Newsletters

1996

9601

While watching television over the Christmas holiday I saw a ton of WWW URLs on the tube. I thought I would check them out to see what they offered.

This is the page for the Discovery Channel. Don’t bother with this one unless you have Netscape and a fast modem. The entire page is a big pixmap. There is no text.

This is the Comedy Central home page. It came with a disclaimer and a ‘RUN AWAY’ button. A great place for fans of MST3000 and ABFAB. Note that this URL has no WWW prefix.

For technology junkies. Plus, you can keep up with Paul and Phil - The Answer Guys.

The Arts and Entertainment channel on-line. Another pixmap abuser. Check out the Biography, Mystery and History Channel Pages.

The Science Fiction channel on-line. Called the Dominion, it is also a pixmap abuser.

Looking for a satellite dish in the convenient take home size, check out the Direct TV web site. It has pricing, programming and other information.

Looking for some new electronic gear. Then check out the Mangnavox home page. They even have a contest where you can win a new TV. I am not a big fan of their products, so this is not an endorsement.

Of the unofficial pages I like the RUGRATS home page best!

Mark Pendergast

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9602

There are a number of tricks you can use to make moving and copying files a snap in the Windows File manager. These tricks might be old hat to some of you, but even the most experienced Windows Guru can always learn a few more tricks about the File Manager. The most obvious way for a DOS user to copy files is to select the file and use the FILE/COPY pull down menu. The only problem is that you must type in the full destination path into the form. The Windows ‘object-oriented’ way to copy files is to drag and drop them.

The tricks I plan to cover are all aimed at getting drag and drop to do what you want it to do with less clicks. The tricks fall into a few categories. These are : File Selection, Action Control and Destination Selection.

To select files in the Windows File Manager just click on them. This works great if you have only one file to select, but it is very time consuming to copy a whole wad of files this way.

The first file selection trick is selecting a block of files that are all in a row. To do this click on the first file you want to select. Then press the shift key and hold it in. Then click on the last file in the block. Windows highlights all the files in the block. This trick can be used with the VIEW/SORT BY pull down menu to select all the files of a certain type or all the files created on some date. You can drag and drop the whole group just as though it was one file. Note that the drag icon looks like a big pile of files. The drag icon is the shape that the cursor changes into when we are in the process of dragging files.

Selecting a block of files is great when you can get the files you want to line up in a row. If the files you need to copy are all over the place in the directory, use the next file selection trick which is selecting multiple unrelated files. To do this click on the first file you want to select. Then press the ctrl key and hold it in. Then click on the next file you want, and the next, and the next. Windows highlights all the files you clicked on. You can once again drag and drop the whole group just as though it was one file. And again note that the drag icon looks like a big pile of files.

The last file selection trick is not for selecting files. In the Windows File Manager you can select whole directories and drag them to new places. This is great for reorganizing your hard drive. Just be careful to patch up any references to the directory or the files in it in the PATH statement, batch files or ini files.

The Windows File Manager provides default actions for what to do when we let go of the files after drag and drop operations. Sometimes these actions are not the ones we want. The next series of tips will let us see what Windows File Manager is planning to do and how we can change its mind and have it do what we want instead.

The default actions for the Windows File Manager are to copy files from one physical drive to another and to move files within the same drive. If we drag and drop a file from the hard drive to a floppy drive, the Windows File Manager will copy the file. If we drag AUTOEXEC.BAT from C:\ to C:\WINDOWS, the Windows File Manager will move the file because the file stayed on the C drive.

To tell what the Windows File Manager plans to do we need to look at the drag icon. If the drag icon looks like a file or files with a big plus sign on them, the Windows File Manager plans to copy the files. If the drag icon looks like a file or files with no plus, the Windows File Manager plans to move the file. When you are moving files you will also see the icon for the file in the file list disappear so that only the name remains.

So, what do we do if the Windows File Manager decides to do the wrong thing. Once again the shift and ctrl keys come to our aid. If you want to force the Windows File Manager to move a file, press the shift key after starting your drag. If you want to force the Windows File Manager to copy a file, press the ctrl key after starting your drag. Note: it is very important that you press these action modifier keys after you begin your drag or the Windows File Manager will think it is a file selection command. Pressing your action modifier key too early will usually mess up your selection and you will need to start selecting all over again.

The Windows File Manager provides a number of landing zones for dropped files that allow the user great flexibility in moving the files around. There are even two surprise actions that are built in that go beyond just moving the files.

The first drop zone that can be used is a directory in directory list window. The files will be copied or moved to that directory. Directories in the directory list window can be expanded to see their subdirectories.

In a similar manner we can drop files on any directory icons that are in file window. These allow us to copy files into subdirectories below the current directory. This is useful for sorting a big wad of files into categories.

We can copy files directly onto the drive icons up above the file window. Sometimes it is not obvious where these files will go. They do not go to the root directory of the drive as you might guess, they go to the working directory that was last used on that drive. To find out where the files will go, or have went, just click on the drive icon to open the current working directory.

To get more control over the destination for our copies we can open two file windows in the Windows File Manager. Select the WINDOW/NEW WINDOW command from the pull down menu. This will create a new file list window on the screen. Select the WINDOW/TILE command from the pull down menu. This will arrange the two windows on the screen so both are visible. Now navigate one of the windows to the source directory and the other to the destination directory. You will now be able to drag files from one window to the other to have complete control over the drag and drop process. I find this to be the best option when I do anything more complicated than a very simple file move.

The two surprise drop zones are on top of other files, and on top of the Windows Print Manager icon. When you attempt to drop a file on top of another file, the Windows File Manager attempts to execute the second file (just as though you had double-clicked it) with the second file as its input. You will usually run across this as an error if you drop a file into a crowded directory and accidentally get it on top of another file icon.

The second drop zone is on top of the minimized print manager icon on the desktop. Windows will execute the registered application for the dropped file (just as though you had double-clicked on the file) but will pass it to the application with a ‘/P’ option, which for most Windows Application means print the file. Many other software vendors were after Microsoft to open this functionality to them too, but Microsoft claimed that the implementation of this feature was a poor one and that some day OLE would allow them to do the same thing.

I hope you enjoyed our tour of the Windows File Manager. I guess if you made it this far, you probably did. If you have any tips or tricks you would like to share with the group, just write them up and drop a diskette to the Group Newsletter Editor. We would love to hear from you.

Mark Pendergast

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9603

Please forgive me. I am no David Letterman, but this just jumped into my head and I couldn’t get it out. So I give you the top ten reasons to but a MAC:

10. You can’t program your VCR and can only get the toaster to work once in a while.

9. The case color matches your new drapes.

8. You expect to get a great deal on spare parts in the near future.

7. You drive a ‘62 AMC Rambler because the thought of a computer controlling your cars engine frightens you.

6. You own stock in Apple Computer.

5. You feel a need for less control in your life.

4. Rush Limbaugh uses one.

3. You are obsessed by fruit.

2. You think it might be an antique some day.

And the number one reason to buy a MAC ...

1. Your Amiga just went belly up.

Mark Pendergast

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It’s not that I really have any problems running Windows 95. It’s just that after all the hype and all the wait, Win95 is just Windows 3.2 (with compatibility problems, flakes and a 8 Meg minimum RAM requirement)

But, there are two real cool features of Win95 that have made me feel better about the whole thing.

The first great feature is the ability to change video screen resolution on the fly. In Windows 3.1 you had to reboot to get from 640x480 to 800x600. In Win95 you can change the resolution from the control panel.

To change resolution you push the START button on the tool bar, hover on SETTINGS and click Control Panel when it appears. From the Control Panel window double click on the Display icon. In the Display Properties window click on the Settings index tab. On the Settings page there is a frame called Desktop Area with a slider going from Less to More. Just adjust the pointer to the screen size you want and press OK.

When you press OK the system displays a message box that tells you that it will take a few seconds to change resolution and if you have problems it will switch back in 15 seconds. If you press OK on the message box the system tries to change resolution. When it is done it displays a second message box that asks if you can read it and if everything is OK . If you press OK the system accepts the new resolution and allows you to continue. If you don’t press OK in 15 seconds the system assumes you couldn’t read the second message because the resolution change messed something up, so it switches back to the original resolution.

This feature is great for CD ROMs that run at 640x480, you can run your desktop at 800x600 and quickly switch to 640x480 to run the CD in full screen mode.

This great flexibility doesn’t extend to color changes. It still takes a Windows restart to go from 16 to 256 colors, even in Win95.

The second great feature of Win95 is the ability to autostart CD ROMs. When you push a CD into the drive Win95 looks at it and most of the time fires up the CD program. Or in the case of a music CD, fires up the CD player. This is a very convenient feature. All of the Microsoft Home CDs will fire right up. The only CDs that seem to have problems are some of the CDs that came bundled with my system where there are more than one application on one CD.

That has been my experience with Win95 so far. I hope you liked it. I would like to hear from those of you out there that have tried Win95 and liked it or hated every minute of it. Just jot down a quick story and give it to one of the officers on a floppy disk (in text or Windows Write format). I would love to hear from you.

Mark Pendergast

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9604

The Internet (the Net) and World Wide Web (the Web) have spawned their own vocabulary and jargon. Without a good understanding of these terms you will find yourself unable to follow any conversation on computer networking. I have provided a short glossary to help you get started.

Browser -

A browser is a software program that allows you to access information on the Web. It reads HTML documents and paints the correct display on your computer. It also allows you to activate hypertext links to other documents on the Web.

Client -

This is you and your software. In general any thing that makes requests of a server.

Cyberspace -

Cyberspace is a nickname for the digital universe that exists inside the computers that make up the Internet.

E-mail (Electronic Mail) -

E-mail is a message that is sent as data through the Internet. E-mail is very fast compared to Snail Mail, but is vulnerable to being read by hackers sifting through messages as they are forwarded on between systems on the Internet. Don’t send credit card numbers or passwords by e-mail.

FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) -

The FAQ is a document that is maintained by the manager of a Usenet newsgroup. It has a list of questions that new members of the newsgroup frequently ask, and a complete set of answers. It is posted to the newsgroup every so often so that new users will not fill up the group by asking the same questions over and over and over...

FTP (File Transfer Protocol)

FTP is a method for moving files across the Internet very rapidly. It works a lot like the DOS copy command. Normally access to files with FTP requires an account and password on the server providing the files, but anonymous FTP servers allow anyone to access the files that they have made public.

Home Page

A home page is a World Wide Web document that serves as an introduction to a set of information. The home page may be for a server, a user on the server, or just some sub-set of information provided by the user or server. The home page usually gives a rough outline of all the information available and highlights any new or especially interesting information.

HTML (Hyper-Text Markup Language)

HTML is the coding scheme for formatting of Web pages. HTML tags indicate where text is to be justified, underlined, bolded, numbered, paragraph wrapped, etc. They also indicate hyperlinks, and graphics to insert.

HTTP (Hyper-Text Transport Protocol)

HTTP is a high level network protocol that is used to retrieve information from a hyperlink.

Hyperlink -

A hyperlink is a tag in a hypertext document that instructs the browser to jump to another spot in the document or to another document entirely. Hyperlinks are often represented as underlined text or graphic icons. A pixmap is a set of special graphical hyperlinks.

Hypertext

Hypertext is a document style that allows non-linear access of a document by activating a series of pointers called hyperlinks that take the reader to other part of the document or even to other documents.

Internet

The Internet is a collection of computers and the networks that interconnect them. It was started as a way for Defense researchers to collaborate on projects and share computer resources. It then evolved as a way for many diverse groups to communicate information. For the most part sponsored by the US government, the Internet is being privatized and will eventually become a collection of private enterprises.

ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network)

ISDN is a special phone service that you can buy that is designed to handle data at very high rates of speed. Designed from the ground up as a data system it can handle voice and data over the same line at the same time. It is currently very expensive.

Newsgroup

A newsgroup is a long chain of articles and responses and responses to responses that focus on a single topic. A newsgroup named alt.computers.ibm would be an unofficial newsgroup devoted to computers made by IBM Corp.

Newsreader

A software program that allows a user to read, print, save and post news messages to and from newsgroups.

Pixmap -

A pixmap is a way to navigate through web pages. It consists of a picture that acts as a map of the available information and an underlying mapping of the pixels of the picture to hyperlinks in other documents. For example a picture of the U.S. could have links to regional weather based on where the map was clicked.

Provider -

A provider is someone who sells access to the Internet. Also known as a service provider.

Server -

A server is a computer that holds information. This information might be files (a FTP server), Web pages (a HTTP server), news (a news server) or mailing lists (a list server).

Snail mail -

Ground mail from the U.S. Postal Service. Generally known to be slow compared to e-mail.

Tag -

A formatting command in the HTML language that tells the browser that something special needs to happen with the associated text.

TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol)

These protocols determine how messages travel around the Internet. Every computer on the Internet has a unique address and TCP/IP controls how each computer in-between forwards the message to its destination.

URL (Uniform Resource Locator)

The URL is the address of a Web page or other Internet resource. It starts with an identifier of the type of resource, then has the Internet address of the resource, and lastly the path to the resource on the destination server. For example: http://www.ibm.com/~jsmith/index.html is a web page (http). It is on the www.ibm.com server. It is located in jsmith’s web directory as file index.html.

Usenet

Usenet is a network of news servers that store and distribute newsgroups on almost every topic imaginable to users with newsreaders.

Viewer

A viewer is a software package that helps a browser display non-HTML formatted data to the user. This non-HTML formatted data may be a picture in GIF or JPEG format or a postscript document. A viewer is a special type of ‘helper’ application for the browser. Other helper applications could be used to view videos or play sounds.

Mark Pendergast

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9605

I believe that the PowerToys were Win95 features that didn’t make the final cut of the product. Microsoft includes a disclaimer saying they provide this software ‘as is’ and make no claims for its reliability. In other words "YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN!"

The compete list of PowerToys is as follows:

HTML Printer Driver:

Lets you print HTML formatted text on the printer without a web viewer.

Telephone Location Selector:

This has something to do with using the phone dialer from multiple locations.

TweakIU:

This control allows you to change some of the default desktop settings in Win95.

Fast Folder Contents:

Allows you to look into folders with the right mouse button, without opening them.

FlexiCD:

Gives you quick toolbar control of audio CDs.

CAB file viewer:

Allows you to look inside CAB files. CAB files are the Microsoft version of PKZIP files.

Round Clock

Provides an analog clock.

Explore from here:

Change Explorer to open where you are now, rather than from the root directory.

Shortcut Target Menu:

Allows you to see an objects properties from the shortcut.

Xmouse:

For all you UNIX fanatics. This allows the window focus to follow your mouse, rather than making you click in a window to move the focus.

QuickRes:

Quickly change the resolution and color depth of your display from the task bar.

I went ahead and downloaded and installed the PowerToys. The installation was easy and so far my system is not acting weird. In fact the three PowerToys I have tried so far were really cool.

I used TweakUI to speed up my menu speed (I hate to hover and wait). I also removed the "Shortcut to" prefix when I create shortcuts. Lastly, I deleted all the Microsoft network icons off my desktop. I didn’t mess with my mouse settings or the default boot options, even though they were available as choices.

The FlexiCD program is almost invisible, but it is cool. I just stuck an audio CD in my CD drive and it started to play. I could also pause and restart the CD from the task bar. When I was done I used FlexiCD to eject the disk.

The QuickRes program is real cool. It adds itself to the task bar and allows you to change screen resolution and color depth without rebooting, restarting or waiting for the system to ask you if you can see the OK button. It is quick and painless. I use this feature to switch from 1024x768 normal operation mode (for me) to 640x480 full screen CD ROM multimedia mode (for Mayo Clinic and other CDs).

Microsoft claims they will continue to upgrade the appletts as time goes on. It looks like they add some stuff or enhance it every month or so.

How many of you are using Windows 95? Would you like to hear more about it? Would you like to forget about it? Let me know at the next meeting and I’ll adjust my output accordingly.

Mark Pendergast

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9607

The Kokomo IBM PC Users Group was offered a freebie. It came to Richard Smiley, our Newsletter Editor, in the usual pile of junk mail he gets for the Group. If we would provide a few interesting newsletter articles, join in a chat group or two and add them to our newsletter mailing list, we could have two free memberships to America-On-Line (AOL). Sort of an on-line users group that AOL was trying to start. They call it their AMBASSADOR program.

One free membership was for the newsletter editor, the other was up for grabs. I grabbed it. (Executive Privilege) Richard sent away for the free membership kits. When mine arrived I put it in a safe place. About two months later I found it again. About a week after that I found a quiet night to load the software.

A few days later I got the time to sit down and hook up the account. I dialed in to their 800 number and got the local dial-in number. Then I dialed in. I filled in the account and password from the kit they sent me. Then I filled in the personal information section and the credit card information. Imagine my surprise what the computer said that my credit card number was on file and that it wouldn’t let me use it.

I had an AOL account about a year ago. We parted company when Prodigy went to 9600 and AOL stayed at 2400. I have always liked AOL’s interface better than Prodigy’s, but four times faster is four times faster. As far as I knew I was history to AOL.

Now, AOL not only had my card number on file, they had it wired into their on-line security check system. Holy paranoia, Batman. The number said to call technical support if I had any problems. Ok. I had problems!

I called AOL technical support. After navigating about five levels of their voice mail system I finally got to talk to a human. She asked "Do you have an account on the system?" I answered "I’m not sure." After hearing my description of the problem she decided it was a billing problem. She transferred me to the billing department number. A nice message said the department was busy and disconnected me. Thanks.

I called AOL support and navigated through their voice mail system to the billing department. I got there in only three levels. They haven’t learned to hide as deep as the technical support people (five levels). After getting disconnected a couple more times I got through to a human being.

The billing representative had no record of my old user id. She asked me for my credit card number and confirmed it was still on the system. I asked her why my number was still hooked up when my account had been dead over a year. She mumbled something about keeping people from opening multiple accounts or something. It didn’t make much sense and she didn’t seem to be in the mood to clarify it much more than that. She said I could use a different credit card number and everything would be just fine. I told her I would prefer to use my current one. I use one card for all my on-line transactions, and only use it for that. I figure it will minimize the amount of damage that I will need to clean up if something goes wrong. She said she would open the old credit card number up for 24 hours so I could use it again.

I tried to get registered a few more times and finally got through. I completed all the forms and even got to the AOL service agreement acceptance form. Then before I could read it. Pop! I’m out again. I try it a few more times, same story. Back to AOL billing.

The new representative states that it is now the credit card company that is refusing to authorize this transaction. I need to call the bank. Nice idea, only it is Saturday night.

I asked my wife. "Any ideas?" She looks at my credit card and says "This is your new one. It’s not valid yet. You need to use your old one till next month." True, I had just gotten it in the mail. Oh well, I dig out my old card and try again. Still no deal, the bank will not take it.

"Honey?"

Well, she said she paid the bill. Well she gave it to her sister mail it when she was in Wisconsin. "Oh, did I mention it sometimes takes mail three weeks to get out of Milwaukee?" Wonderful!

Well, the credit card company still hasn’t seen the check. So my AOL sits.

The moral of this story is not: Don’t trust big city post offices or even that on-line service hookups are more complicated than they seem.

It really concerned me that AOL had my credit card number on file (on-line) a full year after I closed my account. I can’t even come up with a good theory of why they would do it. I can only guess that they must have had rampant card abuse at some point. If you have any insights into what is going on here, or would like to egg me on to go talk to the Attorney General about this I would like to hear from you.

The true moral is: When on-line it is best to beware!

Mark Pendergast

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9608

Prodigy has just released a new news reader for its users. It has lots of new features and is much more flexible than the old one. I have forgotten the exact time, but it took less than 15 minutes to download the new reader from their Web Page.

The new reader is called BBUsenet. It is at version 1.00.17b. I normally steer clear of V1.0 software, but this a huge improvement over the old newsreader. It is a little buggy. It leaks system resources, if you use the image viewer, and it gets unstable at times causing General Protection faults (GPFs).

The best feature by far is the auto uudecode and view of images. This saves a great deal of time sorting through UUE files and also lets you see if this series of photos is worth the time to download. The only limitation is that it uudecodes a series of pictures all at once then displays them without pausing. In other words you only see the last in a series of pictures. I assume that they did this because it was quick and dirty and because if you download pictures one at a time, but append them to the same file you will get the last valid picture displayed.

The second best feature has to be the download screen. It shows progress (percent complete for this article) as well as progress for the whole batch. This was a major problem in the old reader which displayed no status at all. The other nice feature is a stop button that kills the download. This was also unavailable, as far as I could tell in the older reader.

The interface for the new news reader is a more graphical interface. You can click on icons to perform many of the functions and the list of articles has a graphical drill down style.

There is better control of news reader configuration information. A special options menu allows you to maintain this setup.

By the way, the downloader also multitasks with other applications. I am writing this article while downloading images. I have even saved this article to a file and minimized and maximized their application a few times and everything seems to be holding together. (Knock on wood!)

The new news reader does not work with the existing Cyber Patrol software, but a new version of Cyber Patrol is available that is compatible. Cyber Patrol allows you to filter out newsgroups that you would find offensive. (for example alt.sex or alt.rush.limbaugh)

I liked the search better in the old news reader. There was much more capability to define your search and more actions that could be done from the search list.

Although it claims you can look at multiple newsgroups in multiple windows, I haven’t done this yet. I have noticed that, even though it has already been downloaded, the news articles list freezes when a download begins. I wonder if the second group freezes too.

If you have learn any interesting tips from surfing through cyberspace, I would like to hear them. Please submit them as a newsletter article, or if you are really adventurous, as a presentation at one of our meetings. I would love to hear from you.

Mark Pendergast

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9609

What they do, how they do it, and what you would be able to do if you step up to the challenge of leadership in our Group.

The President, as the name suggests, presides over the regular meeting and the board of directors meeting. The President sets the tone and direction for the Group. Traditionally, the President has included a short message in the newsletter. (Typical time budget: 4 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Newsletter: 1 hour.)

Although I may be biased, I believe this is the easiest job. Anyone who enjoys computers and has a basic understanding of why people attend Group meetings will do well. There is a need to do some speaking before the Group, but this is really easier than it looks.

The Vice-President backs up the President. Our Vice-President is also in charge of the program at the regular meeting. (Typical time budget: 5 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Coordinate Program: 2 hours.)

The other directors often suggest program topics, and sometimes even volunteer to present. Most of the extra work involves calling around to find someone willing to speak and coordinating any special arrangements with Ivy Tech for things like modem lines or computers. All in all it is a good way to meet a dozen interesting new people over the course of a year.

The Director of Membership Services is a new office. This position was originally the Librarian, but with the advent of free BBS downloads and $10 CDs full of games there has been little or no activity in the shareware library business. The Director of Membership Services is in the process of inventing the job so there are no fixed duties.

(Typical time budget: 4 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Dream up and execute new ideas: 1 hour.)

I feel this office is vital to the future of the Group. We need to find more services to offer our members as our traditional services are being done better through technology. This would be a great way to express your creativity and plow new ground in serving our members.

The Treasurer maintains the financial records and archives of the Group. Group disbursements and receipts are handled by the Treasurer. (Typical time budget: 5 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Write checks, deposit receipts, balance the books, print membership mailing list: 2 hours.)

The Treasurer has a routine job that is very well defined. It doesn’t involve public speaking or creativity, just a great attention to detail. This position is a great way to get started as an officer.

The Newsletter Editor collects articles, arranges them in a newsletter format, gets the newsletter duplicated, and mails it out every month. (Typical time budget: 7 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Publish newsletter: 4 hours.)

The Newsletter Editor is a great position for someone with artistic abilities. Layout and distribution of the newsletter is one of the most visible services we provide to our members and one of the best ways to attract new members. This office does take a little more time than the others and has a pretty firm deadline.

This year we plan to begin allowing Directors at Large to help direct the Group. The job description is not very detailed, but Directors would be expected to attend Directors meetings once a month and contribute ideas for programs and perhaps a presentation or newsletter article from time to time. (Typical time budget: 4 hours per month. Regular meeting: 2 hours, Directors meeting: 1 hour, Activities to support the Group: 1 hour.)

Directorship is a great way to increase your commitment to the Group without making any major commitments of time or resources. You really have control over how involved you become.

Holding a position of leadership in the Group is an excellent addition to any resume. It is a powerful differentiator for people looking for a new job, or looking to take on increased responsibility in an existing position.

Holding a position of leadership in the Group is an excellent development opportunity. These positions can allow you to try out your leadership abilities in a non-threatening environment and develop those skills that will be required as you progress in your personal and professional life.

Holding a position of leadership in the Group is an excellent opportunity to provide service to the community. Our Group members are the community, we also arrange other events to serve the community (like our donation of a CD Drive and Sound Card to Ivy Tech). This is a very rewarding way to use your hobby to help others.

If you would be willing to help run the Group, please contact any of the officers. We would love to have you on board. All positions are open so you can have your pick. Hope to see you at a Board of Directors meeting next year.

Mark Pendergast

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9610

Last month I had a tremendous opportunity to go forth and serve the community in the name of the Kokomo IBM PC Users Group. Gene Sturdevant, officer of an Airstream Campers group and Kokomo IBM PC Users Group member, asked me to speak to his Airstream group about Windows 95.

I met the Airstream group members for dinner at the Pizza Shack in Tipton. There must have been a hundred people. They were a lively bunch with a wide range of interests. I can see why the group is so popular. They had just returned from a tour of Ivy Tech presented by Shawn McCully. He also gave them a presentation on computer virus checkers. After dinner we returned to the Tipton fairgrounds, where the ground was covered with Airstream camper trailers as far as the eye could see.

The Airstream group had a PC interest group set up in one of the main buildings. They had about 20 computers of various models and sizes set up along two walls of the building. I gave my presentation to about 30 of the Airstreamers. I used one of the group members computers to do my demonstration. They asked very good questions and even came up with some things that enlightened me. I had a great time working with the Airstream group.

Mark Pendergast

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Windows 95 comes with a New 3D GUI Interface. Some of the major enhancements are:

The Program manager is replaced by the Start Button; The Task Bar shows all running programs; The Right Mouse Button pops up a Menu for the currently selected object; You can Hover the mouse to get help on icons or activate menu extensions; The Trash Can provides delete protection (like DOS undelete); Shortcuts allow multiple ways to run the same program; The Save As... dialog box allows you to create a new folder to save your file. (This is one of my favorites)

Windows 95 also sports an Enhanced Windows ‘Engine’. Some of the major enhancements are: Windows now directly supports 32 Bit Applications; The Plug and Play standard for detecting and configuring new hardware is supported; The DirectDraw Video API will allow for live action games to be developed; Multi-user configurations allow multiple people to use the same computer, each with their own desktop setup; Long file names finally free us from DOS 8.3 files; An Application Install Wizard allows easy addition of new programs; and you can change screen resolution on the fly.

Also included were a trial membership to Microsoft Network and the new MS Internet Explorer World Wide Web browser.

I have found some ‘enhancements to Windows 95 that I do not enjoy. Some of my top annoyances are: No macro capability to automate tasks in Windows; No DOS support for long file names in scripts; No DOS help command (I guess they don’t want you to use DOS); By placing the Close button where maximize used to be they ensure I close my applications just when I want to use them; and last it will not run on 386 or < 8 meg, which means I will have to run two operating systems in my house.

- Change the files in "C:\windows\Start Menu" to manage start menu icons.

- Shut down IS REQUIRED, before turning off the computer.

- Passwords do not provide security (but are good for multiple users).

- When in doubt use the right mouse button menu .

- Don’t forget to hover over icons to get help.

- Clear document list from taskbar right mouse menu -> properties.

- Right mouse button drag-and-drop to get drop menu.

- Don’t forget to reset your recycle bin size (10% of your total disk space is the default).

Some helpful shortcut keys:

CTRL-Z = undo almost anything, almost everywhere.

ALT-BACKSPACE = undo replace-selected-text. (This is for the times that you highlight a bunch of text and accidentally hit a key that wipes out all the text)

ALT-TAB = switch between applications.

CTRL-ESC = start menu / task bar.

CTRL-ALT-DEL -> New Task Manager (Old task manager still there).

Mark Pendergast

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9611

When I was a kid, the old Sears & Roebuck catalog featured a peddle car for $9.98. I wanted one of those cars in the worst way. Unfortunately, my father could not afford such a luxury! That old feeling of want occurred again after reading the Computer Shopper and seeing an ad for Quantex. It featured a Pentium Pro with a 3.2 gig hard drive 32 MB EDO Memory, also featuring a Panasonic SCSI PD/ 4X CD-Rom including a 650 MB removable re-writeable optical cartridge. Along with a 17" Mag Monitor and a decent sound card.

In my life I have owned 5 Airplanes and 3 Motorcycles. Each aircraft had to have a larger engine and more features and the same with the motorcycles. That old peddle car feeling came over me again. I had to have a new computer, after all, my new interest in graphics demanded something better than my old 386! After consulting with the comptroller of my marriage, looking over my 50 acre soybean field and with confidence that the next Social Security check would be on time - "Go for it !" was the only answer I could give myself. After all, I am over 70 and this may be the last chance!

I made the call and was told the monitor would not be a "Mag" but would be a "Mitusbishi" instead and delivery would be 3 weeks away. I had made my mind up not to accept any substitutions from any ad and decided not to buy! After a week of looking up and studying the difference between digital and analog monitors, I thought it would be OK! I trotted out my trusty GM card, ordered and was told delivery would be in 1 week. This was a Friday and sure enough the next Thursday we were called and told delivery would be the next day.

At noon Friday a shiny Fed Ex truck was in front of the house and there it was! The truck was driven by a petite young lady and all I got was tailgate delivery. After lugging those heavy boxes in the house all I could do was sit there and stare at all that stuff. At about five in the evening I had my old computer in storage and the new one setting on my desk, wired and ready to go!

I invited my wife into the room and told her to sit down, as I was going to punch the button and give it the smoke test! Lights came on the disk drive started, the fan was very quiet but nothing came up on the monitor! There was nothing to do but shut the system off and trouble shoot. I discovered a defective socket on my power bar! My old fashioned computer had a switched power socket on the back of the case for the monitor.

Instructions for the starting sequence stated that Windows 95 would go into a little dance at the beginning and you would have to insert some serial numbers, etc. at startup. With the aborted first start, of course, I had missed the sequence. Windows 95 came up very nicely and announced the program was licensed to an unknown user. I didn’t care much about that because I do not anticipate calling Microsoft under any conditions.

The computer came with Corel’s Word Perfect package and I opened Word Perfect to compare it with the Microsoft Word 6 that I was currently using. It looked very nice on that big monitor. Another program icon took my eye, it was Quicken SE. I jumped on it with eager anticipation, since it has, in the past, been one of my favorite programs. It asked me to insert the CD Rom, which I did, and clicked OK. It asked again, and again. By this time I was smelling a rat. Stumbling blindly through Windows 95, I found the icon for "my computer" and looked at the drives. I had A, C, and D, but no CD-Rom.

At 8:00 Friday night, with the help number shining brightly on the screen, I placed the call. Waiting for my turn for about 15 or 20 minutes and listening to music that was not too good, I hung up. I would place the call the next day. Saturday at 9:00 AM, I was on the line again. After waiting 10 minutes, the call was through. I had the order sheet in my hand. With a combination of a New York City and New Jersey dialect, and speaking as a rapid fire machine gun, the Tech Rep demanded my order number. It was in large print and was easy. He then asked for the serial number. The serial number was so small I had to get my magnifying glass to see it.

He asked "What is your problem?". I replied "My CD-Rom drive is dead!". "How do you know its dead?". I said "It does not work.". He replied "How do you know it does not work?". At that moment I knew this guy was going to vote for Bill Clinton! My hair began to stand on end as I told him when a CD was called for in a program and a disk was placed in the drive, it would not accept it and would keep asking for you to insert it! "What is on your screen right now?" he persisted! I replied " just a bunch of icons". This kind of banter went on for 20 minutes and the phone line went dead. A hang up.

Diving back into the telephone and receiving a quick response, the next tech rep was on the line for 2 hours. He had me change the config.sys and autoexec.bat files about 6 times. He decided it had a bad scsi board and he would send me one to arrive in about 2 days. This was Saturday.

Waiting with the patience of Job till Thursday, I called again asking for the rep that had talked with me the second time. This man (Gary) had never heard of Duane, the fellow who had helped me the second time! So now I have a new rep. We went through 2 hours of looking at IRQ’S, etc. and found some conflicts between the sound board and the scsi controller card. At about 5 minuets `till 5 he announced that the man he needed to confer with was in a meeting and asked if he could call me back at 8 AM tomorrow. My little rat told me 5 PM was quitting time. "Of course" I replied cheerfully, you may call me at 6 AM if you wish.

This was Friday Oct 18 and at 8:06 the call came! It was Gary with a few more suggestions. I was asked to pull the scsi card and inspect the interrupts on the board. After resetting a jumper and restarting, the thing took off like a mule with its tail on fire! All systems worked and worked very well! It was impossible for this unit to work when it was shipped! One has to snicker when they tell you the systems are burned in for 72 hours.

By the way, Quicken SE is nothing much but a shell program. It is somewhat like the old side show, pay 50¢ to see beyond the next curtain. Don’t get too excited when it is offered as a package!

Would I do it again? Yes, with some reservations! The quality of the Tech Rep is certainly important. After all, they are the front line of the company. Incidentally, the new scsi board that was promised in 2 days has never arrived!

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9612

THE WEB, need I say more.

Well, maybe I do need to say more. What is this thing that has transformed the Internet from an interesting experiment to the worlds greatest, well ... , you name it? How can something that didn’t even exist a few years ago be the dominant force in everything? Even Bill Gates (please pause until the heavenly chorus fades) was caught unprepared for the rise of the Web. And every ad on television now has a Web address at the end.

The Web was developed at CERN, the European particle accelerator lab. CERN needed a good way to distribute information and papers to their researchers and their colleagues. They built the Web based on known technologies. Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) from the U.S. Department of Defense Computer Aided Logistics and Support (CALS) project, the Internet, and Hyper text from, among others, the Hypercard application from that fruit flavored computer company. They combined all these diverse technologies into a unified system that allowed documents to be published over the Internet with self contained links to other documents that had additional details of a similar interest.

The user accesses the Web with a program called a ‘browser’. The browser accepts the address of a document and displays the requested page of information. The address is called a Uniform Resource Locator (URL). The URL is called: ‘uniform’ because the address is basically the same no matter what type of ‘document’ you request; and ‘resource’ because the web uses a very broad definition of the word ‘document’ that includes resources like FTP (the file transfer protocol), Usenet news groups, sounds, graphics and video.

Your browser talks to the ‘server’ at the Internet computer that is represented by the URL you requested. The server is a computer program that waits for requests from browsers and then supplies the requested document. The communications scheme that the browser and server use to communicate web documents is called Hyper-Text Transport Protocol (HTTP). You do not need to know anything about HTTP to run your browser. You may notice that ‘http’ are the first characters of most URLs. One fact about HTTP that can help you understand performance problems better is that HTTP is a connectionless protocol. This means that the system connects independently for each request and then forgets where it was (unlike a telephone system that keeps the connection open until you are done). This can cause performance problems when a web page has a number of graphics. Each graphic is a separate resource, and as such a separate request. Each request goes to the end of the line for the server, so a busy server may take a long time to serve you up a graphics intensive page.

Now, what are these documents, how do we imbed graphics in them and how do we create hyper-text links? First, these documents are files on the server’s computer that contain text that is written in a special code called Hyper-Text Markup Language (HTML). HTML is a subset of the SGML language, described above, that has been defined to do web page stuff. Much of the code in HTML is used for text formatting. When used this way HTML files are a lot like Rich Text Format (RTF) text files. The browser reads the code and displays the text in the correct font, bold, underlined, and with the correct paragraph style.

Second, we imbed graphics using other HTML codes. These codes are sometimes called ‘tags’. The tag used for imbedded graphics is an IMG tag (It looks something like <IMG SRC="picture.gif">). The browser will read the tag and if the user’s browser is capable of displaying graphics, it will stuff the picture right in line with the rest of your text. There are a number of options for alignment of the graphic, etc. Note: the browser will not display tags directly, only the things they represent. In fact, if your browser does not recognize a new tag, it will just ignore it.

Last, we create hyper-links using still another HTML tag. The tag used for creating hyper-links is an anchored Hyper-Reference (It looks something like <a href="link address">link text</a>). The users browser sees the tag and displays the ‘link text’ in a way to indicate that it is a hyper-link. Normally the text is shown underlined in dark blue, but it can be anything the browser decides. When you click on the link text the browser requests the new web page represented by ‘link address’. You are at the new document.

The Web got its name because of all these links between documents. You can imagine what a mess it would be to try and draw a map of all these links. The links have no rules. They can point to themselves, to documents that point back to themselves and to documents on the other side of the world. It would resemble a spiders web when the map was all done.

So, how do we find anything on the web? Well, the original method was to post your URL on another Internet application: the Usenet newsgroups. Many people would read the newsgroups for a topical area, for example: sci.physics.partical.CERN. If they saw a URL posted with the news, they could use their browser to check it out. Although this method still works well, the modern way to find what you want on the web without hoping that someone will post it to a newsgroup you happen to be reading is to use a web search engine. A web search engine is a server that provides an index to many web pages. The server has a program that goes out and looks at many, many servers and records what it finds. You just ask it to find a specific subject and it displays a web document with an index of sites that match. Cool!

So, Who Cares ...

Initially only a few scientists at CERN cared. Then college students got on the web and created more documents with a wider variety of themes. Then interest groups began to see the potential of getting their message out to people over the Internet. The government began publishing a variety of statistics and documents on the Web. But the biggest driver of the Web was more and more users of home PCs got Internet access to download files via FTP and read netnews. They also discovered the Web. That is when major advertisers waded in and began advertising commercial products on the Web. This is when the Web took off. You now see a Web URL at the end of almost every TV advertisement.

The Web has become a place to see the world, do research and be entertained. In the near future technology will solve the one obstacle limiting the usefulness of the Web for commerce, Electronic Money. When this becomes available the Web will truly become an electronic shopping mall. For the moment it is only an electronic library.

Mark Pendergast