Emmett Will Speak at Bookstore

Next Saturday (August 23) at 11 a.m. PMUG member Emmett Buell will speak at the local Barnes & Noble Book Store. He will be discussing his recently published book, Attack Politics: Negativity in Presidential Campaigns Since 1960. Emmett didn't return from Washington, D.C. in time to attend yesterday's PMUG meeting. You'll be hearing more about Emmett in our newsletter, so stay tuned for further exciting developments.

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Art Takes Good Pictures

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New PMUG member Art Gorski takes good pictures. He’s just published 143 photos from his iPhoto picture albums and 2 iMovie videos to his MobileMe gallery directly from those iLife applications. http://gallery.me.com/agorski He’s got good looking relatives shown on still photos (those are all your relatives, Art?) but do not miss the narrated movie of his trip to the Grand Canyon. Thanks, Art, for the e-mail informing us of your latest fun with Mac.

Connie is Smiling

Connie (Kramer) Johnson had a big smile this morning as she showed us her new book, "Mr. Bunny's Secret Party." This delightful children's book has splashy bold art by local artist Clareen Barrett, and was published by Prescott's EMI PrintWorks. Their graphic designer, Nealy, spoke at length with me this afternoon about the services they offer. They use Mac computers for prepress and technical communication with the printers, and offer commercial design services, digital color press, and book binding. I invited them to attend PMUG, and hope to see them. Their site is www.emiprintworks.com.

But back to Connie. She is excited about opportunities to promote this new book, along with her first book, Farm Kids. and we'll be seeing more of this busy gal soon. Find my earlier item about Connie in the June 2 newsletter, headed "Starting Off June." Connie attends my Writers' Networking group which meets weekly in Prescott Valley. You can contact her at clotheslinepress@earthlink.net.

Ginger Appreciates Her Mac

Our Cookie Break gal, Ginger Carlson appreciates her Mac. I've prodded her to tell how she uses Mac, and this is her report:

My Mac creds go back to sometime in the 80s (Jobs was barely out of his garage) when a friend let me use an extra Mac he had. I don't remember what it was called but the monitor had to be maybe 6 x 6 inches or so, (David probably still has one) and, to me, that was the most magical thing I'd ever got my hot little hands on! Way better than the typewriter I had at the time that let me see the the first two lines of type in a little window that I actually could make corrections on before committing it to paper. And for me, not being a typist, and having a very close relationship with Whiteout (remember Whiteout?) when I did have to type something that, too, was magical. But being able to scroll up and down on that first little Mac and see a WHOLE PAGE, well, it couldn't get any better than that!

Fast forward to 2008, and I still think my Mac is magical. It allows me to do what it took several people many days to do BC (before computers). In those days everything had to be designed by sitting down at a drawing board and actually drawing it out (that's what I did) whether it was an ad, a billboard, a booklet, a sign, whatever. There were copy writers, type setters, printers (for whom color percentages had to be specified), artists, paste up people, go-fers, etc. and then someone (me) had to coordinate it all. Today I can just sit down at my magical Mac (an iMac G5 with Leopard) and zip something out!

So what do I do now on the computer besides email and surfing the Web? Well, I do a volunteer newsletter for YRMC that goes out to over 900 people (and other hospitals). And with Dan's help and iWeb, about a third of those folks now get their newsletter on line, which saves the hospital a ton on paper, postage and printing. We publish a newsletter approximately every quarter and they range from 12 to 16 pages. I use Adobe's InDesign and now that Photoshop Elements has come out with a decent Mac version, I'll be buying and using that, too.

Doing the newsletter is interesting and fun to do, and allows me, in a small way, to keep my hand in the print business which I still find enormously satisfying.

PMUG meeting, 7-19, part 2

Thanks to Bobbie Pastor, PMUG secretary for the "rest of the story." Attending the meeting were 25 members, 6 guests, and a guest speaker, Ellen Tyler. Her topic was "Demystifying Resolution in Digital Photos," both a PowerPoint Presentation and Q & A. She shared a lot of information and will schedule to come back and further address this subject. New officers started this month: Jim Hamm, president, Roger Lakner, vice president; David Passell, treasurer; and Bobbie Pastor, secretary. We now have a supply of new brochures, thanks to Think4Ink. (Note on the calendar that PMUG will go back to the 10 a.m. time next month.)

Apple Store Opens on Saturday

The Grand Opening of the Apple store in Glendale Arrowhead Mall is this Saturday, July 26 from 10 a.m. until 9 p.m. Check out the info at http://www.apple.com/retail/arrowhead/. Thanks, Derek Collins, for bringing this to our attention. Derek mentions he'd like to go, but would need a ride. Contact him at mailto:derekpcollins@gmail.com. If you do make it down to the Grand Opening we'd love to hear about the store at our next PMUG meeting on August 16.

Is It Raining There?

That talented couple, Erica and Dan Simpson can show you what the weather is! From the PMUG site click on About Us. There click on SIG. When Dan's Miracle Max site comes up click on Weather. Amazing!

Or, go to www.wunderground.com/ and then type in Prescott or Prescott Valley in the Search box at the top of the left side. Up comes the weather report. Scroll down to the Weather Stations. Click on Meadowridge, Prescott AZ and up comes the weather statistics, graphs, history from Dan's back yard. On the right side of that page is a map of Prescott Weather Stations. Now we can know if it's raining before we go to SIG.

SIG Sounds Fun

Did you see Dan's SIG announcement? This Saturday, 7-12-08, brings an "old-fashioned, free-for-all Q & A session." He and Erica have been snowed-under (now there's a thought for a warm July afternoon!) and additionally promise us a tour of "what has been keeping us so busy." Come with your computer questions. Go to the PMUG home page, then to About Us. Click on SIG and here's where you click to RSVP to Dan; Erica will know how many goodies to set out, and you'll then be entered for the monthly drawing.

Take Any Good Photos Lately?

Help is on the way! Ellen Tyler will help us all, amateur or competent and confident user of digital photos. Look at this intro. . .

Trouble emailing or printing your digital photos? Confused by the "quality" settings on your camera? What the heck is resolution? How much is enough? How much is too much?

Ellen's presentation will explore the different kinds (yep, there's more than one) of resolution and how to manipulate them for your own purposes. Your images will speed more quickly across the Internet and show better onscreen. You'll get better prints, too.

The session will also take you through her Eight Basic Steps for correcting images in Adobe Photoshop or Elements, and can be used in similar photo editing programs.

On July 19 from 1 to 3 (yes, note that time change this month!) we'll gather for information and socialization with PMUG members and visitors. Come, expecting to have fun!

Norman's Jobs Were Interesting!

Today's e-mail from new member Norman Foster fills us in with some fascinating facts about jobs he's held.  He writes, "I can't say any of my many jobs have been uninteresting.  I worked in Air Force Ground Communications Maintenance for 23 years.  My assigned specialty was data and voice encryption.  A fascinating field, there was always new equipment and methods to learn.  At Offutt AFB we put the voice and data ciphony equipment on six "Flying Command Post" (Looking Glass) aircraft.  As my assignments took me to other stations I lost track of that project.  I know that for well over 10 - 15 years at least one of those planes was "On Station" (in the air) 24/7.

After AF retirement I took a position in the Utica, NY GE Component Lab.  That was like going to the playground every day.  Run life tests on new electronic components.  Take units that had failed, open them up and determine how and why they had failed.  Record the results using microphotography, X-rays and oscilloscopes.  All that fun and got paid too.
Still there was more out there.  It was 1971 and what was the big new challenge:  COMPUTERS. Off I went to Mohawk Data Sciences in East Herkimer, NY.  Eight years as a Quality Control Engineer, testing and making small changes to all of our units to improve the reliability of the complete system.  We lacked one thing:  a computer program to prove that certain units needed improved design.  The Corporate Programming section said,  "Sorry, it has nothing to do with personnel or finances."
Guess who got the job of learning to program and build a computerized manufacturing control system?  Our programming language was MOBOL.  More fun; that was an in-house combination of Basic and Cobol.  It was very good for the task, but there was no text books and not a lot of documentation.
So what was my most interesting job?  In 1983 (remember that was only two years after the IBM PC was put on the market)  Management said the PCs were Tinker Toys and we would continue to build real computers!  We did need to automate more to improve costs.  Let's build a station to final test and burn in a finished system just before it is shipped to the customer.  This phase was called the BLESS cycle and took two technicians from two to four days to complete.  
Our team was a Test Equipment Engineer for the mechanical interface, a Software Engineer to program the interface code (low level drivers and a transmission protocol) and I had the job of programming the control and logging system in MOBOL.  It took us 8 months, and we had a working station that did the task very well on one shippable system.  To be real cost effective we could not have a test station of each shipping system, so it was back to work to extend one test station to take multiple systems that might be started at random times.
Two months into this second phase it  became apparent to Management that the Tinker Toy boys were winning, and that our company was coming apart.  A week before Thanksgiving 1984 was the bitter end.  Even if I did not see it to the finish, I knew it worked and I consider it the most enjoyable job I have had.
When I look at the equipment and programs we have today it is not a big task to have one computer test another.  It is done every day over the networks, but in 1984 we broke our arms patting ourselves on the back.  
Ah, the good old days!  I am glad I didn't miss them, but have no desire to go back.  I am 80 this year and wonder what in the next 20 years will make today look as primitive as the 70s and 80s.  Hang on, Boys and Girls, it will continue to be an exciting ride."
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A Cool Meeting

Yesterday's June PMUG meeting was a cool meeting on a very warm day. Twenty-three members attended. Katie Baird, our featured guest speaker, related some of her experiences at the January MacWorld in San Francisco, then spoke about blogging. Already today she's posted about PMUG on her About Prescott blog, http://aboutprescottarizona.com/blog/community/pmug-prescott-mac-user-group/ She links to the PMUG website, noting both our calendar and library parking. She mentions the helpfulness of Jim Hamm, David Passell, and Dan Simpson. To check out her biz site go to www.LooseEnds.net

Newly elected officers were announced by Bobbie Pastor. She continues as Secretary. David Passell moves to Treasurer, Roger Lakner is now Vice President, and Jim Hamm becomes "De Prez."

Check back here soon for more info. And, while you're at it . . . consider dropping me a few lines about what YOU are doing this summer with your Mac.

Starting Off June

     Did you have a childhood?  Have you written your memoirs?

       New PMUG member Connie (Kramer) Johnson answers, "Yes!" to both questions.  She takes us on a delightful journey to Wisconsin in the 1950s.  She wrote the book, Farm Kids, on her iMac.  Now, with the help of Erica Simpson she has a Keynote/PowerPoint presentation for book clubs and other groups.  Last week she spoke at the Prescott Valley Library. 
     Prescott's EMI PrintWorks was Connie's choice for the second printing of the book.  They use Mac G5, and under the direction of owner Mark Davidson, turn out quality work.
     Who buys her book, and who comes to hear her talk?  People from Wisconsin who relate to growing up on a farm — and those who didn't and can't.  A woman from New York announced to Connie that she didn't know what Connie was talking about, but that's why she bought the book!
     Growing up on a 160 acre dairy farm near Roberts, Wisconsin the two sisters, Dianne and Connie Johnson were inspired to write on topics from "Chickens" to "Laundry Day."  Putting those memories onto paper was a collaboration via phone calls and letters.  Dianne now lives in Camarillo, California, and she was most interested in preserving those memories for her own children.  Together the sisters wrote for 9 months, designed the cover, enlisted 5 friends to edit, then engaged a printer in California for the first run.
     In June 2007 a book signing tour in Roberts, Wisconsin during the annual Good Neighbor Days gave the two sisters the first opportunity to sell their books. Connie had contacted the River Falls Journal and found that a conglomerate owns seven small town newspapers, so one editor handled the publicity.  An independent book store and a coffee shop took the book. Sitting in the shade alongside Main Street for the parade Connie and Dianne were thrilled to see grade school and high school friends stop by, even telling them some stories not previously remembered.
     Later, a friend encouraged Connie to submit a short write-up to the View, the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire Alumni magazine.  They published a tiny headshot of Connie holding her book, along with her e-mail address.  To her surprise, two former college roommates e-mailed her.
     Getting acquainted with Erica and Dan Simpson brought information on "Bean," a writing program that Connie finds more helpful than TextEdit.  She attends the Writers' Networking Group headed by Elaine Hardt, meeting weekly in Prescott Valley. 
     What's next for Connie?  She's written a picture book for children, ages 3 to 9, "Mr. Bunny's Secret Party" that's due out from EMI PrintWorks the last of June.  Local artist Clareen Barrett was the illustrator.
     Meanwhile Connie's enjoying the role of speaker and book publicist. She's also a member of Professional Writers of Prescott and the Arizona State Poetry Society.  ASPS has just notified her that one of her poems will be published in their quarterly booklet, due out in July. When her birding hobby doesn't take her out of town we'll be seeing more of this vivacious gal at PMUG and SIG.
     In closing,  Farm Kids sells for $20. Contact Connie at clotheslinepress@earthlink.net. Take a look at EMI PrintWorks' useful information, "Printing Terminology" on their site, www.emiprintworks.com.  
     Mac can make it easier for you, too, to write your memoir.     # # #