Friday, February 1st, 2008
The meeting was called to order at 7:36 P.M. by President Chuck Horner. He invited attendees to add to his pre-meeting electronic cartoon display and noted that PCC has 3 components: The Main Meeting, the SIGs, and the Clubhouse. He welcomed new members, reminded everyone to sign in on the Hayward Adult School sign-in sheet, and to turn off their ringing and buzzing devices.
Chuck also reminded everyone that they get a reminder about their dues expiration date 12 times a year, as part of the address label each time a Newsletter arrives.
SIG Announcements:
As a followup to last month’s Home Server presentation, Bud Gallagher noted that several updates have been announced. Vern Perry won PerfectDisk 2007 for being the first person to report to Bud that he has set up Home Server. For those who want more, Bud noted that www.mswhs.com provides a link to how to build a cheap server; more info about Home Server can be found at www.stayathomeservers.com
The new User SIG will not meet in February.
The Hardware SIG will meet tomorrow night, the night after the main meeting, as usual at the Smiths starting at 8:00 P.M. Bring hardware and manuals.
Bill George reminded the group that the Genealogy SIG meets on the 3rd Tuesday at the San Lorenzo Library.
Bill said also that Mack Hossack won’t be able to continue leading the Digital Photo SIG. PCC is looking for another leader for this valuable SIG.
On the last Saturday of the month, the Spectacular Linux SIG will be looking at Mandriva 2008. Mandriva finds close to everything when added to any system, including old laptops.
Other Announcements:
Chuck let the group know that Bruce Hevelin would like to retire from the VP Programs position. Del Parton pointed out that this would be a good opportunity for someone interested in other kinds of presentations to set them up, according to their interests.
Presentations:
Bruce Hevelin presented some features of Microsoft Publisher 2007. It is available as part of several versions of the Office Suite or as stand-alone. Publisher 2007 is a basic, simple desktop publishing application. It does not have all the bells and whistles of some of the more expensive applications. Neither does it have the learning challenges. A lively discussion of desktop publishing programs followed. These applications are for gathering and organizing words and pictures into a single document and preparing them for printing. Extraction and further editing is not part of the intended model, which is why it is so difficult.
Bayle Emlein demonstrated the Neo portable word processor–under 2 pounds, 300 hours on a set of AA batteries–the Intellikeys adaptive keyboard and the Big Keys large-key keyboard.
Jan Fagerholm showed off a One Laptop Per Child computer, waving it around at various angles with one hand and then the other. It automatically saves all actions and files. Jan showed various multimedia capabilities, such as video. Other kid-friendly freatures include durability, versatility, multimedia and drawing. Jan noted that the leader of the OLPC movement, Nicholas Negroponte, sees this as an education initiative, not a technology initiative.
After the Break:
Bruce distributed DVD movies from Pinnacle: Movie Making Magic about Making Movies on Your PC to interested attendees. He also distributed PC Computing mousepad 2008 calendars.
Bud displayed the trophy Diane won in the APCUG international competition for Web site design. Bruce reminded everyone of the award Elsie has received in the APCUG competition for the Newsletter.
Chuck’s Questions:
What can I do to so my laptop doesn’t announce to the world when I’m booting up during a meeting? Answer, go into the Control Panel and turn off the Startup Sound.
Comcast won’t let me send an e-mail to more than 50 people; how do I send to 200 people? Answers: make batches; try a program called WorldCast; try Gmail.
The meeting was adjourned at 9:52 P.M.
The next meeting will take place 7:30 P.M. at the same location on March 7, 2008.
