Connectivity

As the latest class of college students graduates into the working world, the media are filled with stories about the lack of jobs. That suggests a couple of questions - where do jobs come from, and how can we get more of them here? It's a very complicated answer, but it can be boiled down to this: Jobs come from vibrant regional economies, and to create more of them we have to invigorate innovation throughout the region. Other regions with "hot" economies - San Francisco, San Diego, Austin - have proved it. Innovation isn't just a buzzword; it is essential for regional survival.

Now, you can log on at the airport without plugging in and dialing up. Global Digital Media, based in the Boston area, yesterday officially unveiled its Becon network of wireless Internet hubs at the Philadelphia International Airport. The network provides connections to the Internet and e-mail from a laptop computer equipped with the appropriate PC card. The backbone of the Becon network is the 15 hubs presently located in the A, B and C terminals, the general concourse area, the concourse connectors and the baggage claim areas.

Chester County's on-ramp to the information superhighway has hit a few detours, a few potholes and even a new toll taker. But supporters of CHESCOnet say all of this is to be expected in the fast- changing world of technology and should not overshadow what has been accomplished in less than two years. "From the beginning, the question was how to get the information highway in Chester County," said County Commissioner Andrew Dinniman, an early and vocal cheerleader of the project.

BY MOST REPORTS, consumers are opening their wallets wider this gift-giving season than last. Still there's good reason to keep thinking practical, even with gifts for the crazed techie on your list. A FLAT SCREEN'S BEST FRIEND: Have (or getting) a high definition flat-screen TV? You might be tempted to hang it high on a wall, maybe over the fireplace. But the HD picture looks best and your body is most relaxed when the screen is positioned right at seated eye level. Filling the bill perfectly (and unusually affordably)

When we reflect on the enormous challenge Philadelphia faces in guiding the development of seven miles of its riverfront, from Port Richmond in the north to the grounds of the old Navy Yard in the south, we think about the connectivity - and lack of it - represented by this complex riverfront. Nowhere is connectivity more essential than in the riparian corridors of our city because the opportunities are few and precious. The very nature of this contact zone between land and water systems makes connectivity its reason to be - its ethos.

Despite having nearly doubled its 1987 revenues, Rabbit Software Corp. of Malvern said yesterday that it expected to report a loss of about $4.7 million for 1988. That compares with a loss of about $4 million for 1987. Rabbit attributed the loss to the company's "continued intensive investment" in its local area-network gateway-product lines, which enable computers to communicate with each other. In addition, the loss was increased by an unspecified amount in year-end writeoffs.

Dying to hear about "Hitchhiker's Guide to Lotus Notes"? or "Preparing Buildings for 100 Megabits and Beyond"? Or simply want to know "What Is a Network"? Or how to get your company into a new county database that should help local businesses win government contracts? If so, there must be something for you at West Chester University this week at a conference that is expected to attract more than 1,600 techies and teachers, CEOs and government officials, computer nerds and just plain folks.

West Chester University is expecting thousands of visitors to its Technology Symposium on March 20 and 21. "About 2,000 people attended last year," said Eugene Kray, a university dean. "Our seminars cover emerging technologies, connectivity and databases, government procurements, distance learning, and multimedia use in the corporate community. " U.S. Rep. Robert S. Walker (R., Pa.), chairman of the House Science Committee, will give the keynote address. As many as 80 vendors will have displays and booths to pitch their products.

ERM Program Management Co. has been awarded two major contracts for federal agencies. The company, an affiliate of Environmental Resources Management in Exton, will receive $6 million over three years for services relating to storage tank removal and replacement on bases in the Middle Atlantic and Southeastern regions. The U.S. Department of Energy in Idaho Falls, Idaho, has contracted for $5 million in services over a four-year period for managerial and technical support services from ERM for environmental restoration, waste management and nuclear safety services.

When the CEO Forum on Education and Technology began its five-year mission to chart schools' progress implementing technology in 1996, 59 percent of schools were using outmoded computers and only 14 percent of the nation's classrooms were connected to the Internet. Today, 77 percent of individual classrooms are connected, multimedia computers abound, and 96 percent of students use them to research school assignments. "Our nation is already experiencing some of the benefits of technology in education," the forum said in its final report, which was released this week.

By Darran Simon INQUIRER STAFF WRITER Authorities are seeking the public's assistance in identifying two men spotted returning a rented Dodge Ram pickup used as a getaway vehicle in a Camden homicide last month. The pair may be able to lead investigators to David Porrata, 33, of Camden, who is wanted for fatally shooting Franklin Parker, 36, also of Camden, at a Crown Fried Chicken on the 200 block of Broadway, the Camden County Prosecutor's Office and Camden Police said Friday.

Jen Green looks out at the 80-some millennials chatting it up with local designers at the art gallery studio: christensen in Rittenhouse Square. Clad in this spring's must-have brights, the guests look swank. The rhubarb cocktails are flowing. And Green couldn't be more pleased. The April soiree, featuring Germantown-based women's-wear label NIC*FISH and calligrapher/jewelry designer Danny Fox, marks the one-year anniversary of HyLo Boutiques — short for hyper-local — Green's consulting company and design collective that uses a unique-to-our-time business model to promote fashions conceived of and manufactured in Philadelphia.

ALMOST AS soon as horse trainer Tony Dutrow bought the filly for $95,000 in 2010, his wife Kim knew the name. She could only be Grace Hall. One of her owners was Mike Caruso, the three-time NCAA champion Lehigh wrestler from the mid-1960s, a man whose high school and college record was 141-1. Then as now, the Lehigh wrestling venue was intimidating Grace Hall, named after Eugene Grace, the president of Bethlehem Steel and a great Lehigh baseball player. "I've lived in Bethlehem the last 50 years since I came to Lehigh," said Caruso, who went to St. Benedict's in Newark, N. J. He was on the Lehigh Board of Trustees for 14 years.

Bio: 36; grew up in the Rittenhouse neighborhood; still lives in the city with his wife. Trained: Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park, N.Y. Philly restaurant connections: Lacroix, Adsum. What's new? Square Peg (929 Walnut St., 215-413-3600), Barry Gutin and Larry Cohen's casual American; he is exec chef. It's all in the name: Like the old expression about square pegs in round holes, the Midtown Village spot puts "our own little twists on what classic American foods are. " And spiked milkshakes: "Diner-inspired but we're making it fun, doing it differently.

PHOENIX - Two of the seven buildings at Canal Crossing Business Park, one mile south of Phoenix's Sky Harbor International Airport, are vacant. One is available with 90 percent financing. Tucked in the far left corner, behind the companies that produce filter supplies, concrete construction, and electric solutions, is Fischer Sports Therapy. This is where Chase Utley works now. He spends as many as six hours a day in the gym, which caters to a number of professional athletes, to build strength in his chronically injured knees.

Philadanco, by its very name — the Philadelphia Dance Company — embraces its hometown. And if ever there was a dance company to love back, it's this one. The dancers are sublime, the works accessible, and some of the best American choreographers regularly make new pieces for Danco to premiere for Philadelphia audiences. When the company tours the world — it was most recently in Macedonia — it's as an art ambassador from the City of Brotherly Love. The troupe opened Friday night at the Kimmel Center's Perelman Theater with a program called "The Philadelphia Connection.

ONE HUNDRED years ago Sunday, the "unsinkable" oceanliner Titanic made headlines when it struck an iceberg and sank, carrying more than 1,500 passengers to their deaths. Philadelphia connections among the victims and survivors will be explored this weekend in an exhibit at Independence Seaport Museum. The main focus is the Thayer family, which donated many artifacts to the exhibit relating to family members who were passengers on the doomed ship. The Thayers were part of upper-class Philadelphian society.

IN PHILADELPHIA, 40 percent of citizens lack access to the Internet at home, as Mayor Nutter said in a speech about the city's digital divide last September. To better connect people to city services, education opportunities, jobs and more, we have to work together as a city to make access to the Internet as easy as possible. Because of that charge, we've launched a tool in partnership with great organizations in Philadelphia that we're hoping can be another step to bridging the digital divide.

William B. McNamee told his grandson a secret about memory, even as he was losing his own memory to Alzheimer's. One day, we'll be strangers . . . but you can remember the way we held hands when the wind moves through your fingers. McNamee, an orthopedic surgeon from Drexel Hill, died in 2003. Six years later, as Matthew Ross Smith drove along the Schuylkill - with a hand out the window in the early-spring breeze - his grandfather's words came back to him. Thus was born the Spaces Between Your Fingers Project, which offers people across America a chance to connect by tracing their handprints on postcards.

How hard is it to find a public-access computer in Philadelphia, or a place that offers free computer training, or WiFi access for the disabled? A lot easier than before, thanks to the launch of a new service, Connect Philly, that identifies more than 200 such sites throughout the city. Send an address or intersection by text message to 215-240-7296, and you'll get a response directing you to a site that offers access. Add a word such as disabled or WiFi after the address, and you'll be steered to particular kinds of facilities, which can also be found with an interactive map at the Connect Philly website.