Diablo Blue

The Newsletter of the Diablo Valley PC Users Group

APRIL 3, 2008 MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT

Ripping, What and How
Presenters: Alan Mildwurm and Ron Ogg, DVPC

At the March DVPC meeting we covered CD and DVD burning. While that's all well and good, if you're interested in bringing your music with you you're going to have to figure out how to rip it from whatever media or source where it resides. Then you can burn it to a CD, or to an MP3 player, or to the hard drive on your PC.

Alan and Ron will talk about the various sources for music and video, and show how to rip it onto your hard drive so it can be burned or copied to other media and/or devices. Whether you want to copy from a CD or DVD, from a vinyl record (remember those?), or a video tape, or from streaming source on the internet, we'll show you how to do it and tell you about some helpful software and hardware tools.

This month's meeting will be fun, interesting, and informative. We'll see you on Thursday, April 3rd at Diablo Valley College.

NOTE: Diablo Valley College has replaced all of the old parking permit dispensers that required quarters with new models that take dollar bills as well as nickles, dimes, quarters, and dollar coins, and will at some time in the future take credit cards. No longer do you have to have a collection of eight quarters to buy your parking permit! Note that these parkeing permit dispensers do not make change.

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Where and When We Meet

Our monthly meetings are held on the first Thursday of each month at 7 p.m. at Diablo Valley College In Pleasant Hill, California, on the Main Campus located at 321 Golf Club Road. We meet in room H109 in the Humanities Building. See the campus map on the About DVPC page for driving directions, parking information, and how to get to room H109. Remember: there's a $2.00 parking fee, payable at the ticket machines in each lot. These ticket machines take dollar bills and quarters, but do not give change so be sure to bring correct bills and/or coins to buy your parking ticket. Place the ticket face up on the driver's side of your dashboard.

We have a Networking Table from 6:30 to 7:00; if you have something to sell or trade, need technical help, or just want to exchange views, visit the Networking Table. The regular monthly meeting starts at 7:00 p.m. with Random Access where you can ask questions or report on technical problems, followed by a presentation by our guest speaker. Also, as usual, we'll have SIG news and some of our usual great door prizes.

Driving Directions:
680 Northbound:
Exit at Willow Pass Road
At the end of the exit ramp turn left onto Willow Pass Road
Continue on Willow Pass Road to the second signal and
turn right onto Contra Costa Blvd.

680 Southbound:
Exit at Concord Ave.
At the end of the exit ramp turn left on Contra Costa Blvd.

Direction into the Campus:
Continue on Contra Costa Blvd. to the signal at Golf Club Road and turn into Golf Club Road. At the second entrance into the campus turn left then immediately right to parking lot 7. Turn left into lot 7. Park (but don't use parking spaces that are reserved for faculty and staff only), then purchase a parking permit (see Parking Fees below) and put it on your dashboard. Click on this link (www.dvpc.org/about.html) to see:
> a detailed DVC map showing parking and our meeting room
> a map for driving to DVC
> an aerial view of the DVC campus

Parking fees:
On the Pleasant Hill campus parking permits are $2.00 per day for short-term parking. You can purchase permits at the parking permit machines marked with a red star on the maps above and below. Parking permit machines only take dollar bills and nickles, dimes, quarters, and dollar coins. Note that these parkeing permit dispensers do not make change. DVC parking permits are required Monday through Friday at all times that classes are in session. That includes the times that DVPC meetings are held! Do not park in metered or faculty/staff spaces.

You need to purchase a parking permit and place it face up on your dashboard so it is clearly visible through the windshield. If you attend classes at DVC and have a campus parking permit, you can use it when you attend DVPC meetings.

Some members park (for free) in the College Park High School lot across Viking Drive from the DVC campus. Do so at your own risk!

Parking violations:
Be sure to purchase a parking permit! Fines range from $35 for parking in a regular space without a permit, to over $275 for illegally parking in a space reserved for the handicapped.

Parking alternatives:
Some members carpool and share the parking fee; they park at Sun Valley Mall, have dinner at one of the many restaurants in the mall, then take one car to the meeting. Some members park in the lots in front of College Park High School, which is across Viking Drive from DVC. Remember: if you decide to use any of these parking alternatives, you do so at your own risk!

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Diablo Blue Password Access
by Ron Ogg, DVPC

Starting with the December, 2007 issue of Diablo Blue, you will need the monthly login ID and password to access the current issue of the newsletter. If you are a paid-up member of DVPC you'll receive an email message, usually on the Weekend prior to the meeting, with the password.

As each month's issue is uploaded, it's placed in a password protected folder on dvpc.org. When you click on the link to go to the newsletter, a dialog box will be displayed asking for the login ID and password from the email message. The password is case-sensitive; either copy it from the email message or make sure you type it correctly.

As we add the current month's newsletter, the password on the prior month's newsletter will be removed so anyone coming to the DVPC website can access older issues of Diablo Blue.

If you have any problems accessing a password protected newsletter, please email webbie@dvpc.org.

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Watch for Updates!
by Ron Ogg, DVPC

With our new method of producing and publishing the monthly Diablo Blue newsletter, we can easily add updates to each month's issue. For example, we added an update to the October issue, a news article about Barry Brown demonstrating the new version 6 of Photoshop Elements at the PE SIG meeting.

When we add a new article "mid-month" it will be shown in red in and will be at the bottom of the Table of Contents.

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President's Message
by Alan Mildwurm, DVPC

Spring is in the air — along with heavy campaigning. A day doesn’t go by without reading about the latest candidate’s gaffes. In our case, we just need to read Tom’s Minutes and recognize that the material contained in his minutes probably doesn’t reflect anything except the harsh reaction of his latest meal. With that said, it’s election month- how about putting in YOUR name to be on the Board. Some of us have been doing it for so long, we feel due for a pardon. The more YOU put into the club, the more YOU will get out of it. It’s fun, the pizza is good, and Tom will undoubtedly spell your name right at least once.

In addition to paying tribute to our democratic traditions, we will have a further lesson in ripping and burning CD’S AND DVDs, making us all attempted copyright infringers. Of course we will only discuss legal ripping and burning issues.

See you there — I personally can’t wait to hear Nick’s campaign speech!

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It's April and DVPC Annual Board of Directors Election
by Ron Ogg, DVPC

April marks the annual DVPC Board of Directors election. I know we say this every year, but... we're always looking for people to run for office. DVPC is a volunteer organization, which means we need volunteers to help put on our meetings, attend the monthly Board of Director's meetings, assist SIG leaders with their Special Interest Groups, and bring ideas about how we can grow our membership so we can continue to grow as a service and educational organization for our members.

So, despite the list of current Board members who are up for re-election, if you are interested in joining us — and having fun at the same time — then come on up to any of the existing Board members at the beginning of the April meeting and say "Hey, I'd like to run for the Board!" We can make room for you, and will welcome your participation.

The following Board of Directors members have signed up to run for re-election. If you'd like to know what they do, walk up to them at the April (or any other) DVPC meeting and ask.

2007-2008 Officers and Directors

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DVPC Board of Directors Meeting Minutes
by Tom Krauss, DVPC

I should never wait three weeks between attending the Board meeting and writing the minutes. Among the amazingly detailed and accurate notes I took is this little gem: “No singer”. I have no idea what that is about. We never have a singer, so it’s not like this was unusual and worth noting. We weren’t planning to have a singer, so it can’t mean that the singer was a no-show. The only thing I can think of is that one of my peers made the comment that they were “no singer”. Although I kind of think that this is what the note refers to, it doesn’t help me much. I strongly suspect that one could say of every one on the Board that they are “no singer”. It’s certainly true in my case. I couldn’t carry a tune if it had super glue on its handles.

Giving up on that note, the next one is “NY gov, medical mistakes”.

Now this rings a bell with me. This refers to two separate topics discussed by the Board, not to any medical mistakes made by the governor of New York. Eliot Spitzer was on his way out as governor of New York at the time of the meeting, and although he may have played doctor a few times too often in expensive hotel rooms, to our combined knowledge he never made any medical mistakes: just mistakes in judgment and morality. The phrase “medical mistakes” rather refers to his successor, David Patterson. It turns out Barry personally knew Governor Patterson in days gone by. The discussion of Governor Patterson being legally blind got Barry nearly as excited as a new major release of Photoshop Elements. It seems Governor Patterson can see better than the phrase “legally blind” would have one think. In fact, as a young man he declined to undergo surgery that could have restored him to normal vision. Or there was a very good chance it would have left him totally blind. This triggered a round of medical mistake anecdotes. While that perhaps sounds a bit morbid, at least we did not waste time talking about our own “procedures”. We are all of us of an age where procedures and cruises start to become favorite topics: a sure sign that one is on the down-slope of life.

My final notes are “mini-plug” and “Nick’s card shot out”. I can explain.

Someone asked how to connect their cell phone to their PC or TV or toaster or something. Maybe they wanted to connect their cell phone to their house phone to save on cell phone charges. I don’t really recall the details. But the answer was to use your cell phone’s mini-plug. And of course some the more electronically challenged members (me, for example) had no idea what this was about. The more sophisticated members quickly whipped out their cell phones and began probing and prying at them with dental picks, forks and even teeth. It seems every cell phone has at least one mini port. These are ports for inserting tiny plugs, like on the earphone of your old two transistor radio in the ‘60’s, so you can transfer data into or out of your cell phone. Often they are disguised with plastic covers which I always thought were there so I would be less likely to drop my phone. Carried away by the moment, Nick decided to field strip his cell phone. While doing this, he discovered a hitherto unknown secret function. If Nick is within three feet of you and makes the right move, his phone will eject a small memory card with enough force to momentarily stun you, giving Nick time to either run to safety or to pick your pocket, depending on the situation.

That pretty much covers the meeting. Or at least my notes. If I missed anything I assume my peers will let me know....

.

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February Windows SIG – Part II
by Walt Parsons, DVPC

For me the most interesting part of the February Windows SIG meeting took place after the meeting in the parking lot.

Pete Mitchell had a question for Ron which just happened to be a question I wanted to ask Ron. It seems that both of us had bought flash drives containing the U3 software. This is the software that enables you to use somebody else’s computer and still have most of your needed information.

It turned out Pete and I didn’t like the U3 software but couldn’t find a way to use the flash drive without the U3 program coming up. We had tried to remove all traces of the software and even reformatted the flash drive but still U3 came up.

Ron, the all knowing seer pointed out that the U3 software was in a hidden partition and that the U3 people had a “U3 Launch pad removal” web page. By goggling “U3” I was led to www.u3.com/uninstall/

This page does its hardest to dissuade you from removing U3 but if you are insistent you can click on “Remove Launchpad” and in a few moments the deed is done and no traces of U3 are left on the flash drive. Now I have a new 4 gig flash drive that I can use for what I want. Thank you Ron for the valuable information. I had come very close to just throwing out the 4 gig flash drive.

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Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 Review
by Nicholas Chase, DVPC Board Member

As one with a seasoned experience in using Internet Explorer going back to Windows 95, I was interested I seeing what the next release from our partners in Redmond had to offer. In fact, there is a lot going on here. More interesting perhaps there's much more to come as well.

This release has caused ‘the web generation i.e. “gen-w”, who have abandoned IE Explorer for Mozilla’s Firefox browser, to point fingers and kibitz about Microsoft’s failure to deliver a robust and secure browser solution.

Some History

Internet Explorer has had a checkered history, beginning with the first few Spyglass-flavored versions from the mid-1990s. With IE version(s) 3 and 4, Microsoft turned the tables on market leader Netscape and established its domination of the industry. But as competition dropped off, so did Microsoft's competitive zeal. IE 5.x and 6 were minor functional upgrades, after which Microsoft essentially halted IE development and pondered dropping the product as an ongoing concern.

The rise and popularity of Mozilla Firefox changed all that. So Microsoft re-formed the IE team, which created the surprisingly potent IE 7 release, combining backwards compatibility with a rich feature set and strong security. But Firefox kept chipping away at IE's heels and today, the competition is nothing less than ‘heated’. Microsoft needs another home run if it hopes to stave off further IE Explorer usage-share-losses.

So, what can we expect in this ‘developer-public-beta-release’ offering of IE 8?

The 10,000 foot view is that IE 8 will be a major upgrade to Microsoft's legacy browser.

My former direct report at Sony Electronics’, Software Development Center, is now the Director of Product Development for Microsoft “Windows” in Redmond Washington.

She has direct control over 400 software developers currently tasked to come up with the next version of “Windows”.  I have not provided my own feedback to her, as even though I have her cell number and email address, the line in front of me offering suggestions is miles long.

For example, I believe there will be a new user interface, one that's not here today in Beta 1. This UI will be based on customer feedback, which told Microsoft that the discovery of Favorites and adding to Favorites was too difficult in IE 7, that users want to resize the search bar and move the Stop/Refresh and Home buttons to new locations. Users requested more consistency to the tabbing functionality, and wanted better exposure for help and the Send Mail feature.

Unfortunately, due to the nature of making these major changes to the browser, Microsoft can't respond to all of the requests it got for IE 8. Some items will no doubt be passed along to the next release, including more discoverable menus, full customization so that any command can be placed at the top level of the browser UI, more room for tabs, a full extension UI (similar to that in Firefox), and better discoverability for "deep" commands (i.e. those that are well hidden in the current UI).

I understand an earlier version of the beta included a ‘ribbon-based design’, like that is used by several Office 2007 applications and has proven popular with users. Microsoft felt the ribbon UI was good for command discoverability, customization, and exposure of Activities, a new IE 8 feature (see below). But the ribbon was too big and inflexible, with a poor size to value ratio.

It was considered pretty ugly by users and, more important perhaps, promoted commands over navigation, which doesn't make sense for IE, as it is a navigation-based application.

Microsoft is exploring a so-called "outspace" area at the top, also similar to that used in Office 2007, where users could add their own commands. This design might feature a somewhat awkward "e" button, like the Office button in Office 2007 applications.

The problem with this design is that the 'e' button clashes with the Back and Forward buttons and that allowing users to put their own commands into the ‘outspace’ isn't a long-term solution. This design doesn't help with extensions either.

Another issue relates to height. Many users feel that the IE 7 UI is "too tall" when compared to previous IE versions or competing browsers, especially when an additional toolbar like those provided by Google, Yahoo!, and Windows Live is installed.

Most people are browsing at 1024 x 768 or higher and browsing with at least one toolbar installed or just using the Links toolbar. Their design must minimize vertical space and provide for navigation, commands, links, and toolbars. Analysis of the relative height of Safari, 118 pixels, Firefox 2, 137 pixels, and IE 7, 121 pixels, compared to IE 8, 118 pixels and is preferred.

Add the Windows Live toolbar and the size jumps to 138 pixels. IE 8 with a ribbon UI is about 187 pixels, however. It's just too tall.

New features in IE 8 Beta 1

Looking at the Beta 1 release of IE 8, I discovered two major new features: Activities and Web Slices.

Activities

Several years ago, Microsoft developed a UI feature called Smart Tags that it planned to incorporate in Office XP and Internet Explorer 6, part of Windows XP. Smart Tags were added to Office XP as planned and they still exist today in subsequent versions of that product. But the company's plans to include Smart Tags in IE 6 were scuttled after Web developers and users complained long and hard about the feature, which many saw as anti-competitive. So IE 6 shipped without Smart Tags and the feature, presumably, was dropped for good.

Guess what? Smart Tags have returned. Only this time they're called ‘Activities’ and to prove their not exclusionary or anti-competitive, Microsoft is even stocking the first beta version of IE 8 with a number of Tags, i.e., ‘Activities’ that are made by its competitors. See, they're completely different…!

Actually, they are not different. ‘Activities’, which are indeed a renamed version of Smart Tags, provide contextual menus on Web pages that can provide additional information via Web services that will lead readers to new locations. The contents of these contextual menus are determined by what's selected on the page and which ‘Activities’ are available in the user's browser.

In other words, the functionality is not provided by the Web site at all. It is provided by the browser via this new ‘Activities’ feature.

Initially my reaction to the Activities feature was “ok, it’s interesting and useful”.

However, they also allow users to completely bypass whatever facilities the Web site itself has provided! So, for example, you might use the IE 8 Activities feature to find a MapQuest Map for a selected address on a Web page.

But that page may supply its own map, one that you have now chosen to bypass. My suspicion is that this feature will cause the same hand-wringing among Web developers that Smart Tags did years ago. What may offset these complaints is that many ‘Activities’ are now created by Microsoft's competition, and with many more being released as we approach the formal introduction of IE 8, this may lessen the complaint volume.

In the past, the default Smart Tags were all Microsoft-specific, raising privacy and exclusivity concerns.

Here’s how the Activities feature works. If you select a word or any other text in a Web page in IE 8 Beta 1, you'll see a small green Smart Tag. Click this tag and a menu will appear, loaded with Activities that may or may not apply to the selected text.

What you see will depend on what's selected, meaning it is contextual and based upon which Activities are loaded in your browser. By default, IE 8 ships with several Activities, including Define with Encarta, Map with Live Maps, and Translate with Windows Live. But you can also visit a Web page to add new Activities from Microsoft and companies like eBay, Facebook, and, yes, Yahoo!. The process of adding Activities is similar to adding search providers in IE 7.

So what can you actually do with Activities? You can highlight an individual word and get a definition. You could select a full address and get a map. You could highlight a word in a foreign language and get a translation. By design, most Activities trigger a small pop-up window, but many also provide a link so you can load the information in a separate window or tab.

You can also use Activities to send information from a Web page to another location, triggering a Google search, perhaps, or blogging about the selected text in Windows Live Spaces.

Web Slices

The other major new IE 8 feature in Beta 1, Web Slices, provides a way for Web sites to let readers "subscribe" to information in a manner that is simpler and more obvious than RSS feeds.

In contrast to Activities, Web Slices require some support from the underlying page. To enable this feature, a Web developer will have to add some code to a Web page's underlying HTML. Fortunately, it's not much code, and given the point of this feature, it's not the type of thing you'll be seeing implemented in a major way on websites anyway.

How are Web Slices going to apply to the average user? Developers can mark portions of a Web page as "Web Slices" which can be automatically monitored for changes and saved as mini-Favorites in the new IE 8 Favorites Bar which, in Beta 1, exists between the main toolbar and the Tabs/Command Bar.

For example, you want to check your local weather forecast for Concord, CA. Your preferred weather-oriented Web site might mark the forecast portion of a page as a Web Slice, so that any user who saved this slice could then view just the updated forecast at any time. Pre-coded Web Slices are already available for Facebook friends' status updates, eBay item monitoring, and MSN news headlines.

Unlike RSS feeds, which are typically saved somewhat like IE Favorites, but in the Feeds folder, Web Slices are normally saved to the new Favorites Bar, which is enabled and displayed by default. When you save a Web Slice, an RSS Feed-like dialog appears and then the new slice appears in the toolbar. When you click the link to the slice, however, a new page doesn't load. Instead, you see the information in a pop-up window. To get more information, click on the item you're viewing.

Does this feature offer anything truly new? I'm not sure yet. Yes, it's simpler than RSS feeds, both conceptually and in use. But I can see open standards purists being up in arms over what will likely be seen as Microsoft subverting existing content subscription methods.

We'll have to see how the feature evolves and whether enough sites implement it before we can intelligent debate the issue. But I like the visual nature of Web Slices. And Microsoft has made the specifications for Web Slices available to one and all via the Creative Commons license, so other browser makers can implement this feature too.

Other features in Beta 1

Microsoft is again changing the way that we interact with browser add-ons (plug-ins) in Internet Explorer, and you can see an attractive new ‘Manage Add-ons window’ in this release, via ‘Tools - Manage Add-ons - Enable or Disable Add-ons’.

Now, add-ons are segregated by type--Toolbars and Extensions, Search Providers, and Activities--and you can easily filter the view by currently loaded, all add-ons ever used, those that run without permissions, and downloaded ActiveX controls.

The default view is OK, but if you dig a little deeper, you can get in over your head pretty easily. For example, I see a 32-bit GUID for a Skype add-on instead of a plain English name, which I'm sure, would blow some people away. And though you can click a Disable button for any add-on, the Delete button is often grayed out. We should be able to delete add-ons from this UI. It is, after all, called ‘Manage Add-ons!

In the IE 8 Beta 1 address bar, you'll see a new domain name highlighting feature in action. This is designed to help people understand when they're being spoofed, but it makes me think I have developed a vision issue.

If you load a URL like: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ie8/welcome/en/default.html, most of the URL will be grayed out, but the domain name part (microsoft.com) will appear in black and be thus emphasized.

So it appears as:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ie8/welcome/en/default.html.
We may just need time to get used to this product feature.

Security

Microsoft is adding a new Safety Filter feature to IE 8. The Safety Filter is basically an expansion of the Phishing Filter from IE 7 that adds additional protection against evolving threats. It analyzes the full, URL string, loaded into IE 8 and provides more granular protection than was possible with the Phishing Filter.

This feature addresses the need for greater protection against increasingly sophisticated attacks. I suspect we'll learn more about this functionality when the company ships a consumer-oriented beta of IE 8 in the future.

Standards

IE 8 features a new "super standards mode" rendering mode, enabled by default, that should place IE 8 among the rarified company of such standards-friendly browsers as Firefox and Apple's Safari. This is a monumental change from Microsoft's previous backwards compatibility fixation, and an early version is available in the current Beta 1 release.

There is an awkward ‘Emulate IE7 button’, thankfully is not estimated to be included in the release version. This ‘feature’ is for testing purposes only.

By the time IE 8 ships, developers will need to have placed special META tags in their pages that will require IE 8 to render in IE 7 mode.

Acid2 compatibility

IE 8 will render the Acid2 standards compatibility browser test, Microsoft says. This is apparently a big deal in the Web development community, but I see it mostly as a bullet point Microsoft can place in an IE 8 overview. It won't impact end users per se, though it's part of the interoperability work that's going into Microsoft's support of true Web standards.

CSS 2.1 support

Finally, IE 8 will fully support the Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) 2.1 specification which, if I'm not mistaken, was ratified about 225 years ago. The goal here is as simple as it is upscale.

 A Web page written with a properly-formed CSS style sheet should render identically on all major browsers now.

About –insert-preferred-expletive-here time!!  

In a related thread, Microsoft is also working with the W3C on certifying what it means to be truly compatible with CSS 2.1.

HTML/DOM improvements

IE is infamous for its quirky support of HTML standards, so IE 8 will fix this by fully supporting the latest HTML standard, HTML 4.01, and correcting bizarre past behaviors that have irritated Web developers for years. IE 8 will also support upcoming standards like the HTML 5 Draft DOM Storage standard and the Selectors API. Note that this isn't full HTML 5 support. Instead, Microsoft sees IE 8 as the beginning of its support for the HTML 5 spec.

IE 8 Developer Tools

Microsoft previously shipped a separate Developers Toolbar for IE that, apparently, few people knew about. Now, as with Firefox, Microsoft will build the tools right into IE 8, though they'll be hidden by default. To enable them, simply add the Developer Tools icon to the Command Bar. From this button, you can view the HTML, CSS, or scripts in the currently loaded page, switch between IE 8's three rendering modes (Quirks, Strict/IE 7, Standards/IE 8), select on-page elements, and add visual outlines around structural on-page elements like tables. Most intriguingly, the Developer Tools include a full debugger so you can set watches and run through the execution of pages to see where problems and bottlenecks are.

AJAX navigation features

One of the problems with so-called ‘AJAX Web applications’, is that they don't tie in nicely to the global browser navigational tools like the Back and Forward buttons. IE 8 fixes this by providing programmatic support for the browser's navigational features, including various buttons and the address bar. So, for example, a Web developer could reprogram the Back button so that it doesn't load the previous page when clicked but instead redirects you to the previous task in the currently loaded Web application.

Platform performance improvements

Microsoft has fine-tuned the performance of numerous IE subsystems, including those for HTML rendering, CSS rules processing, markup tree manipulation, the JScript parser, garbage collector runtime, and memory management. These changes should improve IE performance overall, but the company notes that future performance work is planned for upcoming betas as well. For Beta 1, performance of scripts is a priority, so expect big changes there.

IE 8 in the real world

I've been using IE 8 Beta 1, for the past month, and haven't run into any major issues, aside from Google Calendar, which renders rather poorly and an IE plug-in I use to upload articles. It mostly works, but the button for changing text into a hyperlink curiously does not. That said, most of the sites I visit work just fine in IE, a fact I credit to Firefox's wide successes.

From a users perspective, it's way too early to worry about compatibility issues and this is precisely why Beta 1 is aimed at Web developers anyway.

Microsoft wants to ensure that developers have the time they need to update their sites to work with the new browser.

While IE 8 seems to work surprisingly well even in Beta 1, I don't feel that typical users should be installing it, as it completely replaces IE 7. You could always put the browser in ‘Emulate IE 7 mode’, but what's the point?

Put simply, IE 8 Beta 1 is aimed squarely at Web developers, not end users.

Final thoughts

It's far too early to judge what IE 8 will be like from an end users’ standpoint, since so many changes are coming in the final release version.

What I see in Beta 1 is a new browser inside an old shell, with a few new and mostly useful features and a ton of internal changes.

As the browser that will ship with Windows 7 and replace the world's most popular Web browser, IE 8 is interesting nonetheless. I just don't think it's ready for prime time. But then, that is not going to change Microsoft’s business plan. My voice seems to fade in volume as it arrives in Washington State, and disappears completely once it reaches the town of Redmond.

If I could communicate my opinions directly with my former boss now in the catbird-seat at Microsoft, I would in fact thank her team for addressing the multiplicity of issues IE 7 and earlier versions have visited upon your humble author.

IE 8 Beta 1 is surprisingly usable despite the raw state of the Beta 1 version.
Web developers should be all over this release, as it points to a simpler near-future, where managing the quirky features of each browser will no longer be necessary.

If Microsoft can deliver on its promise to fully support modern Web standards in IE 8, this will prove to be a watershed release of the Internet Explorer browser. In Beta 1, I can already see the beginnings of that work.

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Exorcise Your Ghost
by Alan Mildwurm, DVPC

I needed to purchase a backup program for the office the other day because we needed to do a backup immediately and I did not have my copy of Acronis at the office. A trip to Frys yielded only two programs-Norton Ghost by Symantec* and a backup program from a company I never heard of. I bought Ghost. I did not choose wisely.

I attempted to load the program on a system running Vista Business. The computer is stable and meets all the Ghost system requirements. Ghost 14 is Vista compatible. Ghost refused to install. It generated several errors and flatly refused to install because something terminated the install process. Note to Symantec: How about a useful error message or log! So much for needing to get something done immediately! After several attempts to install the software, over two days, I tried Symantec’s on line chat. That is because their web site is useless for tech support as is the manual. The tech assistants are very pleasant. The first two techs could not figure out why the program would not load- even while running the machine remotely. The error messages were as much a mystery to them as to me. For some reason I could not reconnect to the chat for a third time (internet otherwise up and running) so I called. The third tech was able to get the program to install- I think. It shows up in the task bar with a red “x” over the icon. The program tries to run but every backup fails with 1 second remaining-after 30+ minutes of something. The error message states that the system lost its host connection. I can’t find any detail as to what that means- other than it didn’t work. The external drive shows that there are files on the drive but the program insists no restore points have been created. Who knows what it is doing.

It has been years since I purchased a program that would not install and caused so much grief. I used to be a regular Symantec antivirus and Norton utility user but stopped around 2000 when their software got buggy, bloated and ate system resources like crazy.

Coincidentally, at CES this year, I spoke with Symantec and told them of my disaffection to their products and they gave me a copy of Norton 360 to show me how much they have improved. I haven’t loaded it yet and after this latest debacle with Ghost, I doubt I will.

We’ll see how the return goes! Bottom line: Stick with Acronis (http://www.acronis.com)  for your back up needs!

* the link to the Symantec site was intentionally not included.

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APCUG NOOZ
by Cheryl Wester, APCUG Region 10 Advisor

In this edition of NOOZ:

  1. Annual Convention
  2. Regional Conferences
  3. Fundraising Idea
  4. FACUG Spring Conference Recap
  5. APCUG’s News Magazine, Reports

1. Annual Convention. The Board of Directors and Board of Advisors recently had a discussion regarding the Las Vegas annual convention and decided that APCUG will try something new. The annual meeting will not be held in Las Vegas. It will be moved around each year to a new location at regional events. This solution allows different user groups to attend APCUG events. Discussions are ongoing to offer events around the world as user groups show interest in hosting a local event. APCUG is willing to work with the user groups who would like to offer these regional events in their area. If your group is interested in helping start an APCUG-sponsored regional event, contact Jay Ferron at president@apcug.net. More details will be found in Q1 Reports that will be sent to selected officers in April.

2. Regional Conferences. Two APCUG-sponsored regional events are planned for 2008. The first Membership & Leadership Development Conference (Growing Your User Group in Today’s Digital Age!) will be held May 16 – 18 in West Nyack NY, 30 miles north of New York City. This is the first meeting of Eastern regional groups in over 10 years and something they have been looking forward to. The $49 early-bird registration fee ($60 for non-APCUG members) includes breakfast and lunch for two days as well as a welcome bag and t-shirt. This rate is good until April 15. Friday evening will feature a welcome event for those who come early; Saturday is an entire day of speakers and workshops devoted to building and increasing your group’s membership; and Sunday workshops are on technology, promoting your club, and the ins and outs of running a club.

The conference will be held at the Palisades Center Mall, one of the largest in the U.S. There are many restaurants, shops, movie theaters, a bowling alley and ice skating rink so that all can enjoy their time in NY. There are hotels/motels within a few miles to fit any budget. See the conference website for special event rates and book early. If you have any questions, please contact Sam Wexler at swexler@apcug.net.
www.apcug-ldc2008.org

The second regional event will be the first APCUG Midwest User Group Conference to be held at the Prairie State College in Chicago Heights, IL, September 19 – 21. The Chicago Society will host this event. The theme of the conference is “Technology for the Rest of Us.” Again, everyone is invited to attend. This three-day conference will feature topics that will cater to the membership of organizations rather than its leadership. The conference begins on Friday with registration and an evening social gathering with light snacks being provided. Saturday will feature vendor and member presentations. Sunday will feature a Vendor Fair and end with the ever-popular prize drawing. For spouses of out-of-town attendees, brochures of sites in the Chicago area will be available. For further information, please contact Patty Lowry at plowry@apcug.net.

A third event, the Southwest Computer Conference, will be held in San Diego, May 30 – June 1 (the weekend after Memorial Day). Although this event is not an APCUG-sponsored regional conference, this is the 15th year for the conference and the majority of the attendees are members of APCUG-member user groups. As with the other two events, all are invited to attend. Some of the new activities this year will include a presentation on Friday afternoon on the History of Computers and a keynote address by a representative from the Homeland Security Department in Washington DC. Saturday activities include user group leadership and personal productivity workshops as well as vendor tech sessions. Saturday evening is devoted to the Vendor Expo and Sunday features the Digital Photo Contest awards, door prize drawings and another round of workshops. The $60 early-bird registration fee includes all meals, workshops, a welcome bag and t-shirt, as well as numerous door prize drawings. For further information, contact Judy Taylour at JudyTaylour@theswcc.org
www.theswcc.org

3. Fundraising Idea from Gabe Goldberg, Region 2 Advisor. Become an Amazon Affiliate. It’s easy to join Amazon’s Associates. Just visit
 http://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/join and follow the instructions. Once you’re approved, simply tell your members and everyone they know to shop at Amazon through your group’s store link rather than going directly to amazon.com. Then count the money rolling in. Gabe says that until you have your own group’s store established, the Capital PCUG would LOVE for you to use their store. Just go to http://shop.cpcug.org/ and shop away. See Q2 Reports for more information.

4. FACUG (Florida Association of User Groups) Spring 2008 Conference.
A very successful 14th annual FACUG Spring Conference was held just north of Tampa on Florida’s west coast in early March. All of the participants and vendors gave extremely positive feedback. The member presentations were great and each and every vendor presentation was stimulating and interested their audience. Kudos to FACUG. They had the courage to try many new concepts and swept the 150+ attendees off their feet. For pictures and a description of the program, as well as a copy of some of the presentations, visit www.facug.org.

5. APCUG’s News Magazine, Reports. Some of the interesting information you will find in the Q2 issue are: Preparing a Gadgets Presentation for UG Meetings by Gabe Goldberg; more about the LDC in New York by Sam Wexler as well as a recap of the recent FACUG event by Stu Silverman; an article by Terry Roberts about the ICON Computer Users’ Group annual technology fair, “The March of Technology Expo,” held in Springfield, Missouri, on February 29; an article by Ash Nallawalla on his award-winning list of computer user groups new website; Windows Home Server by Clint Tinsley; an APCUG White Paper by Ash Nallawalla on Realignment with Consumer Electronics; plus much more.

DVPC is a member of APCUG; you have received this e-mail to inform you of updates, changes, or special news and information. APCUG’s policy is to send e-mail messages only to announce such information, and we will continue to honor this policy.  If you no longer want to receive these e-mails, please reply to the sender. Thank you for being a member of APCUG.

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O'Reilly News for User Group Members
by Marsee Henon, O'Reilly Media

March 25, 2008

http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/covers/9780596517663_cat.gifGet 35% off from O'Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, Rocky Nook, SitePoint, or YoungJin books you purchase directly from O'Reilly. Just use code "DSUG" when ordering online or by phone 800-998-9938.

Free ground shipping on orders of $29.95 or more. See details.

Did you know you can request a free book or PDF to review for your group? Ask your group leader for more information. For book review writing tips and suggestions, go to: http://ug.oreilly.com/bookreviews.html

New Releases: Books, Short Cuts, and Rough Cuts:

Web 2.0 Expo
San Francisco

Web 2.0 Expo 2008

Apr 22-25, 2008

San Francisco, CA

Co-produced by O'Reilly Media and CMP Technology, the annual gathering of technical, design, marketing, and business professionals, Web 2.0 Expo events bring together the innovators and industry figures building the next generation web.

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Photoshop Elements SIG Meeting Program
by Peggy Johnson, DVPC

The April Adobe Photoshop Elements SIG meeting will be held on Thursday, April 24, 2008 at 7 p.m. at the home of Peggy Johnson in Concord, CA.

Barry will continue his demonstration of techniques for restoring old photographs. This is a topic we have all expressed interest in learning about. As usual, checkout the Elements SIG pages at www.bkbrown.net for all the latest news, information and tutorials.

The Photoshop Elements SIG usually meets on the third Thursday of each month, but (like this month) may meet on another day. Please email Peggy for further information and directions, and to add your email address so you'll receive meeting notices.

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Windows SIG Meeting Program
by Walt Parsons, DVPC

Due to a family emergency, the April WinSIG meeting has been cancelled. The May meeting will have the same topic.

At the May 5th WinSIG meeting Ron will try to remove the mystery that shrouds the ports in your PC. Walt will have a topic for us as well.

The Windows SIG meetings are held in the Community Room at the Concord Police Station. See the detailed directions on the DVPC SIG News page.

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Today's Dilbert Cartoon
by Scott Adams

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