Newsletter

Computers lined the walls and were throughout the middle of the room at last month’s Games Night. It was a fun night even though not many people made it to the meeting. The Resource Center was placed out in the hallway and featured some old games plus several new ones, many of which were featured on the computers throughout the room.

You could take a chance at a wide variety of games. Quake, which is the newest, hottest Doom-type game, was one of the featured games, and managed to attract a lot of people. The younger kids had fun with games that made loud and strange noises. They even had a learning game that had them match pictures with their name.

We also featured mind-games such as Rings of the Magi and Fields of Fruits. Rings of the Magi is a good game for people who like brain teasers. You try to group rings of the same color and make them disappear. It is not as easy as it sounds and you definitely learn to like the undo button. The more rings you make disappear simultaneously, the more points you receive. If you get bored, it has a hidden game. Read the help file, and it will give you a clue on how to find it.

Jeff Nelson set up a computer with a program called Goo on it. You can take a digital image of someone with a video camera and with a click of a button you can change it all around. Some techniques twisted or smeared someone’s face. Jeff demonstrated many ways to morph a face. Seeing all the strange things you could do was really fun. Once again the high point of the night was the auctioning of a multimedia upgrade donated by Bolt Computer. We would like to thank Bolt Computers along with several other companies who donated door prizes. Be sure to look at the list of prizes and companies in the “Winners” listing. If you missed Games Night, you missed all the fun. Be sure you come next year, because next year might just be even better!

This month’s meeting is billed as the Internet Browser Wars. It is between Netscape Navigator 3.0 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0 in a shootout.

To keep everything fair we will be using one computer and one modem and the same Internet provider. This keeps the playing field level and make it so one computer, modem, and the Internet service provider used by one presenter is not a faster than the other presenters. This could make one browser look much better than the other browser. Sherry Nisly, Eric Nisly, and I will be showing the browsers. Again this is to prevent one side bringing in a super presenter while the other side did not have a fireball presenter.

We will be looking at and comparing several items that matter to the end users. We will check out Mail Services to see how well or poorly they work. This will include filtering of messages, filing the messages, and creating messages.

Both browsers allow the use of plug-in applications. Some of the plug-ins include audio, video, and multi-media players. We will check out several of the plug-in to see how they work. I hope to be able to show you a video movie and some audio clips real time.

Throughout the presentation we will also be looking at how other general software operations work in each package. This will include how security works, how favorite places are stored and filed, and general ease of use. Each browser has strengths and weaknesses. We will be using several references from several magazine articles on this subject.

Lotus was scheduled to be here in January. In early December, I was E-mailed that we were not on the U.S. tour. I have contacted them again about later in the year. They do not want to schedule any new presentations until Microsoft comes out with Windows 97 late this fall.

At this point, I want to thank Parsons Technology for coming to the February meeting. Parsons is not waiting to show off their software. Matt McCann was ready, willing, and able to come to the February meeting.

Parsons has come up with a new tax preparation software that interviews you and then prints your IRS approved forms. Matt will also be showing several other software packages from Parsons Technology. Parsons is known to be one of the leaders in tax preparation software for the home. It should be a very interesting meeting.

P.S. Just a reminder, the Internet Special Interest Group is starting again on January 20th at 7:00 p.m. in Goshen. The Goshen Chamber of Commerce is allowing us to use their meeting room for free as long as we allow other Chamber of Commerce people to attend. I think that is a fair trade-off for both of us. The building is the old NIPSCO office on Main street in Goshen. The meetings will be on the 3rd Monday of each month from 7:00 to 9:00 in the evening.

Another whirlwind year has past us by and we have only three short years to make sure our computers will work after the year 2000. I trust everyone had a great holiday season. With my family’s busy schedule, I need a vacation to wind down.

Our November/December games night was a great success even though the weather was not. We had about 18 PC demonstrating a variety of great commercial and shareware game. In looking back at a newsletter from 10 years ago, Del Mineard described the setup. “Six computers showing Sticker, Flight Simulator, Millionaire, Wizardry, Shamus and Sargon III. The flight Simulator was running on a Kaypro small-foot-print 8086 and 80286-based PC’s are expected to make the original PC obsolete. The PC’s fifth birthday was last August. At that time, the dual-floppy was selling at $1595.” “Amdek introduced three new monochrome monitors in green, white and amber. Prices are $240 for the green and $250 for amber and white.” “US Robotics dropped the list price $100 on its Courier 2400 Modem. The new Courier 2400E sells for $695 and has MRP error correction. A whole new line of modems was also introduced including a 9600-baud modem.”

My how the times have changed. I’m sure another 10 years will bring the same results. The only thing that hasn’t changed is the need for your involvement in the direction of this group. Here is Tim Weiss’s “Food For Thought” that applies as much today as it did then. “I have been taking with others lately about the direction EPCUG should go. The goal - to be ever more responsive to the wants of our users. One thing for sure, we can do a much better job of that if we know what it is you would like to see. So, don’t be shy, help us out. Speak up and we’ll do our best to accommodate all requests.”

One final note, we would definitely like to express our appreciation to Bolt Computers for their donation of the Multimedia System which was auctioned off at Games Night, and also Bob Heiland for “winning the auction.”

Q. What's the difference between the popular on-line services and an Internet Service Provider (ISP)?

A. On-line services generally do not provide you with a direct connection to the Internet. When you log on to these services, you are connecting to their server, and your access may be limited to the categories and areas they feature. With an Internet service provider, you have direct access to the Internet, and you decide where you want to go and what you want to see your choices are virtually unlimited.

Also, on-line services often charge extra fees for functions such as accessing the Internet, downloading files, or sending e-mail. These services are included at no extra charge when you set up an account with an Internet Service Provider.

Choosing to use an Internet Service Provider instead of an On-Line Service gives you greater flexibility, usually at a much lower price, and you control where you go and what you do on-line.

Q. Why do prices vary so much from one ISP to another?

A. Prices vary for two basic reasons: (1) The ratio of customers to modem lines--ISP's who guarantee no busy signals must have more modem lines available. Look for an ISP with a customer to modem line ratio no greater than 10:1; and (2) The quality of customer service an ISP offers. Help desks are very expensive to maintain, but are essential to your getting the most out of your service. Be sure the ISP you select has a professional customer support group, and that it is available when you need it.

Compare both the quality and type of services being offered, then decide what will work best for you.

Happy New Year from your newsletter editor. Just wanted to say hello to you all and talk about our newsletter. I could really use some people to write some articles about the meetings, product reviews, events, SIG group updates, and any special events in the community relating to computers. If you are interested in helping out, you can E-mail me or call me. I’m in the officers’ list in the newsletter. I would love to hear any suggestions you have for the content or layout, good/bad comments, or suggestions on information you want to see. This newsletter is all of our’s, and it would be great if more were involved in it.

I would like to put in a special thanks to my family Marcus, Sherry, and Karen for helping me with proofreading and other tasks dealing with the newsletter. If it weren’t for their help I would have a lot more trouble than I do.

Do you like being creative when you type? Well if you do then have I got a program for you. Aldus Type Twister is a very simple program to use and is easy to master. Type Twister allows the new user to take simple headlines and turn them into eye-catching graphics.

Type Twister is easy enough for kids, but can still be intense enough for adults. It has simple to use editing buttons with macro preset functions that allow you to be creative IMMEDIATELY! It also has advanced features that allow you to go beyond the basics, such as, manipulating the blended colors by deciding how intense or deep to carry the 18 levels of blends.

The only real complaint I have with the program is that your work cannot be saved as a Type Twister graphic. You must either cut & paste regular using the clipboard, which causes your work to become a bitmap, or cut & paste special which uses Window’s OLE function and only allows you to reedit your work by causing the reopening of Type Twister.

Overall, this program fills the need to create graphical headlines and typography without learning a complicated program. It’s small but gets the job done well and is fun!