Meeting 13 May 1997


	John Saxon ran this mornings show, bit different, everyone was
given the opportunity to talk, and as a result we went way over time,
but I guess that didn't matter. These notes are organised into topics
rather that the sequence in which the meeting took place.

	The PCUG was seeking feedback on a proposal to cease disk
sales. The general feeling was that these sales would not be missed,
so long as there were a stock of disks at the centre for sale, so when
you came in to get a file, and you had forgotten your disks, then you
could buy a packet. 

	Another comment was that it may be worthwhile for the Users
Group to buy Zip disks in bulk, $22, for sale to members, compared to
some street prices of $35 or so.

	On the subject of Zip drives, Emil explained that they were
like another hard drive that plugged into your printer port, and as
such, could be used as another hard drive. Darrell Burkey handed
around a Zip disk, and various people told how great they were for
transferring data from one machine to another, making backups, and
archiving. Wolf is still planning on the purchase of a Zip drive, and
we should know more next meeting.

	Jim Fogg advised that he could get 248 Megs onto a Zip disk
using Stacker, but double space was close to useless, in fact he took
Doublespace back to Harvey Norman and got his money back.

	Cec Watson, I think, was a new member with interests in the
Internet and photography, he wanted to know about modems, so the
"standard" advice, with some discussion, was given, buy a Maestro 33.6
Executive external modem.  We look forward to seeing Cec again, I am
sure he is going to have a few more questions.

	Nev Anderson can connect and work with Advanced Bank, but the
C'bank had him confused. He runs Win3.11, and was under the impression
that he needed a 32 bit system to connect to the C'bank. Considerable
discussion, and thanks to Darrell again;
You cannot run a 32 bit winsock on a 3.11 machine, even if it has the
win32s program.
The C'bank should have a 16 bit version of its programs, so look for
Win 3.1 programs.

	Elizabeth Ward sent an e-mail but it bounced ,addressee
unknown, and she wondered why. The most likely reasons were:
The address no longer existed
The address was incorrectly entered, an l instead of an I (ones an
little l, the other is a capital I, but can you tell the difference ?)
Using an address book was one way of minimising addressing mistakes.

VIRUS ALERT...........His wife works at the Tax Office, and there she
found a notice warning of the Pen Pals Virus. This was relayed to the
C&C group........Pen Pal greetings carries a virus, it is self
replicating, and gets messages out of your address book and sends it
on to other users.

	Darrell thanked John for the information, and advised that the
virus could only be activated if the attachment was executed. (Someone
asked what does executed mean)
It only works apparently with MS Mail and if one ever turns up on your
mailer, simply press the Del(ete) key.

	Colin Pitson, visiting home from India for a while, said that
to send a fax from India to Australia costs up to $10. With Internet
access, could he send faxes via that medium ? Well sort of yes or no,
Telstras service has apparently be suspended, so while it looks like a
no-no, make sure you have a friend here who can relay them for you.

	His W95 also has started to play up, it freezes from time to
time, and no longer does he get the meesage......It is safe to turn
off your computer. Suggestion was to reinstall win95.

	The University of the Third Age, via Mike Dinn and John
Goodspeed will give a Demo of the Internet for Seniors on Thursday, 29
May 1997 between 2 and 4pm. The demo will be at the National Science
and Technology Centre. This will comprise;
Illustrate the use of the Net, as orientated towards seniors.
What you need to have and do to get on to the Net
The demo is free, mainly intended for third age members, but other
seniors are welcome. Interested ? Then contact Mike at
mdinn@pcug.org.au

	Also on the subject of Seniors, Wolf provided an up date on
the ACT Governments Seniors Net. It will now be set up at the Woden
Library, as a first step, it will be owned by the government, and a
group to be known as "Friends of the Internet Seniors" will look after
the Internet Seniors. Some members of the PCUG may be interested in
assisting in this regard. If so contact Wolf at wlieske@pcug.org.au

	There was a BBQ after the meeting...How did it go, great day
for it anyway, and the next meeting will be 27 May 1997, but if you
are into IRC, you can come to the VCC net Tuesday, see
http://www.pcug.org.au/~ejoseph/ for details.

Cheers for now

Owen


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