october 2014 volume 25, issue 10 $2.00 next event:...

October 2014 Volume 25, Issue 10 $2.00

Next Event: October 7A User Guide to the Nuts,Bolts and Widgets of . . .

an Internet of Things

2 • Oct 2014 http://www.dacs.org

DACS, its officers and directors as-sume no liability for damages arisingout of the publication or non-publica-tion of any article, advertisement, orother item in this newsletter. The editors welcome submissionsfrom DACS members. Contact RichardTeasdale ([email protected]). Ad-vertisers, contact Charles Bovaird at(203) 792-7881 ([email protected])

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to reprint articles from dacs.doc orhttp://www.dacs.org by sending e-mailto [email protected]. Reprintedarticles shall credit the copyrightholder and a copy of the final publica-tion shall be mailed to:

Danbury Area Computer Society, Inc.65 Legion Rd,

New Milford, CT 06776

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dacs.doc, ISSN 1084-6573, is publishedmonthly by the Danbury Area ComputerSociety, 65 Legion Rd, New Milford, CT06776. Annual subscription rates: $45to regular members, $30 electronic ac-cess (included in dues).

PPPPPostmasterostmasterostmasterostmasterostmasterSend address changes to Danbury AreaComputer Society, Inc., 4 Gregory Street,Danbury, CT 06810-4430.

Editorial CommitteeEditorial CommitteeEditorial CommitteeEditorial CommitteeEditorial CommitteeManaging Editor: Richard TeasdaleProduction Editor: Allan Ostergren

Bill Saturno APCUG [email protected]

IN THIS ISSUEPRESIDENT’S FILE 2DIRECTORS’ NOTES 3HELPLINE 3REVIEW: E-MAIL & SOCIAL MEDIA 4PREVIEW: THE INTERNET OF THINGS 5DACS WINS NEWSLETTER AWARD 5SIG NEWS & NOTES 6OCTOBER CALENDAR 7TWITTER FOR SENIORS 8BUCKT MILAM CARTOON 8ASK DACS 9FUTURE EVENTS 12

President’s File

CopyrightCopyrightCopyrightCopyrightCopyright

ContributorsContributorsContributorsContributorsContributorsCharles Bovaird Richard CorzoDrew Kwashnak Lisa LeifelsRob Limbaugh Dave MawdsleyBruce Preston Bill SaturnoJim Scheef Annette van Ommeren Andy Woodruff

General meeting

THANK YOU, ELLEN WILLIAMS, fora terrific presentation on “Email and

Social Engagement” last month. The pre-sentation got veryhigh ratings fromthe surveys col-lected after themeeting. It wasvery informative,with you sharingyour expert knowl-edge on the topicand comparing theeffectiveness of

different flavors of social media and their tar-get audiences. It was apparent from all thequestions you answered afterward that it wasa very engaging presentation. We wouldlove to have you back again next year.

Once again we had an excellent presen-tation that the vast majority of our mem-bers missed. Why? I really want to know.What will draw you away from your day-to-day activities to participate in an enlight-ening, informative and educational presen-tation? You have the opportunity to inter-act with experts in their fields at our gen-eral meetings, something you don’t get byreading about them or watching videos. Ifit is the meeting topic that is holding youback then please let the program commit-tee know your suggestions. Better still, ifyou have listened to a speaker recently ona topic you think might interest the group,please send information about it [email protected] so we can look into it.This is your group and we are working hardto make it beneficial to you.

DACS 25th year anniversarypreparation underway

We are in the midst of making prepara-tions for the 25th anniversary of the Danbury

Area Computer Society. Bruce Preston madean excellent suggestion at a recent Boardmeeting: that we put together a commemora-tive CD of all 25 years of past newsletters.Another suggestion was to present a timelineof what has happened in the computer in-dustry linked to DACS events and mile-stones during that time. Photographs andvideos of DACS events might also be col-lected on this CD. What are your recollec-tions and suggestions? Can you rememberanything that stands out in your mind? Whatevent(s) would be fun to celebrate next yearand at the same time get our name out to thepublic? Share your thoughts with us [email protected].

Public RelationsEvery month we send notices to all the

local newspapers but only a few bother topublish our general meeting announcements.If you have any suggestions on how to bet-ter publicize our events to the general pub-lic, please offer your thoughts [email protected].

There is something every one of you cando to boost attendance and possibly in-crease membership. Spread the word. Tell afriend or neighbor or coworker about us.Everybody that has a smart phone, tablet, orcomputer will walk away from our generalmeetings a little smarter and empowered toget more from their devices. Go forth andevangelize!

Thank YouI am grateful that many of you have

stepped up to do what needs to be donemonth after month. Our entire Board of Di-rectors does a lot behind the scenes as doour committees, SIG leaders, and many ofour members. I try to acknowledge your con-tributions when I can. This month I am happyto recognize Drew Kwashnak who has notjust joined the Civi development team buthas taken the lead to integrate CiviCRM andWordPress in an organized manner. This issignificant to expand ‘members only’ ben-efits on our website and allow you to updateyour own information eventually.

Open Opportunities DACS meeting ambassador and

Greeter. Two months ago Cathy Quarantaassisted Bob Green and learned the processso that Bob has been able to pass-the-torchto her. She has suggested several membersshould step up to greet attendees on a rotat-ing basis. Why don’t you ask her how youcan help when you check in at our next gen-eral meeting or send email [email protected] and let us knowyou would be happy to help out. Thanks.

http://www.dacs.org Oct 2014 • 3

DACS GENERAL NUMBER: (203) 744-9198PRESIDENT: Richard Gingras [email protected]

VICE PRESIDENT PROGRAMS: [email protected]: Bruce Preston • TREASURER: Bert Goff

Officers

HelpLineHelpLineHelpLineHelpLineHelpLine

[email protected]

Richard Corzo (203) 797-1518 [email protected]

Richard Gingras (203) 426-1780 [email protected]

Bert Goff (860) 355-8895 [email protected]

Lisa Leifels (203) 416-6642 [email protected]

Bruce Preston (203) 431-2920 (days) [email protected]

Jim Scheef (860) 355-0034 [email protected]

Bill Saturno (203) 437-0611 [email protected]

Richard Teasdale (203) 794-6170 [email protected]

Andy Woodruff (203) 744-9588 [email protected]

CommitteesNEWSLETTER: Richard Teasdale: [email protected],

PROGRAM: [email protected]

WEB MASTERS: Richard Corzo ([email protected]), (203) 797-1518

Annette van Ommeren ([email protected]), (914) 232-0149

PRESS RELEASES: Richard Teasdale ([email protected])

APCUG LIAISON: Bill Saturno (203) 437-0611

MEMBERSHIP COORDINATOR: Charles Bovaird: [email protected]

RESOURCE CENTER: (203) 748-4330 • WEB SITE: http://www.dacs.org

Our former telephone HelpLine has been replaced by our web-based DACSCommunity Forum at http://forum.dacs.org. We have topic-specific forums whereDACS members can post questions. Questions may be answered by SIG leadersor other DACS members. If none of the categories fit your question, just post it tothe Ask DACS forum.

Topic Forum

.NET Programming ASP.Net and C#VB.Net SIG

Digital cameras/scanners/image processing Digital Imaging SIG

Content Management Systems Drupal SIG

Linux Linux SIG

Mac and iPhone/iPad/iPod touch Apple SIG

PC maintenance PC Maintenance SIG

Smartphones & Tablets Mobile Devices SIG

Virtual machine software Virtual Computing SIG

Desktop publishing and website design Web Site Design SIG

Windows Windows SIG

Directors’ Notes

A meeting of your board of directors washeld on Wednesday, September 3, 2014.

Attending were Dick Gingras, Andy Woo-druff, Lisa Leifels, Bill Saturno, RichardTeasdale, Richard Corzo., Bruce Preston, JimScheef, Bert Goff.

The meeting was called to order at 7:15PM. The minutes of the last meeting wereaccepted.

TTTTTrrrrreasureasureasureasureasurer’er’er’er’er’s Rs Rs Rs Rs ReeeeeporporporporportttttNote: To conserve space in the minutes,henceforth, only current activity is shownin minutes. The report distributed to theboard includes year-to-date items thathad no activity in the current month.

Balance on hand 8/1/2014 $3,403.12

INCOME: Dues

Check/Cash (5x$30+2x$45) $240.00PayPal $135.00

less PayPal fees - $5.12 Dues Subtotal: $369.88 Total Income $369.88

EXPENSES CT State Registration (annual) $50.00General Meeting Supplies $6.29

General Meeting Subtotal: $6.29Newsletter:

Postage & Supplies $41.30Printing $78.00

Newsletter Subtotal: $119.30Renewal Postcard Postage

& Supplies $8.84Resource Center:

Phone & Internet $71.94Security (4x/yr)/Keys $74.85

Resource Center Subtotal:$146.79

If you are already using social mediaand have suggestions for how we can useit to create better word of mouth marketingfor DACS events, please contact me [email protected] . We need to seize this op-portunity to entice more potential membersto experience DACS.

Would you be interested in learningmore about a topic but don’t see a SIG for it?Do you want to start a Special Interest Group(SIG) or workshop? We could be utilizingour Resource Center much more and thereare many available time slots available.Please send a message to [email protected] you are interested in attending.

From mobile to desktop, we inform, en-lighten, and educate.

– Dick Gingras, President

Directors’ Notes, Cont. on page 10


Meeting Review

E-mail & Social Media MarketingBy Richard Teasdale

AT THE DACS SEPTEMBER 2014general meeting, Ellen Williamsgave us an overview of the advan-

tages of using e-mail and social media forsales and marketing. Ellen, a regional de-velopment director for Constant Contact,is an expert on the subject.

Constant Contact, based in Waltham,Mass., is a softwaremaker in the field ofContact Manage-ment, which in-cludes E-mail mar-keting, Event regis-trations, Manage-ment of offers, deals,and promotions,and Online surveys.

With the help ofinformation technol-ogy, marketing andsales are more focused now than they werein the past. Whereas “filling the pipeline”was once the goal, today’s marketing ismuch more precisely targeted to actual andpotential customers. Ellen explained how asophisticated marketing strategy empha-sizes maintaining contact with customersinstead of just inundating them with e-mails. A smart company uses good serviceto “wow” prospects and entice them to stayin touch, engaging them in a conversation.This is done through the use of e-mail andsocial media such as Facebook, Twitter,Pinterest, etc.

Social media have the potential to mag-nify the impact of a marketing message.When a Facebook user shares it, or a Twit-ter user re-tweets it, they are acting as anexternal sales force for the original senderand imparting social visibility to the mar-keter. E-mail and social media are reallygeared to growing a business.

Ellen described for us four essential el-ements of digital marketing: Getting Found,Engage & Nurture, Campaigns & Drive Ac-tion, and Analytics.

Getting Found means everything thatenhances visibility and discoverability, e.g.having a website, using listing services, do-ing search engine optimization (SEO), andensuring good visibility on mobile devices.

Engage & Nurture is the process of es-tablishing a dialog with customers and pros-pects. It includes getting permission to en-gage with people by e-mail, in accordancewith CAN-SPAM and CASL, and the cre-

ation of loyalty programs. (CAN-SPAM isthe federal legislation, enacted in 2003,which established national standards forthe sending of commercial e-mail. CASL isthe equivalent law in Canada.)

Campaigns and Drive Action is thephase in which a marketing campaign isexecuted, using software tools of the type

produced by ConstantContact.

Last but not least isAnalytics, which mea-sures the effectivenessof a campaign and en-ables it to be fine-tuned. Information in-cludes what proportionof e-mails were read,and how many were“clicked through” toweb pages. Marketers

will want to refine their message as muchas possible via e-mails and social mediabefore making the financial commitment ofgoing to print.

Ellen gave us a short tutorial on how toconstruct and send marketing e-mails. Thehighlights included:

• Many e-mails are sent in the form of anewsletter, which typically contains a logo,content, and links.

• Create good content by focusing onwhat you know that recipients don’t. Shareexpertise and provide links to good infor-mation.

• Less is more. More than 50% of e-mails are now opened on mobile devices -they must be short and to the point. Themost important information should be intext. Put flyers and other images some-where on the web and link to them. Mobileis critical.

• People do one of three things whenthey receive an e-mail: 1. read it immedi-ately, or 2. save it to read later, or 3. deleteit. The sender should aim for 1. because 2.is a “well-intentioned never”.

• People decide what to do based onwho the e-mail is from and the contents ofthe subject line. Ensure that the sender isclearly recognizable. Ensure that your iden-tity (branding & images) is consistentacross platforms: e-mail and social media.

• In the subject line - follow the “222”rule: you have 2 seconds, in the first 2words of the subject line, to entice peopleto read the e-mail today.

• When to send - recommendation:send to one third of recipients on each ofthree different days of the week. Look atthe results. After the best day has beenchosen, send the next mailing at three dif-ferent times of day. Again look at the re-sults to choose the best time of day.

• Identify links by underlining text in-stead of using buttons so that recipientsrecognize them as links. Remember that im-ages get clicked on also, so make sure thatthey link to something. Put logos left ofcenter because that’s where they are ex-pected to be. Don’t make people hunt forthe reason you sent them an e-mail, i.e. putyour message high enough so that theydon’t have to scroll down to read it. Also,don’t give them too many action choices.Test the mailing on yourself before send-ing it to the audience.

• Use Constant Contact or one of itscompetitors to help you adhere to theserules.

Ellen devoted much of the remainder ofher talk to the value of using social mediafor marketing purposes and recommenda-tions for how to use e-mail and social me-dia together.

Online social media were used by 10%of people in 2008. Last year (2013), it was87%. People are looking for things on so-cial media. Your competitors are on socialmedia. If you’re not using social media,you’re missing out on an opportunity tocommunicate. The first users of social me-dia were cave men. Their drawings taughtothers things like: “I can kill this, using thistool, over here.”. The audience “re-tweeted” by drawing the same message forothers. Your customers’ friends are yournext great prospects. Social media sharingtakes advantage of this rule because theessence of it is the sharing of information.

Ellen taught us to re-purpose and re-use content. We don’t have to come upwith new things all the time. So long aswe’re there regularly, people will begin toexpect us again. Consistency is importantwith social media.

A quick overview of the important so-cial media platforms from a marketing per-spective:

• Pictures are useful forms of social me-dia and can be very powerful. AlthoughInstagram and Pinterest were designed tofocus on pictures, other platforms, e.g.Facebook, can often have more impact withpictures than with words.

• Most Google+ users are “techies”.Google+ has much functionality that helpswith SEO.

• Facebook is popular mostly for per-sonal use but a Facebook business page

Meeting Review, Cont. on page 10


The Internet of Things by Richard Corzo

Meeting Preview

IF YOU HAVEN’T HEARD the term“Internet of Things (IoT)” before, youprobably will soon. We’re all used to

accessing the Internet from a computer andnow our smartphones and tablets. You mayeven have your home theater equipment,such as a DVR, Blu-ray player, or videostreaming device set up to access theInternet through your home network. Butsoon other devices in our household, suchas our thermostat, will be accessing the

Internet to pullinformation thatenables them to runmore intelligently.Home automationis soon to becomemore common-place, and not justto be found in BillGates’s house.

A lot of compa-nies are starting tolook closely at thisarea. Apple is just

now releasing their HomeKit framework iniOS 8 to enable home automation develop-ers to connect their accessories to youriPhone or iPad. You might soon be able totell your iOS device, “Time for bed,” and itcan send commands that lock your doors,dim your lights, and adjust your thermo-stat. In January Samsung announced itsown platform for the smart home. Microsoftthinks this technology is going to be of in-terest to business by connecting devicesand sensors to business intelligence tools.And you know Google is in on this, too. See“Google Is Making A Land Grab For TheInternet Of Things.”

Our speaker this month, Steven Posickof ESPN, is an insider involved in this tech-nology. He says, “There are many compa-nies working on home automation and theInternet of Things. The [Society of MotionPicture and Television Engineers] SMPTEST2071 standard is the first internationalstandard that addresses the IoT space andtherefore will take some time before adop-tion spreads. It is being adopted within theProfessional Media industry and EclipseSmart Home is built around the core prin-ciples (we have been in active discussionswith the Eclipse Smart Home Project fromthe beginning of the Smart Home project).”Steve will discuss the concrete applicationsand how the work benefits people, fromhome automation, to improving their media

entertainment experience at home, to howthe ideas defined within the standard changethe way software is designed (keeping thathigh level).

Steven Posick is a veteran senior sys-tems architect, software engineer, networkengineer, computer/network security pro-fessional, and information & media tech-nology thought leader, with over 23 yearsof experience in Information Technologyand a 10+ year focus in Media Technol-ogy: Identity, Management, and Control.Steven is employed by ESPN, as Associ-ate Director, Production Workflow Appli-cation Development, having worked for thecompany for over 14 years. Steven is alsoa participating member of the Society ofMotion Picture and Television Engineers(SMPTE), having served as a working/drafting group chairperson and documenteditor for a number of Media Technologystandards, including the recently publishedSMPTE suite of standards on Media &Device Control over Internet Protocol Net-works (MDC) [SMPTE ST2071].

If you’re a software developer interestedin a more in depth look at the programmingdetails, Steven is preparing a more technicalpresentation, “The Control of Media & De-vices in an Internet of Things (Iot),” andaccompanying white paper for the 2014SMPTE Technical Conference & exhibitionon this topic. There Steven will discuss the

topic of Capability-based programming.Abstract. The “Internet of Things” (IoT)

refers to an Internet-like structure consist-ing of uniquely identified objects that exposeservices. These services are typically de-signed using traditional Object Orientedmethodologies that encourage the coales-cence of features into a single consolidatedview. This may work well for homogeneousenvironments but can be problematic for het-erogeneous environments, such as media con-trol systems, where objects may be modularand change their behavior dynamically atruntime. To better represent objects withinthese environments, and the IoT, the SMPTEST2071 standard allows objects to be de-scribed using sets of uniquely identified fea-tures, known as Capabilities. Capabilitiescan be used in much the same way as build-ing blocks to construct object behaviors andthe objects can change their behavior dy-namically by changing the set of Capabili-ties exposed. In addition, the use of Capa-bilities also allows objects to be discoveredwithin the IoT by the features they support.

DACS meetings are usually held atDanbury Hospital auditorium. (Go towww.dacs.org to find directions and parkinginformation). Doors open at 6:30 p.m. for reg-istration and casual networking. Meetingsstart at 7:00 p.m. with a Q&A period (AskDACS), followed by announcements and ashort break. The featured presentation beginsat 8:00 p.m. The meeting is scheduled to ad-journ at 9:30 p.m.

DACS General Meetings are free and opento the public. Members and prior attendeesare encouraged to extend invitations to any-one interested in this topic.

DACS founding (and current) president, Dick Gingras joins production editor, AllanOstergren, founding editor, Marc Cohen and managing editor, Richard Teasdaleto show off the 2014 award for Best Newsletter from APCUG, a worldwide associa-tion of user groups. DACS.DOC will soon celebrate its 25th anniversary.


Special Interest Groups

SIG NOTES: October 2014SIG NOTES: October 2014SIG NOTES: October 2014SIG NOTES: October 2014SIG NOTES: October 2014Apple. Focuses on all aspects of the Mac and iPhoneoperating systems.Contact: Richard Corzo ([email protected]).Meets 2nd Tuesday, 7 p.m. at DACS Resource Center.Next Meeting: Oct 14

Digital Imaging. All about digital cameras, retouching, andprinting using various programs.[Note: Ken Graff is relocating in Florida. We are consideringoptions to continue the SIG as a virtual video connection. Pleasecheck in for updates.]

Drupal. Covers all things on Drupal, the open sourcecontent management system (CMS).Contact: Jim Scheef ([email protected]).Meets on the second Thursday at 7:00 p.m. at the DACSResource Center, or go to the DACS Community Forum(http://www.dacs.org/forum/) within the Members only area.Next meeting: Look for future announcements.

Jobs. Networking and jobs searchContact: Charles Bovaird, 203-792-7881 (aam@ mags.net).Go to DACS Community Forum (http://forum.dacs.org forjob listings.

Linux. Helps in installing and maintaining the Linux operatingsystem. Also of interest to Apple owners using OS X.

Contact: Dave Mawdsley, [email protected] 3rd Wednesday, 7:30 p.m. at the DACS Resource Center.Next Meeting: Oct 15

Mobile Devices/Windows 8. Focuses on smartphones, tab-lets, and e-readers of all makes and models.

Contact: Richard Corzo and Jim Scheef ([email protected])

Meets 4th Thursday 7 p.m. at the DACS Resource Center

Next Meeting: Oct 23

PC Maintenance. Review of PC hardware and OpSysmaintenance and use.Contact: Charles Bovaird, 203-792-7881 (aam@ mags.net).Go to DACS Community Forum (http://forum.dacs.org).

Server. Explores Back Office server and client applica-tions, including Win NT Servers and MS Outlook. SIG ison hiatus and presently merged into the Drupal SIG.Contact: Jim Scheef ([email protected]), or goto the DACS Community Forum: http://www.dacs.org/fo-rum/, within the Members-only area

Web Design and DTP. Learn how to work with HTML,CSS, CMS Systems, WordPress, SEO and more.Contact: Annette van Ommeren ([email protected]).Meets 3rd Tuesday, 7-9 p.m. at the DACS Resource Center.Next Meeting: Oct 21

SIG News & Events

SIG Notes, Cont. on page 11

Apple. Turnout for the September 9th meeting was high, withkeen interest in discussing Apple’s announcements. As pre-dicted, two iPhones were announced, an iPhone 6 with a 4.7”screen and an iPhone 6 Plus with a 5.5” screen. The startingconfiguration for either one is the usual 16GB of storage, butthen the other two capacities being offered are 64GB and 128GBinstead of 32GB and 64GB. There is an improved camera witheven better ability in low light conditions, and a higher frame ratefor even slower slow motion effects. The 6 Plus has opticalimage stabilization.

Apple also announced an Apple Watch (not the expectedname “iWatch”) which will be available early next year in twoscreen sizes. The watch will require an iPhone to pair it with andreceive notifications—calls, text messages, etc.—that come into the phone.

To me the most interesting announcement was a mobilepayment system called Apple Pay. It relies on a new NFC (nearfield communication) chip in either the new iPhone or the AppleWatch. Tapping the merchant’s pay terminal will complete thetransaction. Authentication on the iPhone involves using the TouchID built into the Home button. The Apple Watch monitors forcontinuous contact with a person’s wrist after initially entering aPIN code. It’s not necessary to reenter it for each transaction.

I also mentioned a couple of good YouTube tech reviewers:Marques Brownlee’s MKBHD (https://www.youtube.com/user/marquesbrownlee) and Jonathan Morrison’s TLD Today (https:/

/www.youtube.com/user/tldtoday). The latter has an especiallyfunny parody of Apple’s typical announcements, Meet the iPhone6 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EePrfd9HnI).

I had mentioned having some trouble with my Wi-Fi athome, so I showed everyone a Mac program WiFi Explorer(http://www.adriangranados.com/) that shows the channels be-ing used by nearby Wi-Fi networks (you and your neighbors).Interference can occur if your network overlaps or coincideswith your neighbor’s. Jim mentioned that the default channelfor wireless G networks is channel 6. If you decide to change itin your router’s settings, go all the way to channel 1 or channel11. Otherwise there will be some overlap.

—Richard Corzo

Linux SIG Bits September Report of the Meeting at the DACSResource Center [Next Linux SIG meeting: Oct. 15th at 7:30 PM]

Tonight’s meeting session included three presentations:

1. Report on the FOSSCON Conference in Philadelphia in August,

2. Helping Solve a Molecular Biology DNA Problem-Discussion,and 3. Using a Raspberry Pi with a camera, a garage door sen-sor, and an interactive web application to open or close the door.

1. Report on the FOSSCON in Philadelphia in August (FreeOpen Source Software Conference—FOSSCON)

FOSSCON (http://fosscon.us/) met at the Franklin Institute, whichis Philadelphia’s very popular museum and worth a visit just to


October 2014Danbury Area Computer Society

General Meeting7:00 PM

Web Design& DTP

Annettevan Ommeren7:00 - 9:00 PM

[email protected]

Linux7:30 -9:30 PMDave Mawdsley

[email protected]

Apple7:00 PM

Richard [email protected]

Board ofDirectors7:00 PM

Mobile Devices7:00 PM

Jim Scheef &Richard Corzo

[email protected]

Digital Imaging7:00 PM

Ken Graff203 648-9747

[email protected] for UpdatesCheck for UpdatesCheck for UpdatesCheck for UpdatesCheck for Updates

DACS.DOCDeadline

MembershipCommittee

7:00 PMJim Scheef

860-355-0034


YOU'VE NEVER USED TWITTER. Yousay you're too old for Twitter…it'sonly for kids, and you could care

less about reading what Lady Gaga had forlunch today. So obviously, Twitter is notfor you. Wrong! If these are your thoughtsabout Twitter, I can say with authority thatTwitter is not what you think.

Twitter does not exist totell you what a celebrity hadfor lunch, or what thethoughts are of the singerwho was just voted thisyear's American Idol (thoughthey might tweet this infor-mation). Twitter is a handyway to break news, shareknowledge, and refer peopleto longer forms of communication.

Here's some great examples of how I useTwitter. Where we live, in Tellico Village (agolfing and boating community in East Ten-nessee), the demographic is very much re-tired and very much over the age of 60, andsome of the most important information wereceive each day comes via Twitter. Updatesfrom our three golf courses regarding whethercarts are on the path or not; what the flagpositions are; are any holes under repair;status of last night's storm damage…and thelist goes on. The golf course superintendentspost these tweets very early in the morningso the hundreds of golfers here know whatto expect as they start their day on the links.

Twitter is a free social networking andmicro-blogging service that enables its us-ers to send and read messages known astweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to140 characters displayed on the author's pro-file page and delivered to the followers.That's why information on Twitter is short,to the point and effective.

More than half the people I talk to aboutTwitter think they have to have a smartphoneto use it. Not so! You can access Twitter viaWeb, Desktop Applications andsmartphones. It costs nothing to use and it'sjust one more social media source, likeFacebook, that you won't know how muchyou needed it until you try it.

Twitter also has a built-in function foryou to befriend and track the messages ofother users. This is a simple way for youconnect with like-minded people outside ofyour usual circle. A Twitter association canbe developed into a long term acquaintance(if you desire).

If you do happen to have some famous

folks you like (singers, actors, golfers, etc.),Twitter is a wonderful way to unobtrusivelyfollow what they're up to. One of my per-sonal favorites is Brandt Snedeker, the pro-fessional golfer from Nashville. His life iscomedy of tweets that make me laugh al-most every day. Recently, he's been trying

to figure out how to win a warwith raccoons and his gar-bage can…and so far the rac-coons are winning!

As an individual, youhave a variety of interests thata single newspaper or maga-zine can't cover. With Twitteryou create your own personalnewsfeed. You can get smallbites information on local

events, celebrities, politicians, hobbies or in-terests, your favorite news sites, etc. Muchlike you read a newspaper by scanning theheadlines, on Twitter you can see short head-lines describing an article and you can de-cide if you want to click on the link to readthe rest of the story.

News is published on Twitter the instantit happens and if something big happensyou'll likely find out when someone you fol-low tweets about it. In fact, Twitter becamemore widely known after a user tweeted alink to a picture of the US Airways plane thatsuccessfully landed in the Hudson River.

Unlike traditional media where it is a one-way medium, you can be involved in Twitter.You can re-broadcast (re-tweet) the informa-tion you find valuable. You can comment on

issues and share your own views (withinthe 140-character constraint, of course).

You can quickly and directly contact lo-cal politicians, celebrities and other peopleyou don't know. You don't have to find outtheir address and compose a lengthy mes-sage, you can instantly let them know youropinion. These are people you will prob-ably never meet in real life but now you canget daily updates on their lives and theirinterests.

Public figures tend to have hundreds ofthousands, if not millions of followers andthey may not respond to a tweet, but theyoften do read their (most important) mes-sages because a 140 character tweet is easierto read quickly than a lengthy e-mail. Celeb-rities usually have an aide sift throughtweets and pass on only the ones they thinkare worth reading.

You can also use Twitter to quickly in-form friends and family about your daily life.You can tweet about things that aren't im-portant enough for an e-mail but somethingyou would mention to your friends if youbumped into them. You can also keep trackof what they are up to by following them (ifthey're on Twitter, of course). You may alsoconnect with other people with similar inter-ests and strike-up an online friendship.

In any event, much like Facebook orSkype, don't be afraid to give Twitter a try.It's free, nothing tracks you or your actions,and you might just find that it's fun! If it isn'tfor you…that's what the DELETE key is for.

LARRY MCJUNKIN hosts a website servingolder computer users. He is author of TheRetired Geek: Technical Tips for the Non-Technical "Over 50" Crowd, and can bereached at http://retiredgeek.net/.

This article is distributed for reprint by usergroups.

Twitter for SeniorsBy Larry McJunkin

Data Trails


Ask DACS

September 2014Moderated and reported by Jim Scheef

WE WELCOME QUESTIONS FROM the floor at the start of our GeneralMeetings. The role of moderator is to try to guide the discussion to a likelysolution to the problem.In addition, members who are not able to attend the

General meeting may submit questions to [email protected]. We will ask thequestion for you and post the reply in dacs.doc and on dacs.org. Please provide asmuch information as possible, since we can’t probe during the session.

Become a member and supportDACS. Each member has ac-cess to the Community Forum,where they can post questions,the online newsletter in PDFform, group related news viaemail, SIG meetings, online fo-rums, and any group-only relatedevents, promotions, or activities.There is also an option to receivea mailed newsletter. For infor-mation on how to join DACS,http://dacs.org/joining-dacs/.

Membership hasits Privileges!

Q – I have a new cable modem fromCharter that I cannot install. Thedevice is an Arris TM822. Whenconnected to the incoming cable, themodem does not get an IP address. Hasanyone else had this problem?

A – A member suggested connectingdirectly to the cable modem without anyrouter. This will make it easier toconfigure the device. Newer cablemodems include router (and sometimesWi-Fi) functionality which cancomplicate a home network that goesbeyond “the basics.” Charter’s list ofofficially supported modems is here ontheir website (tinyurl.com/3uvfl2t). YourArris is listed. The key in this case islikely that Charter has not added thedevice to your account. Until thedevice’s RF (radio frequency) MAC(media access control) address isrecognized by Charter’s network,nothing will happen when you connectit to the incoming coaxial cable. Thesolution is to call Charter support andtell them you have a new cable modem.When they add the new device, theywill remove the old one so the old cablemodem becomes a door stop.

Q – A friend has a new laptop that usesface recognition software (FRS) asthe means to log in to the computer.This is the only account on the systemand s/he is concerned about how itwill work, or if it will conflict withother user accounts on the samemachine. They would like to add asecond user account and have thataccount use a conventional useridand password to authenticate. Is thispossible?

A – At the meeting no one had anyexperience with FRS as a means toauthenticate a login. The onlyexperience I can draw on is fromlaptops, such as IBM ThinkPads of a

few years ago, that had a fingerprintscanner. This feature did not restrictmultiple accounts in any way. I neversaw anyone try to configure more thanone account on a single machine touse fingerprint authentication, so I donot know if that was possible,however, second accounts withconventional passwords workedwithout any problems and I expect thatthis case will be the same. Anothermember made the point that for remotelogin to work, even the account usingFRS must have a regular password.

Q – There have been news items aboutthe next version of Windows thatmost people are calling “WindowsNine”. Rumors are that this newversion will look more like Win7 andsome pundits are recommending thatpeople wait for the new versionrather than use Win8. What havepeople heard?

A – Richard summed things up prettywell saying that it is very early tospeculate about how Win9 might look,but the consensus is that it will bemore “desktop friendly”. The other bigrumor is that Win9 will be free. Exactlywhat “free” means is subject to furtherspeculation. The press release fromMicrosoft that is generating all this isthe coming release of the initialdevelopers’ version. This release goesonly to software developers registeredwith Microsoft so developers canbegin testing existing software withthe new operating system. Publicavailability is likely to be more than ayear away, so I recommend everybodycontinue to breathe normally.

Q – How can one get Google Chrometo shut down completely when it isclosed?

A – This is one of those questions we

can investigate, but never reallyanswer. At the meeting, I startedChrome, noted the running processes(four with two tabs open) and thenclosed the browser. It seemed toterminate all of the processes on mymachine. Your mileage may vary dueto configuration options and anyinstalled add-ons.

Q – Google Chrome has an option inYouTube to change the playbackspeed of a video (as does IE butFirefox offers only a quality option).Does anyone know of a way to speedup the playback of C-SPAN videos asthe option does not exist for C-SPANin Chrome?

A – The playback options offered inYouTube do not seem to exist on C-SPAN. I checked both Firefox and IE.Members offered some (garbled)suggestions at the meeting. There aremany programs that can capturesteaming video and save it as a file onyour machine. Once on disk, VLCMedia Player can vary the playbackspeed as desired.

[Disclaimer: Ask DACS questionscome from members by email or from theaudience attending the general meeting.Answers are suggestions offered bymeeting attendees and represent a con-sensus of those responding. DACS of-fers no warranty as to the correctness ofthe answers, and anyone followingthese suggestions or answers does soat their own risk. In other words, wecould be totally wrong!]


Total Expenses $331.22Balance on hand 8/31/2014 $3,441.78Bank Balance $3,341.54PayPal Balance $100.24Confirmed Balance $3,441.78Ending Balance onHand,

7/31/2014: $3,403.12Bank Balance $3,232.76PayPal Balance $170.36Confirmed Balance $3,403.12

Announcements:

Generic business cards are available toeveryone who will at any time be evangeliz-ing DACS, which includes everyone on theBoard and other active members.

Old BusinessSolicit more suggestions for 25th year

celebratory events and preparation. -Only 4 months away! Great ideas lastmonth about commemorative DVD ofnewsletters, videos, Industry timelinesof events, DACS milestones, etc. - Brucewill generate industry milestone list. Jimwill gather online DACS.DOCs back to1998. Bill S. will do scanning of old docu-ments. Dick G. will see if Marc still hasold PageMaker files. Bert identified viaCT secretary of state that our registra-tion was August 1990.

We need to list all of DACS assetsand replacement costs. Bert, Jim, Charlie- due end October.

Bert will provide Dick G. with list ofvarious electronic accounts.

Discussion of how to promote DACS,primarily to grow membership

• "Amazon Smile" click-through pro-gram for non-profits has been activated.

• PayPal "Donate" button - Bert Goffand Richard C. will implement.

• Microsoft Matching Gifts program -We can get $17/hr for time worked byMS employees, such as leading a SIG.

• See if we can get Tom to start a so-cial media SIG

• Do some of the social media recom-mendations made at the Sept. GM.

• Increase Meetup activity, includingpostings by board members

• Non-local membership promotion• Webinars? Multi-camera recording

of meetings, then post-production edit-ing and publish. Do well before JohnPatrick's presentation, it would be a goodone to release (with his approval of ed-its, etc. and release approval etc.)

• Joint venture with CandlewoodCamera group?

Bert will look into "trip and fall" typeinsurance for group events etc. Suggestgoing to an independent agent. Jim be-lieves that our current carrier is the onlyone offering appropriate plan.

As it stands now CiviCRM integrationwith our website may not occur until afterOctober and may take several months to ac-complish. Jim says that he tried but disquali-fied the 'free' SSL certificate that is offeredby Bluehost. He will look into StartSSL.Andy and Drew are interested in joining Jimand Richard C. in the CiviCRM project. Teamwill set up a 'sandbox' environment support-ing the Wordpress/CiviCRM combination..

Bill Saturno talked about rate card,and focused upon 'value added' ratherthan membership exposures. He cameup with several "sponsorship levels":

• "Friends of DACS" to replace businesscard - $35/year or $20/year as a member.

• One-Third Page ad in newsletter at $15/month, or annual commit to include bannerad on website, GM slideshow at $150/year.

• Half Page ad in newsletter, web sitebanner ad, slide-show ad, counter-top signat greeter's table - two transferable mem-berships (only with annual) $20/month,$200 annual.

• Full Page in newsletter, full slide,banner, desktop, 4 transferable (only w/annual), $40/month, $400 annual.

• Discussion suggested that we notdo transferable memberships as thatwould be difficult to maintain the re-

stricted access to site, SIGs etc. Change"banner ad" to "sponsorship" or "webad" — reason being it would be hard todo properly if we support mobile devicesetc. or have more than one due to screenreal-estate restrictions.

New BusinessThe card content needs to be altered

as it shouldn't have the Ives Manor ad-dress, and needs web-site [email protected] on it.

Annual Meeting preparation - Boardof Directors terms, candidates. We cur-rently have 9 board members, 5 seats willbe up for election, we have one memberwho will not be running in December.

Public Relations pushWeb site - share links with other sitesincluding SCORE, Hackerspace, Candle-wood Camera Club, area libraries,WestConn, John Patrick's website, otherGeneral Meeting presenters' websites,other user groups, etc.

Press release mailing statusOnly the Ridgefield, Newtown, and NewMilford papers are known to have pub-lished our press release. What can bedone to encourage more coverage? Nosuggestions forthcoming.

Meeting adjourned: 9:42 PM —Bruce Preston

Directors’ Notes, Cont. from page 3

can be very successful if it has a communi-cation style and content that doesn’t dis-rupt the personal news feed. As with allthe platforms, it’s all about building a com-munity around what you have to say.

• LinkedIn is strictly professional andis great for building online resumes.

• Twitter is very quick information thatgoes by very fast. Mutual following opensup doorways for private conversations.Hashtags are very useful, e.g. they allowTwitter to emulate chat rooms. The basicelements are a time, a day, and a topic. e.g.one could use a hashtag of “DACSQA”on Fridays at 3:00pm. Users who put thathashtag in their posts will see all other com-munications with the same hashtag. So oneperson could answer questions posted byothers about the chosen topic. This so-called “Twitter Chat” is very popular.

• Pinterest is a very popular vehicle forretail information because links to e-com-merce websites can be made directly fromposted images.

So, what are the next steps in socialmedia marketing? Amplify the impact of

Meeting Review, Cont. from page 4 your e-mails by using them together withsocial media. e.g. if distributing a news-letter, post it on social media and use alink in the e-mail to access it there. Thisapproach broadens the audience by al-lowing the newsletter to be accessed bypeople who follow you on social media,as well as by those to whom you sentthe e-mail. It also deepens the audiencebecause social media users tend to fol-low your posts more frequently than yousend them e-mails.

Constant Contact offers many tools, in-cluding third-party apps, to help with thecombined use of e-mails and social media.Lots of how-to information is availableonline via Constant Contact’s blogs andvideos - you don’t have to be a customerto use these. A 60-day free trial is available,which is full-featured except that there isno ability to send to large lists. Pricing isbased on the number of names on the listof contacts. Non-profits get the same prod-uct as everyone else but with discounts.

Ellen concluded the presentation witha question and answer session about Con-stant Contact.


SIG Notes, Cont. from page 6see exhibits. Attendees numbered in the low hundreds, butwith much enthusiasm and energy. The talk I liked best for this1-day conference was by Charlie Reisinger, IT manager of thePenn Manor School District in Lancaster, PA. (http://www.pennmanor.net/techblog) The district has a number ofschools, with 3500 students using Ubuntu laptops, completelyconfigured for student use with many of the popular programsthat Linux users tend to use. Students quickly become helpdesk assistants and leaders for the younger members of theschools.

This year’s FOSSCON drew about 250 attendees, whichturned out to be a nice advantage since lots of time could bespent after the talks one-on-one with the speakers, to engagewith questions and further ideas. Larger FOSS and Linux con-ferences I’ve attended tend to be overcrowded, with little timebetween talks to engage with the speakers and many peoplewishing to talk.

2. Helping to Solve a Molecular Biology DNA Problem — Alook at a new disease discovery tool (a look at using Pythonand Kalzium to help identify a DNA nucleotide distribution of adisease species).

In the ‘Scientific American’ June, 2014 edition, there was anarticle, “Germ Catcher”, which discussed rapid identification ofdisease species and subspecies by looking at the ratios ofadenine, guanine, cytosine and thymine in a sample strip ofDNA. The article motivated me to write and use a Python pro-gram to tease out the possible A, G, C, T ratios in a sample,using its molecular weight and the molecular weights of the fournucleotides. My program using the article’s data found a num-ber of possibilities from the calculations—each ratio pointing toa different animal or plant. Typically, species that are not closelyrelated have noticeably different ratios in their DNA. The ratiosare known for those species in which DNA has been studied.

I went on to explain some of the traditional difficulties ofdoing this time-consuming work in a lab: severely exacting mea-surements, the tight precision levels required and the continualfight to obtain funding. Consequently, any method to speed upthe process is welcome. I further explained my personal use ofa free chemistry program, Kalzium, to find molecular weights ofelements and molecules. A Linux distribution such as Ubuntuprovides a comfortable environment in which to study the math-ematics of nucleotide counting of a DNA sample, using a Pythonprogram and Kalzium.

3. Using a Raspberry Pi with a camera, a garage door sen-sor, and an interactive web application to open or close thedoor (a look at the code in C, Bash and PHP/HTML and theproject’s hardware)

Jim Ritterbusch showed his updated application to monitorhis garage doors via video, server, Internet and cell phone—allto open or close a garage door remotely as needed. His appli-cation showed a picture giving the current status of his garagedoor. He could then change it via his cell phone and the newphoto would show that the door had moved. His applicationalso used a radio configuration using a low-pass filter, whichwas also explained along with the circuitry used with the Rasp-berry Pi.

Jim showed much of the programming code required forthe camera mounted on a Raspberry Pi (modified C), Linuxcomputer (Bash), and Webserver (Bash, HTML, PHP) Thisneat package shows a glimpse of the $35 Raspberry Pi world,which is available for all computer users to experiment with.

Lastly, we turned our attention to an attendee wanting GNUAPL on a Linux computer. The recent GNU APL version appar-ently needs an up-to-date version of Ubuntu. The application wefound worked on an Ubuntu 14.04 laptop, but not on an Ubuntu10.04 tower. A dependency issue on the older computer couldnot be resolved. Some programmers might remember APL (“AProgramming Language”). An attempt will be made to upgradethe Ubuntu on the older computer. The user manual for GNUAPL is available on the Internet. (http://www.gnu.org/software/apl/apl.html)

Next Linux SIG Meeting

At the October 15th meeting, no new presentations are sched-uled as of the moment. However, attendees can certainly raisetopics and issues as they feel the need to do so. We will con-tinue to help with individuals migrating their older Windows com-puters to Linux. This typically is the Linux community’s normalway of sharing, which we mirror at our SIG.

Join us at our next meeting in the DACS Resource Center ofIves Manor. Bring your laptop, Arduino or Raspberry Pi and showus a thing or two. Our meetings are for the beginner, intermedi-ate or advanced user, so topics vary considerably dependingupon the needs of the attendees. Linux topics cover softwareand hardware along with the joys and sorrows of those using it.Check the DACS Forum (Linux) for updates.

—David Mawdsley

Let’s join heads!Do you have a special technologyinterest you would like to shareor learn more about? Joina DACS SIG or startone. You don’t haveto be a nerd or a guru—just have a cu-riosity for what’sout there and an in-terest in sharing or

discovering with others like you. Justsend an e-mail to dacsprez@

dacs.org, or talk to one ofour officers at the next

meeting, and saysomething like “Iwant to start a SIG!”or “Wouldn’t it benice if we had a SIGon . . .?”

Future Events:

dacs.docDanbury Area Computer Society65 Legion RdNew Milford, CT 06776

OctoberOctoberOctoberOctoberOctoberSteve Posick

The Control of Media &Devices in an Internet

of Things

NoNoNoNoNovvvvvemberemberemberemberemberBruce PrestonSecure Digital

Computing

DecemberDecemberDecemberDecemberDecemberTBD

When you come to the next DACS meeting,why not bring a friend?

Voice forJoanie

Help give thegift of speech

Call Frank Ruizat 203 770-6203

and become aVoice for Joanie

volunteerwww.voiceforjoanie.org

JJJJJanananananuaruaruaruaruaryyyyyTBD

october 2014 volume 25, issue 10 $2.00 next event:...

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