 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Editorial Ash Nallawalla ash@melbpc.org.au |
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Who Are the Winners?
Those of you who come along to the World Congress Centre to see Borland CEO Philippe Kahn launch dBASE 5.0 for Windows will also be the first to hear the winners of the Readers' Choice Awards. Yes, the monthly meeting on 3 August is at this new venue, thanks to Borland, although we are still looking for a permanent venue for September onwards.
There shouldn't be too many surprises at the awards. A casual glance among the entries shows an expected tussle between WordPerfect, Lotus and Microsoft, and I don't think Borland will go away empty handed. Some of the entries were interesting, particularly in the hardware categories. There is an interesting brand called "Clone" and a lot of people answered some questions with comments like "when you find one, tell me". A full breakdown will appear in the next issue.
Internet Service
At long last, all eight lines have modems connected to them. Users now can use up to 90 minutes per day, else sysadmin Hamish Coleman's demonic timer daemon will haunt them. Billing started on 1 July.
So you would think that the intrepid Internauts would be happy little Vegemites, right? Wrong! Someone's quota has been exceeded unfairly; someone else keeps losing all her mail; someone swears (with offers of eyewitnesses) that he did not log on for five hours and so on. The opening screen says that SLIP/PPP has not yet been enabled, so the FAQ of the month is "When will we get SLIP?" closely followed by "What is SLIP?" When SLIP is made available, there will probably be a small charge as it may require a separate login to be created for each such user.
Any More Subscribers?
Now, it is very easy to log into the Internet box. During the day I am sometimes the only caller, and rarely have all eight lines been busy this past fortnight. At 7.45 pm as I write this on a Wednesday, there were four modem lines free. We will monitor this and see if we can take any more users. Get on that waiting list now. I can almost hear our treasurer rubbing his hands with glee.
Missing Subscribers
I don't believe we rejected anyone's application for Internet access except for some corporate members (owing to our arrangement with APANA and connect.com.au). So, it is puzzling that some people who have paid up have never logged on. Perhaps their letters of acknowledgment were lost in the post. If you are in this category, please contact the office.
Newsletter Awards
There is always room for improvement and awards help to keep us on our toes. The Seventh Intergalactic User Group Newsletter Awards were recently announced in New York. In the past we have won
- Best Publication: Winner, 1992; Runner Up, 1991
- Best Feature Articles: Winner, 1991: Runner Up, 1993 and 1994
- Best Coverage User Group Events and Meetings: Runner Up, 1991
Melb PC extends congratulations to all other winners, in particular, our fellow Aussie user groups who scooped a couple of awards each:
- Significant Bits, Brisbug PC User Group: Winner, Best Features and Runner Up, Best User Group Coverage
- Sixteen Bits, PLUG Inc (Canberra): Runner Up, Best Columns and Runner Up, Best Design
