Stacey Falconer - Big Blue and Cousins

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 I would like to introduce Randy Esdon, our Volunteer of the Month. Randy is one of our resident geeks, his involvement with computers began in 1977 at LaSalle High School when he became intrigued with an elderly mainframe computer. After acquiring his first PC, an Apple, in 1985 and the next year moving to an IBM XT. helping our Librarian catalogue books on an as-needed basis for about six years. He built a number of computer systems out of spare parts to sell at the auction that was held when the BB&C clubhouse was being moved to its present location. Prior to the move, Randy contributed a major effort to clean the new clubhouse. Afterward, he planned, set Randy stayed just behind the bleeding edge of technology, upgrading his systems as the components dropped in price from the expensive pinnacle of their first introduction to the market. Randy recently finished upgrading his President’s Choice Volunteer Volunteer of of the the Month Month up and networked the Lab systems. Since then Randy has been our “hardware guy” replacing components as they wore out and generally maintaining the Training Lab systems that are vital to the courses taught at BB&C. system to an AMD 750MHz CPU, which is a comfortable step back from the 1 GHz CPU’s that are now available. September 2000 In ’89 Randy joined the Canadian Armed Forces where he received training as a Naval Electronics Technician with a speciality in fire control. For the rest of us, that means a radar technician with a speciality in controlling the aim of weaponry using radar. Randy is regularly at sea tending to his duties but when he is ashore; you can often find him helping out at the clubhouse. Joining BB&C in 1993, Randy “hung out” in the conferences on the BBS where he shared his interest in PC’s with other enthusiasts. In the days before the World Wide Web and the kind of email we now take for granted, using a BBS was one of the few ways open to the public to quickly and inexpensively communicate digitally with people. Not only locally but, using echo-mail, around the world too. He has been Monthly Meeting Learn All About BB&C Communications! In response to the concerns of some members who have trouble using our communications services, Systems Department member, Clive Amos will explain all the nuts and bolts of accessing our communications systems. Members will be given the chance to submit questions in writing to be answered on the spot. There will be coffee at half-time to be followed by discussions. Please think about what you expect from your club and let your executive know. The meeting will be on Monday, September 11, 2000 at 7:30 pm. at the Royal Canadian Legion, Pro Patria Branch #31, 411 Gorge Road East, the 2 nd floor meeting room. Elevator service is available to those who have difficulty with stairs. Everyone is encouraged and welcome to attend! Randy Esdon I would also like to mention that not only has Randy contributed a great deal to Big Blue & Cousins he also finds time to help out at that other club he belongs to. In 1998 he joined the Victoria Linux User Group (VLUG) where he is currently serving as the Membership Director. Randy is a very community minded individual that we are very lucky to have as a member of our club. Given on behalf of myself and the members of Big Blue & Cousins, this award symbolizes our appreciation for the time and effort you have given us to make our club better. Thank you Randy, Clive Amos President, Big Blue & Cousins ...funnies cont’d. Glossary of Computer Terms - Lesson 2: Interpreter: The person you take with you to the computer store to understand the salesman (usually a 12-year old kid) Memory: Part of a computer where data is placed before destruction. Menu: An itemized list of way to make a mistake on a computer. Plotter: Computer salesman Program: Random accumulations of bugs. RAM: Where most of the bus is kept. ROM: Where you put the bugs that don’t fin in RAM Plotter: Computer salesman Program: Random accumulations of bugs. RAM: Where most of the bus is kept. ROM: Where you put the bugs that don’t fin in RAM Upgrade: Take old bugs out, put new ones in. www.bbc.org 9
September 2000 Big Blue & Cousins I’m writing while listening to Dave Brubeck. Not unu sual but this is one of Brubeck’s long-out-of-produc tion cuts, a song I’ve been searching for on CD for a couple of years. You guessed it: I found it on Napster. It was free. Another? “High Wire”, a just released cut from a Rob Brown and Sunny Wilkinson CD that wasn’t available at cdrom.com or Barnes and Noble, my usual haunts. Right. It was already on Napster. Napster works by connecting you to other people wanting to download MP3 music. Once connected, you search on, say, “Brubeck” and Napster’s servers find everyone logged on with music that has “Brubeck” in the listing. You can limit the search to a reasonable number of hits - 100 is the default - or ask for 900 (sometimes you get your wish, filling the screen with songs). Once the search is complete, a click on the title starts a download; click on the sender’s name and he or she is added to your Hot List, providing a way of finding them in subsequent sessions. So yes, I’m using Napster, feeling conflict and guilt, and collecting songs. I logged on last month and it wasn’t for research or a future article. I just had to see it for myself. Free music, all you can download, all perfectly anonymous. And entirely illegal. The The Napster Napster Conundrum Conundrum Gimmie Some More The problem is just that: the music is free, as much of it as I want, and stunningly easy to get. With a high-speed connection, I can pop a 5MB song onto my PC in less than 30 seconds. Hell, it takes me that long to turn on the amp and CD-ROM player on my home audio system. In about seven minutes I can download and start listening to the equivalent of an entire long playing record, about 55MBs. And it’s ever so tempting to dip in and grab another few songs. Scour Your i-drive for Gnutella Want more? While less valuable than Napster, there’s Scour.com, an Internet app that supplies music, videos, and images. Scour works with i-drive.com, a site that supplies users unlimited-and free—online storage space. The story is that things get even more outrageous with Gnutella, a free program that provides anything you want. Search on Word and you’ll get the program. Music? Easy. Porno? No sweat. But that’s nonsense so let’s dispense with Gnutella right away. First, Gnutella is more difficult to use than Napster or Scour. Once you master Gnutella and start searching for items, you’ll find more junk and x-rated sites than you can possibly imagine. For example, a search on Wordstar (stop laughing) brought up wordstar.html, a file with an x-rated URL embedded inside. Same thing happened with a search for most popular programs. In a way it’s a lot like unmoderated newsgroups with unfiltered files and messages. It’s Free, It’s Easy, It’s Wrong a commentary, by Steve Bass, PIBMUG Worse, Gnutella is probably the easiest way to pick up a virus or have your system examined by an experienced hacker. You can safely get a taste of what Gnutella’s capable of by searching at CapnBry’s site. http://capnbry.dyndns.org/ gnutella/gs.php If you want Gnutella, get it at http://gnutella.wego.com The Napster Connection On the other hand, Napster’s files are 100 percent MP3s with no worries about viruses. The program’s commercial enough with a relatively easy interface so you’ll get the knack in a few minutes. If you use a personal firewall-I’m using ZoneLabs free Zone Alert (zonelabs.com) and feeling comfortable with it-you’ll be safe against intruders. Of course, there are a few downsides to Napster. Not all the music is complete, and not all of it is good quality. Some Napster users are conscientious and make it clear in the song’s title that the song was cut short. Often a cut doesn’t get rippedtransferred from the CD to the hard drive-properly and the music is distorted. When you log on to Napster, you fill in your connection speed. Unfortunately, not everyone tells the truth. So you might find yourself downloading from someone using a 56k modem, making your high-speed access valueless. Or if you’ve decided to share one of your folders filled with music, slow connectors may start grabbing songs and you might feel guilty disconnecting them before they get anything downloaded. Knock Knock, it’s the Net Cops In mid-June, the Recording Industry Association of America, a trade association, and a handful of record labels sued Napster, alleging it’s contributing to massive copyright infringement because of its members trading songs through the service. Nobody’s going to catch you, so don’t worry. 12 www.bbc.org
Page 2 and 3: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 6
Page 4 and 5: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 C
Page 6 and 7: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 N
Page 10 and 11: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 T
Page 12 and 13: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 C
Page 14 and 15: Big Blue & Cousins September 2000 J
Page 16: August 20, 2000 COMPONENT PRICE LIS

Stacey Falconer - Big Blue and Cousins

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?