Minutes of the Meeting held 5 March 2002


 The meeting at the PCUG Centre was chaired by Terry B. Rod B took the notes.
 One new member (John) was present.

 1. Terry B reported that a Barbecue Picnic is planned to take place at
 Edison Park on March 26th. Reminders and details will be given at meetings
 between now and then.

 2. Terry B asked to what extent email is available to PCUG members who do
 not subscribe to TIP. Limited access, available at no extra cost to all
 members on application, provides a mailbox and allows terminal access in a
 UNIX environment. Workable, but unattractive to people already used to email
 clients such as those available in a Windows environment. People with
 existing Internet access other than TIP can access their PCUG mailbox by
 pointing their client to mailhost.tip.net.au.

 3. Greg B asked if anyone present knew about monitor synchronisation. The
 meeting proved to be ignorant.

 4. Brock B asked if there was any place in Canberra where toner cartridges
 could be exchanged or safely disposed of. Toner Express in Fyshwick, The
 Cartridge Factory in Phillip and Ink Bank in Mitchell were all suggested.
 Users of each of those services expressed satisfaction.

 5. Ken M explained that PCs can be thought to be either female or male. They
 display characteristics that are recognisably similar to humans of either
 sex. Full text of Ken's explanation is available on application.

 6. Rod S spoke about an application to produce PDF files. Others mentioned
 that the March 2002 issue of PC World has some discussion of PDF and its
 cover CD has several applications that will do the job.

 7. Mike D mentioned a number of web sites with interesting content:
         Visible Earth - a NASA site - visible.nasa.gov
         Connection speed tester - www.computers4sure.com
         Multimap - maps on photographs! - multimap.com
         Shuttle pass info. - www.heavens-above.com
         Print settings for MSIE - Microsoft Knowledge Base Q260642 and  Q236777
         Welcome wall - electronic version of an immigrant help system -  www.anmm.gov.au
 He also mentioned that Computer Choice magazine gave a very good write up of
 IBM's Websphere. Looks good, but rather expensive.

 8. Esther wanted to now why she kept getting the message "You have been
 disconnected from the computer you dialled". The meeting could give no
 obvious explanation; trying a manual login to TIP and dialling an alternate
 ISP or TIP's 15 minute service were suggested as ways of investigating the
 problem.

 9.  Jeff C mentioned the Silicon Kid column in the Canberra Times of 4/3. He
 wasn't able to understand the Kid's solution to the problem of mail opening
 in a minimised window. Various methods of closing windows were discussed
 (top left, top right and Alt-F4). Closing a window with the desired size
 should result in it opening with that size next time.

 10. Tony B asked if anyone had a spare old, slow CD-ROM drive. Someone had
 and the transaction was left to be negotiated after the meeting.

 11. Moby J mentioned that he had been pleased with QIMAGE, a program for
 manipulating images. This led to a general discussion on image manipulation
 programs. People tend to be happy with what they are used to. QIMAGE can be
 found at www.ddisoftware.com/qimage.

 12. Ted M said he was planning to buy Star Office as a gesture of discontent
 with Microsoft. A number of people expressed satisfaction with the tools.
 Ted also asked if other people were experiencing regular disconnections
 after 15 minutes. No other person admitted this misfortune.

 13. Phillip B asked for confirmation that there is to be a computer market
 at EPIC on 9/3. "Yes", said the meeting. Phillip also asked about the
 availability of Fax software. A search of the Internet was recommended.



		


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