file names. WWW information is accessed using   
Mosaic, an application developed by the National Center     
for Supercomputing Applications, and is available at no     
cost to the user.                                           

For more information on the National Trade Data Bank on     
CD-ROM or on the Internet, National Trade Data Bank CD-     
ROM, or the Business and Economic Node, please contact      
the Office of Business Analysis of the US Department of     
Commerce at (202) 482-1986, or Toll free at (800) STAT-     
USA.                                                        

How To Find ESA Data on the Internet                        
The Internet addresses for the NTDB on the Internet are:    
     WWW:      www.stat-usa.gov                             
     Gopher:   gopher.stat-usa.gov                          
     FTP:      ftp.stat-usa.gov                             
To obtain the NCSA Mosaic Software for Unix, Windows, or    
Macintosh:                                                  
FTP:      ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu                                 
To obtain Gopher software:                                  
FTP:      boombox.micro.umn.edu                             

Go To Top of File        MSU Extension Home Page

This information is for educational purposes only. References to commercial products or trade names does not imply endorsement by MSU Extension or bias against those not mentioned. This information becomes public property upon publication and may be printed verbatim with credit to MSU Extension. Reprinting cannot be used to endorse or advertise a commercial product or company. This file was generated from data base IT on 03/05/98. Data base IT was last revised on 03/31/96. For more information about this data base or its contents please contact cook@msue.msu.edu . Please read our disclaimer for important information about using our site.