President’s Report
It’s 9:00 and the General meeting has just ended. Now what? You could go home or you could join fellow members for a little socializing and perhaps a bite to eat at Wendy’s on 43rd and Lincoln.
Going out after the general meeting goes back quite a few years.  It all started when we were meeting at TRC on Hwy 100 near Burleigh.  Somebody suggested going to McDonalds afterwards and from then on it became a regular thing.  Later when we met at Security Bank on 76th and Layton, we went to McDonalds on 76th, just south of Layton.  At the time it was being remodeled into what is now Solid Gold McDonalds.

So as the tradition continues, why not be a part of it? It’s a good way to have a good time with good friends.  See you at Wendy’s!
Bruce Kosbab
 

AppleII/AppleIIGS SIG
Our June 6th SIG was attended by only a few:  Tony Reale, Dick Reinhard, Sr. Samuel, Blue (Sister's bird), Richard Durand and Pat Nye.  We did manage to keep busy though.

Richard wanted to preview a "Speed Reading" disk, which he had obtained for the Apple IIe.  He and Sister then went into the beginning/easy part of the program, which consisted of testing your memory on typewritten lines given to you at a quick glance, and then you were to type in what you had seen.  He then made a backup copy for himself.
I, on the other hand, had erased one side of my Print Shop disk, which Sr. Samuel helped me restore.  She then suggested that I make a backup copy for myself, and that I also be sure to lock the disk to avoid a similar mistake.

We reviewed "Z Z Copy" on the IIGS which is an easy disk to use for copying other disks.

We also checked out games of Yahtzee and Mastermind, which are part of Sister's game collection and browsed through the IIGS library.
Pat Nye

1st Pick PCtip
ADD DESKTOP TO SEND TO MENU
Do you frequently move items to your desktop? Add this common destination to your Send To menu, and from then on, you can accomplish the move using the right mouse button.

To add the desktop to your Send To menu, simply place shortcuts to the Windows\Desktop folder inside the Windows\SendTo folder. An easy way to do this is to open the Windows folder, right-click and drag the desktop folder directly over the Send To folder, release the mouse button, and select Create Shortcut(s) Here. You may also want to rename the new desktop shortcut now inside the
Send To folder.

From now on, moving an item to the desktop is a simple, right-mouse operation. Just right-click any file, folder, or shortcut, select Send To, and in the resulting list, select Desktop. No clicking or dragging necessary!
 

  Jackie Tamsett, Treasurer

May Board Meeting
Those present at the May 24th board meeting were:  Bruce Kosbab, Doris Regner, Marcia Zientek, Marie Bellin, Leo Hoffer, and myself.  Jackie Tamsett was excused.  Diane Vukovich also usually attends but her father-in-law had just passed away.

We will be purchasing supplies to make mouse pads as incentives for hard-working WAUC members.

Since we are no longer able to hold our Telecom SIGs at the French Immersion School due to summer vacation, we are without a meeting place.  Leo called the Super America station on 60th and Layton and talked with the manager, Steve.  Steve agreed to let us host our meetings there and wrote us in for the rest of the year.  Leo will talk with the members who regularly attend the Telecom SIG and see if they would like to continue to meet at the Super America station in the fall or if they would prefer to meet at the French Immersion School.  It was also suggested that the French Immersion School might be a better meeting place for the Mac SIG as they mostly have Mac computers.

John Hirsh has contacted New Horizons Computer Learning Center.  They are located near Mayfair and they have graciously offered the use of their facilities for meetings.  We will keep them in mind for any future SIGs.

Leo will verify the September demo with PKWare.  There is some concern as their president recently passed away.  He will also contact Microsoft and verify plans for the July meeting.  Microsoft has cancelled us a number of times and we need to be sure they will really have a representative at our general meeting.

There was more discussion on the purchase of the cordless microphone.  We will be looking into what type amplifier and speakers are needed.  We hope to have a price for all that’s needed by next month.

We looked over the information on the new insurance policy that offers replacement coverage for the new overhead projector and laptop.
Terry Harvey, Co-secretary

Software Review
By Bruce Kosbab

SOS--Best Defense
With the concern of privacy on the home or business PC, the need for good software to protect the average user is a must.  While there are many products that protect our children from the bad Internet sites, I have found one that seems to be a total package that protects each user of your computer.

SOS--Best Defense by Evon Software is a program that lets you profile each user so you can determine what restrictions are required.  Whether it is certain Internet sites, personal files on your system or hardware restrictions, with SOS--Best Defense you are in control.  SOS provides a custom setup area where you set up users with their own passwords and tabs where you can set each user restriction.  There are high, medium, low or no restrictions.

With the Internet, certain words listed trigger a red flag and block access to certain sites.  You can customize the word file.  You can also block access to certain parts of your computer such as the display panel, the start menu, explorer, and other applications.  Included with the SOS software is a program called eSafe Protect Desktop, an anti-vandal program, which sets up a firewall to protect your computer from hackers, or viruses that may attempt to invade your computer via the Internet. It even allows you to encrypt information when sending it over the Internet.

If you have numerous users on your PC, such as children, this product is a good investment.  It is easy to install.  I did have a question, however, about proper installation.  I called their tech support and they walked me right through it.  Good tech support is a sign of a good product.  I purchased SOS--Best Defense at Comp USA for $39.95 and feel it is a worthwhile program for the price.
Bruce Kosbab

Learn, Create and Have Fun with Microsoft
Get the answers at WAUC's General Meeting, July 6, 2000!

Looking for an easy way to help the kids learn, create great looking projects and have some fun on your computer? At our July 6, General Meeting, the guest will be David Severino, a Channel Marketing Representative with the Microsoft Corporation. Experience the fun and entertainment of Microsoft's productivity and gaming line-up and you might just find something for everyone in the home, including:

Microsoft Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000
Graphics Studio Home Publishing Suite 2000
Works™ 2000
Flight Simulator 2000
See the best-selling encyclopedia in the world, Encarta 2000, which provides rich content and advanced technology that sets the standard for an engaging educational experience. Bottom line: the kids will love it!

Find out why Home Publishing Suite is perfect for the creative-types you know, with one of the most comprehensive sets of home desktop publishing tools around. Learn how to create high-quality print and multimedia projects such as greeting cards, screen savers, Web pages, collages, and more for all occasions. You'll also learn how easy it is  to become an expert at digital imaging with the power of Picture It!™ 2000, which is included in the Home Publishing Suite.

Explore how Works 2000 provides the essential tools you need for home computing. We improved the most popular integrated software package by updating it all-the word processor, spreadsheet, database, calendar, address book, and Outlook Express. Works 2000 is designed specifically for the home user because the pre-defined tasks, templates, and wizards make home computing simple, quick, and easy.

Finally, experience the latest edition of the best-selling PC game ever, Flight Simulator 2000. Experience the thrill of getting in the cockpit of a Boeing 777 and flying out of virtually any airport in the world. Built on a foundation of realism that spans over 17 years, Flight Simulator 2000 is the largest leap forward in the history of the franchise. You won't believe you eyes when you see the new 3D scenery graphics system that provides incredible realism and immersion to every building, plane, landscape, and weather system where you choose to fly. Surely, no game player’s profile is complete without this all-time game winner!

Is it a Hoax or is it Real?
These are a few of the many places that you can check out that pesky chain letter that is asking you to please, please,  if you care enough, send it to every one and his brother.  Let's all be responsible members of WAUC and the Internet and make sure that what we send on is legitimate.
Doris Regner

http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/CIACHoaxes.html

http://korova.com/virus/index.htm#cyberban_legends

http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Heights/3652/SKA.HTM

http://hotfiles.zdnet.com/cgi-bin/texis/swlib/hotfiles/search.html?(continues on next line - without space)
   link=1&Utcat=utilities&UTsubcat=security&Ukeywords=virus&Usrt=download&Urating=high&b=adesk
 

PC SIG
Eleven people attended the PC SIG at Super America.

Some of the questions asked were:
How do you get rid of stray marks on your paper from your printer?  It was suggested that if you have a HP printer, lift the lid and look over to the right, you would find a reservoir.  Take out the pad and clean it carefully.  Paper jams:  raise the lid, push the top button and it will back the paper out. Do not pull the paper out.

How do you copy a floppy disk when something is broken on it and won't let you copy?  Go to Explorer, and then open another Explorer window so you have two windows open on desktop. Drag and drop the file.  Normally you would click on My Computer, click on the 3-½ disk, File, insert disk to be copied from, click Copy, and click Start.  Insert the disk you want to copy to when prompted.

How do you reduce the size of a large graphic you receive in e-mail? If it is not a JPEG first go to ACDSee and convert it.  Then open in Print Artist and make it smaller. ACDSee is a graphics program that is great for viewing graphics all at once. If you have a floppy with graphics and you want to look at all of them at one time, that will appear on the screen in this program.  Reminder, you need Winzip to load ACDSee on your computer.  To copy a picture from e-mail Right Click, a pop up screen appears, click on Save Image As.  To create a short cut on your desktop, Right Click, click on Put on desktop, creates short cut.
We discussed the three ways to uninstall a program. If you delete the icon for the program from your desktop that only deletes the icon, not the program. The best method is to go to, Start, Programs, and find the program to be deleted.  If there is an Uninstall program click there. If there is no Uninstall for that program then go to, Control Panel, click Add or Remove Programs.  The least favorite method is to do a Find, highlight and delete each file. But be careful not to empty your Recycle Bin because sometimes programs share files and you may need these to run other programs.

We talked about a new book out by Hewlett-Packard, The Official Scanner Handbook, by David B Busch, Susan Krzywicki, and Laurel Burden. This is a guide to buying, using and troubleshooting your scanner no matter what brand you own. It even has projects for the home, kids, seasonal and web sites. This  book sells for $19.99 at Barnes and Noble. I checked at Amazon.com and they sell it for $15.99. The reviews on this site for this book were very good.

Also this book discusses how to use DeskScan software a lot because they said it was the most popular program used for scanners.  It has a section on scanner troubleshooting where I even found an answer to a problem I encounter when using my scanner.  I get a message “not enough memory available”.  For Windows 95/98, go to the Control Panel, double click the System control panel, click the Performance tab, click the Virtual Memory button, make sure the Disable Virtual Memory button is not checked.

To change the amount of virtual memory available on your system, or to change the drive used for virtual memory, click the Let Me Specify My Own Virtual Memory Settings option button. Select the hard drive you want to use. Choose the maximum and minimum amounts of hard disk space used for virtual memory. Click OK. When setting virtual memory, be careful not to use all the available free space on your drive. If you have plenty of extra disk space on your drive, you’ll want to set a maximum that is two to three times your available RAM or even more.

We are going to continue to work on Calendar Creator at this SIG and learn how to use this program and make checkbook calendars also.  Marie checked with them and they said Calendar Creator 5.0 version is cumbersome and they will get back to her as to how to create these checkbook calendars.
Barb Rausch
 

June General Meeting
President Bruce Kosbab welcomed forty-six members and four guests to the June general meeting on a very stormy, very wet, June 1, 2000.

Sandy Karlovich asked how to change the default settings for her printer.  She needs to go to START, CONTROL PANEL, PRINTER, select her printer and set her parameters.

A new member asked why his screensaver goes off but the sound continues.  The reason is the monitor goes to “sleep” or powers down,  but the speakers don’t have that capability.

Anthony Brooke had a question about Outlook Express.  Ron Stykl had the answer.  It was also noted that many of the latest viruses are targeted at Outlook Express.

Peter Green hosts a computer show on the radio the first Monday of the month.  It is on 90.7 FM from 11 AM until noon.  Ram and Rom host another show on Saturday mornings on WISN Radio.  They will speaking to our group later this year.

Paul Jurkowski announced he will no longer be the Mac Librarian as he no longer has a Mac computer.  Debbie Breese was suggested as a replacement.  We will contact her to see if she’s willing to assume that position.

Harold Miller had trouble connecting to the Internet.  He found that disabling his fax software solved the problem.

Richard Moffat has an IMAC and had a number of problems with it.  He was able to solve his problems with the help of the telephone company, Naspa and by removing some conflicting software.  He’s now back online.

Sandy Karlovich asked if anyone had the new Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe program.  I have it and will be demonstrating it at the next Multi-Format SIG.  So far, I’m not too thrilled with it but we will take a good look at it at the SIG.

Paul Jurkowski is looking to purchase Windows 95A.  Please contact him if you have it to sell.

Sandy Karlovich asked what the differences are between the Hewlett-Packard 930 and 932 printers.  Ron Stykl said it was the same printer but bundled with different software packages.

Sandy then told us about the June Disk-of-the-Month which includes 4th of July graphics, TinyJong which is a Mahjong-type solitaire game, and Zdisk Tracker which keeps track of zipped files.

Paul Jurkowski offered the Mac DOM which was a backup program.

Bruce Schneider talked about the HTML SIG and all the interesting things they are doing there.  He also presented a number of nice checkbook sized calendars he made using Notepad to various WAUC officers and members.  He then donated the template to the PC library.  He urged all members to attend the HTML SIG.

Bruce Kosbab announced the Telecom SIG will now be held in the conference room at the Super America gas station located on 60th and Layton.  He asked that anyone interested in attending a Mac SIG contact him.  If there is enough interest we will make the necessary arrangements.

The topic of a clip-on microphone was brought up.  Jerry Regner carries around an amplifier and gigantic speakers at the present time.  Although Jerry hasn’t complained, this is unreasonable to ask of anyone and it’s felt that a more compact system would be much more convenient.  Roger Brinkmeier has a portable public address system that he has offered to bring next month for us to try out.

Leo Hoffer and Bruce Schneider sang the praises of the ITECH convention.  John Hirsh commented that Ram and Rom hosted a hospitality suite upstairs with good food.

Bruce Schneider announced the Super Computer Show would be back in town at State Fair Park later this month.  There wasn’t much interest as people are pretty turned off by their high admission prices.

Sister Samuel was presented a WAUC tote bag and the Indispensable Person Award for hosting the Apple II SIGs.

Roger Brinkmeier was in charge of this month’s raffle.  This month we had PrintMaster Gold 3.0 for the PC and Corel Print House 2000 for the Mac.
 

“INTERNET PRIVACY CONCERNS”
presented by Sara Kierzek.

Sara is the Assistant Milwaukee Director for Congressman Jerry Kleczka.  She talked with us about Congressman Kleczka’s efforts to pass the Personal Privacy Information Act.  This legislation attempts to restore some control over the use of our personal information.  This bill prevents credit bureaus from giving out social security numbers, and prohibits the sale of any information that includes anyone’s social security number unless they have written consent to do so.  It would also prohibit any merchant from requiring a social security number on a check used for any purchase.  Further, this bill prohibits any State Department of Motor Vehicles from selling driver’s photographs or driver’s lists containing social security numbers.

We were each given a packet of information which included many good tips on how we can protect our privacy both on the Internet and in everyday life.

Sara did an excellent job of informing us about this country’s fastest growing crime; the theft of personal privacy.  She informed us of the present laws and what legislation is in progress.

This was a most informative presentation and opened our eyes to a concern most of us weren’t even aware of.
Terry  Harvey, Co-secretary
 

HTML SIG
On June 14, ten of our members attended the HTML SIG at Corporate Technologies.  Bruce Schneider was ready to lead us in creating our own web pages using only Notepad and HTML tags and procedures.

Before we got started on the page, he compared numbering systems.  We started with our familiar decimal system using the symbols 0-9 over and over in different combinations to represent different quantities.  Then he talked about the binary system which uses 0 and 1 in different combinations again to represent different information to the computer.

Finally, we learned about the hexidecimal system which uses 0-9 and a-f to represent information to the computer.  I found it fascinating.  I was beginning to understand why some codes had numbers, some letters, and some a combination of the two.  Bruce showed us how to continue counting in each system and then encouraged us to try it at home.

After a giving us some information about ASCII, we were ready to begin.  We created a skeleton HTML page, which can be used each time you start a new web page.  Then we started filling it in, inserting the Title which is seen at the very top of the page, a Heading which was given a tag to enlarge the print, and then typed a message in the Body of the page.

Then, after saving the page as an HTML document, we opened it in Netscape.  We did it!  Our first web page, not very fancy, but definitely a start.  For the rest of the evening, we added Tag Attributes to change the Font, and Font Color.  We created Italics, Superscript, Bold and Underlined text, checking after each tag to see that it was working in our web page.  Bruce was a great teacher, I learned a lot and am anxious to continue.
Marie Bellin
 

1st Pick PCtip
Browsing back and forward with the keyboard.
Here's a keyboard shortcut that works in  MS Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator and America Online's browser.

To move back to the previous web page, instead of clicking on the back arrow or icon, press and hold the Alt key and tap the left arrow key. To move forward again,
press Alt+right arrow.
 

Multi-Format SIG
High points of pre-SIG socializing:  James Smith was visiting from California.  He had pictures of his new offices to show us.  Terry Harvey had hit a high score of 3995 on the Same game.  Chris Gardner was all excited at having won 3rd place in the Delphi Rubber Stampers May SOM contest.  Terry, Di Vukovich, and Chris all had DTP projects to show.

Getting down to business, Terry fielded questions and demonstrated the answers on the WAUC laptop.  There were several ways to use graphics from Print Artist Platinum Disk 4 (or other disks):
 

1.)  Start Print Artist and open a sign or other document.  Pull down the File menu and choose Directory Setup.  Under More Print Artist Graphics, change the directory to your CD-ROM drive.  Exit Print Artist, then reopen the program while holding down the shift key.

2.)  Go to “My Computer,” open the CD-ROM.  You should also have the graphics catalog handy to know which directory to look in and the name/number of the graphic.  For example in Tropical Fish, you can do a CONTROL-F to find TPFsh001.  Under the Edit menu, Copy Image.  Then close My Computer.  Start Print Artist, if it isn’t already running.  Paste the graphic in the document you want.

3.)  In Print Artist, choose the Import command from the File Menu.
4.)  You can use a graphics viewer, such as ACDSee to view graphics, provided they are not GFX files (ACDSee does view JPEGs).  Right Click and copy to your JPEG directory (in Print Artist).  You can copy several at a time, but you need to redo the Graphics Grabber in Print Artist (if you don’t see the box behind the title screen, which means that the Graphics Grabber is adding new graphics), hold down the shift key while the program is loading; or go to Directory Setup, and have it count the graphics in the JPEG directory).

5.)  Using Windows Explorer, you can drag and drop graphics to the proper subdirectory for them in PA4.  If the Graphics Grabber doesn’t automatically start the next time you run the Print Artist, hold down the shift key while it is loading.

We had a question regarding not being able to import for Drive A.  If, when you installed Print Artist, you had it keep the graphics on the CD-ROM instead of your hard drive, this problem occurs.  This is because the graphics directory is your CD-ROM, and when you Import, you write new graphics to your graphics directory.  You cannot overwrite the CD-ROM.  There are a couple ways to remedy this:
 

1.)  Create a directory on your Hard Drive for the type of graphic you are importing (JPEG’s for example).  You will need to copy graphics of that type from your Print Artist CD’s, if you intend to use them as well as the graphics you intend to import.  In Print Artist’s Directory Setup, change it to agree with where the graphics now are (example:  your JPEG  directory on the hard drive).  Every time you import a graphic of that type, it will now be able to write to that directory.

2.)  The other way is to uninstall Print Artist, and reinstall it, this time having it set up a directory on your hard drive for the graphics (you will not need to insert your CD-ROM every time you run the program thereafter).

One of the disks we tried dragging and dropping stopped partway through; James said that the way it did that looked as if the disk may have had a corrupted sector.

You might remember Wanda Henry from the PALS video.  She is seriously ill, and would appreciate humorous cards.  Her birthday was June 13.  Anyone wanting to make Wanda a cheerful, funny card, please contact Terry for her address.

Terry had figured out how to make trifold (fits standard business envelope) cards and extra long cards (no standard envelopes available; she plans to enclose these cards in gifts) in Print Artist, she showed examples and has created templates.  The extra long card is 2 signs (one for the inside, one for the outside).She also had limited copies of how to dump categories of graphics that you don’t use from your hard drive (like those dorky woodcuts).

If you had PLUS on Windows 95, and now have Windows 98, the pinball game in Plus won’t work.

Our PD librarians are working on an Angel DOM for August.  They are also working on the Birthday card template DOM, which has 8 folders so far.

Carol mentioned that us.buy.com is offering a free Hewlett Packard 930 printer with one of their E-postage offers (does not include tax and shipping).  This lets you download postage and store it in your computer; you pay a convenience fee at time of purchase.  James mentioned that there are several companies offering E-postage, some require special hardware and some don’t (something to ask about before purchasing).  You need to print the label and postage at the same time.  If anyone tries this offer, please let us know how it works.

Office Max was running a special on Microsoft Home Publishing 2000, which might be used in future SIGs.  But we are not sure that the program’s initial bugs have been ironed out...please stay tuned.  They also have an ACER scanner for $30 after rebate.

Terry demonstrated Sierra’s version of Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe, which she recently purchased on sale for $39.99 and with a $30 rebate.  Full price is about $50.  She temporarily “lost” the monitor display while loading the program; James found a function key to toggle between the monitor, the projector, or both at once.  Once in the program, you can start with a premade card, and edit the text enough to personalize it with someone’s name; or start with a blank card.  It is not as convenient as the old Micrografx version of the program; which retains it’s crown as the best of the Hallmarks, but unfortunately is no longer available.  One of the difficulties of starting from scratch is that some of the CD’s (there are 4) are marked appropriately, and some not.  For example, when the program (on screen) asks for the “Designs” CD, the CD’s had different titles.  Terry went through all of them before getting the one with “designs.”  We found out that the word “designs” was what we normally term graphics.  They use the term “clip art” for other graphics.  Terry had mentioned that, when making a single card at home, she had to swap CD’s 6 times!  Another bug she found is that not everything prints WYSIWYG.  She had created a card with an elk on it; the background printed but not the elk!  The only way to get the entire graphic to print was to copy and paste it to Print Artist (another program).

While some of the graphics were nice, there were quite a few we wouldn’t bother with.  Not all were unique to this program, either.  We recognized some from other programs we already have, such as Print Artist and PrintMaster Gold

Another bug is that after the program is running a little while, it shows all the categories twice onscreen.  Most of the sentiments (quotes, pre-formatted text files) are not what we would consider “Hallmark Quality.”  Some were simply unimaginative (“Happy Birthday” Hey, I’ve got a rubber stamp that says that), others were downright crude.  Sierra’s Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe also covers up the task bar while it’s running (a inconvenience most programs don’t have).  It’s useful to see the negatives as well as positives in software before purchasing it.  Most of us gave this version of Hallmark Card Studio a thumbs down.

Next month, American Greetings Create-A-Card 3.
Christine Gardner
 
 
 

1st Pick PCtip
Adding items to the Right click menu

By default, Windows 95 opens files of a particular type in a particular application. For example, if you double-click a *.txt file, it opens in Notepad.  But sometimes--or perhaps lots of times--you'll want to open files of a certain type in an application other than the one with which it's associated. (For example, you might frequently open *.txt files in WordPad.) Assuming you want to keep the original association in tact, an easy way to streamline this task is to add the secondary application to the right-mouse menu of that file type.

Sticking with the same example, here's how to add WordPad to the right-mouse menu of *.txt files (feel free to follow these same steps with your own file type and application choices):

Inside any Explorer window, select View, Options and click the File Types tab. Scroll through the list of Registered file types and select Text Document. Click the Edit button, and in the resulting dialog box, click New. In the text box under Action, type the command name that will appear in the right-mouse menu, such as Open With WordPad. Then, in the Application Used To Perform Action box, click Browse, navigate your way to the file that opens WordPad (Program Files\Accessories\Wordpad.exe), select it, and click Open. Click OK to exit the New Action dialog box, and you'll see the new command in the Actions list. Click Close twice.

From now on, you can open any *.txt file in WordPad by right-clicking the file and selecting Open With WordPad. (Note: Double-clicking a *.txt file still opens it in Notepad.)

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