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STANFORD UNIVERSITY
STANFORD, CALIFORNIA 4305

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY

January 17, 1975

Dr. Jerrold Karliner
CIBA-Geigy Corporation
Ardsley, New York 10502

Dear Jerry:

| find myself in the somewhat embarrassing position of having encouraged you to
contact us if you were interested in access to our programs, then having to tell you
the caveats. Your expressed interest, as a potential first industrial user, has forced
SUMEX to investigate its guidelines on such users.

We all appreciate your extension of an offer to pay for access. However, SUMEX
does not operate on a fee-for-service basis, nor is it likely it will in the near

future. Because it is funded by NIH there are some rather strict guidelines on access
to SUMEX for any use which can be construed as even indirectly providing public
money for furtherance of a private corporation. This may seem somewhat of a Catch-22
situation. Everyone's feeling, and this includes SUMEX and DENDRAL personnel, is
that we would like to offer in some way our programs to the widest possible group of
people including those in industry who may find access most difficult under the existing
guidelines. Therefore we want to encourage you to consider two altematives. First,
if you or your colleagues who may desire access to SUMEX are engaged in research
which is supported at least in part by the government, then this would probably be
sufficient justification for your access. If this is the case, please write to us out-
lining your situation and we can proceed. Secondly, there is another computer system
exactly like SUMEX almost literally right next door. This system is run on a fee-for-
service basis, but it is not available over TYMNET as is SUMEX. We are willing

to explore your access to our programs running on that machine if you wish.

The latter option is the more difficult to follow up since in addition to the mechanics
of mounting and maintaining our programs on another facility there are a number of
other questions, important to you, for which we have no immediate answers (but could
relatively soon), For example, how to get the cheapest access, what is the estimated
computer charge, and so forth. Also, you probably would want some trial access to
see if the effort needed to follow this option was worth it. We can arrange that
access as long as it is on the record that we agreed that a successful demonstration
Dr. Jerrold Karliner
January 17, 1975
page 2

of utility for you was our goal, and that the period of access was limited (e.g., say
90 days).

Please write or call Suzanne Johnson or myself (same telephone number) if you have
further questions. | really hope we can work something out as we enjoy users who

have problems which seem to be amenable to solution using what we have available.

Sincerely yours,

Dennis H. Smith
DHS :gp
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S. Johnson