C C C C N E W S L E T T E R
CENTRAL COAST COMPUTER CLUB
Santa Maria, California
VOLUME XIX: NUMBER 11 NOVEMBER, 2004
Meetings are held on the third Tuesday of every month at the Knollwood
Village Clubhouse 4012 S. Bradley Dr., Santa Maria.
General meeting at 7:00 PM. Special Interest Groups sessions are at
5:45pm and 6:00pm. Guests are welcome.
Check out our web site: http//member.apcug.org/fourseas for the latest
program schedule information.
Membership is $15 for twelve months for individuals, $20 for families.
For this you receive: Monthly newsletters, EXTRA4C E-mail Messages,
Access to the clubs software library, Disk of the month (usually for $1),
Help-line support, Monthly presentations, Valuable door prizes, Question
and answer sessions.
NEXT MEETING: November 16, 2004 KNOLLWOOD VILLAGE 4012 S. BRADLEY
PRESENTATION: The November presentation will be Amy Malicki on Using
Speech Recognition Software.
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| CONTENTS |
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(1) OFFICERS, HELPLINES, S.I.G.S
(2) PRESIDENT'S CORNER Spence Stimler
(3) EDITOR'S COMMENTS Dick Trissel
(4) WEB WANDERINGS
(5) SYSTEMS S.I.G. Dick Trissel
(6) DOCTOR DATA IS IN - HOAXES Steve Burgess
(7) RESOLUTION EVOLUTION Ernie Joiner
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OFFICERS HELPLINES
President Juno
Spence Stimler 938-0217 Gilbert Smith 925-3743
SPENCE923@msn.com colgil1@juno.com
Vice President Windows 95/98/ME/XP & VoiceControl
Bill Corning 934-0775 Amy Malicki 925-5780
foster95@juno.com savvyforseniors@juno.com
Secretary and Book Librarian Hardware and Windows XP
Barbara Godwin Ray Isenson 937-6938
yung.bag@verizon.net risenson@juno.com
Treasurer AOL
Gerry Miller 934-1396 Frank Maciel 922-2318
2741 Banyan Way frm8198@aol.com
Santa Maria CA 93455
gandamiller@verizon.net
Disk Librarian Visual Basic and Genealogy
Sharon Allen 928-2209 Gerald Miller 934-1396
sallen4060@aol.com gandamiller@verizon.net
Publicity Help With Any Problem
Bill Corning 934-0775 Fred Adams 934-1128
foster95@juno.com fredeadams@verizon.net
Newsletter Editor Digital Imaging
Dick Trissel 937-7572 Charles Barney 937-1240
rtrissel@juno.com Cbarney@lightspeed.net
SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS (S.I.G.s)
Systems (5:45pm) Word & Windows (6:00pm)
Dick Trissel Amy Malicki
rtrissel@juno.com savvyforseniors@juno.com
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CCCC Page 2 November 2004
PRESIDENT'S CORNER by Spence Stimler
President's Corner
We had 44 members attend our October meeting; not an overwhelming number
but it was an active session. Our speaker, Gene Barlow, was impressive as
usual. He donated two of his programs which we added as door prizes.
Laudell Ludwig chose Acronis True as his name came up first. Fred Adams
was second, and he chose Secure Clean.
Other door prize winners were:
Carol Rich - Card Games CD
Bill Corning - Stationery Maker CD
Vic McLaughlin - Business Card maker CD
Cliff Rush - Keyboard
Bernie Benninger - CD Tray
Ray Isenson - Mini Golf Game CD
We want to welcome a new member; Gloria Davis.
Election of officers for 2005 will take place at the November meeting.
Here is the slate of candidates.
President: Spence Stimler;
Vice President: Bill Corning;
Secretary: Dorothy Raupp;
Treasurer: Gerry Miller.
It doesn't look like a tight race. Dick Trissel will oversee the election.
The voting will be done by voice votes by the members present.
As a reminder, the CCCC fiscal year begins January I, 2005 at which time
membership fees are due. The fee for single membership is $15/yr, and for
family memberships is $20. Dues are paid to our treasurer, Gerry Miller,
and can commence any time before the first of the year.
Amy Malicki will give a demonstration of Speech Recognition Software at our
Nov. meeting. It is a program that finds usage with not only physically
impaired but also for those who do a great deal of writing. It will be
interesting and Amy will have the program set up and ready to roll.
Please note the following announcement regarding our December meeting.
CHRISTMAS PARTY
Our December meeting will be our traditional Christmas party beginning at
6:00 pm on December 21. Members and guests are invited. You need to bring
finger food to be shared. Coffee and punch will be furnished by the club.
Drawings for many prizes will be conducted using tickets which will be
distributed at the door; one per member. Come and enjoy the fellowship of
the club. There will be no S.I.Gs or business.
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CCCC Page 3 November 2004
EDITOR'S COMMENTS by Dick Trissel
It's hard to believe we are well into November already. Time flies when
you're having fun. This is fun?
We're approaching the end of the year when three important CCCC functions
occur. First we have the officer elections at the November meeting. Then
we are going to have the annual Christmas party we usually have on the
third Tuesday in December (21st)--lots of food, door prizes, and no
official business meeting. And third, we have the yearly membership dues
payable by the end of the January meeting. For the members that joined
during the year, know that the yearly dues are $15 for one member, and $20
for a family membership.
It was a pleasure to see past President Charles Barney at the October
meeting. Hopefully he will have time to attend future meetings, especially
the Christmas party.
This comment is probably only of interest to those members that have a
laptop computer. I just installed a new toy in my laptop--a Wi-Fi 802.11g
network PC card. They were on sale for $19.94 after rebate. I also got a
wireless router for my desktop ($24.94) to assist in setting up my laptop.
After a three day struggle, it all works. But the real fun was looking for
Wi-Fi hotspots. There are several pay hotspots in Santa Maria, but only
two free ones that I know of--the Santa Maria Library and BestBuy. But I
don't think BestBuy really wants the public using their connection.
It was quite an experience sitting in the back lobby of the library and
surfing the Web. No special connection information is necessary--just
click on the library net detection (Blackgold).
The 802.11g is a 54mgbs (5.4 megabytes/second) maximum rate. Of course,
you don't experience that rate because the maximum rates of the library and
the Internet are much lower. But, it sure beats my dialup modem.
The library is providing this service (and library laptops) to the public
to help relieve the high demand for the libraries desktop computers.
Don't miss Amy Malicki's November meeting presentation. Amy has been using
Voice recognition software for many years in assisting computer users with
disabilities. I use the Via Voice program. It's a fascinating technology.
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CCCC Page 4 November 2004
WEB WANDERINGS
CIVILIZED BEHAVIOR (from Kim Komando)
As my 3-year-old boy Ian grows into a little man, I'm trying my best
to teach him manners each step of the way. Today, manners are taught
by parents. When the middle class arose as a social group in the 19th
century, there were books to guide people.
This Web site is a fun look back at how a 19th century gentleman
should behave and dress. Some of the dress codes were strict and
aren't upheld today.
But some of the rules of etiquette still stand--such as this line
from The Art of Good Behavior: "Never scratch your head, pick your
teeth, clean your nails, or worst of all, pick your nose in company;
all these things are disgusting. Spit as little as possible and never
upon the floor." Amen! To visit this site, go here:
http://www.lahacal.org/gentleman/index.html
FOOD CONNOISSEURS
How many times have you heated up a frozen meal for lunch or stopped
at a fast-food joint after work for dinner? It's a quick and easy
way to eat in our hectic lives. We forget that eating isn't just a
necessity--it can be a pleasure.
Take a look at today's site. It reminds us that really good food is
something to be treasured. You'll find recipes, articles and links
to online stores. To visit this site, go here:
http://www.gourmetsleuth.com/
NEW LOOK
Seeing the same thing everyday gets boring. That's why we get
our hair styled differently or rearrange the furniture. If you
work with computers, you probably stare at the same desktop for
eight hours at a time. Today's site helps jazz things up.
InterfaceLIFT has a number of different looking icons, wallpaper and
themes for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux operating systems.
http://www.interfacelift.com/
STOP CLIPPING COUPONS
Save with coupons without having to pick up a pair of scissors.
Coupon Cabin has coupon codes for popular online stores, such as
Amazon, Kohl's, Nordstrom, Sony, Spiegel and others. These codes
will get you free shipping or a percentage off goods.
It monitors more than 500 online stores and updates the codes
daily. You can search for codes by store name or by category.
To visit this site, go here:
http://www.couponcabin.com
GEOGRAPHY QUIZ
How well do you know your geography? Find out by taking one of
the dozens of quizzes here.
You'll find sections of quizzes for different regions of the world--
Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, Oceania and an all-encompassing
world section. Each section has quizzes based on cities, capitals,
flags and even shapes of countries. They're challenging but fun. You
may surprise yourself at how much (or little) you know about the world
around you. To visit this site, go here:
http://www.triviaplaza.com/geo.htm
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CCCC Page 5 November 2004
SYSTEMS S.I.G. by Dick Trissel
In spite of the heavy early season rain on the evening of the October
meeting, we still had a very good turnout for the Systems S.I.G.--30
members.
I had planned a demonstration of running Juno and accessing the club's Web
site. We never got to it, but I hope to do this at the November Systems
S.I.G.
Along that line, one question was what must a Juno subscriber do if they
move their residence? The only concern is that your connection information
show the correct area code so the available phone numbers are appropriate
for your new location--non-toll numbers. I suspect that is true for most
Internet Service Providers.
Juno is sending out announcements that as of December 1, 2004 the free Juno
direct-dial e-mail will no longer be available. I thought they had already
eliminated that several months ago. They sure did for most of my free
accounts (I have one pay and four free). However, one free account still
has direct-dial (the EXTRA4C account). I guess that will go away in
December. That means that free Juno users will have to use the Juno Web
mail to read and send e-mail. I think you can still, with a free phone
call, convert your free Juno to a pay account for $4.95/month.
For free Web browsing (and e-mail) try Netzero. It has a fixed ad banner
that doesn't obscure part of the display like free Juno Web does. It also
makes a good address to use when an e-mail address is required on a Web
site and you don't want to reveal your regular address.
I reimphasized the caution NOT to respond to the bogus e-mail requesting
you to respond to the big winning you just won. NONE of these types of e-
mail are legitimate, no matter how good it sounds.
Did you notice the thunder and lightning during the October storm? That
was a warning for computer users to make sure you have an Uninterruptible
Power Supply (UPS) for you computer system. They are inexpensive and are
highly recommended.
In case you missed the ComputerWorks ad in the Times, they have free
utility CDs with a LOT of free software on it, including the XP SP2 file.
Just go to the store at 207 W. Main and pick up a CD.
A question was asked about why the CCCC monthly e-mail newsletter pages
aren't actually an 11inch page length. That is deliberate as the "page"
connotation refers to the HTML indexing. Also, it wasn't apparent that as
a Web document you can click on a Contents subject and link directly to
that "page".
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CCCC Page 6 November 2004
DOCTOR DATA: THE DOCTOR IS IN - HOAXES
by Steve Burgess
Doctor, should I help this guy in Nigeria with the 24 million dollars? Is
Jane Fonda really the woman of the year? Will I get a dollar from Bill
Gates for every email I send?
Can you say, "hoax?"
With the advent of email, one person can send millions of messages. With
the help of willing accomplice friends, a single hoax chain letter can
multiply into hundreds of millions. There are any number of hoaxes and
well-meaning people can unwittingly propagate them.
Some hoaxes are political disinformation; some are scams, some are chain
letters, and some are just outdated information making the rounds again.
The disinformation type are intended to hurt some public figure or company,
the scams are intended to separate you from your money, the chain letters
can plug up the Internet (and eventually can make your Internet access cost
more), and the old information can get you to do the wrong thing.
There are two warning signs. If it seems too good to be true, it probably
is (where have you heard that before?), and if it says something breathless
like, "Send this to everyone on your list right away," you probably
shouldn't. Often, these hoaxes quote people and institutions. You can call
or email those people and institutions to check. Often there will be a web
page mentioning the existence of the hoax, as millions of people will have
received it.
I received an email from a relative last year, decrying Barbara Walter's
selection of Jane Fonda as a "Woman of the Century," and detailing
statements and actions she took at the time of the Viet Nam War. The email
was a hoax that took some facts, some outright lies, and some outdated
information and put them all together. Fonda did say some of the things in
the early 70's that were mentioned in the email (although she apologized on
television in 1988), didn't do many of the things mentioned, and the
Walters event took place 5 years ago. Someone wanted to damage Fonda, and
found an audience willing to propagate this hoax, over and over again.
The Nigerian scam has a lot of variations. The basic story is that a rich
person has a fortune they need to get out of the (name your favorite
politically oppressed) country and they need your help. In exchange, you
get some percentage of these millions. When you reply, you get asked for
your bank account number (for them to deposit the funds) and possibly a
small deposit (to show your trustworthiness). People have been taken in by
this scam for two decades, and more than a $100 million.
As for the email telling you that Bill Gates is giving you money for every
time you forward an email - it ain't gonna happen. It's just a chain
letter, and some versions give you a virus for your trouble.
If you aren't sure an email you get is talking about something real, try
going to one of the Web sites that are dedicated to exposing these hoaxes.
They don't always completely agree, so you might check a couple. In any
case, they make for entertaining reading:
http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoaxsites.html , http://www.snopes.com/ ,
http://www.hoaxkill.com/index2.shtml , http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org ,
http://urbanlegends.about.com/od/virushoaxes1/ ,
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html
Doctor Data will answer your questions about hardware and software on
Windows and Macintosh. Doctor Data as Steve Burgess is the proprietor of
Burgess Consulting in Santa Maria. Burgess Consulting does data recovery,
data transfer and conversion, and computer forensics. Send your questions
to DoctorData@aol.com.
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CCCC Page 7 November 2004
RESOLUTION EVOLUTION by Ernie Joiner
Note: Some of these items don't agree with conventional wisdom, but they
work for me. For example, the Epson scanner manual uses the units of dots
per inch (DPI), samples per inch (SPI), and pixels per inch (PPI)
interchangeably. Whereas, usually DPI relates to printers (inkjets make
dots), SPI to scanners (photo sample elements), and PPI to display monitors
(picture elements containing color and intensity information).
CAPTURE DEVICES
Scanner
Typical resolution.
1200x2400 samples per inch (SPI)
1600x3200 samples per inch
The first number is the optical resolution or the number of photo sensors
horizontally deployed.
The second number is how many steps the scanner can position the row of
sensors.
These numbers are sometimes referred to as pixels per inch (PPI). They
become pixels when the resultant scan is displayed on a monitor.
For the scanning of 35 mm slides you should have a resolution of 1600 by
3200 or better. In addition, the scanner should have provisions for a
special light source to illuminate the transparencies.
It's convenient to scan an image directly into the Photoshop program. Then
you can adjust brightness, contrasts, etc. before saving as a JPG file.
Digital camera
A camera is rated by the total number of pixels (picture elements) captured
by the camera's charge coupled device, measured horizontally and
vertically.
1600 by 1200 = 1,920,000 pixels or two megapixels.
2560 by 1920 = 4,915,000 pixels or five megapixels.
Four megapixels is adequate for most amateur work.
DISPLAY DEVICES
Monitor
Most monitors will display a resolution from 72 to 96 pixels per inch (PPI)
depending on the setting.
Printer
The printer's resolution is given in dots per inch (DPI).
For a typical printer ( e.g. Epson 860) maximum resolution =
1440 by 720 dpi.
VIEWING IMAGES
Monitor
Some older systems will have trouble displaying high-resolution images. If
this is the case, open the image in an application such as Photoshop where
you can select 'fit to screen'. You can also change the resolution, if
desired.
With Windows XP, using Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, the image will
automatically be displayed full screen, no matter what the resolution or
the physical size.
The same thing applies to the use of images for a screen saver.
DIGITAL CAMERA SETTINGS
Pictures should be taken with the camera set for maximum resolution. The
availability of large capacity memory cards such as 256 or even 512 MB
allows this. You can always reduce pixels later, if necessary. This allows
for cropping without loss of image quality.
RESOLUTION ADJUSTMENT
Premise: Optical pixels are better than artificial pixels.
Using Photoshop and opening the image size window allows you to adjust
physical size, resolution, and pixels.
Don't use 'resample image' unless absolutely necessary. If you adjust the
physical size, then allow the resolution to change.
If you must add pixels, then use the bicubic method.
E-MAIL
File size is a function of the number of pixels, the file format, and the
degree of compression, not of the physical size or the resolution of the
image.
If you are certain that the recipient of your picture will not be printing
the image, you can use Photoshop to lower the number of pixels. Usually it
helps to crop the image. This automatically reduces the pixels. If this
isn't sufficient, then use the image size window and resample.
If there is a chance that the image will be printed, then send a larger
file by not resampling. Half a megabyte file size can usually be handled
without too much trouble. Of course, for those that have broadband, file
size is not as much of a concern.
It's convenient to store the files as JPG type files. Using a JPG
compression of eight gives a good compromise between quality and file size.
PRINTING
The desired pixel resolution on the monitor of pixels per inch (ppi)
depends on the planned printer resolution of dots per inch (dpi).
For a typical printer (e.g. Epson Color 860) the optimum ppi is one-third
of the printer's dpi.
For example:
to print at 720 dpi--- use 240 ppi
to print at 1440 dpi--- use 480 ppi
The minimum and maximum ranges are:
Minimum (20%) Maximum (42%)
Print at 720 dpi 140 ppi 300 ppi
Print at 1440 dpi 280 ppi 600 ppi
In other words, don't send too few or too many pixels to the printer.
PRINTING FOR BEST RESULTS--WORKING IN PHOTOSHOP
Decide what size print you want.
Crop the image to the exact size (e.g. 8 by 10).
Choose the printer resolution, perhaps 720 or 1440 dpi.
Open the image size window.
If the resulting pixels per inch falls in the desired range, then okay.
If not, as a last resort, use resample. Resample up to meet the minimum ppi
or down to meet the maximum ppi.
Then you're ready to print.
For best results use heavy glossy photo paper.
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