March 2003
Volume 21, Issue 3
Kokomo PC
Users Group
A Message from the President:
The good cold weather has been holding. No distractions from my PC computing; at least, no distractions due to an early onset of spring.
We had an excellent meeting last month. It was a battle between Turbo Tax and Tax Cut software. Gene Surdevant gave a great tour of the Turbo Tax product. We also had some rebuttal from the peanut gallery that Tax Cut was the best. In all, everyone that attended had a good time.
My wife and I just bought Turbo Tax for the first time this year. It was very easy to use and we were very happy with the ability to e-file. The e-file went very smoothly and we had our money back in about two weeks. We will probably get Turbo Tax again in the future.
The Kokomo PC Users Group’s 20 year anniversary is coming up next month. The club was founded in April of 1983. Rodney Malkoff is planning a party to celebrate. It may be a road trip so keep your eyes open for a change of location in the next newsletter.
The officers of the group would like to know what type of presentations you would like to see at our regular meetings. We always try to get you the best presentations about things you are interested in. As far as I can tell our series of ‘low-budget’ panel discussions are going well. If anyone else would like to lead one just jump in and grab the controls. If you have any ideas for exciting presentations that we could provide, please contact one of the officers and let them know.
As the author of most of the newsletter, I would also like to know what you would like to read about. I always try to share my own experiences with you so you can learn from my mistakes. What else would you like to hear about? Just let me know and I will try to get the information published.
Mark Pendergast
Da Prez
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More Cool Stuff
I got a new digital camera for Christmas. The camera is cool, but I noticed another cool feature. The camera stores all the pictures I take on a small flash memory card. These cards are cool. I might start using them as super floppy disks to move information between computers.
The little flash memory cards are called SanDisk cards. They are about twice the size of a postage stamp and about as thick as a graham cracker. The one I bought holds 128MB of memory and cost about $50 - on sale.
I was able to buy a flash card reader from PNY Technologies for about $20 - on sale. The reader is about the size of a pack of cards and has a slot to insert the SanDisk card. It has a USB port and hooks into a USB port on my computer using a USB extension cord.
The reader comes with software that makes it look like a removable disk drive. I just use Windows explorer to see the files. (It shows up as my F drive.)
I know it is probably not very practical to use these chips as floppy disks, but that does not diminish how cool they are. Imagine, 128MB of storage on a chip you could hide in your wallet. I bet the secret agents like James Bond use these things all the time. They probably even have smaller ones for their top secret information.
Well, I guess my message is - "hey, these things are really cool". If you find something that you think is really cool, write up an article for the newsletter. We all love to have cool stuff.
Mark Pendergast
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My new Palm Pilot
I have some more toys from Christmas. My Palm Pilot is now a peripheral for my computer. I have a nice ‘hot-synch’ cradle that allows me to share information between my computer and the Palm.
The Palm Pilot is like a small computer in itself. My Palm is an m500. It is in a small case that fits in my shirt pocket. The screen is about 3.5 x 2.5 inches. The unit has four application buttons at the bottom. These can launch the date book, phone book, things to do list, and notepad. There are also two buttons that can be used to scroll the screen up and down. Along the top of the case there is an IR port and the power switch. On the right side is a place to keep the stylus. The unit runs on a rechargeable battery.
The screen of the Palm is divided into two areas. The upper area is used by the applications to display menus and data. The lower part of the display has three active areas.
The first area contains several icons. The home icon brings up the main list of applications. The menu icon brings up a drop down menu that is specific to the application you are in. The calculator icon brings up the calculator application. The find icon is used to find documents on the palm.
The second active area is used to enter text. Text is entered in this area using 'graffiti'. Graffiti is a language, a lot like printing, with a few changes to make handwriting recognition simpler. (Just in case you have trouble with graffiti there is the ability to pull up an onscreen keyboard to use for text entry.)
The third area is used to enter numbers.
The main applications are the address book and the date book.
The address book has entries for individuals with room for multiple phone numbers as well as email addresses. There is also the ability to add a small free format note with any information you like.
The calendar application has the ability to track appointments. There are daily, weekly, and monthly views. There is an alarm that can be set to remind you of an appointment. You can also add a note to the appointment to keep track of the location, agenda, questions you want to ask or meeting minutes.
There are a number of other applications that come with the Palm and more that you can order or download.
I use the memo application to keep track of information. I have a memo for each person I contact regularly to keep track of the things I need to talk to them about. I have a memo for miscellaneous information like important dates, the boss’ phone number and the combination to my luggage. I also keep my long term things to do list in a memo.
I use the calculator application when I am in a meeting and need to verify figures. It is not very good, but it beats doing calculations on paper.
The notepad application is pretty useless. It is like a draw program. You write with the stylus and likes appear. I don’t believe I have any notes.
There is a things to do list application that allows you to sort by priority and due date. It also lets you categorize your things to do into different categories. I keep all my immediate, high priority tasks in this application.
The expense report application allows you to keep track of expenses and categorize them so you can see where your money is going.
There is a clock application that is not very special.
There is an email application, but I have never used it.
There is also an application I got for free when I bought my Palm called ‘Documents to go’. It allows you to create and view MS Word and MS Excel documents and view MS PowerPoint documents. It also allows you to pass these documents back and forth between the Palm and your computer.
The process of moving documents back and forth between the Palm and your computer is called synching. This is short for synchronizing. I have a small cradle that can hold the Palm and plug into the computer with a USB port. I place the Palm in the cradle and turn on the computer. Then I push the hot-synch button and the computer automagically synchronizes the data. The cradle also recharges the Palm battery at the same time.
At home I loaded the Palm Desktop software. It looks a lot like the Palm applications, but it runs on my main computer. The palm synchronizes with the Palm desktop. Documents are available on both sides and update the other side when you hot-synch.
There is also the ability to synchronize with MS Outlook. I plan to do this at work some day. This would be really handy.
The reason I have not synchronized at work is a long story. In a nutshell, I still run Windows 95 at work and it will not recognize the USB cradle. I bought a Palm V serial synch cable at Wal-Mart for $3. Unfortunately it does not work with the m500. I finally found a m500 serial synch cable, but have not had time to load the software at work since then.
I have only been using my Palm for a month, but I don’t think I could live without it. It is so small that I can carry it everywhere. It holds all the information I need in a space that is about one sixteenth the size and weight of my old Franklin Planner. I have 8MB of storage on my palm. I am using less than 1MB right now. I can download the entire Delco phone book in 613K of memory. I made a chopped version without some of the information and made it fit in 300K. It will be nice when I can download this at work.
When I get my work computer set up, I will tell you about the integration with MS Outlook.
If you got any cool toys for Christmas, please write a newsletter article about them. We would all like to hear from you.
Mark Pendergast
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Good buy at Best Buy
We got a great deal at Best Buy the other day. I don’t think we were supposed to, but we couldn’t find anyone that disagreed.
In the past I have told you about the great game Civilization 2 by Microprose. We really enjoy playing it.
We saw a new version of Civilization 2 called the Test of Time at Best Buy for $1.99. It includes a new version of the original game with extra levels as well as a Fantasy Version and A Science Fiction version.
I didn’t believe the price and asked the clerks. They all said that it was the right price.
We grabbed all three copies they had and bought them. We are running one of them and will probably give out the others as gifts. (If you get one and have read this story , try to be impressed anyway.)
I suspect that the Headquarters at Best Buy typo-ed the original price as $1.99 rather than $19.99 that I would have expected. Everyone down the chain just accepted it and went along with the program.
Needless to say we are happy shoppers and are enjoying the game.
Mark Pendergast
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