January 1998
A Review of the past and a Look into the future
1997 was a year of uncertainty on meeting locations for SPAUG, but somehow we managed to lock in our most desirable quarters at EPRI for most of the year with only a couple of exceptions, thanks to Tom Passel of EPRI. We are most grateful to Tom and all of the executives at EPRI who allow us the privilege. SPAUG was graced with the presence of a number of representatives presenting the latest releases of software from a variety of manufacturers. Those who attended were treated to presentations on Quicken, Partition Magic, Corel Draw, Adobe Photo Deluxe, Norton Utilities and System Commander Deluxe. We saw a relatively early presentation of voice recognition software. We had a little fun and some laughs with the very popular game show software, You Don't Know Jack, and we saw the earliest version of Ricochet Wireless Modem hardware. For those of you who were present for Jim Dinkey's presentation on Windows NT, you can now decide if you want to make the big investment into a new world. Through the efforts and personal time of Brian Christopher we saved a lot of money that would otherwise have been paid out to copying services in the publication of PrintScreen, and used some of it to provide us with presentation hardware that will insure us of a presentation at every meeting whether or not presentation hardware is provided to us. Because of this and an expanding bank account we can be more selective of future locations should we eventually lose our present meeting location. Also, with a meeting schedule that can be locked in, booking presenters months in advance can be a reality.
Very special thanks to all of the people who contributed their time, suggestions, knowledge, hardware, software and money to SPAUG. In particular, Kendric Smith who regularly updated SPAUG information and continually added new and interesting material to the Web Page, Walt Varner who through the Windows SIG provided its members with a much more complete knowledge of the Windows 95 operating system, Jim Dinkey who offered the members of the Internet SIG new ways to use the Internet, and Robert Mitchell who searched out the best freeware and shareware applications for our DOM at each meeting. It all helped make it a success this last year. Thanks also to all of you who have agreed to renew your membership in SPAUG, and to you who have expressed your kind comments. After all, without you there is no club. It is sincerely appreciated.
Our goals this next year will be to encourage more of our members to attend our meetings, and increase our total roster. We hope to do this by offering more usable information in an interesting and entertaining way. We want to encourage all members to take an active part in the meetings, and in the group itself. With your help, this next year can be a big one for SPAUG. We look forward to it.
Our November meeting was held for the first time at Little House in Menlo Park, because EPRI was not available. It also had an early start of 7:00 PM. There were 28 members along with 3 guests.
A demonstration of Ontrack software was presented by Chris Doyle . We usually think of Ontrack software as that extra piece of software that usually comes packaged with your newest purchase of a hard drive as a means of setting up your hard drive. Actually, Ontrack Data International and its subsidiary Ontrack Data Recovery are the industry leaders in the protection of corporate data through the use of software solutions and data recovery services. Chris described various projects that Ontrack had taken on and successfully recovered data from hard drives apparently destroyed in airplane crashes, submerged under water, and exposed to fires. He also offered an example of a Japanese automobile manufacturer whose entire design data for an upcoming year had been apparently destroyed (and not backed up), but miraculously recovered by Ontrack. Members were convinced that one can never assume that a data loss is necessarily unrecoverable.
Random Access followed with a number of questions on various problems that were encountered by members.
Jim Dinkey offered a two part presentation on the wonders of Windows NT. Jim detailed some of the many differences between Windows 3.x and Win 95 compared to Windows NT. Based on the information Jim offered, it was convincing evidence that there is no doubt but that Windows NT will eventually be in the future of almost anyone seriously into computers.
The raffle included a number of fine prizes including a number of Ontrack Data Advisor disks donated to SPAUG by Ontrack.
The meeting closed at approximately 9:10 PM.
The meeting was called to order at 7:30 PM at the home of Beverly Altman. Present were President Bob Mitchell, Vice-President Arlan Kertz, Walter Varner, Accountant, Brian Christopher, PrintScreen editor, Kendric Smith, Webmaster, Beverly Altman, Member at Large, Robert Mitchell, Disk of the Month, Mildred Kohn, Secretary.
The new Planning Meeting startup time will be 7 PM in line with the new startup time for the general meetings. We hope to be able to meet at EPRI until April. The next meeting there will be on January 28, starting at 7 PM. Other sites are being considered. Potential meeting places these days tend to want us to pay rent and to be insured. Insurance alone will be around $1000 a year.
Again we discussed getting more of our own equipment. An LCD panel, used, is available for about $500. We will test this unit at our next meeting and if it is acceptable, we will plan on buying it.
A nominating committee will be chosen soon since elections are in April. Please think about whom you would like to nominate or perhaps volunteer yourself for a post. The club can only survive if the general membership will take turns shouldering responsibilities.
Jim Dinkey sent out a generous offer to host an Internet SIG and received only one reply. The need for a reply may not have been clear. President Bob Mitchell will prepare a questionnaire to determine the interest of the members.
Vice-President Arlan Kertz will be renewing our tax-free status soon.
The PrintScreen will publish the location and time of meetings on the front page. The PrintScreen is the publication of, by and for the membership. Therefore, we all should be writing a paragraph or two about new hardware and software which we install, the pluses and/or minuses. This is our most useful way of communicating with each other, which, after all, is the main purpose of the club. And while you are at it, send a copy to Kendric Smith, the Webmaster. If you are on the Internet send your article to brianc@mediacity.com in Word 6 or Word 97. Kendric requires that the message to be sent as Text Only. The same applies if you would rather send a floppy.
The meeting adjourned at 8:30 PM.
Respectfully submitted,
Mildred Kohn, Secretary
Type Keyword: Marketing Prefs, and double click on Tell Us What Your Pop-Up Preferences Are. In the bottom right corner, click on the box next to the item that mentions "special member benefit pop-up offers". Check the box stating, "I prefer not to receive special member pop-up offers from AOL".
Other Marketing Prefs include:
Tell us What Your Mailing Preferences Are.
Use this to request that AOL not provide your name to mass-mailing marketers
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Use this to request that AOL not provide your name to e-mail marketers.
February 1998
The Stanford/Palo Alto PC Users group will be celebrating its 15th birthday this next April. Coincidentally it will also be headed up by some new officers, with fresh ideas and new thoughts on ways to make each of its meetings exciting, entertaining and educational. Some of the present officers have agreed to run again for election. I wish to continue as an active member of SPAUG however after two years as president, burnout is starting to take place and it is really time to bring in new blood. Brian Christopher our former president and for the past two years the editor of PrintScreen has also indicated that he will be passing the publishing mantel on to the next person. It is now time to start thinking about other members of SPAUG who you would like to see taking over the various reins, or indeed if you are interested, getting somebody to nominate you.
It is interesting to note that SPAUG was formed as an alternative to the Silicon Valley Users Group which many felt at the time was much too large and impersonal. They wanted a smaller, close knit group. SPAUG was born. Even SPAUG grew to over 200 members at one time and there was some concern that it was becoming too big. Well we are now back to a manageable size albeit perhaps leaning a bit toward a too manageable size. It presents a wonderful challenge. It is however not nearly the challenge it must have been starting out with no money in the bank, no reputation, and no history to refer to in planning the future and only a handful of members. Today we have everything they didnÕt have.
All of the members that regularly attend our meetings and enjoy perusing the information contained in PrintScreen do want SPAUG to continue. In order to remain together as a continuing organization we must have leadership. Please give some serious thought to volunteering a small part of your time to take on one of the positions that are being vacated.
SO WHAT AM I VOLUNTEERING FOR?
In order to give you some idea of what duties each officer or manager is expected to handle, the following may be of some assistance:
PRESIDENT
Is the chief executive officer of the group He or she establishes an agenda and presides over all planning meetings and all general membership meetings. Alone or with the help of a program manager he or she arranges for presentations by representatives of hardware and software manufacturers and other specialists. He or she also solicits software from various sources and arranges for demonstrations by club members familiar with that software. He or she takes an active part in contacting club members on renewals, and other matters that help to maintain a continuing interest in the group.
VICE PRESIDENT
He or she shall, in the absence or disability of the President, perform all duties and exercise the powers of the President. As needed he or she arranges programs including those for the general meetings and special programs including educational workshops, seminars and shows.
TREASURER
He or she has custody of the groupÕs funds and keeps full and accurate accounts of all receipts and disbursements. He or she disburses the budgeted funds of the Group according to the approved budget. He or she prepares a monthly report showing receipts and expenditures and the financial condition of the Group.
RECORDING SECRETARY
He or she shall be responsible for keeping minutes of the planning meeting and if designated minutes of the general meeting. He or she also arranges for pickups of SPAUG mail at the Stanford post office box and distributes it accordingly to the officers to whom it is addressed.
MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY
He or she shall be responsible for maintaining the membership records of the Group, is an information source for guests and prospective new members. Based on the updated membership records, he or she provides labels for the newsletter and other mailings and the badges used at general meetings.
WEB MASTER
Maintains the SPAUG Web Page with information supplied by the various officers and material he or she chooses to make the Web Page attractive and informative as well as a means of attracting new members to SPAUG
NEWSLETTER EDITOR
He or she is responsible for writing, editing, producing and mailing a monthly newsletter that announces all Group business and serves as the official publication for SPAUG.
DOM MANAGER
He or she selects freeware and shareware that is deemed useful for SPAUG members and prepares several copies of a Òdisk of the monthÓ that is sold at each general meeting.
Our January meeting was held at EPRI. All of the audio/video facilities have been remodeled. In particular, the three-gun overhead projector has been replaced by an LCD projector and the mechanical control panel for all facilities has been replaced by a multi menu touch panel. Quite impressive.
The members were informed of the unfortunate death of Gaye Passell, the wife of Tom Passell who continues to be our benefactor, allowing us to use the EPRI facilities. The date of the service for Mrs. Passell was announced for any who wished to attend.
A brief demonstration was presented using the newly acquired SPAUG overhead projector and LCD panel. These facilities will now be available for any SIG meetings, when a general meeting is held at a location that does not provide projection facilities and as a backup should other equipment fail.
Bob Mitchell offered a demonstration of Nuts & Bolts, the multi faceted utility program produced by Helix Software which recently became a part of Network Associates. The application tells you everything you want to know about your PC, keeps it shipshape, repairs and recovers, and prevents it from crashing.
After the mid-break, Robert Mitchell demonstrated some sample programs on the January DOM. Random Access followed with a number of questions on various problems that were encountered by members. The raffle included a number of fine prizes including two copies of Nuts & Bolts that were generously supplied to us by Network Associates.
The meeting closed at approximately 9:00 PM.
The meeting was called to order at Beverly Altman's house at 7:15 p.m. Present were Bob Mitchell, President; Arlen Kertz, Vice-President; Walter Varner, Accountant; Beverly Altman, Membership; Kendric Smith, Webmaster, Robert Mitchell, Disk of the Month; Jim Dinkey, Internet SIG; Mildred Kohn, Secretary.
Everyone present expressed pleasure for the presentation of the software Nuts and Bolts by Bob Mitchell at the last meeting. This was a one-time exercise which came off very well. It was necessitated by the fact that since the total number of members and the number of members who attend meetings is so small, it is almost impossible to get a representative of a commercial house to give his or her time to us. There was a long discussion about the possibility of joining with other clubs to increase our ability to attract presentations.
The February meeting will be at EPRI and one presentation will be ZAP Mail. The club computer didn't work with the EPRI equipment at the last meeting; the reason is still a mystery. We now own an overhead projector and will be acquiring an LCD panel, so that we will be less dependent on the equipment at our meeting place, wherever it may be.
Dissatisfaction with the dual ticket system at our meetings was expressed. Specifically, the door prize given to the owner of the ticket everyone gets who comes to the meeting, including guests, is of little value, while the best prizes are held for the purchasers of extra tickets. Arlen offered to check the legal aspects; e.g., does everyone who walks in the door have to have a chance at the prizes or can this be reserved for members? Beverly pointed out that selling tickets for a drawing is an important part of the club's income and good prizes are a stimulant to the purchase of tickets. This matter will receive further attention.
Bob Mitchell polled each office holder as to his or her willingness to accept reelection. Bob, for himself, expressed the hope that someone else ("new blood") would volunteer for the office and he would be glad to assist that person. His biggest problem has been getting speakers. Arlen said he would accept another term of office as long as he was not called upon during tax return preparation time. Walter Varner is willing to serve again. Beverly Altman requests a replacement, so volunteers for her job should step up. Kendric Smith would like some help. A suitable volunteer would be a person who knows his or her way around a computer and the Internet. Robert Mitchell is willing to continue his time-consuming work preparing Disk of the Month. The editor of our newsletter, Brian Christopher, is throwing in the towel because of the increasingly heavy demands of his job. Is there an aspiring editor out there?
Mildred Kohn is giving up her position as secretary.
Bob Mitchell directed every officer who is leaving office to write a job description to aid volunteers in estimating their willingness and ability to do the job.
After hearing, not for the first time, the problems of being President of the club, Jim Dinkey offered to run for President.
Walter Varner reminds us that his Windows95 SIG will be held Thursday, February 12 at his home. Jim Dinkey's Internet SIG will take place Tuesday, February 10 at his home.
The officers of the club agreed to send a small donation in her memory to the favorite charity of Gay Passell, the wife of our sponsor at EPRI, Tom Passell.
Respectfully submitted,
Mildred Kohn, Secretary
For years we turned to PC Tools or Norton to perform those favorite utilities that made our PC life a bit easier. PC Tools was absorbed, other utility programs came and went and Microsoft offered some help with Windows utilities. Nothing has made a splash lately as much as Nuts and Bolts. Originally a Helix Software product, it was later absorbed by Network Associates. Nuts and Bolts does about everything Norton Utilities does and a little more.
Nuts & Bolts breaks up its utilities into five categories. They include Discover, Diskminder, Clean & Optimize, Prevent & Protect and Secure and Manage. They even throw in the Cheyenne Anti Virus program.
Discover tells you all you want to know about your PC. That includes system information, memory, drives (with some very fine graphics that include pie charts), I/O, benchmarks and diagnostics.
Diskminder scans hard drives and disks offering additional information and correction that MS Scandisk misses.
Clean and optimize does exactly that. It locates all those temporary files that you stuck yourself with when you inadvertently turned off your PC without properly exiting programs. Sorry, make that when the rains disrupted your power. It locates all those duplicate files placed in your drive by installation programs. Careful there: If you delete you may have to explain to your applications where a needed file is located. And of course it defrags in a choice of ways. For example you may choose to have all of your most active files at the front of the disk for faster access. I found the defrag operation rather long for a fully loaded 1.2 Gigabyte drive but based on the job that had to be done, any other defrag program may have taken just as long. Oh, remember those rains may still be around and just may cause you to lose power in the middle of a defrag operation. A backup in advance of a defrag may save you a repair job on your wall where you have placed your fist through it following that power failure.
Prevent and Protect offers you crash protection in the form of "Bomb Shelter" Since loading a few weeks back it has come up a number of times and it has allowed me to continue without losing data. The N&B version of Win Gauge offers you in a number of graphic choices, a measure of system resources, virtual memory (how much of your disk swap file is in use), Swap file requests (how often Windows is accessing swap files) and Drive Space (how much room is left on your drives) Remember, if a disk fills up while a program is running it may very well be crash city. Trash Guard is also a part of Prevent and Protect. It will direct ALL deleted files to the recycle bin including DOS and earlier Windows files. Be careful here though. It also recycles all old program and data files that are updated either by you or by a program operation. In no time at all I found 28 MB of files in my recycle bin.
Secure & Manage offers you the protection you need from your boss (home or office) by providing a means of "shredding" those special files you don't want anybody else to see. As you probably know, you can restore a deleted file that has not yet been overwritten. You cannot restore a "shredded" file. If that doesn't suit your fancy you can also use N&B to encrypt your files, thereby preventing anybody from reading them. You can also send those encrypted files to someone else who can then decrypt the file if you provide the password. No, he does not need N&B to do so. And no, don't send him the password inside the encrypted file. A zip & unzip program is also thrown in under this section.
There is a lot more that could be described here, but you get the idea. After you have read all this, I'll tell you now that this is primarily a Win 95 program. Parts will work in a Win 3.1X program, others will not. One other thing to throw in that I didn't find in the documentation; a number of N&B windows appear without a "BACK" command. In some cases you will have to right click on the window for a drop down menu that will allow you to close it. If you wish to go on to another N&B area you will have to maximize the N&B again from the bottom of your window to reestablish the N&B main menu. A little inconvenient.
The cost is a bargain at about $50.00. It has excellent graphics, easy to use, does what it is supposed to do and does it well. It is a recommendation.
IN A NUTSHELL
Nuts and Bolts
Helix Software (now Network Associates)
System Requirements:
DOS 3.1X or later
386 SX or above
Win 3.1x or above (Best with WIN 95)
4 MB RAM
15 MB of Hard Drive Space
Cost:$49.00
Rating:4 out of a possible high of 5
Reviewed by: Bob Mitchell (650-368-9530)
March 1998
The Stanford/Palo Alto PC Users group will be celebrating its 15th birthday this next April. Coincidentally it will also be headed up by some new officers, with fresh ideas and new thoughts on ways to make each of its meetings exciting, entertaining and educational. Some of the present officers have agreed to run again for election. I wish to continue as an active member of SPAUG however after two years as president, burnout is starting to take place and it is really time to bring in new blood. Brian Christopher our former president and for the past two years the editor of PrintScreen has also indicated that he will be passing the publishing mantel on to the next person. It is now time to start thinking about other members of SPAUG who you would like to see taking over the various reins, or indeed if you are interested, getting somebody to nominate you.
It is interesting to note that SPAUG was formed as an alternative to the Silicon Valley Users Group which many felt at the time was much too large and impersonal. They wanted a smaller, close knit group. SPAUG was born. Even SPAUG grew to over 200 members at one time and there was some concern that it was becoming too big. Well we are now back to a manageable size albeit perhaps leaning a bit toward a too manageable size. It presents a wonderful challenge. It is however not nearly the challenge it must have been starting out with no money in the bank, no reputation, and no history to refer to in planning the future and only a handful of members. Today we have everything they didn't have.
All of the members that regularly attend our meetings and enjoy perusing the information contained in PrintScreen do want SPAUG to continue. In order to remain together as a continuing organization we must have leadership. Please give some serious thought to volunteering a small part of your time to take on one of the positions that are being vacated.
SO WHAT AM I VOLUNTEERING FOR?
In order to give you some idea of what duties each officer or manager is expected to handle, the following may be of some assistance:
PRESIDENT
Is the chief executive officer of the group He or she establishes an agenda and presides over all planning meetings and all general membership meetings. Alone or with the help of a program manager he or she arranges for presentations by representatives of hardware and software manufacturers and other specialists. He or she also solicits software from various sources and arranges for demonstrations by club members familiar with that software. He or she takes an active part in contacting club members on renewals, and other matters that help to maintain a continuing interest in the group.
VICE PRESIDENT
He or she shall, in the absence or disability of the President, perform all duties and exercise the powers of the President. As needed he or she arranges programs including those for the general meetings and special programs including educational workshops, seminars and shows.
TREASURER
He or she has custody of the group's funds and keeps full and accurate accounts of all receipts and disbursements. He or she disburses the budgeted funds of the Group according to the approved budget. He or she prepares a monthly report showing receipts and expenditures and the financial condition of the Group.
RECORDING SECRETARY
He or she shall be responsible for keeping minutes of the planning meeting and if designated minutes of the general meeting. He or she also arranges for pickups of SPAUG mail at the Stanford post office box and distributes it accordingly to the officers to whom it is addressed.
MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY
He or she shall be responsible for maintaining the membership records of the Group, is an information source for guests and prospective new members. Based on the updated membership records, he or she provides labels for the newsletter and other mailings and the badges used at general meetings.
WEB MASTER
Maintains the SPAUG Web Page with information supplied by the various officers and material he or she chooses to make the Web Page attractive and informative as well as a means of attracting new members to SPAUG
NEWSLETTER EDITOR
He or she is responsible for writing, editing, producing and mailing a monthly newsletter that announces all Group business and serves as the official publication for SPAUG.
DOM MANAGER
He or she selects freeware and shareware that is deemed useful for SPAUG members and prepares several copies of a Òdisk of the monthÓ that is sold at each general meeting.
Our January meeting was held at EPRI. All of the audio/video facilities have been remodeled. In particular, the three-gun overhead projector has been replaced by an LCD projector and the mechanical control panel for all facilities has been replaced by a multi menu touch panel. Quite impressive.
The members were informed of the unfortunate death of Gaye Passell, the wife of Tom Passell who continues to be our benefactor, allowing us to use the EPRI facilities. The date of the service for Mrs. Passell was announced for any who wished to attend.
A brief demonstration was presented using the newly acquired SPAUG overhead projector and LCD panel. These facilities will now be available for any SIG meetings, when a general meeting is held at a location that does not provide projection facilities and as a backup should other equipment fail.
Bob Mitchell offered a demonstration of Nuts & Bolts, the multi faceted utility program produced by Helix Software which recently became a part of Network Associates. The application tells you everything you want to know about your PC, keeps it shipshape, repairs and recovers, and prevents it from crashing.
After the mid-break, Robert Mitchell demonstrated some sample programs on the January DOM. Random Access followed with a number of questions on various problems that were encountered by members. The raffle included a number of fine prizes including two copies of Nuts & Bolts that were generously supplied to us by Network Associates.
The meeting closed at approximately 9:00 PM.
The meeting was called to order at Beverly Altman's house at 7:15 p.m. Present were Bob Mitchell, President; Arlen Kertz, Vice-President; Walter Varner, Accountant; Beverly Altman, Membership; Kendric Smith, Webmaster, Robert Mitchell, Disk of the Month; Jim Dinkey, Internet SIG; Mildred Kohn, Secretary.
Everyone present expressed pleasure for the presentation of the software Nuts and Bolts by Bob Mitchell at the last meeting. This was a one-time exercise which came off very well. It was necessitated by the fact that since the total number of members and the number of members who attend meetings is so small, it is almost impossible to get a representative of a commercial house to give his or her time to us. There was a long discussion about the possibility of joining with other clubs to increase our ability to attract presentations.
The February meeting will be at EPRI and one presentation will be ZAP Mail. The club computer didn't work with the EPRI equipment at the last meeting; the reason is still a mystery. We now own an overhead projector and will be acquiring an LCD panel, so that we will be less dependent on the equipment at our meeting place, wherever it may be.
Dissatisfaction with the dual ticket system at our meetings was expressed. Specifically, the door prize given to the owner of the ticket everyone gets who comes to the meeting, including guests, is of little value, while the best prizes are held for the purchasers of extra tickets. Arlen offered to check the legal aspects; e.g., does everyone who walks in the door have to have a chance at the prizes or can this be reserved for members? Beverly pointed out that selling tickets for a drawing is an important part of the club's income and good prizes are a stimulant to the purchase of tickets. This matter will receive further attention.
Bob Mitchell polled each office holder as to his or her willingness to accept reelection. Bob, for himself, expressed the hope that someone else ("new blood") would volunteer for the office and he would be glad to assist that person. His biggest problem has been getting speakers. Arlen said he would accept another term of office as long as he was not called upon during tax return preparation time. Walter Varner is willing to serve again. Beverly Altman requests a replacement, so volunteers for her job should step up. Kendric Smith would like some help. A suitable volunteer would be a person who knows his or her way around a computer and the Internet. Robert Mitchell is willing to continue his time-consuming work preparing Disk of the Month. The editor of our newsletter, Brian Christopher, is throwing in the towel because of the increasingly heavy demands of his job. Is there an aspiring editor out there?
Mildred Kohn is giving up her position as secretary.
Bob Mitchell directed every officer who is leaving office to write a job description to aid volunteers in estimating their willingness and ability to do the job.
After hearing, not for the first time, the problems of being President of the club, Jim Dinkey offered to run for President.
Walter Varner reminds us that his Windows95 SIG will be held Thursday, February 12 at his home. Jim Dinkey's Internet SIG will take place Tuesday, February 10 at his home.
The officers of the club agreed to send a small donation in her memory to the favorite charity of Gay Passell, the wife of our sponsor at EPRI, Tom Passell.
Respectfully submitted,
Mildred Kohn, Secretary
For years we turned to PC Tools or Norton to perform those favorite utilities that made our PC life a bit easier. PC Tools was absorbed, other utility programs came and went and Microsoft offered some help with Windows utilities. Nothing has made a splash lately as much as Nuts and Bolts. Originally a Helix Software product, it was later absorbed by Network Associates. Nuts and Bolts does about everything Norton Utilities does and a little more.
Nuts & Bolts breaks up its utilities into five categories. They include Discover, Diskminder, Clean & Optimize, Prevent & Protect and Secure and Manage. They even throw in the Cheyenne Anti Virus program.
Discover tells you all you want to know about your PC. That includes system information, memory, drives (with some very fine graphics that include pie charts), I/O, benchmarks and diagnostics.
Diskminder scans hard drives and disks offering additional information and correction that MS Scandisk misses.
Clean and optimize does exactly that. It locates all those temporary files that you stuck yourself with when you inadvertently turned off your PC without properly exiting programs. Sorry, make that when the rains disrupted your power. It locates all those duplicate files placed in your drive by installation programs. Careful there: If you delete you may have to explain to your applications where a needed file is located. And of course it defrags in a choice of ways. For example you may choose to have all of your most active files at the front of the disk for faster access. I found the defrag operation rather long for a fully loaded 1.2 Gigabyte drive but based on the job that had to be done, any other defrag program may have taken just as long. Oh, remember those rains may still be around and just may cause you to lose power in the middle of a defrag operation. A backup in advance of a defrag may save you a repair job on your wall where you have placed your fist through it following that power failure.
Prevent and Protect offers you crash protection in the form of "Bomb Shelter" Since loading a few weeks back it has come up a number of times and it has allowed me to continue without losing data. The N&B version of Win Gauge offers you in a number of graphic choices, a measure of system resources, virtual memory (how much of your disk swap file is in use), Swap file requests (how often Windows is accessing swap files) and Drive Space (how much room is left on your drives) Remember, if a disk fills up while a program is running it may very well be crash city. Trash Guard is also a part of Prevent and Protect. It will direct ALL deleted files to the recycle bin including DOS and earlier Windows files. Be careful here though. It also recycles all old program and data files that are updated either by you or by a program operation. In no time at all I found 28 MB of files in my recycle bin.
Secure & Manage offers you the protection you need from your boss (home or office) by providing a means of "shredding" those special files you don't want anybody else to see. As you probably know, you can restore a deleted file that has not yet been overwritten. You cannot restore a "shredded" file. If that doesn't suit your fancy you can also use N&B to encrypt your files, thereby preventing anybody from reading them. You can also send those encrypted files to someone else who can then decrypt the file if you provide the password. No, he does not need N&B to do so. And no, don't send him the password inside the encrypted file. A zip & unzip program is also thrown in under this section.
There is a lot more that could be described here, but you get the idea. After you have read all this, I'll tell you now that this is primarily a Win 95 program. Parts will work in a Win 3.1X program, others will not. One other thing to throw in that I didn't find in the documentation; a number of N&B windows appear without a "BACK" command. In some cases you will have to right click on the window for a drop down menu that will allow you to close it. If you wish to go on to another N&B area you will have to maximize the N&B again from the bottom of your window to reestablish the N&B main menu. A little inconvenient.
The cost is a bargain at about $50.00. It has excellent graphics, easy to use, does what it is supposed to do and does it well. It is a recommendation.
IN A NUTSHELL
Nuts and Bolts
Helix Software (now Network Associates)
System Requirements:
DOS 3.1X or later
386 SX or above
Win 3.1x or above (Best with WIN 95)
4 MB RAM
15 MB of Hard Drive Space
Cost:$49.00
Rating:4 out of a possible high of 5
Reviewed by: Bob Mitchell (650-368-9530)
April 1998
So this is it, the final communication under the above banner . It has been a very busy two years that were supposed to have been labeled "retired" but they have been very enjoyable. I was able to establish a closer and very pleasant relationship with a number of club members. Whatever contributions I have made to the club were very rewarding to me personally. Hopefully they have been of some benefit to SPAUG. After two years SPAUG still exists with a rather consistent number of people attending meetings. We have lost a few people and we have gained some new members. We have been able to pick up all of the necessary equipment in a PC and projection equipment to sustain the independence of the club and do so while retaining a fairly good balance in the treasury. Most of that credit goes to Brian Christopher for the savings he has offered in the publication of PrintScreen. Along the way I hope that the meetings have been interesting and entertaining and that most of you picked up a little additional knowledge of the PC world. Thanks for that goes out to all of the industry people we have had as guests and to the individual club members who have contributed their knowledge and talent. Thanks also goes out to all of the individuals who have served as officers, managers and leaders. In particular I want to thank the people who by word of mouth or by letter have had some very nice things to say about the club leadership. It is appreciated.
It is my intention to remain with the group and help out wherever I can, including doing a few reviews in PrintScreen on occasion. Jim Dinkey has been with the group for many years. He certainly deserves a chance to show his stuff. I wish him well in the hope that he will pick up from this point and take it to an even higher level. John Sleeman who will be our new editor and publisher of PrintScreen is very anxious to dig into that chore. He will do very well. I also want to thank Herb Hammerslaugh and Ron Nicholas for agreeing to take on responsibility as Vice President and Recording Secretary at a time when it looked like we might have to start the new SPAUG season without members in those roles. Last but certainly not least, thanks to all of those who have agreed to remain in their roles for another year, Beverly Altman as Membership Chairperson, Walt Varner as Treasurer, Kendric Smith as Webmaster and Robert Mitchell as DOM manager. The very best to all of the loyal membership who have found reasons to renew year after year and contribute to the group. Now back to the role of spectator.
Our March meeting was held for the first time in the Lodge Room at the Palo Alto Elks Lodge. Thanks to Jim Dinkey for making the arrangements. In the opening announcements we indicated that because of the uncertainty of having the EPRI location always available to us we felt the move was necessary. It was announced that through the efforts of Arlan Kertz, the IRS has given their final approval for us to continue as a non-profit organization.
Bob Mitchell with some help from Brian Christopher provided a presentation on the publishing of our monthly newsletter, PrintScreen using Microsoft Publisher 98. Following that, Robert Mitchell demonstrated some of the programs that are currently on the Disk of the Month.
Nominations were held for officers on the Board of Directors to hold positions from May 1, 1998 through April 30, 1999. Three officers, Bob Mitchell (President), Arlan Kertz (Vice President) and Mildred Kohn (Recording Secretary) elected to retire, having served two years in those positions. Bev Altman (Membership chairperson) and Walt Varner (Treasurer) agreed to remain on as a nominee in their positions. Jim Dinkey was nominated for President, Herb Hammerslaugh was nominated for Vice President and Ron Nicholas was nominated for recording secretary. No other nominations were made for any office, therefore nominations were closed. With but one nominee for each office the need for an election was obviated. All nominees were declared as an officer.
The other managers/committee chairpersons that constituted the other members of the planning committee, Kendric Smith (Web Master) and Robert Mitchell (DOM Manager) agreed to remain on in their position, which the Board of Directors had previously approved. Brian Christopher (Publisher of PrintScreen), elected to retire, having served two years as publisher and as President before that. John Sleeman agreed to replace Brian as PrintScreen publisher. The Board of Directors also previously approved him. Stan Hutchings has also volunteered to share the Web Master position with Kendric Smith.
The group then took to the air with Walt Varner at the controls with Bill Gates supplying the plane and geography in the form of Microsoft Flight Simulater 98. We flew the Las Vegas strip, traveled a very low level flight along the peninsula area and picked up a quickie lesson in the basics of getting into the air, maintaining a level flight and avoiding an unintentional premature contact with mother earth. Walt offered several examples of a pilot's eye view of such a contact. Not pretty, but it was fun!
The usual raffle of software prizes took place. The meeting ended with a crowd of people surrounding Walt begging him for an additional flight.
The Planning Meeting was called to order at 7:10 p.m. at the home of Beverly Altman. Present were President Bob Mitchell, President-Elect Jim Dinkey, Vice-President Elect Herb Hamerslough, Accountant Walt Varner, Recording Secretary Mildred Kohn, Recording Secretary Elect Ron Nicholas, Membership Secretary Beverly Altman. Walt and Beverly consented to continue with the new administration. Also present were the new editor of PrintScreen, John Sleeman, Stan Hutchings, who will be working with Webmaster Kendric Smith. Jim Dinkey has consented to remain in charge of Publicity and Robert Mitchell continues with his demanding job as DOM manager.
There were 29 members and 7 guests at the last meeting. Two of the guests became members: Dorothy Montgomery and James Sterrett. Raffle prizes were won by D. Philpott, Herb Hamerslough, Jim Bailey, Roger Finke, Tom Ackerman, Jim Sterrett, Dorothy Montgomery.
Bob Mitchell mentioned the importance of the newsletters we receive from other clubs in exchange for ours in connection with the problem of finding speakers. When another newsletter mentions the future arrival of a speaker from a large company in another part of the country, we can contact that company and perhaps get the speaker to add our meeting to his/her list of engagements in this area. Bob will be handing over to Jim Dinkey some good prospects for meetings in the near future. Now that Jim has provided us with an assured meeting place and time at the Elks Lodge in Palo Alto, it will be much easier to get speakers.
Having an assured place of meeting will justify our acquiring the next piece of necessary presentation equipment-a projection screen. According to our accountant, Walt Varner, we can go ahead.
John Sleeman has been thoroughly schooled by Brian Christopher on how to do the layout for the PrintScreen. The routine elements were reviewed by Bob Mitchell. At this point I make my usual plea for articles from the members. Write about what has pleased you and/or displeased you about new software, hardware, etc.
It was suggested that the SIG leaders give a brief report at the general meetings.
The next planning meeting will be held at Beverly's house on Wednesday, May 6. Members should call Jim Dinkey ahead of the meeting to put an item on the agenda. Members are welcome to attend.
The meeting was adjourned at 8:50 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Mildred Kohn, Secretary
Thank you for electing the new Board of Directors. They are hard at work already getting ready for you the benefits of being in the Club.
I am impressed that each person, new or old to the Board, has bent to doing what is necessary for an effective Club to operate. The old argument of what section of a Club is the most important is always the same: all of 'em.
I was seriously concerned about the loss of Brian Christopher as Editor/Publisher, but John Sleeman has already taken charge of that function and learned the Print Screen setup.
One problem I will guarantee I will solve is the ability of members to be able to gain access to the Elks Lodge in a timely manner. At Kendric Smith's suggestion, I will be installing a radio-controlled doorbell on the outside of the Elks Lodge. There is an electrical outlet about 20 feet to the right of the door. When you come next time and need access, walk 20 feet to the right, press the doorbell button three times, and ask for Joe.
I feel strongly that there is a wealth of talent within the Club and it is best that we use it. Therefore, at the next meeting, a questionnaire will be passed out attempting to elicit your areas of strength. Please feel free to talk with me about your perception of these areas. I will be looking for applicability to the Club in general and the ability of public speaking.
At the next meeting there will be a table of literature and catalogs available for the taking. This will permit you to do some comparison shopping.
Further, where feasible, the 'crosstalk' section will be just before break to assure that connections made during the session can be completed during break.
The Elks Lodge seems to be working out just fine; at least location is one problem I don't have to deal with - it certainly made life difficult for my predecessor.
With Windows 98 on the horizon, I have been thinking of how we might have a one-night SIG on how to make Windows 98 dual bootable back to 95 for those who are cautious in nature or have a business that wants to test first. It is for this reason that I have the Club Computer at home and am planning to ADD a 1.2 GB disk to it and then do the double install necessary using Partition Magic as an aid. I don't believe it would be interesting to everyone and I think many would fall asleep in a monthly meeting waiting for certain functions to complete. What do you think? Any interest? See me at the meeting or e-mail me.
The SPAUG April meeting took place at the Palo Alto Elks Lodge. We had a total of 31 members in attendance in addition to 6 guests. An election of new officers that normally would have taken place at the April meeting was not necessary. With only one nominee for each office, all new officers were elected by acclamation at the previous meeting. Bob Mitchell expressed his appreciation for all of the help he has received from other officers, managers and members in general during his two-year term as president. Beverly Altman offered her thanks for the past efforts of the president.
Our industry guest for the evening was Sherri Smith who represented the scanner/printer division of Alps Electric. The members present quickly became familiar with printing that relies on dye transfer using exchangeable color ribbons instead of the more familiar ink jet or laser. While necessarily slower than ink jet or laser printers the improvement in quality was obvious with the Alps MD 4000 scanner/printer. It was even more outstanding using the premium Alps MD-1300 printer. The number of questions from the group that were all well fielded demonstrated the degree of interest in the products during and after the demonstration.
Robert Mitchell presented a number of freeware and shareware applications that were made available on the DOM (disk of the month).
Random Access followed the break. There were a few problems that members encountered with their personal computers. There were some good suggestions made on recovering from those problems. SIG dates were also mentioned. They were Tuesday, May 5 for the Internet SIG and May 19 for the Windows SIG.
The raffle of prizes was then held. Through the generosity of Alps Electric the raffle included an MD 4000 scanner. A very happy Keith Smith won that major prize. The meeting concluded about 9:30 PM
The planning meeting of May 5, 1998 convened at Bev Altman's house at 7:30 pm. Present were Jim Dinkey, Stan Hutchings, Walt Varner, Arlan Kertz, John Sleeman, Bev Altman, Kendric Smith, and Ron Nicholas.
The Treasurer reported a balance of approximately $4,000, including a sizeable increase from last month's "raffle". SPAUG is now officially considered a non-profit organization by the IRS and CA Franchise Tax Board; the club's trial period has been completed.
SPAUG has purchased ad space in the Elk's Newsletter, thereby giving exposure to 2,000 Elks and many potential new members.
Considerable discussion ensued on how to interest more visitors to SPAUG's website and also to make contributions. When making contributions, our webmaster has requested that all submissions be in plain text only and no attachments; any would be attachments should be incorporated into the body of the message.
A SPAUG website presentation will be at a general meeting to encourage SPAUG members and others to visit our website. New meeting dates for the Internet SIG is the 2nd Tuesday and the Win95 SIG on the 3rd Tuesday..
The Lodge front door being continually locked problem has been resolved. A remotely controlled device will accommodate the late arrival persons which individually unlocks the door for those arriving after 7:00 PM. The Lodge will have coffee available.
Considerable interest was expressed in having a future presentation of genealogy programs. Other suggestions will be greatly appreciated and will be further explored and requested at the next general meeting.
The next planning meeting is scheduled for June 3, 1998 at Bev Altman's house. The meeting adjourned at 8:30 PM.
The planning meeting of June 3, 1998 convened at Bev Altman's house at 7:00 PM. Present were Jim Dinkey, Stan Hutchings, Walt Varner, John Sleeman, Bev Altman and Ron Nicholas.
There was considerable discussion of the problems experienced at May's General meeting. Ways of averting the delayed room availability and disruptive setup time were explored. A later starting time was not pursued.
SPAUG's ad appeared in the Elk's newsletter thereby exposing the club to a large potential membership increase. Increasing the Club's exposure to more computer newspapers, magazines and making the website easier to find was discussed. and is highly desirable. A new Publicity candidate, Herb Hammerslaugh, is forthcoming.
Ways of restructuring the guest admittance to the general meeting and the number of free admissions before becoming a paid up member was discussed in detail. The first time is free. The second time a $2.00 fee will be requested and a club application form given; the same for a returning elapsed membership. More details to be presented at the next general meeting.
Our club will be having many interesting guest speakers and events in the coming months. One new idea of field trips to some of the high tech Silicon Valley companies was well received; a poll will be taken at the next general meeting. A hardware SIG, where the club computer will be upgraded and questions to hardware problems and upgrade situations, was proposed. Also a web page SIG for members to contribute and ask questions. On-line banking was another suggested topic. Some members asked about having a membership roster of e-mail addresses published; only with the members' consent.
One easy to contact everyone at once is through the club Listserv (spaug-list@mediacity.com). For example, if you'd like to ask a question of the entire membership, you'd send the message To: spaug-list@mediacity.com. Since this does go to everyone, it should be used with discretion. Also, if you reply, make sure the reply goes to who you want - either the entire membership or the sender only. Does a hardware problem SIG sound worthy of your attendance?
The next planning meeting is scheduled for July 1, 1998 (check the website) at Bev Altman's home.
The meeting adjourned at 9:15 PM.
Respectfully submitted, Ron Nicholas,
Recording Secretary
TipWorld is a Web resource on all kinds of information. The following was taken from a series of tips on rich text format (RTF), and edited for continuity and length. More help is available at the Ziff-Davis Help Page.
7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30, 7:30
There I said it enough. This is the new time of the meeting as the Club because we cannot assure that the room will be accessible to us until 7:00 and we need the time to do setup. Even though I have been setting up at 3:30 and leaving the material I have and the projectors, many people cannot get there until the evening and so the setup continues at 7:00 until we are ready to start at 7:30.
The speaker this month is from HP, renowned for their printers. Many of you thought that the ALPS printers were pretty good. I have to tell you that HP has a few things to say about that and the specs they have are so far conservative to hide their lights under the bushel.
The schedule of meetings is as follows:
July 29 - Ken Tiffin - HP Printers
August 26 - Robbie Robins - Trellix - Web Document Processing
September 30 - Hank Skawinski - How to set up, buy and plan for the future in PCs.
October 28 - Jan Altman - Spreadsheet Wars Revisited (Excel)
You were heard when you replied in your surveys that you wanted more information about spreadsheets. Note that Jan Altman will be the lecturer on October 28 so save up your questions.
The agenda for the meeting will look something like this:
7:30 Sig Reports: Walt Varner - Win95 SIG; Jim Dinkey - Internet SIG
7:35 Notice on field trips and associated activities.
7:40 DOM (Disk Of the Month) Robert Mitchell
7:50 Announcements
7:52 Guests introduction
7:55 Random Access (Crosstalk)
8:05 Break (15 min to resolve crosstalk issues)
8:20 LECTURER - Ken Tiffin - HP printers
9:20 RAFFLE
9:30 ADJOURN
It was interesting to hear the differences between the two means of communicating, modems and satellites, could coexist within their respective fields. I missed the boat somewhat when a fair portion of the audience did not have any access to a cable modem capability.
I wanted to use my soapbox for a minute to let you know that I recently upgraded my USR x2 modem to the V90 standard. The throughput is about 20% higher, reaching about 4.0 KB per second. If you have not done your upgrade to the flash ROM, then you should consider it. Further, the upgrade is not limited to USR modems. I am also told that the various ISPs will be eliminating the X2 and Flex56 capability fairly soon.
Regards,
Jim Dinkey, President
The planning meeting of July 1, 1998 convened at Bev Altman's home at 7:05 pm. Present were Jim Dinkey, Stan Hutchings, Herb Hamerslough, John Sleeman, Bev Altman, Bob Mitchell and Ron Nicholas.
Jim Dinkey asked if SPAUG was a member of any parent organization and the round table discussion concluded that SPAUG was not.
Bev Altman reported there were no new or renewal memberships in June. A joint effort by Bev and John Sleeman was developed to send a renewal notice letter to an expiring member.
John Sleeman was praised for the excellent newsletter editing job, but he responded with "send me more articles". John also plans to send our newsletters to other computer clubs, a cross fertilization for ideas..
Bob Mitchell reported an Adobe product presentation demo kit was enroute for our use at a future meeting. SPAUG's meeting attendance was insufficient to send a company representative.
Publicizing SPAUG by submitting the General Meeting's location and time in Computer Currents, and Microtimes plus other local newspapers was agreeable to Herb Hamerslough, our new Publicity Chair. Jim Dinkey put out the request for a Corresponding Secretary.
The General Meeting's new start time is 7:30 PM The reason being that the room is not available for adequate setup time for the presentations.
The next planning meeting is scheduled for August 5, 1998 at Jim Dinkey's home; 3380 Cork Oak Way, Palo Alto. That is the corner of Cork Oak Way and Ames. Ames is off Middlefield between Loma Verde and East Meadow. The meeting time is 7:00 PM. All members are invited to participate.
The meeting adjourned at 8:45 PM.
Respectfully submitted,
Ron Nicholas, Recording Secretary
Norm Wintemute has agreed to take on the Windows 95/98 SIG. I am very pleased to have Norm join us once a month to teach the class. Norm is an experienced instructor of this topic and has been teaching the course at a senior center to classes that are larger than we will be presenting to him.
In order to support Norm and to gain a better feel of where the membership of SPAUG is, there is a survey designed to give feedback to the Board of Directors, not only about the Windows 95 class, but to also explore your desires and needs for our class of speakers. Once I define (based on the survey) who I want to have, I'll go out and get him/her.
At the Board of Director's meeting, we first discussed at length the support of Robert Mitchell, who needed some help and support. Each member of the Board of Directors was requested to give to Robert about half a dozen suggestions about what to present with supporting information as available. Frankly, I also would consider it quite proper that members also plan to present to Robert the information that would help make his job easier. I gave him that night: PrtScr95, FAVTool, TweakUI, RegCLean. Can you add to the list? Please bring it with you.
As long as Robert was willing to continue to put together the DOM with the additional help, the B of D turned its attention to the replacement of the SPAUG computer. There are no hard and fast answers here. As expected, the Board went all over the place between the balance of money versus utility. As a part of that review, the opportunity arose to pass out an article from the Palo Alto Daily that showed certain vendors were more likely to be acceptable to our needs than others. It was noted that Kevin Tiffin of HP had not gotten back to us. So we have our work cut out for us.
The schedule of meetings is as follows:
August 26 - a double feature
Nancy DeBiccari - General Manager - Micro Center "What we can and can't do for you."
Robbie Robins - Trellix - Web Document Processing
September 30 Hank Skawinski - How to set up, buy and plan for the Future in PCs.
October 28 Jan Altman - Spreadsheet Wars Revisited (Excel)
AGENDA for 26 August
7:30 Sig Reports Norm Wintemute - Win95 SIG; Jim Dinkey - Internet SIG
7:40 DOM (Disk Of the Month) Robert Mitchell - some changes to be announced.
7:50 Announcements
7:52 Guests introduction
7:55 Random Access (Crosstalk)
8:00 Break (10 minutes to resolve Crosstalk issues) Note that issues resolved should be given to Ron Nicholas.
8:10 LECTURER - Nancy DeBiccari - General Manager - Micro Center "What we can and can't do for you."
8:50 - LECTURER - Robbie Robins - Trellix - Web Document Processing
9:25 RAFFLE
9:30 ADJOURN
Regards,
Jim Dinkey, President
The planning meeting of August 5, 1998 convened at Jim Dinkey's home at 7:05 PM. Present were Jim Dinkey, Stan Hutchings, Kendric Smith, Herb Hamerslough, John Sleeman, Robert Mitchell, Walt Varner, and Ron Nicholas.
Our treasurer, Walt Varner, reports $4,225. Approximately 30% of the club's income is from the DOM sales, aside from new memberships and renewals. It was felt there is adequate funds available for the much needed upgrade of the club's computer.
Considerable discussion ensued on whether to upgrade the existing club computer (which will not load WIN98) or replace it with a laptop or newer desktop. Further definition of the intended usage, system specifications, and price were explored. The next step is researching the available flyers and receipt of a proposal from Walt Varner. The club computer would primarily be used to demonstrate DOM's and new programs.
Our Disk Of the Month wizard, Robert Mitchell, was desiring some assistance for the DOM's preparation. This brought up questions of the DOM's meaningful function, advantages, the significance of the DOM's income, scope and type of programs, involvement in searching of programs that might be of interest, and ease of installation. Many good suggestions were brought up and the DOM will continue... but feedback on the types of programs or fields of interest are needed. Any suggestions for programs to be included on the DOM should be emailed to Robert Mitchell.
A WIN9x SIG instructor is sought for our retiring instructor Walt Varner. Thank you Walt, for the many hours of insight into the mysteries of the WIN OS.
The club's publicity campaign is progressing nicely with current computer publications and businesses being visited or faxed with our new meeting place, time, and officers.
A new feature was suggested and will be adopted at the next General Meeting - the Q&A portion of the meeting will be recorded and reported in the monthly Newsletter. It was felt that with such a vast cross section of experiences we all would benefit from each other's trials and triumphs.
Kendric reported that our Majordomo list server, spaug-list@mediacity.com, is still broken, but he expects a resolution before very much longer. In the meantime, anything that needs to be sent to all members should be sent to spaug@mediacity.com with a request for it to be sent to the list. A list of email "hotlinks" to all SPAUG members will be posted on the web page, in the Contacts section. Members can use this to contact individual members of SPAUG. Members who wish to be removed from this page should send email to the Webmaster at spaug@mediacity.com requesting removal. The meeting adjourned at 9:00 PM.
The next planning meeting will be September 2, 1998. All members are invited to attend.
Respectfully submitted,
Ron Nicholas, Recording Secretary
Our next speaker, Hank Skawinski, is President of a company that builds and maintains for a number of clients about 800 computers. Here is an opportunity to get insight into what your next computer should look like, and what you can expect out of it. Further, he will be able to tell you just how much life is left in the present one you have.
Further, if you are having problems, this is the person to ask.
The company is not in the retail business, so they don't have a hidden agenda. They are in the servicing to corporations that don't have their own MIS department.
Hank and his Chief Technician Jim Crutchfield are used to designing, configuring and assembling their own hardware/software combinations that are expected to run, unattended, for log periods of time. Basically, they don't want to see them again after sale. If the machine goes bad, it is fixed. If the software fails, it is fixed such that the software doesn't break again. Ask him about how he does it.
The Club laptop is in. The Micro Center (Nancy DeBiccari) had a refurb come in that had a 4 GB drive (not the 2.1) and all the rest the same. The first thing that I did was offer it to our Win98 instructor - an offer I could not have made a few days ago. The price was $100 off, grace of Micro Center, and another $100 for its being refurbished ($1499 + case + tax).
Kendric is still working on the absence of the SPAUG-LIST which is still inoperative. We are operating on membership lists.
Robert Mitchell is ready for the DOM this month after over a month of not feeling well. Further, he could use some more suggestions about your favorite programs that he should disseminate on his DOM disks.
Whether the Club restarts the Internet SIG will be brought up to the membership at the next meeting. The present SIG is getting pretty much to the end after running for about 9 months. It has pretty much completed its function of bringing aboard persons who wanted to expand thir use and knowledge of the Internet. I am making the assumption, as the club membership slowly turns over, that there are a number of members that would like to start at the beginning to expand their knowledge of the Internet and how to deal with it. You will be asked at the meeting.
This is not to short our Win95/98 SIG that under the tutelage of Norm Wintemute, is moving right along. Attendance was twelve last time, and I expect that the attendance might even expand a bit. Norm has a plan and is implementing it. This coming time, he will be presnting an overview of Excel to assure comprehension, and then will go on from there.
Our Vice-President (and Publicity Chair) Herb Hammmerslaugh has made much progress into assuring awareness of SPAUG via the various newspapers and magazines. If you become aware that there is a lapse either in presence or content, please bring it to our attention.
This club used to have a sidewalk sale under the great efforts of Bev altman. The subject was again broached at the last board meeting. She used to make about 85 phone calls setting things up and it contributed greatly to the coffers of the club. I want to know how many of you are willing to help out on such an endeavor. I will be asking at the meeting.
Since the Novemeber meeting is on the eve of Thanksgiving, it has been proposed that we move the meeting date - you will be polled at the meeting. My inclination is to leave sleeping dogs lie.
The Club is running short of raffle prizes from which the Club derives about a third of its income. When you are in some of the local stores, ask the general manager of the store if they have a PR fund, and does he want to support the local PC Club. Let us know which ones you have approached so that we do not duplicate our efforts.
The schedule of meetings is as follows:
September 30 Hank Skawinski - How to set up, buy and plan for the Future in PCs.
October 28 Jan Altman - Excel revisited - Tips & Tricks
November 25 John Lomax - Genealogy master and docent at the Menlo Park LDS Genealogy annex will show you how to use the various tools that are available and how to make a full book that is not just a programmed book. He will discuss the various resources and CD sets that are available both at the Center and mail order.
AGENDA
7:30 Sig Reports
Norm Wintemute - Win95 SIG (By Jim) 3rd Tuesday
Jim Dinkey - Internet SIG 2nd Tuesday
7:40 DOM (Disk Of the Month) Robert Mitchell
7:50 Announcements
7:52 Guest introduction
7:55 Random Access (Crosstalk)
8:00 Break (10 minutes to resolve crosstalk issues)
Note that issues resolved should be given to Ron Nocholas.
8:10 LECTURER - Hank Skawinski - President - DataWise
9:25 RAFFLE
9:30 ADJOURN
Regards,
Jim Dinkey, President
Hank Skawinski - President - DataWise
How to set up, buy and plan for the future in PCs
The Planning Meeting of September 2, 1998 met at the home of Bev Altman. Present were Jim Dinkey, Herb Hamerslough, John Sleeman, Bev Altman, Robert Mitchell, Walt Varner, Stan Hutchings, and Ron Nicholas.
Considerable discussion was given to replacing the club's desktop computer with a new laptop capable of handling WIN98. A mail order house purchase was discouraged due to lack of local service and support. Our resident system integrator, Walt Varner, declined to bid. Two of the large computer super stores, Micro Center was selected because of its product selection, local service, and technical training expertise, and general customer satisfaction approach. A $1,780 check was approved by vote, 5-1 with 1 abstention, and given to Jim Dinkey to purchase the laptop. The club computer would primarily be used to demonstrate DOM's and new programs.
Our Disk Of the Month wizard, Robert Mitchell, requests some assistance on the types of programs or fields of interest
The WIN9x SIG instructor conducted a very interesting meeting having about twelve persons learning some of the hidden or unclear WIN95/98 features.
Our publicity manager reports about twelve computer publications or stores have been contacted and on the mailing list for SPAUG's meeting place and time and general activities.
The club's total membership stands at eighty, with one new member. The last meeting had 38 participants.
Our Editor, John Sleeman, is publishing our newsletter very well. He request more articles.
Our Co-webmaster, Stan Hutchings, continued his disappointment with the e-mail list server. A replacement is being sought. The inclusion of members e-mail address being published was discussed only if the individual member approves. More on this at the next General Meeting.
A restart of the Internet SIG at the beginning level was discussed, and will be explored more at the next General Meeting.
Early thoughts on the club's Spring Sidewalk Sale surfaced. Further coordination with the Elks Lodge will be forth coming.
Since the November meeting is on the eve of the Thanksgiving holiday, a vote will be taken at the Meeting regarding moving the meeting date.
Our club is running short on raffle items. Since the raffle is an income item, members are requested solicit or donate newer useable software or items.
The next planning meeting will be October 7, 1998. All members are encouraged to join in the club's inner workings.
The meeting adjourned at 8:45 PM.
Respectfully submitted,
Ron Nicholas, Recording Secretary
Here are some URLs from recent magazines. I have not had time to check them out.
If you check out the software from any of these URLs, it would be nice if you would write a short report on them for the SPAUG Newsletter.
In Home Office Computing for September 1998, there was an article titled "The High-Tech Hall of Shame (battling bugs and bloat) by Rick Broida. In this article are a number of URLs that I thought might be of interest to SPAUG Members.
1. BROWSER: If you don't like the memory hogs of Explorer or Netscape, try the Norwegian-born browser Opera. http://www.operasoftware.com
2. OFFICE SUITE: You can build an entire Office Suite from shareware that takes much less disk space.
Final Writer: Word Processor. http://www.softwood.com
Above & Beyond: Contact Manager. http://www.1soft.com
As-Easy-As: Spreadsheet. http://www.triusinc.com
3. BUGS: To find out about bugs in commercial software, go to: http://www.bug.net
4. WINDOWS HELP:
http://www.worldowindows.com
http://winfiles.com
http://support.microsoft.com
5. USER GOUPS
http://www.apcug.org
1. ZTree: For people who liked the old XTree for DOS, there is now ZTree for Windows. http://www.ztree.com
2. 1998 PC Magazine Shareware Awards
a) Web Development: GDIdb, v3.1.0 - - - http://www.gd-ind.com
b) HTML Editor: HomeSite 3.0.1 - - - http://www.allaire.com/products/homesite
c) Chat: ICQ, Beta (DLL 1.30) - - - http://www.mirabilis.com/icqhomepage.html
d) Desktop Accessory: Judy's TenKey, v4.0 (calculator) - - - http://www.judysapps.com
e) Applications: NoteTab Pro, v4.001 - - - A plain-text editor and HTML editor that does math on the side - - - http://www.notetab.ch
f) Applications: Power Utility Pak 97, v3.0b - - - a set of extensions for Excel 97. An earlier version is still available for Excel 5 and Excel 95 - - - http://www.j-walk.com/ss/pup/pup97.htm
g) Programming Tools: Setup Specialist 97b, v1.56 - - - http://www.setupspecialist.com
h) Graphics and Multimedia: Screen Saver Toolkit, v2.1 - - - http://www.stardustsoftware.com
i) System Utilities: Take Command/32 - - - replacement for 4DOS for power users - - - http://www.jpsoft.com
j) File Management Utilities: Turbo Browser 98, v6.01 - - - http://www.turbozip.com
k) Communications and Networking: WinProxy, v2.1 - - - a secure firewall - - - http://www.ositis.com
l) Interntet Utilities: WS_FTP Pro, v5.0T 98.04.09 - - - http://www.ipswitch.com
My grandson, age 6, was taking a typing class from a computer program. Following directions, he covered the keys so he would learn to touch type faster.
He lost interest in the course, so I took the paper tabs off. The remaining sticky glue attracted the dirt from my hands and his, as well as the dust from the air. What a mess! Walt Varner told me to use spare amounts of Label Off (so as not to drip liquid between the keys).
Following that, he recommended that I take a sheet of plastic wrap and wrap it around the keyboard. Except for certain moments when the light from the skylight glances off of the plastic wrap rendering the keyboard invisible, this wrap works perfectly.
If you haven't heard about this directly from Walt, I'll pass the suggestion on to you. It's a great idea when the other user of the keyboard forgets to wash his hands after eating buttered popcorn!
A new feature has been added to the SPAUG web site - the ability to e-mail an individual member. The feature accessed from the Contacts page: all the way at the bottom of the page, there is a link: "E-mail an individual SPAUG Member". Clicking on that, you get a list of members in alphabetical order by last name, but with first name first. If you click on one of the names, your browser e-mail will open already addressed, and all you need to do is fill in the subject and write a message. Then click on the send button (or File- Send).
(NOTE: your browser must be set up to allow email to be sent. If you get an error when you try to send, in Netscape 4.0x, Edit - Preferences - Mail & Groups - Identity and fill in your name and email address. Other browsers have a similar procedure. If you have problems, attend one of the SIG meetings to find out how).
If you want to send to more individuals, (in Netscape) if you right-click an address, and on the menu select "Copy Link Location", then position the cursor in the To... or Cc... field on the email, and do Edit - Paste, you will get the email address with "mailto: " in front of it. Delete the mailto: part, and the address is ready to go.
I get many questions from PC users who are confused by warning messages on their monitors that indicate the system is "short of memory" or "low on resources" when they have six to ten gigabytes of hard drive memory and 64 to 128 MB of RAM. The basic answer is simply that all that memory is not the same kind, has different access times, and only a relatively small part of it is directly addressable. At any time you do not have the luxury of being able to instantly move directly to any one of those millions of bytes. In a perfect computer world you could read and operate on any one of the billions of bytes in your computer hundreds of millions of times each second in less than a picosecond. Someday technology may approach this utopia, but today's computers are millennia away from it.
The reason today's computers can run at such phenomenal speeds is that the data being processed is stored electronically within the system as are the instructions telling what to do with the data. The actual manipulations on the data are made at almost incomprehensible speeds by the central processing unit (CPU) clocking at speeds today of 500 Megahertz to 1 Gigahertz.
All of this speed depends on the stored data, and the instructions on what to do with it, being instantly available to the CPU when it wants it. This is accomplished by having a hierarchy of many different electronic memories available within the computer. They are in the CPU, in several high speed cache buffers, in the high speed RAM chips, in the hard disk drive, and on CD ROM disks. Each of these memories has a different access time and a different transmission rate. Data from these memories arrives in the CPU when it is needed through thousands of gates that are synchronized to open and close at just the right time. If anything interferes with this concert of perfection, output is degraded or terminates resulting in a slow or completely locked up machine.
If you liken this data storage and flow to rush hour traffic in your car, it is easy to visualize what happens in the computer when there are no metering lights, traffic signals are not synchronized or there aren't enough lanes to carry the number of cars trying to use the street or highway. It doesn't do you any good to have a high powered automobile capable of going 100 miles per hour if you run into a string of red lights or a merging lane slowdown. You move at 5 miles per hour or stop completely. The highway system is "short of capacity" and "low on administration and construction resources" even though your car has plenty of power and there are hundreds of miles of roads in the area with no cars on them. It's just that you can't use them.
Q: Using Word 97, the word wrap feature works well, but the first letter of each line is capitalized. Using FORMAT, PARAGRAPH corrects each paragraph, but does not appear to be a default setting. Anyone know why?
A1: May be a FORMAT, STYLE setting that would allow this condition. Resetting these settings should fix the problem.
A2: Could be the auto underline feature is doing the capitalizing also.
Q How do I get an e-mail list? I want it for distribution of sports card/coin collectors. What are the rules?
A1. On the internet, type MAIL LISTS, and many sources should be listed.
A2. Yahoo mail lists will give many lists to choose from, could be by category.
A3. BUT any hints of spamming could be a problem. Your ISP could discourage more than a 25 simultaneous mailings.
A4. Abuses, like spamming, could be forwarded to an ISP for complaints; abuse@ix.com can help kill e-mail abuse. Other ISPs may have similar addresses
Q. Please comment on the use of an encyclopedia off the hard drive and ease of upgrading.
A1. The encyclopedias, typically on a CD ROM, should be run off the CD and not the copied to the HD for running. The CD holds too much data and could fill your HD very quickly.
A2. The upgrading is simple, just buy a new CD every few years and keep the old one. The data does not get obsolete.
Q. My AOL has no sound - help! I have AOL 3.0, upgraded to 3.5, upgraded to 4.0. Still no sound. I do get sound through my speakers and from other programs. AOL Help Line says its a WIN/my computer problem!
A. I had a similar problem; and uninstalled the WIN sound drivers and sound card drivers. Reinstalling the sound card driver corrected the lack of sound.
Q I have a Start Up Menu problem - I get an error message saying it can not find a program file that is not on my HD. Is there a program that will search my HD file for the program.exe name?
A. An older DOS 3x program called XTREE GOLD could search all files for a string of text, i.e. program name, and show where in that file the string existed. But that program does not work on 32 bit files. However, see ztree under "Web Sites" in this issue.
Q. How do I control the automatic capitalization of the first letter of a sentence in Word 97 (some earlier versions are similar or identical)?
A. Go to Tools - AutoCorrect... and click the AutoCorrect tab. Look for the "Capitalize first letter of sentences" box; if it is checked, Word will automatically capitalize the first letter after a period and space. This means you would not have to press Shift plus the letter at the start of a sentence, Word will automatically capitalize the first letter. However, if your document is of a structure that this causes problems, just make sure the box is unchecked and click OK. Note there are many other options in this menu item that you may want to change.
Another option that causes confusion and frustration is under the tab "AutoFormat As You Type": the "Automatic Bulleted List" and
"Automatic Numbered List" may cause confusion if they are turned on. However, if used correctly, these options can make creating and editing numbered or bulleted lists much easier (the trick is to select the text to be formatted first, and remember that if an unwanted new bullet or number appears after pressing The Wednesday, October 28 meeting will have Jan Altman as the featured speaker. She is a specialist in Excel so bring tons of questions for her. Plan to project foils or overheads if you want complete comprehension of your problem. The next month, we will have a dual speaker session on Wednesday, November 25 [yes, we are having a meeting the day before Thanksgiving]: John Lomax - Genealogical Consultant - Menlo Park LDS Church. How to use the genealogical computer tools available. Suzanne Eaton - Marketing Communications Manager - Mylex Corporation RAID systems for super integrity of your data. We STILL are working over the fact that we do not have yet a handle on how to get the Media City mail processors to work correctly. As a desperation move, we are investigating using the mail list processors of some other ISPs as there is no requirement that the list server be on the same ISP. Plan on the SECOND and THIRD Tuesdays for the Internet and Win95/98 SIGs. The response about Hank Skawinski's knowledge of the problems associated with PCs, means that I just might ask him back about mid next year for an update. AGENDA 7:30 Sig Reports Norm Wintemute - Win95 SIG Jim Dinkey - Internet SIG 7:40 DOM (Disk Of the Month) Robert Mitchell - some changes to be announced. 7:50 Announcements 7:52 Guests introduction 7:55 Random Access (Crosstalk) 8:00 Break (10 minutes to resolve Crosstalk issues) Note that issues resolved should be given to Ron Nicholas. 8:10 LECTURER - Jan Altman - Excel Tips, Tricks and Treats 9:25 RAFFLE 9:30 ADJOURN Regards, Jan Altman - Excel Tips, Tricks and Treats
The Planning Meeting of October 7, 1998 met at the home of Jim Dinkey. Present were Jim Dinkey, John Sleeman, Bob Mitchell, Walt Varner, Stan Hutchings, and Ron Nicholas. Our treasurer, Walt Varner reports a balance of $3018 not including last month's DOM sales. It was suggested we try new approaches to obtain software for our "door prizes". Perhaps approaching the SW manufacturers for self-demonstrating kits of their software would be possible; and SW donations to follow. Many SW makers want large audiences to justify their demonstrator/speaker. Suggestions from the membership are encouraged. The member skill list of those who would volunteer to help other club members, appears to need updating. If anyone has acquired new skill in a new operating system, program, or such, please send the information to John Sleeman, our newsletter editor. The old SPAUG computer is disassembled, and parts that are useable are off to resurrect other relics. Our Co-webmaster, Stan Hutchings, continues to be disappointed with the e-mail list server. A free replacement is being sought but is difficult. The SPAUG website now lists the e-mail addresses of Spaug members. Now you can e-mail your club members. The concept of latest web page updates be shown was thought to be a nice feature. The co-webmaster will investigate. A lower cost alternative for solving the Y2K (Year 2000) issue has been identified: The November 25 Wednesday meeting will have John Lomax as the featured speaker. John is Genealogical Consultant - Menlo Park LDS Church. How to use the Genealogical computer tools available in the marketplace. John will present the overall picture of what needs to be
done and how the various computer tools can aid the researcher. As he does not work for any of the software companies, he has no axe to grind if you ask him which software is the best.
Tuesday, November 10 (2nd Tuesday) is the Internet SIG at 3380 Cork Oak Way starting at 7:00. All members are welcome. We are on Class 2 of a 10-class series.
Tuesday, November 17 (3rd Tuesday), Norm Wintemute will demonstrate the creation of a newsletter from beginning to end including the computer insertion of the address onto the address field of the newsletter.
December 9, 6:00 - 9:00 (2nd Wednesday) Holiday Party at Jim Dinkey's home at 3380 Cork Oak Way (Corner of Cork Oak Way and Ames). Potluck dinner and comradeship. RSVP needed by completing the form below and returning it via e-mail.
Wednesday, January 27, 1999, Microsoft - Windows 2000.
---------------------------------------------------------------- _________ Yes I'm coming.
_________ No, can't make it - try next year.
I propose to bring potluck in the following 'food group': Please RSVP as soon as you can concerning the December party.
Regards, John Lomax - Genealogical Consultant and docent at the LDS Geneology Reserch Center in Menlo Park will review the tools, resources, capabilites in the marketplace and how to use them. He will reference the various services that are available to the researcher including the CD services, publications, etc.
A request to change the agenda sequence of the General Meeting brought
out ideas of major rearrangement of several items. A major item was to
advance the speaker/presenter to be before the break. It is worthy of a
trial depending on the speakers setup needs and membership feedback.
The WIN9x SIG's are doing well, attendees are enthusiastic.
There is no Planning Meeting for December as there will be no December
General Meeting, so the thundering herd of member showing up will be
lonely.
The Club mail pickup has been more infrequent than desired. Efforts to
make more pickups, route the membership applications and renewals in a
more timely manner were set in motion. The resultant will be better
processing of membership applications/renewals, checks and mail in
general.
The Treasurer reports a balance of approximately $2,900 without the just
received renewals/applications/DOM sales of $290.
Our webmasters have linked computer related TV and radio talk shows on
the SPAUG website. Check it out!! Many issues and problems are
discussed, dissected and discussed and get resolved here.
Since our members like the DOM but the programs are larger than the 1.44
floppy can handle, the need for two disk DOM has arrived. The new DOM
price was set at $3.00, regardless of the number disks.
Donations for our "raffle" are requested form our members and businesses.
The "raffle" is an important source of SPAUG's income.
Since the next Planning Meeting is January 6, 1999 and this is the last
Meeting Minutes this year, Happy Holidays.
Adjournment was at 9:10 PM
Respectfully submitted, The Windows 98 Guide has been updated with new information, including poweruser tips from ZD Journals, links to 3rd party reviews and articles, and more.
http://www.microsoft.com/magazine/guides/windows98/
2. ZD HELP: http://www.zdnet.com/zdhelp/ 3. BUG NET: http://www.bugnet.com 4. SUPPORT HELP: http://www.supporthelp.com 5. MACFIXIT: http://www.macfixit.com 6. COMPUSERVE (WUGNET): http://www.wugnet.com/compuserve/ 7. AOL HELP DESK: Keyword: Help Desk
8. NO WONDER: http://www.nowonder.com 9. DEJA NEWS: http://www.dejanews.com Q2. One member has an older 386 computer and wants to update the operating system to use WIN95. His machine has a 60 Mb hard drive, slave channel 1 with CD ROM. He tried auto load and manual entry and still did not load. He wants to know if he can update to WIN95? Q3. A member suggested a new Special Interest Group (SIG) specializing on Hardware. He is specifically interested on monitor settings, optimum settings, etc. If you try to open a file from Windows Explorer and Windows 95 doesn't recognize the file extension or doesn't know what program to open the file with, a window will pop up and ask you to associate a program with that file. Unfortunately, by default the box that says "Always use this program to open this file type" is checked (is a funny default, since half of the time you're just guessing which file type is the right kind). You might have used this window to pick a certain file type with this default box checked. But it might have been the wrong kind of file type But now Windows will always try to use the wrong program to open that file.
But fortunately, you can easily change the program with which a file type is associated:
Open the Windows Explorer and select the file that you're having trouble with. Press and hold the Shift key as you right-click the file (the shift/right click combination is the secret). From the pop-up menu, choose the Open With command to display the Open With dialog box. Choose the program you really do want to associate with the selected file type. You can choose the Always option again if you want to. Select OK to reassign the association.
Hide, Display or Resize Details Columns in an Explorer Window.
If you're looking at an Explorer window (or regular window) in Details view, you have the option of hiding any of the columns of information. This trick is especially useful if you need more room to display the columns you really do want to see.
Hold the cursor over the black line (on the gray column headings) to the right of the column you want to get rid of, and when it changes to a double-pointed arrow, drag it all the way left. The column simply disappears. To display the column again, click just to the right of where you left it (you'll know you're in the right place because a double-pointed arrow with two black lines appears) and drag right. While viewing the contents of any Explorer window in Details view (select View, Details), you can resize a column to fit its widest entry: Hold the mouse pointer over the vertical line at the right edge of the column's title, and when it changes to a double-pointed arrow, double-click.
Want to resize EVERY column to fit the widest entry? Select any item in the right pane, then hold down the Ctrl key as you press the plus (+) sign on your numeric keypad. Windows resizes all the columns in one fell swoop!
Find out size of selected files and folders. Need to know how much space a selection of folders and/or files takes up on your hard drive? (Knowing this would come in handy if, for example, you've selected items to copy or backup to a floppy disk or tape.)
In an Explorer or My Computer window, hold down Ctrl as you click on each item you'd like to tally. Then right-mouse click on any selected item and choose Properties. The resulting dialog box will display the total size of all selected items, including a count of each item type (files or folders).
Want to know the size of all the files and folders (and files within those folders) in a particular directory (or folder - whatever you want to call it)? Ten download TreeSize, a Windows 95 addon.
It's a great little shareware utility that provides you with every folder's size at a glance - something Explorer fails to do. However, Explorer does offer a neat little trick.
In Explorer's left pane, click on the plus sign of the directory whose size you wish to determine. Now select all the contents of the right pane, files and folders alike, by using Ctrl-A or clicking on the top entry, holding down Shift, and clicking on the bottom entry. Right click on the entire selection, choose Properties, and you'll see the total number of files and folders, as well as their combined size. Note Ctrl-click will select/deselect individual items.
E-MAIL
Saving Space.
When you receive or create a message, it makes a folder bigger. But removing or deleting messages from folders doesn't give you back space. Instead, the deleted messages still take up hard drive space. To control this, compress your folders: Select File, Compress Folders from the Messenger window.
New Mail Notification.
You can use the Netscape Mail Notification to automatically check for mail. To set this up, go to the Windows taskbar and right-click the Mail Notification icon. Click Options from the context menu that appears; this opens the Netscape Mail Properties dialog box. On the Notification tab, in the "Check for Mail Every X Minutes" box, enter how often (in minutes) you want to check for mail.
Address Lists.
You can organize the names in your Messenger Address Book into lists. To create a mailing list, open the Address Book and choose File, New List, which opens the Mailing List dialog box. Enter a List Name and a Description, and a Nickname (optional). Next enter the names and addresses of the people you want to include in the list. Press Enter to add the name. When the list is set, click OK.
Mail Signatures.
A signature is a way of tacking on to the end of messages something that's expressive or fun. To create your own special text-based signature that you can attach to the end of your e-mails, do the following:
1. Choose Tools + Stationery. Next, you need to decide whether you want to have the signature automatically added to EVERY outgoing message or just a select few you choose.
To automatically add your signature to every message:
1. Choose Tools + Stationery. Or, to add your signature just to individual messages you choose:
1. Just before you send the message to your Outbox, put the cursor at the end of your message. CONGRESSIONAL PAPERWORK OLD GOLD ONE STOP SEARCHING For other all-in-one search engines, see the SPAUG Home Page under "Other Web Sites"; "Search Engines"; "METASEARCH (search multiple sites)". You may find "Ask Jeeves" to your liking. (Kendric)
VITAL STATISTICS FREE STUFF FOR YOUR
Bon Mots from the Prez
by Jim Dinkey, October 98
Jim Dinkey, President
Speaker for General Meeting, October 28, 1998
Planning Meeting, October 7, 1998
Ron Nicholas, Recording Secretary
Webmaster Wanderings
Is Your Phone Line 56K Ready? Test it with Line Test.
3Com Line Test
http://www.3com.com/56k/need4_56k/linetest.html
LineTest has only TWO REQUIREMENTS:
1. Any manufacturer's V.34 modem, installed and connected to a phone line
2. Any terminal application (such as Windows95 HyperTerminal, RapidComm, QuickLink II, or MacComCenter)
How to Use LineTest
1. Close your Internet connection, then open a "terminal window" in your communications software. For detailed instructions, consult your software's documentation.
2. Dial this number from your computer: 1-847-262-6000.
Most communications programs offer the ability to dial from a "phone book." Alternately, you may send the following command to your modem:
ATDT1-847-262-6000
3. You'll be connected to the LineTest system, and asked if your system supports graphics. Press the 'Enter' key to proceed.
4. You'll then be prompted for your first name.
Type in: line
Press the 'Enter' key.
Next, you'll be prompted for your last name.
Type in: test
Press the 'Enter' key again.
The LineTest system will perform a series of diagnostics on your connection, and will inform you of its conclusion. This may take a minute or so.
If you see: "This connection supports 56K* technology!" Congratulations -- you're in good company!
Tech Alert!
At this point, if you press the 'Enter' key, you'll see the first of two screens of line statistics. Press the 'Enter' key again for the second screen. When you're done, type in the letter g, then press the 'Enter' key to disconnect.
If you're not interested in this information, type in the letter g, then press the 'Enter' key to disconnect.
If you see: "Your line does not support 56K technology." Type in the letter g, then press the 'Enter' key to disconnect.
Since line conditions can change from call to call, we recommend that you make several calls to LineTest to ensure an accurate diagnosis. If you have multiple phone lines available for use, we recommend that you try calling from each line.
If you see: "56K is not currently possible on this connection, or is likely to be highly impaired." Type in the letter g, then press the 'Enter' key to disconnect.
The most likely reason for this response is more than one analog-to-digital conversion in the connection to your provider. If multiple calls indicate that your line won't support 56K technology, keep in mind that telephone network configurations can change, so your chances of making high-speed connections may improve over time.
If you see: "Cannot determine 56K capability, test must run in V.34 mode." Type in the letter g, then press the 'Enter' key to disconnect.
You may get this response if you have excessive "noise" or static on your phone line. Since line conditions can change from call to call, we recommend you try again at another time.
Important Note
We've taken great care to ensure that LineTest reports accurate results. However, due to the complexity of the diagnostics LineTest performs, we can't guarantee 100% accuracy. We'll improve and enhance LineTest as your feedback rolls in.
* Capable of receiving at up to 56 Kbps and sending at up to 31.2 Kbps. Due to FCC regulations, receiving speeds limited to 53 Kbps. Actual speeds may vary. Requires compatible phone line and server equipment. Complies with both the determined V.90 ITU 56K standard and x2 technology. Standard officially determined in February, 1998; ratification expected in September, 1998. See www.3com.com/56k for details.
MS TIP OF THE WEEK -
Quick Defragging For Your Windows 95 Customers
One of the easiest ways to increase Windows 95's workstation performance is with the built-in System Tool, Disk Defragmenter. It's a simple process that can be quickly accomplished if it's done on a regular basis; often the hardest part is convincing your clients to take the few minutes at least once a week to run the program, particularly if their workstations have multiple drives. Learn all about this easy performance enhancement at: http://premium.microsoft.com/da_smallbiz/tech/tip.htm
ScanDisk and Disk Defragmenter, are two utilities that you should run fairly frequently (every month or so) to keep your hard disk in tip-top shape. One way to access these utilities is to select Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and then choose ScanDisk or Disk Defragmenter. Another is to open a My Computer or Explorer window, right-mouse click on your hard drive, select Properties, select the Tools tab, and click on Check Now or Defragment Now. ScanDisk should be run before the Defragmenter, to insure any disk problems are fixed first.
THE Y2K PROBLEM HAS BEEN SOLVED!
The goal is to remove all computers from the desktop by December 31, 1999. Instead, everyone will be provided with an Etch-A-Sketch. There are many sound reasons for doing this:
1. No Y2K problems.
2. No technical glitches keeping work from being done.
3. No more wasted time reading and writing e-mails.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS FROM THE ETCH-A-SKETCH HELP DESK.
Q: My Etch-A-Sketch has all of these funny little lines all over the screen. What do I do?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: How do I turn my Etch-A-Sketch off?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: What's the shortcut for Undo?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: How do I create a New Document window?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: How do I set the background and foreground to the same color?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: What is the proper procedure for rebooting my Etch-A-Sketch?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: How do I delete a document on my Etch-A-Sketch?
A: Pick it up and shake it.
Q: How do I save my Etch-A-Sketch document?
A: DON'T pick it up and shake it.
Bon Mots from the Prez
Letter from the Prez November 98
1998 Holiday Dinner at Jim & Ro Dinkeys'
Jim Dinkey, President
Speaker for General Meeting, November 25, 1998
Planning Meeting, November 4, 1998
by Ron Nicholas
SPAUG November's Planning Meeting 1998 met on the Fourth at the home of
Bev Altman. Attending were Jim Dinkey, John Sleeman, Bev Altman, Walt
Varner, Stan Hutchings, and Ron Nicholas.
Ron Nicholas, Recording Secretary
WINDOWS 98: WHAT'S IN IT FOR ME?
TECHNICAL HELP SITES ON THE WEB
Submitted by Kendric Smith
1. MICROSOFT KNOWLEDGE BASE. http://www.microsoft.com/support/
A searchable collection of articles about why things don't work.
Search the Ziff-Davis database of their computer publications (MAC and PC).
Chronicles the faults and fixes of scores of popular PC programs.
Find the Web address of a company's support site.
A searchable database of bulletins.
Many PC support forums on Compuserve.
Free support for ALL operating systems, including e-mail consultations.
A compilation of Newsgroups. Use at your own risk.
Random Access: October General Meeting
Paraphrased by Ron Nicholas
Q1. One member inquired about voice transmission over the internet; WAV files and voice messages; how to create them.
A1. Files that have the extension WAV are sound files. Like, "You've got mail" of the Windows "ta-daa" when booting up windows. They can be created by using your own computers multimedia function and microphone. AOL can help create them. They are found on the Internet. They are very large files and can take a long time to download depending on your modem speed. There also are WAV file inside the WIN9X program. One member commented that WIN95 can generate WAV files but not WIN98.
A2. No. WIN95 requires a 486 processor as a minimum.
A3. Many replies ranged from it depends on the screen size to dot pitch size. The consensus was this item should be brought up at a WIN95/98 SIG for an in depth discussion on the third Tuesday of the month.
Windows Explorer Tips
by Stan Hutchings
Change And Make File Associations.
2. On the Mail folder tab, click Signature.
3. Select the Text radio button.
4. Click once in the big white text box and type--well some sort of signature.
5. Click OK twice.
2. Click Signature.
3. Select Add This Signature to All Outgoing Messages.
4. Click OK twice to accept your changes.
2. Choose Insert + Signature. (The signature you previously typed pops into your new message.)
3. Send your message.
OTHER WEB SITES, FROM TIPWORLD
SEARCHING THE UNDERGROUND
When you get tired of the mainstream point of view it's time to put a little "Dis" in your Information--and that's exactly what the DisInformation search site offers. Categories include Propaganda, Revolutionaries, Censorship, Counterculture, Counterintelligence, and Newspeak.
http://www.disinfo.com
The Government Printing Office has put a searchable database of Congressional publications online. You can search and retrieve all kinds of documents. This site is divided into categories, each of which contains subcategories and a search engine, so you want to know where you're going before you start your search.
http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
If you want to find a copy of Navigator Gold, Netscape hides this little gem in its Products Archive, which you will find at:
ftp://archive:oldies@archive.netscape.com/archive/index.html
The All-In-One Search Page is another one of those sites that give you access to more search engines than you'll ever want to use.
http://www.albany.net/allinone/
If you're searching for birth, death, marriage, or divorce records, you probably wouldn't think of the Center for Disease Control. However, it has a helpful How To Obtain Vital Records page. Here, you find links to each state and detailed information about how to request the records you seek.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchswww/howto/w2w/w2welcom.htm