Wisconsin All-computer User's Club

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August 2000 WAUCtalk Newletter

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Volume 17, Number 8 - August 2000
Wisconsin All-computers User's club

General Meeting
7:00 PM,
August 3, 2000
Annual Picnic
Bring family, friends, conversation and a dish to pass, ready to serve

August at a Glance
2 PC SIG, 7:00 p.m.
 Super America Station
 60th & Layton
 Topic—Calendar Creator

3 WAUC General Meeting, 7:00 p.m.
 Jackson Park Lutheran Church
 4535 W. Oklahoma Ave.
 Annual Picnic

8 Apple II/Apple IIGS SIG, 7:00 p.m.
 Child Dev. Center of St. Joseph's
 1600 W. Oklahoma Ave.

9 HTML SIG, 7:00 p.m.
 Corporate Technologies
 9733 W. Greenfield Ave. Suite 206

10 Multi-Format SIG, 7:00 p.m.
 Corporate Technologies
 9733 W. Greenfield Ave. Suite 206

15 Deadline for submitting articles for  WAUCtalk, please send to:
 mbellin@bigfoot.com  or
 marieb@eudoramail.com

17 Telecom SIG, 7:00 p.m.
 Super America Station
 60th & Layton

30 Exec. Bd. Meeting 7:00 p.m.
 Doris Regner’s Home

When I was about 10 years old, my dad bought me a small reel to reel tape recorder with a detachable microphone.  I remember laying the microphone next to the radio or my record player and taping my favorite songs.

It wasn’t much later that cassette tapes come on the scene and players with built in microphones.  You could then tape from the radio without fear of outside noise.  Years went by, then came the dual cassette deck. You could easily copy music from other tapes.

The advent of the compact disc  brought clearer sounding music, plus you could tape the songs you liked. However if you only wanted certain songs, that could mean getting a lot of different CD’s to record from.
Now thanks to the Internet you can go to sites like NAPSTER and pick what you want and download them to your own CD’s and it’s free.  While the fight is on to regulate it, it is for now still legal.

We have come a long way from the tape recorder and it’s just more proof that the age of the Jetson’s may not be far away.
 

With ever improving technology, what some create for good will eventually be used for evil.  The Internet is no exception.  What was meant to bring unlimited information into our homes also has a dark side.  Pornography, unsolicited e-mail, and even the theft of personal information.

One area where a lot of web surfers are most vulnerable, are the many areas on the Internet called chat rooms.  Chat rooms are places where anyone can go and have an online conversation with other people.  Chat rooms may be used to share similar interests, meet other people, or just have a general conversation.  But do you always know who you are chatting with?

It may seem like fun to try and imagine who you are conversing with, but it may also lead you down a dangerous path.  Most chat room users are careful about what information they give about themselves, but a comment here and a comment there and pretty soon somebody can put the pieces together and it won’t be long before they know more about you than you realize.
This could lead to innocent pranks played on you or at the other extreme could lead to stalking.  Internet stalking, called cyberstalking is the continual dogging of one person by another via the computer.  Imagine receiving e-mail from some one describing all details of your life you thought were private.  And what if this continues on and on?  You begin to get nervous, but what can you do?  Civil laws are very limited as the Internet is still somewhat in its infancy.

An Internet watchdog group called CyberAngels can help.  Started in 1995, CyberAngels is led by Parry Aftab, a New Jersey woman who takes her position very seriously.  "The World Wide Web", says Aftab, “is like the Wild Wild West.  A new frontier with few laws and fewer cops.”  Using special tracing programs, CyberAngels are able to find out who the cyberstalkers are and relay the information to their victims.  The cyberstalker is also notified that they have been unmasked and are warned about violating federal laws.  Usually at that point the cyberstalking is discontinued.

CyberAngels is always looking for volunteers to help.  In order to be a CyberAngel, you must pass a criminal background check. In addition to dealing with cyber stalkers, CyberAngels also review web sites, speak at public gatherings, and track child pornography online.  Volunteers are trained through online classes.  If you are interested in becoming a CyberAngel, visit their web site at www.cyberangels.org  You can also get information by reading the article in the April 2000 issue of Readers Digest.  That can be found at www.readersdigest.com
Bruce Kosbab

Before things settled down at our July Multi-Format SIG, we passed around some of our recent projects.  Jackie is making door prizes for a family picnic, including magnetic bookmarks, and some elegant notecards with vellum.  She mentioned a button in Print Shop that lets you antique a graphic (this technique worked particularly well on vellum (I’ll have to try that some time).  Jackie had found some boxes for her stationery, because the wallpaper boxes are too flimsy (Marcia stated that when she makes wallpaper boxes, she lines them with tagboard).  Di also brought a bunch of magnetic bookmarks.  Marcia had a card with teabag folding and glitter.  Sandy had cards done in American Greetings CreateACard Plus 3, the program being demonstrated tonight.  I brought 2 cards, using graphics purchased from the Print Artist Users Club awhile ago.  PC Create It Magazine was passed around ( a good one for crafters).

One of the things mentioned with Microsoft’s Home Publishing Suite, was that you are in big trouble, if you don’t close all programs out and disable the virus scanner when installing.

Terry and Sandy demonstrated American Greetings CreateACard Plus 3.  The program will let you purchase additional graphics from the Internet.  It also has a “Kid Lock” to prevent children from purchasing “adult” graphics.”  We didn’t see any of those.  Sandy was amazed at how well it printed envelopes, often the downfall of many programs, you don’t have to feed the envelopes the wrong way to get them to print right-side up.  You can do a full install, or to save HD space keep a lot of the stuff on the CD.  By clicking on the Windows Icon, you can minimize the program, not all programs of a similar nature let you do this.  There are multimedia greetings you can send via e-mail, and some of these are animated.

The interface is similar, but not identical to the original Micrografx Hallmark Connections Card Studio.  Terry wanted to lighten the background on some of the graphics, to save on ink.  As far as we know, it can’t be done with the program.  We tried copying and pasting such into a Print Artist document, simply to edit the graphic, copy it again, and paste it back into American Greetings CreateACard Plus 3.  Well, you can use the lighten command in Print Artist, but this lightens the whole graphic..  To change the background only in Print Artist, you select custom in the color, and results are unpredictable.  It is tedious and painstaking to recreate the colors which have be turned into shades of gray or other colors, just to change the background.  Doris said that she would do this sort of editing in I Photo Plus (perhaps next month?).  I suggested going into MS Paint (continuing with the copy & paste method).  On one graphic, we successfully changed the dark blue background to white, by using the fill tool.  This technique didn’t work on all graphics, however.  At first we thought it might work with only those graphics with solid colored backgrounds, but even there it was hit & miss.  We don’t know why.  We could crop the pictures, though.

CreateACard Plus 3 does have drawing tools, which let you add shapes or draw you signature to use on cards.  This feature was nice.  Terry mentioned that she liked using copy & paste on a shape she created and liked.

There is also a calendar feature, which can remind you a week or so in advance of upcoming events.

Overall, I was impressed with the program, which included Z-fold cardmaking, and some of the graphics, especially the flowers, are nice.  I think I would like to get it, if we ever get our computer running smoothly at home.
Christine Gardner

WAUC’s Executive Board gathered at the home of Marcia Zientek on June 28th, 2000.  Those present included Bruce Kosbab, Doris Regner, Marcia, Jackie Tamsett, Marie Bellin, Leo Hoffer, Di Vukovich, and myself.

WAUC’s new webmaster is Bruce Schneider.  Roger Brinkmeier did a fine job and his efforts are greatly appreciated.
We still haven’t heard what has happened to the order we placed with APCUG for the CD’s.  Bruce will check with APCUG to see what’s delaying the order.

Bruce showed us an ad for WAUC that he placed in the Milwaukee Lutheran High School yearbook.

The suggestion was made to tape the general meetings and mail them to shut-ins.  We would need
additional equipment to accomplish that and would also incur additional expenses.  Since detailed minutes are included in the monthly WAUCtalks, it was felt tapes wouldn’t be necessary.

Bruce contacted Community Newspapers and has asked them to change the listing in the newspaper to read WAUC.  It previously was listed as WACU.

Leo has contacted PKWare to verify they will have someone at the September general meeting.  They have not yet responded.

Presentations scheduled for this year are as follows:
July – Microsoft
August – Annual WAUC Picnic
September – Pkware
October – How Computers are Used in Hospitals
November – RAM and ROM
December – Annual Holiday Party

Doris will be the new leader of the Telecom SIG.

Terry Harvey

The Telecom SIG was held on June 22, 2000 at the Super America meeting room on 60th and Layton.  There were ten people in attendance.  We must have been the only people not on vacation, cooking dinner on the grill, or just enjoying the beautiful weather.  The purpose of this SIG is to familiarize us with all of the mysteries of surfing the web, and is held on the third Wednesday of every month.
A friendly reminder:  People attending this SIG are asked to park to the West and the North of the station.  Please do not park in the station area.  It reduces the amount of parking for the station patrons.

Terry Harvey was our fearless leader for the evening.  She explained that we have a free account with Naspa, which allows us to connect to the internet.

The first topic of discussion was how to find your modem speed.  Log in, and then point your mouse pointer on the computer icon, which is at  the bottom, right-hand corner of the desktop screen. Do not click, just point, or  you will disconnect.  These numbers will tell you at what speed your modem is connected.  Average speed times average from 28,000 to 48,000 bps.

There are many variables which can cause a slower speed.  Since Terry moved into her new home, she is having trouble with her modem speed.  She thinks it could be that the telephone lines are too long, or because the line is split and hooked up to two different phones.  Other reasons a modem speed could be affected are: a staple holding the line can act as a antenna, time of day,or the distance from a central station.  Terry also noted, that a fax machine or a cordless phone nearby could cause a problem.  Leo suggested calling the phone company, and asking for a quality line check.

John Hirsh gave us a website for free phone calls anywhere on the internet:  www.dialpad.com.  Terry cautioned,  “be patient, the conversations are more like talking on a CB” (Citizen Band Radio).  Java is required  to make these long distance calls.  To check to see if your computer has Java, in Netscape, go to Edit, preferences, applications, scroll down to find Java.

Bigfoot.com is a mail forwarding service.  It is a great way to have only one e-mail address, and still be able to change  internet service providers.  This service will allow you the freedom of changing your email address, but not having to notify friends and family evey time you have a new address.  Go to the site, and you will find the instructions.

Did you know that if you have Netscape 4.7 or  Internet Explorer 5. you do not have to type in http:// www. when you want to find a site that ends in .com, just type in the name.

Webmaster, John Hirsh showed us a site from another user club that he belongs to, www.sewwug.com.  Go to calendar, other user groups, and you will find the meeting schedule for WAUC, and other user groups.  From www.wauc.naspa.net our club’s home page, you will be able to link to sewwug.

Nellie told us about the web site, www.savvytraveler.com  It looks like a good site for travel information.

Terry went to Google.  This is her favorite search engine.  She showed us a site that allowed us to view some baby peregrine falcons right here in Milwaukee.  Their nest is on the top of an apartment building on Prospect Ave.  There is a camera set up allowing people on this site to observe the whole nesting and hatching process.  The eggs have now hatched, and we were watching the newborns. How amazing!  That’s what I call bird watching in the year 2000, with innovative technology!
The site is:  http://www.mpm.edu

Leo gave us a tip on how to change the name of a bookmark.  Go to your bookmarks, highlight, then go to edit, bookmark properties, type in new name.  To save bookmarks to disk:  Go to Edit, File, Save as, on a 3 ½" floppy, click Save.

What is a signature file?  Some people like to sign their e-mail with the same closing, or sometimes a cute rhyme, or words of wisdom.  With Bruce Schneider’s help, we learned how to set it up:  Open any word processing program, like Works or Word.  Type in the closing that you have decided you would like to become your signature.  Save as, txt file.  Type “signature” in the file name cell, and hit space bar and run space bar across the whole page.  Then go to edit, preferences, mail newsgroups, identity, locate file in signature file box.  Select to get it in the signature cell.  Then  hit OK.  When you type in you new e-mail message, the signature will appear.
Thanks to all of the members, and to Terry for all of the tips and instructions we received.  It was another good learning experience.
Carol Zarnik

President Bruce Kosbab welcomed sixty-two members and asked the eight guests to introduce themselves.  Bruce then requested that cell phones and pagers not be used during the meetings.

Treasure’s Report:  Jackie Tamsett reported an opening balance of $5216.34; income of $231.98; expenses of $1468.44; leaving an ending balance of $3979.88.

WAUC in the news:  CNI Newspapers interviewed Bruce about WAUC as a result of a story the paper is doing on this secretary teaching at LaFarge Lifelong Learning Institute.

PC Creator:  Bruce had a copy of this new magazine for us to see the things one can do on the computer.

Webmaster:  Bruce Schneider will be taking over the webmaster duties formerly done by Roger Brinkmeier.

Computer Sale:  July 30th will be the last time the computer sale will be held at Bluemound Gardens.  People are still needed to help at this sale.

Member Recognition:  Bruce recognized Chris Gardner for placing 3rd in a stamping contest conducted on the Delphi Rubber Stampers (DRS) site; she also got  $25 in stamping merchandise.  Chris also made a card for us to sign for Tony Maglio on the death of his mother.

Apple II Disks:  Dave Glish donated a number of 5½” disks.  It was decided that Pat Nye should get them for faithfully writing minutes for the Apple II SIG each month.

WAUC Picnic:  Sign up to bring a dish to pass, set-up or clean up for the August WAUC picnic.

Mac DOM:  Bubble Trouble, Catch 'um, Easy Gin Rummy, a graphic converter, Colorfall, Window Monkey 1-2-3, Peanut Butter Cake recipe, and a bunch of error codes.

PC DOM:  Nature photo disk of pictures taken by Chris Gardner.

Buy/Sell:  Paul Jurkowski would like to purchase Windows 95a and a Windows 95 Resource Disk.

Raffle: Corel PrintHouse 2000 for the Mac or Microsoft Publishing Suite 2000 for the PC.
Questions/Problems:  Ron Toro wanted to know if anyone heard of theinternetisfree.com; it’s supposed to be completely free without ads.  There was some discussion about free Internet services with mixed results, mostly negative.  Banners take up most of the screen and often cut off the user if there is no activity.  It is most frustrating during downloads, when cut-offs are common, even on ExecPC.  Leslie Saint mentioned a program called RealDownload that works great preventing getting cut off during a download.  The program is free; however, there is a program one can purchase.  You can download it at  www.downloaddemon.com.

Bruce has a trial program called WindowWasher that erases the tracks of where you’ve been on the Internet.

This secretary asked if anyone had installed Voice Recognition software.  Those who had saw less than satisfactory results, although the software is improving.
Leo Hoffer thinks he lost his modem during the last storm.  He wants to know how to tell if you’ve lost your modem.  Rich Coplan suggested reinstalling the modem and if it fails, you know it’s not working.  Paul Jurkowski said to go into the Control panel, select Modem, select Diagnostics, click More info.  Doris Regner said to go into Device Manager to see if the modem is working.

Richard Durand gets a beeping noise about 30 – 45 minutes after he starts using his computer.  Programs are performing normally, and he does not get an error message, but the beeping sound is very annoying.  Dave Glish thought the motherboard might be overheating.  He suggested running the computer with the cover off.

Bruce asked if anyone has a DSL cable line.  It is much faster than a regular phone line; however, there is a long wait to have it installed.  The cost for cable and a DSL line would be about $80.

Rich asked if anyone heard of the winstone virus, just about as nasty as Chernobyl.

John Hirsh had a concern about Napster after he spoke with a fellow at Office Depot. He said someone tried to enter his computer through Napster.  Napster is supposedly good for illegally downloading music. It works by sharing music through everyone else's computers.  Normally, you would think that's great, but not at the expense of having one’s files probed.

Microsoft: Learn, Create, and Have Fun with Microsoft
A presentation by David Severino, Channel Marketing Representative with the Microsoft Corporation, David began his presentation by explaining how to fill out the evaluation form, which will also serve as our entry form to win some of the products he brought along.
(Continued on page  6)
Works Suite 2000 was the first program that David told us about which combines six stand-alone programs: Encarta, Works, Money 2000, Streets and Trips, Home Publishing, and Word 2000.  Works opens with a task launcher listing tasks from which the user would choose the program(s) that can accomplish the task, letters, cards, banners, etc.  By choosing Letter, a number of styles and sample texts will guide the user to write professional looking correspondence, leaving room to customize.  David showed us how the programs are integrated; for example, when he opened his e-mail and read of an appointment he was able to enter it into his calendar, which is part of Works.

David used a video to demonstrate Flight Simulator, which is an exciting game that puts the player in the pilot’s seat.  It is even used as a realistic compliment to flight training.  Just about every airport that publishes data is included in the choices of landing and take-off sites with customizable weather conditions, instrument panels and choices of aircraft flying over six cities.

Home Publishing Suite is a combination of Home Publishing, Greetings and PictureIt.  David showed us cards he printed using Home Publishing.  A variety of projects are listed from paper projects, to other crafts, also electronic greeting cards.  He used PictureIt to show how easy it is to adjust contrast, repair marks, remove red eye, remove wrinkles, and crop unwanted areas on photos.  Smart task allowed him to adjust a number of photos with a similar problem to correct them all at once.

We saw Pandora’s Box on video, which is an award-winning non-violent game collection of puzzles for the entire family with varying levels of difficulty.

Last, David showed us the power of Encarta Reference Suite and the great tools at our disposal for doing research on countless subjects. Encyclopedia, Atlas and Dictionary comprise the suite, which are integrated when doing research.  David researched “computers” and brought up articles with footnotes, timelines with other events that occurred during a particular time period, archived articles, and links to other references.  To show how Encarta helps students write reports, David brought up a curriculum guide that shows the steps in writing a report with online tutorials to either read or listen to. The curriculum guide also includes areas of study that are appropriate for various grade levels.  Dave continued by showing us the Atlas with maps in different styles and integrated multi-media and World-Wide Dictionary with meanings that would vary in other parts of the world and other applications.  Each word has an audio component giving the correct pronunciation.

David showed us some new hardware: the new mouse without a track ball, but using optical mouse technology, and an Internet keyboard with two USB ports for ease in connecting other devices, like a digital camera.

David held everyone’s attention throughout his dynamic presentation.  WAUC can be proud of the fine turnout for this demonstration; I’m sure it will encourage David to come again for Millennium 2000.  Thanks to Leo for his persistence in getting David to come to WAUC, despite numerous setbacks.
Marcia Zientek, Secretary

Twelve people attended the PC SIG at Super America on July 5, 2000.  We looked at how to "remove" or "add" items from your Start-Up file.  First go to FIND, type Start.  All the files are contained here when you start your computer.  The more files you have in your start-up file the longer it takes for your computer to start up.  You can drag items from your desktop to this file and then it will start up with that program, or  you can drag them back to your desk-top to remove them from your start-up file.

We looked at a program called http://www.mailstart.com  This is a very easy program to use if you have a POP3 server, like Naspa or Freewwweb.  It's a quick way to get your mail.  If you are out of town and would like to check your e-mail on someone else's computer, you just go to this site.  Or if you have two ISP's, instead of going to both of them to check your mail just go to this site instead.  Type in your e-mail address and your password for your ISP (example: your Naspa password).  If  you use Bigfoot, you would have to use your actual address, in other words, if Naspa is your ISP, then you would type in your Naspa address and password, not your Bigfoot address and password.  Bigfoot only forwards mail so you coudn't use that address.  This mail stays on the server and it doesn't fill up your mailbox.

We talked about www.bigfoot.com which is a free mail forwarding service.  Once you register and  get your bigfoot address, every time you change your internet service provider, you don't have to notify everyone on your mailing list because bigfoot will just forward your mail.
Carol asked how to change a graphic in Print Master to a JPEG for the birthday cards so you have all your pictures for your birthday card on your floppy disc as a JPEG along with the card you created in PA. If your pictures are not JPEG or from PA they won't open up and you will get that dreaded blue box.

First open both programs, Print
Master and Print Artist.  Go to the Art Gallery in PM, right click on the picture you want to convert and click copy. Go to PA, click Edit, Paste, and give Imported graphics a name.  Your picture should be on your screen in cards, signs or whatever format you used to open the file. Click, File, Export, and give it a file name, but be sure to write it down so you can find it later.  Choose bmp for Export File Type.  Next, open ACDSee, find the drive where you have PA and click Sierra, pa4plat.  All of your graphics from PA should come up, they are listed alphabetically. Look for your picture, it will be a bmp.  Click on your picture and it will be highlighted. Next go to Tools, Convert, click on .JPEG and click OK.  Now it is a JPEG. Right click on your picture (example: cat.jpeg).  Click, Copy To, a box will come up asking for the destination of your copy.  For destination directory, click on A:\  , click OK.  Now it will be on your floppy as a JPEG and it should open in PA without the dreaded blue box along with your birthday card..

We looked at Calendar Creator briefly.  To Add an event, click Events, Categories-list of events, click on Add and type in the name of the category you would like to add, click okay.  To add Events, click on New, choose a template style and then click Next.  There are all sorts of event choices listed, such as TV stars birthdays, US presidents birthdays. We will continue with Calendar Creator next month.
Barb Rausch

Bruce Schneider reviewed some things from the last SIG, which I had missed.  He asked which numbering systems were used by computers:  Binary, Decimal, Hexadecimal?  We think of Hexadecimal and Binary as being used by the computer, however Bruce explained that all the computer understands is circuits, which are either on or off; it doesn’t really use any of the numbering systems.  We people use all of the numbering systems.  We use binary to represent the ons and offs as 1’s and 0’s.  We also use hexadecimal in programming.

He also reviewed that a megabyte is approximately a million bytes.  If you have 64 megabytes of RAM in you computer, that is about 64,000,000 bytes.  Since there are 8 bits to a byte, that’s roughly 512,000,000 bits or circuits.  I’d previously thought of these as units of information, not the number of circuits on a chip.  ASCII code is 7 bits per character (I believe the 8th is used as a place marker).  There are 128 characters.  34 are non-printing characters, such as control characters, spaces, carriage returns.

In determining place value, humans understand the 0’s that are not written to the left of a number, just as we understand the subject is “You” in the sentence “Go to the store.”  The computer needs numbers “Zero-filled,” since the circuits are either on or off, there is not alternative to 1 and 0.  If 4 places are allowed for an number, you can’t just enter “10,”  You would need to enter the number 10 as “0010.”

We reviewed Hardware Vs Software.  Hardware is anything physical (including the physical media of a disk or CD-ROM).  Software is the intangible programming contained on the disk, CD-ROM, or Hard Disk.  It is like the story in a book, whereas a book’s “hardware” would be the paper, ink, cover, and binding materials.
A programming language actually tells the computer what to do.  It contains source code (understood by the humans doing the programming), which is submitted to a program called a compiler which translates it into object code (understood by the computer, not by humans). Most commercial programs are proprietary; the owners do not share their source code.  There is no such thing as a decompiler. Programming languages can add, subtract, multiply, divide, find square roots, raise to exponential powers, and perform other high-level mathematical functions.

What surprised me is that Bruce said that HTML is not a programming language (like COBOL, BASIC, or C++), it is a markup language.  It tells the computer how to display the content, but cannot do the fancy math.  It is plain text when it is downloaded into your browser; it contains content and formatting, which the browser must translate.

When you write HTML, you are marking up your content with formatting tags.  The tags are placed between the less than and greater than symbols like <TAG>.  A tag can have an attribute, with a value attached to the attribute such as <TAG ATTRIBUTE=”XXYYZZ”>.  They’re like lines in the parking lot telling you where and how to park you data.

The skeleton is the tag set which every HTML document must have.  It goes like this:
<HTML> Starts an HTML document.
<HEAD> This starts the head.
<TITLE> This starts the title, the content may be “My 1st web page”
</TITLE> This ends the title.
</HEAD>This ends the head.
<BODY> This starts the body; anything you type here is going to appear in the body (body content).
</BODY> This ends the body.
</HTML> This closes (ends) the HTML document.
Notice that the tags are “nested;” the last one opened is the first one closed.

The title appears in the title bar in a program.  No more tags are required, but there are other tags that do other things.

When you are creating an HTML document, always use Notepad.  Do not use Wordpad nor a Word-processing program. These contain other formatting commands, specific to their program(s).  Notepad creates a plain text document, which your browser can interpret, provided the browser follows the standards for HTML put out by the W3C group. 98% of browsers in use are either Netscape or Internet Explorer;  sometimes they don’t follow all the standards, so it’s best to check your HTML document in both programs.

Bruce ran a class exercise in which we created a skeleton and “fleshed it out” with some content and additional formatting tags.  Most tags must be closed <TAG> content
</TAG>.  The exceptions are “empty“ tags.  Empty tags do not change the format of subsequent content.  An example of an empty tag is a Break Tag <BR>, which goes to the next line.  It doesn’t keep doing this, line after line, but does it only once.  Therefore, it doesn’t need to be ended or closed.  The paragraph tag, <P>, is also an empty tag, it goes to the next line and leaves one blank line (but doesn’t repeat itself, unless you repeat the command).

The additional HTML Formatting commands we learned were:  <H1> which made the text large and bold, and had to be closed by </H1> to get back to normal.  <I> to italicize </I> to end italics.  <B> to get bold text </B> to return to normal text.  <FONT COLOR=”BROWN”> This changes the font color to brown.  Notice that between the word “font” and the attribute, in this case the color, there must be a space.  This can be done using colors other than brown (example <FONT COLOR=”RED”>)  The color goes back to the default black with </FONT>, you don’t have to type the color in to end it.  The browsers can interpret 216 different colors, of the millions your computer can display.  The reason being to limit the size of the program and memory used.  If you know the numerical value of a color, you can use that instead of the word, but you need to use the #.  We used the tag, <FONT COLOR=”#FF00FF”>, to get magenta text.  Note that Hexadecimal numbers are used.  There are 16 characters, but a single place only goes up to a value of 15.  The characters are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F. Their decimal equivalents are: 0=0, 1=1, 2=2, 3=3, 4=4, 5=5, 6=6, 7=7, 8=8, 9=9, A=10, B=11, C=12, D=13, E=14, F=15.  The decimal number 16 would be 10 in hexadecimal.

<SUP> Starts superscript, </SUP> ends it. <U> underlines, </U> stops underlining.  <SUB> for subscript;
</SUB> to return to printing on the line.  <TT> to get monospaced type (it also changes the font to Courier, which looks like a typewriter font),
</TT> to return to the default font.  <CENTER> centers your text;
</CENTER> returns to previous justification.  <H3> Larger than normal text, but smaller than <H1>; </H3> ends this format.  <STRONG> Strong text; </STRONG> back to normal.
Remember to nest your commands, example <B> <I> to get Bold italic, but when ending the formatting, </I> </B> (in reverse).

In HTML the browser condenses spaces, and does not recognize TAB’s (there are no tags for these).  We were told to create the fictitious tags <TAB> and <Space>, and they were duly ignored, as were extra spaces or TABS typed in the content.

We were just getting into entities.  Entities are sequences of characters that can make the browser do something, such as force a “hard space”, (or several of them, by repeating the entity) on a line.  The space entity is &nbsp;.  If you wanted 3 spaces, you would do &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;.

After saving to a floppy, we viewed out web pages in a browser. We could make corrections by viewing and editing the source.
Christine Gardner

Our SIG met on July 11th at the Day Care Center with Richard Durand, Dale Voit, Becky Becker, Doris Regner, Lorraine Schmit, Richard Schmit, Debbie Breese, Sr. Samuel and Pat Nye present.

Richard Durand began by reviewing the disk he took as a door prize at the last WAUC meeting.  He had chosen a disk for the Apple IIe, which was a tutorial disk.  A number of the group busied themselves with Richard.

Doris was reviewing setting up databases with us, especially with labels, taking us right through to the printing of the labels.  She showed us how to break down our labels into separate categories for different occasions such as Christmas, birthdays, etc., and naming them so that we could easily access a particular group.

Doris has also created a template for the #10 envelope for me, allowing me to print directly on the envelope when not using a label program.
Pat Nye

  Jackie Tamsett, Treasurer

Software Review   AOL’s Point & Speak Speech Recognition Made Easy By Marcia Zientek

Systems Requirements:
Minimum 200 MHz Pentium Processor IBM compatible PC
Windows 98, Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0 (with SP-3 or higher)
16-bit sound card or built-in audio system with input quality equal to or greater than the Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16.
Speakers required for sound output.
CD-Rom for installation
High Quality microphone.
Hard Disk Requirements—160MB
Memory Requirements
Windows 98, Windows 95 – 48MB
Windows NT 4.0 – 64MB
$44.45 from AOL

When my friend asked me to install software that allowed him to “talk to his computer”, I asked those attending the PC SIG if anyone had experience with this software.  No one had; however, at the WAUC general meeting there was mixed response.  I found out that those who had installed voice-recognition software deleted it because it was not satisfactory or they could not meet the system requirements, and Naturally Speaking by Dragon Systems seemed to be the preferred program.  Up to now, I did not know what program my friend purchased.  My friend had a stroke and had been a hunt-and-peck typist with one finger on each hand.  Voice recognition software would seem to provide more flexibility with text and better enjoyment of his computer.

Arriving at his home, I was pleased to discover the program he purchased was AOL’s Point & Speak by Dragon Systems, which uses the same technology as Naturally Speaking.  The package contained the program CD, a microphone headset, and AOL’s Point & Speak for Dummies, by Tracy L. Barr.  His relatively new computer met the system requirements, so we proceeded to install and put it through its paces.

Installation was very straightforward with no problems.  After installation, we tested the recording level of the microphone, which was fine.  Now we needed to get the program to recognize his voice.  Here’s where the frustration began.  There are two stages: the first stage consists of a two-part sentence; the second, a longer paragraph that you have to allow about 30 minutes for.  When he read the first part of the sentence, “Welcome to the world of continuous speech” a yellow arrow appeared at the beginning of the sentence.  The yellow arrow indicated “If General Training doesn’t recognize your words, it puts a yellow arrow where you should start reading again”.  He read it countless times: louder, softer, slower, pausing between words, adjusting the microphone, etc., with the arrow continuing to appear at the beginning of the sentence and never advancing to the next screen.  My friend is rather soft-spoken and doesn’t have perfect enunciation, which is true for most people.  After 1-½ hours, it was time for a lunch break, to be continued afterwards.

After lunch we continued again.  He was beginning to get frustrated, not only with himself but also with the program.  Now we wanted to see what a different speech pattern would produce; it was my turn.  I pride myself on my diction and clear speech, and the program was perhaps designed for my speech.  After a couple tries reading the first part of the sentence, the screen advanced to the next part, “Training is about to begin.”  I could now proceed to the second stage, the longer paragraph.  There were three from which to choose; I chose Dave Barry in Cyberspace, by Dave Barry.  The yellow arrow flashed where to begin, and as I read, the text changed from blue to black as the text was recognized.  The selection was broken up and appeared on advancing screens. Occasionally, the arrow flashed in mid-sentence to indicate I needed to repeat.  I read clearly at a moderate pace, with no inflection.  At the end, I was congratulated and could begin with vocabulary building.  We had the satisfaction that the program was not malfunctioning, since it continued to advance, not be at a standstill as it had been previously.  I did not save my voice settings so my friend could try recording his voice again, now that we knew what to expect.  After a few more tries, he gave up.  The yellow arrow kept flashing at the beginning of the first sentence and never advanced.  We uninstalled the program and it will be shipped back for a refund.

This was a real learning experience, seeing how the program performed with two different speech patterns, even though the program boasts that it will adapt to your voice even if you have a lilt, brogue or twang, and can accommodate multiple users.
 

PC DOM

If you are looking for ideas to create cards for all occasions you can find numerous angels in a variety of poses from "whimsical" to "fairy angels" to "angelic".  Our disk of the month for August will actually be four disks.  Angel disks 1, 2, 3, and 4 will contain many angel graphics, about 40 on each disk.  If you purchase 3, one is free.
Sandy Karlovich & Di Vukovich,
PC Librarians

Attention!!!

For those of you who eat lots of Cheerios, or other General Mills cereals, the boxes contain Full-Version programs of games on CD such as :  Lego Creator, Clue, Amazon Trail, Carmen SanDiego Word Detective, and Who Wants to be a Millionaire?  These would make super door prizes for the club if you aren’t interested in keeping them for yourselves.Site Updated: December 9, 2000