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The HAPCC general meeting is on 4th Sunday of each month. The
next general meeting will be Sept 27th. Meeting time 7:00 - 9:00
pm. The HAPCC has a meeting place at: Maritime Museum of the
Atlantic 1675 Lower Water Street , Halifax, NS.
Parking available in the nearby Government parking lot or in
the Museum parking lot. Access to the building is via the Night
Entrance Doors, located just to the right of the regular front
doors. If door is locked, use the bell on upper left side of the
Night Entrance Doors.
The meeting room is on the second floor and has a theatre
type of layout. Washrooms are located close by. Elevator service is available. Coffee served.
June's guest speaker was from Microsoft and there was a presentation on Windows 98 how it works better and plays better. See item in "This Issue". With summer we do a little computing, but our group would like to have an interesting 1998/99 season. On Monday August 17th at the Maritime Museum ( where we have our regular meeting's) a planning and business meeting is scheduled. All are welcome to attend.
Bill Marchant - Microsoft's Windows 98 presentation
General Information
A word of thanks to guest speakers and the their web suites
Newsletter Information
Meeting Schedule for the year
Report by Bill Marchant of Microsoft's
Presentation
The last regular meeting of the 1997-98 season was highlighted by a presentation on windows 98 by Martin
Harris of Microsoft Canada. Martin is a member of the Windows Platform Team, and came to Halifax particularly to
talk to our group. Martin was accompanied by Holly Gardner and Megan Kennedy both from the Halifax office of
Microsoft Canada.
He divided his presentation into three parts. First: A description of the new and improved features of
Windows 98. Second: A demonstration of a number of those features and Third: A question and answer session.
Windows 98 has a new look. That of a web page. If a person happens to prefer the old Windows 95 look,
this can be done. We were shown how easily this change is made. The Windows 98 now features single clicking instead
of double clicking from the desk top to launch an application, in addition to the normal start button and other
startup methods.
The integration of Internet Explorer was described as providing a seamless operation between normal
use and internet use of the computer. Martin explained that anyone who preferred to use a competing product would
be free to do so. The IE was simply deselected, and the other product selected.
New video hardware, to support faster and more demanding games software; and for TV, is supported. We
were shown examples of downloaded TV schedules, and the information available on each of the programs. If your
computer has a TV capable video card, the program can be watched on the monitor. For those who still have to watch a
normal TV, Windows can remind you that your favourite program is about to begin.
The plug and play features of the new Universal Serial Bus (USB) were described and demonstrated. The
USB can provide connection to a wide variety of peripherals now coming onto the market. Where the devices themselves
are fitted with a continuation socket they may be daisy chained together from a single socket on the computer.
Devices not so fitted may be connected to a USB hub which costs about $40.00. Problems with IRQ numbers will become
a thing of the past. Martin demonstrated the use of a digital video camera, and a portable scanner.
Because these were not daisy chain-able they were shown separately. They both performed well. Of course, like
many new things, the computer itself must have a USB port. In answer to a question Martin said that some
manufacturers were bringing out a card containing a USB port, for use in older computers. The price
at this time is not known, but it is expected to be cheap.
The 32 bit FAT was released with some versions of Windows 95, and is now a feature of Windows 98. The
advantage is the ability to use larger disks, and the more efficient storage of files on the disks. The example was
quoted of a 2 Gbyte disk reformatted from 16 to 32 bit FAT. The release of formerly wasted space was 500 Mbytes.
In answer to a question Martin explained that when updating from Windows 95, Windows 98 is loaded on the system first,
and then the option of changing to 32 bit FAT may be selected. Once the change has been made, there
is no option to change back.
Augmented Windows Help is a prominent feature of Windows 98. The help is presented a HTML files, and is
fully inter active. The help wizards will lead the user through a set of questions regarding a problem,
suggesting solutions as it goes. If these are exhausted without resolution then Windows automatically can select the
appropriate Microsoft web page to continue the help with any details that may have been discovered
since the system was installed.
Updates to Windows 98 software will be available on the net with automatic installation directly from
the net. Thus a user will no longer need to be concerned about having the latest drivers or corrections.
One question asked about any difficulties which might be encountered when updating from
Windows 3.1. The answer was that the difficulties in updating from 3.1 to 95 would probably still be there, but no new
problems have been discovered.
The new Windows requires between 150 and 290 Mbytes of memory depending on options selected. There is
a provision for saving the Windows 95 setup and reverting to it if Windows 98 does not go well. This would consume
extra memory.
Windows 98 supports new computers which permit memory to be kept alive when the rest of the computer is
shut down. This is referred to as sleep mode. The result is faster start-ups and shut-downs. The feature is spoiled
however if there is a power failure during sleep. If power interruption was a problem then an un-interruptible
power supply would be needed.
The evening ended with a short description of the role of the Halifax office of Microsoft Canada
by Megan Kennedy, the presentation of souvenir mugs to the Microsoft members, and thanks all round for a very
informative and entertaining presentation.
In this issue
Chairperson David Potter
Vice-Chair Bill Marchant
Treasurer Rob MacCara
Web Librarian Thayne MacLean
Newsletter Editor Diane Smith
Membership Promotion Pat Conen
and the following members who assist in planning our monthly
meetings: Norman DeForest, Henry Hill, Ken Gilmour,and Colin Stuart.
The HAPCC has two kinds of meetings. Firstly the regular
Sunday night meeting which most members attend regularly,
secondly the monthly (approximately) planning meeting which
organizes the business of the Club, including what happens on the
Sundays. The planning meeting is held on Monday, a week after the
regular meeting in which all members of the Club are urged to
attend. At the planning meeting, we discuss feature speakers for
regular meetings, finances, membership, training, and other
computer related subjects.
....Bill Marchant
In this issue
Our guest speaker at the March meeting was Mr.
David Baxter, Product Specialist at MT&T for the MpoweredPc
service. His multi-media presentation showed us how far the
service has come, and in which direction it is heading.
MpoweredPc was being officially launched on April 7, 1998 and it
promises to be a serious contender in the high-speed
internet/software on demand arena. More info can be found here:
Mpowered. Once again, Thank you to MT&T and David Baxter.
Our guest speaker in February was Sgt. Bill
Cowper, Internet Communications Officer of the Halifax Regional
Municipality Police Department. He gave a history of how and when
the police department started using the Internet. They were the
first police department in Canada to be on the Internet. Sgt.
Cowper is continually receiving calls from all over the world
looking for assistance. The presentation showed how well the
department and the officers in the patrol cars are versed on
getting the criminals off the streets. If you would like to
check-out their web site the address is
Halifax
Regional Police Service gives an idea
of what an "Internet Cybercop" is all about.
In this issue
Newsletter Articles.... We are almost always in need of good
articles. If anyone has something that they feel would make a
good article, an interesting story to tell, or even a good
meeting topic, please don't hesitate to pass it on. Articles can
be submitted in almost any format, ASCII text, AMI Pro, MS Word,
Windows Write, WordStar and of course WordPerfect.
The news letter is mailed to all paid up members and to
anyone who has attended a meeting within the past three months.
Yearly membership dues are $15.00.
Club Mailing Address -
P.O. Box 29008, Halifax N.S., B3L 4T8.
In this issue
We decide the meeting dates for the upcoming year at the last
planning meeting of the season. The dates for these are listed
below. As in previous years, the December meeting is moved to the
early part of January due to Christmas Eve being near the fourth Sunday of the month.
The planning meetings are normally held on the
second Monday (8 days) after the general meeting. They are
currently held at a members home and the address is announced at
the meeting prior to the planning meeting. Anyone is welcome to
assist in the planning of future meetings or events.
Meeting dates for the 1998/99 season:
Sept-27 Oct-25 Nov-22 Jan-3 Jan-31 Feb-28 Mar-28 Apr-25 May-24 June-27
Any changes to the scheduled dates will be announced where possible at the regular monthly meetings and/or in this newsletter.
