The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group PC (President's Comments) George Skarbek gskarbek@melbpc.org.au |
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Internet Co-location Update
As part of the process of increasing the reliability and quality of the Internet Service, we have begun Internet trials by using modem banks from Comindico data centres. The reason for the move was initiated by the fact that when our lease expires in Dorcas St next year, it will be much easier to move premises if we do not have to house all the Internet equipment and need the telecommunications infrastructure.
Security will be significantly improved at a specially designed data centre. The lack of 24/7 monitoring
was highlighted when on the hottest Saturday we had in Melbourne recently the air conditioning failed.
without remote temperature monitoring and nobody in the building the admin team realised there was a
problem only when some computers failed. The temperature inside the room was about 60 degrees and it's
anyone's guess what temperatures the CPUs reached. Due to the duplication of equipment there was no
outage to our Internet service but there was a slightly reduced performance. A photo of the temporary
air conditioning unit is shown below was used while parts for our unit were delivered.
Ongoing developments will provide local call access from anywhere in Australia. This will be a great
boon to the many Internet subscribers who travel outside Melbourne. It will also provide a service to
those members who reside outside the Melbourne area such as the Mornington Peninsula as well as Bendigo
and Ballarat. This premium service, available to Full Internet Subscribers, will be equivalent to that
provided by Telstra Big Pond but at a lower cost and with more online hours. Significant software
development has been done to bring these exciting new services to the trial stage, but much more remains
before it can be made generally available for the benefit of all members. Further announcements will be
made in this column.
One possibility for the future development of our Internet service is the installation of a Games Server.
Some games that may be considered are: Quake Arena or Unreal Tournament and FreeCiv (a free multi player
version of Civilization, a strategy game that our older members might wish to join. See
http://www.freeciv.org and look at the Introduction to get a feel
for this game). Please note that the admin team does not have the time or resources to install and
maintain a games server and we need some volunteers to take the initiative and to run this project;
hardware will be supplied. If anyone feels they have the skills, please e-mail
admin@melbpc.org.au. Any other suggestions are welcome.
Often I'm asked if Melb PC will provide a broadband service. We are always looking at the possibilities
and monitoring developments in this area but the group is not likely to be providing this service this
year.
Brotherhood Of St Laurence Response
Last month I asked for mature aged members who would be willing to give some basic computer training to
the residents in various Brotherhood of St Laurence locations. I am very pleased that approximately 20
members have volunteered to help. This will ensure the workload can be shared and Melb PC is seen to be
helping the wider community.
Monthly Meeting
Next meeting is on Wednesday 5 March at 7:00 pm. Note the starting time!
There is a telephone you can use through your TV! D-Link has come up with an amazing new system - combining
Internet phone calls with Web vision to give you long distance video phone calls, through your living room
television set! Maurice Famularo will demonstrate.
ZING gets you the answers fast. When the Melb PC Committee ran a day seminar on the future of this group,
a new computer technology called ZING was used to make discussions move quickly and give consensus answers
on each topic. Developed in Australia, ZING has taken off world-wide. Its inventor, John Findlay will give
you a practical demonstration.
The meeting will be at the Besen Centre, Mount Scopus College, 87 Station Street, Burwood commencing 7:00
pm sharp.
Have you been to the Monthly Meeting yet? You don't know what you're missing. There's information and
fun, entertainment and often thousands of dollars worth of prizes. The meeting will also have our Random
Access session (your chance to ask the experts). Bring your membership card so that you will be eligible
for the raffle prizes.
Reprinted from the March 2003 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
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