January 2001 Meeting Report
by Howard L. Bonar
Secretary, Alaska Computer Society

The January 11, 2001 meeting of the Alaska Computer Society was held at the British Petroleum building starting at 7:06 pm.

Questions & Answers

Holly reports getting lines on the screen when scrolling back up on a web page with lots of graphics in it. It happens in Internet Explorer and also in Netscape. This is a problem example of the "good one" type. Upgrading the drivers for the video adapter was the most likely cure offered.

Ray says that he made the mistake of opening up the case on his machine before backing up his files. Immediately he had problems that took a lot of effort to work around.

Howard reports that he learned the hard way not to threaten to remove Windows 98 and go back to Windows 95 while sitting in front of the computer. Windows and several applications have been crashing recently causing excessive frustration and anger. Upon hearing the threat, it immediately went into its self defense mode and refused to allow him to use the Zip drive or to install a network connection so he could back up files to another computer. The blood pressure detector caused Win98 to refuse to boot up even in the Safe Mode. Reloading Windows using the rescue disk restored operation but the network connection problems remained. After many attempts at reconfiguring the network settings it finally would talk to another computer with Win95 on it. It still refuses to acknowledge his other Win98 computer with the large hard drive on it. Time will tell what the final resolution will be.

A member is having problems uninstalling programs using the Uninstall utility in Windows Me. It sometimes leaves the name of the uninstalled program in the Uninstall program list. Win98 has a utility to remove a name from this list when the program has already been deleted. It is probably also available in WinMe. Click on the name to remove it - the dialogue box should come up with the information on it. Another procedure that sometimes works is to reinstall the program and then uninstall it again.

Greg asked if Windows Me has any service packs available yet for updates. It was suggested that he log on to www.Microsoft.com and check out their support pages.

Ron installed Netscape 6.0 and had so many problems he took it back off. According to the laughs from the audience, he was not the only one.

Main Meeting

Gene called the regular meeting to order at 7:18 pm. He welcomed everyone and then introduced the board members and volunteers present.

BP has been donating meeting space for our group for about a year and we are very grateful for their hospitality. It appears they are changing their policies and we are being subtly encouraged to look for a new location for our meetings. A committee will be formed to examine the alternative locations such as Providence Hospital, the Anchorage Museum, Anchorage Library, etc.

ACS-PCUG and the Apple group are going to be staffing a table jointly at the Dimond Mall on Saturday, Jan. 20th from about 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. We will be passing out membership brochures and telling people about our organizations and the benefits of belonging.

A special joint meeting is being held with the Apple Users Group for a presentation by Corel on Corel Draw 10 Suite, Knockout, and Painter. It will be on January 29 starting at 7:00 pm at Providence Hospital. We will send out an announcement via e-mail to all ACS members. The Apple group will notify their own members.

Dawn Scott reports that the February presentation will be on Digital Music. The March presentation will be Aviation Flight Information Systems. The April presentation will be Microsoft demonstrating an array of their most popular programs.

Gene announced that he has received information that memory prices are lower now so it might be a good time to upgrade your computers if you need to.

Door prizes were a backpack and several more t-shirts from the recent Comdex show in Las Vegas. Thank goodness they are mostly all gone now.

The Presentation

Dave Moletti, local digital media developer, was back to give us another interesting presentation on the latest in digital multimedia development. He was our presenter for the July meeting and his demonstrations were so intriguing that we were pleased to have him back. His company, Technoids, offers a broad range of digital media, PC, and network support services. Their specialty is in the law office and courtroom environments. They also are a certified A+ software development shop. Their services include logo creation and animation, CD duplication in all formats, forensic animation, creation of digital media, and 3D animation. To see samples of some of their recent projects, visit their web site and check out the Gallery at www.Technoids.net.

The streets were very icy and our publicity had not worked out too well so the turnout was disappointing. To further complicate the evening the control for the overhead lights didn't work so the slide show was difficult to see. With all of that, he was able to show and tell us about several new and exciting products and services available.

ANIMATION

A substantial portion of Technoids' business is animation of forensic evidence for court cases.

About 80% of courtroom action is visual in nature. It has been shown that cartoons, that is animation, make the connections between various pieces of information much better and clearer than the spoken word can do. Because of this fact more and more attorneys are turning to animation to help them make their cases.

One of Technoids' recent projects was development of a presentation consisting of a number of Native scenes from NANA Corporation. Because it is a proprietary product, we could not see it at this time. It was recorded on CD at 30 frames per second the same as regular film movies. It gives 74 minutes of play at a screen resolution of 640 by 480. It was recorded in the video MPEG format which makes it possible to get so much action on one disk. The advantage of MPEG is that it records the first scene then only records the changes in each succeeding frame. It then recognizes when it needs to re-record the whole scene. The encoding and decoding of the scenes are the magic of the process.

BITS AND PIECES

One of the new services becoming more readily available is the digitizing of camcorder tapes. Turn the tape of the kids taken at Christmas time into a digital signal. You then can post it on your web site to share it with your friends and relatives all over the world.

With all of the equipment and software tools available today, the possibilities are limited only by one's imagination. The development of Interactive media on CD is proving to be an exciting way to provide information efficiently and effectively. By using hot links, one can rapidly jump to an area of interest anywhere on the CD.

The new streaming video MPEG4 format is much better than previous versions which further enhances the viewing experience.

E-cards and interactive CD's are the next hot services to become a major element in the information world.

In this computer age, digital content providers are the new artists. Creating digital media requires a substantial skill set and a large measure of creativity to be successful. An active imagination is also a very valuable asset.

Developing a project in animation requires some very thorough and careful planning. One of the first steps is the development of a flow chart plan of the project. With it the developer plots out every action and interaction of the characters. One of the challenges in creating the animation is to accurately portray the animal behaviors. To be realistic, the mechanics of walking, talking, and moving through the environment must closely resemble the real thing.

As an exercise, Technoids has created a very simple computer game called Road Kill. It is an interactive game where the object is to retrieve the road kill from the middle of the road without getting run over in one of the several lanes of traffic. It is available on the Tundra web site (address not available at this time).

One of the developing uses of the digital media is creating odd shaped cd disks to serve as advertising products. A CD shaped like a business card with a printed message on one side and a recording on the other can holding several megabytes of information. These are designed to fit within the inner circle in the CD disk drive.

The small round disks cost about $ 1.50 each in a production run of 300. Because of the non-standard size of the disk, the 1x speed gives the best results.

Backing up your files can be a problem, especially if they are huge. Where do you find enough capacity to store them? DVD recorders are now available in the market for about $600. These can give you up to six gigabytes of storage space.

It is possible to create a hybrid CD which will work on both the Macintosh and PC machines. The text will be the same but there are differences in the tables of contents for each system.

When storing information on CD it is very beneficial to use hyperlinks in your table of contents if permitted as this can make it much easier and faster to locate the desired information.

One of the funniest commercials to come along in a while is the fight between the salmon fishing bear and a man who attempts to take a fish away from him. The piece was made in New Zealand and displays a great deal of imagination and creativity. (The bear was actually a guy in a suit but it looked good.)

The making of films for network use has become a whole new industry. As the availability of wide bandwidth proliferates, it will give us a whole new world of entertainment and educational opportunities.

One of the new age digital cameras in the market is the Hitachi MPEG-1. It can hold up to 3000 shots in the JPEG format on its 300 megabyte miniature hard drive.

When you are recording to a CD, the table of contents is the last thing recorded and it goes to the center of the disk.

When working with re-writeable CD's you may find you seem to be running out of space even though you have deleted a lot of files. The problem may stem from the fact that the table of contents area has been filled up. You may regain access to the available space by deleting entries from the table and/or reformatting the CD.

One of the problems being experienced when stamping out multiple copies of a master CD is the need for mechanical precision. A calibrated checker is used to make certain of the system before starting the duplication process.

INTERESTING SITES TO VISIT

www.MediaSupply.com - All kinds of CD disks and other media supplies can be found here. If you are interested, log on and go searching.

www.AdCritic.com - If you find a lot of advertising annoying, you may enjoy a visit to this site. Along with their own cutting critique of many advertising campaigns, they offer a forum for viewers to enter their own comments about products they find especially irksome. Also, interesting examples of the technology and art of producing animation pieces.

www.TrailerVision.com - This is a satirical site which displays a selection of bogus trailers for movies that don't exist. It is a graphic example of what can be done using digital technology to create a message. (Be careful, some of what they have may be naughty if not downright nasty.)

If you are interested in learning more about animation, 3D video, and digitizing products, Technoids is located at 3700 Woodland Dr. Suite 300, Anchorage, Alaska 99517. Phone (907) 248-8324, Fax (907) 677-9173. Technoids@Technoids.net.