I knew our computer-assisted reporting was getting out of control on "The Day of Eleven Names."

We had what I suspect is the typical experience of newsrooms that stick with CAR for a few years. We collected a few gigabytes of data for investigative projects. The same data would be a blessing for daily news - if we could figure out how to access it within a day.

When CD recorders became affordable, I began pressing the data onto discs. We bought a second copy of the database program FoxPro and put it on a communal computer at the assignment desk. But almost everyone was put off by FoxPro's complexity (or maybe it was the length of the instructions I wrote: "Step 1: Use the mouse and click twice on the little picture of a So lookup requests kept coming to me.

The worst day

I kept a count on what I remember as the worst day: in eleven separate requests, reporters brought me names to "check on your computer." I had to spend 20 minutes on each name, switching CDs, watching the query progress bar slowly creep along, printing out the results and delivering them to the reporters (which I came to think of as "putting the facts on a silver platter for the ingrates"). Soon, we had to back off our efforts to spread the use of CAR.

Today, technology has become cheap enough that the single-computer approach might work. Thirty-gigabyte hard drives are reasonably priced, eliminating the need to shuffle CDs. And a few months ago I saw a demonstration by the CAR specialist at one of our competitors. He created attractive search screens within FoxPro that are customized for major databases.

But I was a non-computer-assisted reporter long enough to know that you shouldn't expect reporters to abandon the telephone at their desks to look for something on a shared computer. And assignment people have enough to worry about without having to serve as librarians for the staff.

Eventually we experienced a wonderful coincidence: the station's budget for buying computers had a small surplus, and NICAR announced a seminar for creating newsroom Intranets. My news director gave me both. There were two challenges. One was getting the new server to operate on the station's computer network. For this I had generous help from our information technology manager. In fact, I'm not sure how generous it was. He used to be the engineer who ran our satellite truck, and after years of watching me do live shots, I don't think he was going to let me come near plugging a computer into our network. The other challenge was the industrial-strength database program, Microsoft SQL Server. It works like FoxPro or Access, but has a number of devilish differences in the details. And, at least in the version we bought three years ago, it generates the most indecipherable error messages I've ever seen.

What made it work for me was the program that serves as an intermediary, NewsEngin's UniQuery. Often praised in these pages, UniQuery creates search forms for the databases loaded on the server. It installs easily. It creates forms on Web pages, and by now almost every reporter has experience with that interface.

Using UniQuery

Best of all, UniQuery creates a unified search page so reporters can hit every database at once. We have 70 queries loaded on our Intranet now, and SQL Server is powerful enough to complete them in a half minute. There's a wonderful serendipity in finding extra details about a person in databases you'd never have time to check otherwise - a phone number on a hunting license or an employer in campaign contribution lists. Once UniQuery was up and running, I ventured into creating my own Web-based search pages for other data, using training aids created by Tom Torok, now of The New York Times. I created profiles of public schools drawing data from three different sources. I listed city data from FBI crime reports. Even simple Intranet features have their benefits. I got permission from the state to post the Minnesota criminal code (not that I fully accept why I need permission for that). It's copied straight from the state legislature's Web site. But the indexing built into the server's operating system is simpler to use and is up and running more often than the legislature's search engine. We've even branched out to other features used by the entire station, like a Web form to send messages to our alphanumeric pagers. The most widely used features within the station are a form to fill out expense reports on a spreadsheet and our overnight TV ratings.

Lessons from the Webmaster

All of which means I've turned into a Webmaster. That's taught me lessons that may apply as we all try to create versions of our work for the Web as well as for broadcast.

First, not that a TV reporter should need to be reminded to be concise, but I thought the Intranet was supposed to be different the more details crammed in, the better. Instead, I've been surprised to see how slow users are to "drill down," to click repeated links to get "deeper" into the data for more details. I've even watched people who seem reluctant to scroll down a single page to look for data. We're about to receive a new version of UniQuery that should simplify the look of the results.

I've learned not to be cavalier about letting people figure things out for themselves. One day I watched an assignment person struggle on the Intranet to calculate how old a person was from the date of birth. I smugly shouted out an answer in an arrogant "I got straight-As in arithmetic" tone, and then had to go back in a minute when I realized I'd figured it wrong, too. I've now added an "AgeToday" column to the query results for databases that include birth dates. Let SQL Server worry about the math.

And although I no longer have the need to tell people to click twice on the little fox, I have tried to make instructions clearer based on user feedback (often shouted at me across the newsroom when I've got my own deadline to worry about). I assembled a PowerPoint tutorial on the use of our Intranet that I've updated several times to reflect complaints and cautions. One is, "These databases were collected from government agencies, and governments can make mistakes." That may seem too rudimentary even for Journalism 101, but I think it's a helpful reminder for people impressed by the presumed power of computerized data.

But maybe I contribute to that image of power. I keep a running tally of the size of the Intranet on its homepage, something like the McDonald's hamburger signs. Right now it reads "Now featuring 41.9 million records." Eleven names? Bring 'em on.