Your committee is always seeking suggestions as to how we can enhance services to members, and thanks to those who have responded. Some requests have been that the group should provide more How-To sessions for less experienced users at our monthly meetings, such as Internet searching. I was able to do this at our October meeting, and it was suggested that the details be circulated via PC Update, to both help those present and for sharing with our wider membership.

Better Use Of Search Engines

While search engines such as Google are great at finding information, often one is given confusing and extraneous results. As an example, searching on surnames as used by our genealogists, I used Google to search for botherway and got nearly 1000 answers. When I then searched on botherway dave, we got a better result but it included items like dave barker and kevin botherway. Then I used quotes to search on "dave botherway" and obtained more appropriate results, including many Melb PC results. And then by searching on "dave botherway" –melbpc we suppressed most of the Melb PC entries —to see the more obscure information.

Searching on names can show some interesting results; you might try it using your own details. Remember, use quotes to look for specific word combinations and use the minus sign to suppress unwanted results. Having learnt these two simple techniques, it can make your Internet searching far more productive.

Wikipedia Free Encyclopaedia

We then brought up www.wikipedia.org — the multi-language "free encyclopaedia" where anyone can add entries, sometimes subject to a moderator confirming details.

This is truly a users encyclopaedia — usually OK, but to be read with caution. At our meeting, I explored the word gibber, to resolve a recent argument about some of our strange desert roads. Not long ago I even suggested an overseas visitor should use Wikipedia to look up the acronym "AFL'" to help him understand the unique game we play down under.

Planning a Road Trip

Increased cost and the security issues associated with overseas travel has meant that many of us are exploring Australia instead — often by car and caravan. To demonstrate some planning tools, I then brought up www.racq.com.au and drilled down to their Travel and Trip Planner section. There I was able to enter from Vermont South to Canberra — and got a detailed turn-by-turn set of routing instructions via Albury — totalling 679 km; travel time 8:03 hours. We then used the Advanced Route option to specify Lakes Entrance as an intermediate point — giving a totally different route via Cooma of 721 km, time 9:14 hours. Our local RACY on www.racv.com.au has a similar function, but does not enable you to nominate intermediate points, or choose Fastest vs Shortest routes.

Long trips such as these need comfort stops, so we then switched to www.toiletmap.gov.au to find appropriate rest facilities along the way, and specifically in the Lakes Entrance area, to add to our trip plan.

Additional Volunteers

The key to Melb PC's Users Helping Users operation is having members volunteering to assist with the many tasks needed to run this low-cost organization — or as it has been said, "Volunteers are the Lifeblood of Melb PC". To further spread the load, we are seeking some extras in the following areas:

• Office assistance (answering the phone etc) — maybe half a day a week, or occasionally at call when things like sickness strike our paid staff.
  
• iHelp support — for those more technically minded, operating from home, with training provided on how to use the support systems.
  
• Home Visit Assist — an occasional visit assisting some of our less mobile members
  
• Small tasks, such as helping with Monthly Meeting raffles (one hour, once a month)

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