MLCUG Sept 2010 Issue 340

September 2010

Issue 340

VILLANOVA UNIVERSITY, ST. AUGUSTINE, ROOM 210

MEETING STARTS - 09:30 -- SEPTEMBER 11th

MAIN MEETING TOPIC: CALIBRE - eBOOK MANAGER

We all know about e-book readers like the Nook & Kindle that you can hold in your hands, but how do you keep track of your expanding book collection? Especially your non-copy protected books. What do you do if you find a book you want that is in an incompatible file format with your physical reader? Do you keep looking for a compatible copy? Do you or would you like to subscribe to e-magazines and e-newspapers, but don't because you can't take them with you on your physical reader? Do you ever have a need to do some serious reporting based on the e-books your read? Do you find reading e-books with a desktop reader uncomfortable because you can't lean back to read?

Well, Tom J may show you a way that you can address all these issues with a desktop e-book manager called Calibre. As an e-manager, it is much more than just a reader. It has features and capabilities that surpass desktop readers like Kindle Desktop, Nook Desktop, GooReader, Adobe Digital Editions, Stanza, and others. However, the caveat is that it is limited to handling non-copy protected e-books.

For a video preview of Calibre, take a minute or so to visit the website at http://calibre-ebook.com/ .

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ANNOUNCEMENTS & REMINDERS

1) Club membership entitles you to receive a hard copy of the newsletter and access to our email list server, which is run for the benefit of our members. Please do not hesitate to post club and computer related notices and problems to it. If we can't solve your problem remotely, we can be alerted to it ahead of the monthly meeting where more hands-on may help resolve your problem.

2) A few of the regular attendees usually partake of lunch at the Country Squire Diner in Broomall near the intersection of Routes 3 and 320, and recently at the Campus Corner Restaurant near the intersection of Routes 30 and 320 just off the Villanova University campus. So, after the meeting, why not join us? It's an opportunity to get more help and to discuss our common interests.

3) Help MLCUG go ``Green''. We issue this newsletter by both electronic means through our email list server and in hardcopy format. If you find yourself not reading the hardcopy, PLEASE inform John D, the editor, so that you will only receive the electronic version.

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LAST MONTH'S MEETING

Attendance: 10 people in all attended the meeting on Saturday, August 14th.

Main Meeting Round Table Q&A: We began last month's meeting with our normal round of questions and announcements. Among the questions and announcements:

Marty C

Spoke about an Inquirer PC checkup article describing FREE checkups at Office Depot that turned out not to be free
He noted the same(?) article failed to mention the possibility of taking advantage of user group services
Sought guidance for dealing what appears to be exposed HTML code in some of the email he has received when using Mozilla's Thunderbird

Pat S
- Reported on a dimly lit monitor problem. He was advised the problem was probably related to failed back-lighting & advised to test the monitor with another computer to confirm the suspected cause. Joan S
  - Sought help to remove a broken audio plug tip that remained stuck inside the mini jack. A suggestion to use a dab of super glue on the tip of a Q-Tip stick worked. Layton F
    - Showed a hardcopy of a JPEG graphic used for checking printer color accuracy
    - Described problems adding a LAN switch to his network to accommodate an Ethernet printer
    - Wondered why he was seeing multiple printer network interfaces while setting up his new Brother printer Wendy E
      
      Sought guidance for dealing with a Mac password problem
    - Tom J
      
      Sought suggestions for wireless surveillance cameras for use by his condo association
    Main Meeting Program: Our main meeting topic was "Browser Add-Ons", also called extensions, and was presented by John D. The presentation covered add-ons for 4 browsers, namely IE, FF, Safari, and Chrome. The main focus was on Firefox add-ons related to security, Google bookmarks and lists and associated "bookmarklets", and video capture. The interesting Greasemonkey scripting add-on and the related Greasefire add-on for finding a plethora of website related scripts was also discussed along with using the Mr Tech Toolkit addon to make Greasefire compatible with the latest versions of Firefox. Toolbars were also discussed and Google's toolbar was used as an example of a toolbar add-on. There was a brief demo of how to turn toolbars on and off in Firefox and it was mentioned that the same thing could be done in IE.
    For a full list of add-ons referenced or discussed during the presentation, see the public Google List John D created at:
    https://www.google.com/bookmarks/l#!threadID=GtvQaUxx5DaQ%2FBDQetZQoQ5uGot6Yl
    Feel free to add your comments and favorite add-ons to this public list.
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    RELATED MEETING LINKS
    I thought I would include a section on web links related to some of the subjects we discussed during our round table discussions and presentations. Hopefully, readers will find these links of value and interest.
    http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2007/03/google-bookmarks-faq.html A small guide for people that continue to ask how to use Google's low-profile bookmarking service.
    What is Google Bookmarks? Google Bookmarks is an online service that lets you save your favorite sites and attach labels and annotations. Unlike the bookmark feature from your browser, bookmarks are stored securely online, so they are accessible even if you're using other computers.
    http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/03/google-bookmarks-lists.html Tuesday, March 23, 2010 Google Bookmarks Lists Google tests a new interface for Google Bookmarks that lets you share your bookmarks.
    You can now create bookmark lists and share them with other people. Google says that "lists make it easy to organize and share stuff you find on the web", but the new feature adds what was already available in Google Notebook, a great service that allowed you to create collections of interesting content from the web. Google stopped developing the service, but Google Notebook is still available for the existing users.
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    HINTS & TIPS
    How To: Easily Convert WTV Files to DVRMS Files with Windows 7
    http://www.mediacenterblog.net/tips-tricks/how-to-easily-convert-wtv-files-to-dvrms-files-with-windows-7
    With the advent of Windows 7 Media Center there is a change in the format of recorded TV shows from DVRMS to WTV. Many 3rd party video players and editors cannot handle this file type. The more friendly file type is the DVRMS file type.
    There is an easy way to convert back to DVRMS if you have media processing software that can't handle the WTV format. All you have to do is right-click on a .wtv file to open a context menu and you should see a ``Convert to .dvr-ms Format'' option.
    You will NOT see the conversion option IF you do not have Windows Media Center set as the default program associated with WTV files. You can use the "Open with" option in the file context menu mentioned previously to reset the associated default program back to Windows Media Center.
    If you're hoping to convert those copy protected files (such as those recorded via CableCARD tuners), you'll be out of luck with this utility. --------------------------------------------------------
    HARDWARE WORTH A LOOK
    Seagate FreeAgent DockStar ($40)
    http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/products/network_storage/freeagent_dockstar/
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    SOFTWARE WORTH A LOOK WIZMO (FREE for Windows)
    http://www.grc.com/wizmo/wizmo.htm
    Steve Gibson's multipurpose Windows gizmo
    Wizmo is a multipurpose miscellaneous Windows utility that provides an array of single-click functions that are missing from Windows. Triggered by a single mouse click, it can do things like power down your system's displays, activate your screen saver, change or mute the audio volume, restart, reboot, or shutdown your system, and much more. It even includes a rather cool built-in "Graviton" screen saver that simulates the motion of any number of mutually gravitationally attracted celestial objects. Check out Wizmo's web page for the current (and growing) complete list of Wizmo's capabilities and features.
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    SECURITY & PRIVACY
    University Study Finds Problems in Private Browsing
    http://blogs.pcmag.com/securitywatch/2010/08/university_study_finds_problem.php
    A group of researchers from Stanford University and Carnegie-Mellon University say implementing private browsing correctly is not easy. They define two goals of private browsing: to protect against a local attacker, another user on the same computer, accessing browsing history data of any kind; and to protect against a remote web attacker from linking private mode activities to those conducted in conventional browsing.
    The table below, taken from the research, is one of many that show how much browsers could be doing, and which users might suppose is done in private browsing, but which is not in fact done.
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    DIRECTIONS FOR ST. AUGUSTINE CENTER MEETING ROOM
    Meetings are in the St. Augustine Center at Villanova University. The regular monthly sessions meet in Room 110.
    Enter from the ITHAN AVENUE main gate, then proceed to the upper level of the 2-level parking building adjacent to the St. Augustine Center, on the Ithan Avenue side of the building. NOTE: maps on our web page - http://micug.org/
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  MLCUG Meetings 2010                 Steering Committee Meetings
    September 11			September 15
    October 9				October 13
    November 13				November 17
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    EDITOR: John W. Deker, Jr. 2210 Lantern Lane, Lafayette Hill, PA 19444-2211 Produced with HP-P6267C: 2.5GHz 4-Core Q8300, 8GB RAM, 750GB HDD, Brother HL-5250DN laser printer, CD-RW/DVD±R/RW drive, Windows 7 Professional 64-bit OS, MS Office XP, Bullzip PDF Printer software
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MLCUG LISTSERV:		for members only...
OUR WEB PAGE:		http://mlcug.org/
PUBLICITY:		Position OPEN!
VILLANOVA SPONSOR:	Prof. Frank Maloney, Dept. of Astronomy

MLCUG STEERING COMMITTEE;
PRESIDENT: John Deker 		        610-828-7897	
TREASURER/SEC: John Deker 		610-828-7897	
WEBMASTER: Peter Whinnery 		610-284-5234	
AT LARGE:  Tom Johnson		        610-896-2434	
AT LARGE:  Wendy Emery		        215-765-3328
V.PRESIDENT: Al Gottlieb  		215-793-9725
DATABASE: Layton Fireng		        610-688-2080
AT LARGE: Nelson Schrock		610-834-0117
AT LARGE: John Murphy			610-935-4398
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