Dear Listers: I was poking around in my computer looking for something and found this misfiled among my recipes. I thought it might be fun to share as it is now 7.5 years old and it shows how far we have come and how much things have changed.... including my reverting to my maiden name and the name of our group changing to "Computer Interest Group." I used to have copies of this on hand at the meetings to pass out to spread the word about our CIG. It may have been printed in the Kin Tracer, but I don't recall for certain. Happy Trails, Lauren one of the founders of the ---> MCGS Computer Users Group by Lauren Beebe, June 1996 In case you haven't already heard, this year MCGS has an active Computer Users Group. We meet the second Saturday of every month, from 10:00 a.m. to noon. If there is a need to move the date, due to some type of scheduling problem, we discuss this and agree on an alternate date for that particular month. The meetings are held at individual member's homes, on a rotating volunteer basis. We try to schedule two meetings ahead, so we have advance information for the monthly meeting notice. We also ask that folks RSVP so the host can anticipate how many chairs to put out. Some hosts have served coffee and cookies or other wonderful treats. The meetings do not revolve strictly around Genealogical computer programs. Of course the subject always comes back to genealogy! Whoever is hosting the next meeting chooses the topic for that meeting and acts as a facilitator. We encourage and invite all computer users, computer shoppers, and computer dreamers to attend. We have a couple of attendees who do not as yet own a computer, but are interested and are learning what may best suit their needs when they do purchase a computer. We have novices, and not so novices, PC users and MAC users. One of the bonuses we have found is that the computer user group is bringing us together. It provides us with a smaller forum to get acquainted and share our knowledge of not only computer use, but also of genealogy and insight into how others do things. We find we have more than enough to talk about in the two hours we meet. It has been suggested we use a talking stick, in order to keep to one conversation at a time! However, we find we usually digress from the main topic by the second hour and microdiscussion groups evolve. We have also discovered we can call on each other for computer help between meetings. We have recently had a couple of people join MCGS after attending our computer group. All in all, we have a successful group. If you are close enough to attend, please do! If you live in an area outside of Marin and do not have a users group, you can start one. The hardest part was getting the first meeting set. From there on out, it has been really simple. Here are some of the topics we have discussed: The importance of backing up your data. John Bowman says, " Jesus Saves... you should too!"... Pat Friesen highly recommends an external back-up tape drive and frequent backup. Emily Wilson's son has created an automatic backup system for her that performs a complete backup of data on a weekly basis and a daily backup of only the changes and additions to her data. Whether you have a lot of data or a little bit of data stored on your computer, it can be a pain or impossible to reconstruct following a "crash". Your hard drive can crash when you approach using its full storage capacity, Lauren Beebe recommends frequent "housekeeping" and back up of your data. If you have a recent backup of your data, a crash is less painful and fairly easy to recover data.Getting rid of paper. John Deadman shared his use of The Family Tree Maker genealogical computer program to do his genealogy and therefor get rid of his paper. Clara Scarborough uses databases, such as the one found in Microsoft Works, to list her notes on which books she has consulted, which page she has found information on which person, where she can find the book and many other items. She has quite a command of databases and highly recommends them for organization. Susan Trumbull expressed her concern that genealogists must have paper, in the form of various documents such as birth and death certificates, etc. She also said we should be cautious in our use of computers and still leave some handwritten copies of genealogies as technology will progress and what is the guarantee the future generation will be able to "read" our computer disks? Case in point: reel to reel tape recordings, not to mention 8 track recordings and beta video tapes. Jo Larin said she uses a scanner to store documents, along with photographs, maps and passages from books. She can then print them out when she needs to insert them into a document. The conclusion was reached that computers help us to generate more, rather than less, paper, however, they help us to present our information in ways quicker and more detailed than ever imagined. Laptop Computers Ann & Don Gregory graciously opened their home for us to explore the use of laptop computers. John Bowman, Susan Trumbull and JoAnne Rowley brought their laptop computers. The computers were placed on a round coffee table, which enabled a good view for all. They demonstrated how they work, how easy it is to install or change the fax cards. We had the opportunity to see the difference in LCD screens, keyboard styles, tracking balls vs. mouse. JoAnne and John also brought their external CD ROM drives and this enabled us to see how easy it is to attach peripherals. Susan Trumbull shared her information about how easy it is to install additional memory and how soon the computer companies declare their products "old". Her IBM is only about two years old, but she can no longer obtain parts from IBM as it is "too old". They did give her another source. Our discussion also touched on the price of various models and brands. We were able to have hands on use. It was decided that Laptops have come a long way since their inception. It used to be that you had to buy programs specifically designed to work on laptop computers. Now they accept all the regular PC, or Mac, versions depending on the platform you choose. The deciding factor for purchasing a laptop vs. a less portable computer is strictly a personal choice of whether or not you intend to drag it along to the library and elsewhere to do your research and be able to immediately chronicle it. That and price. They start at around $1900.00 and go up as high as $7,000.00. The Internet Emily Wilson hosted this popular topic. Turnout was 20 people and a new member was signed up! Prior to the meeting Lauren Beebe helped Emily move her computer into her dining room to give a better view for those in attendance. There were about 30 America on Line disks available with 15 hours of free time available to those who attended. There were handouts available, including information from The Well in Sausalito, and from Family Tree Maker on direct launching to their genealogical site, reprints of articles from PC Magazine and others. JoAnne Rowley brought her laptop and helped Emily demonstrate CompuServe, AOL, Earthlink and Prodigy. Although AOL is very popular and looks "pretty" a lot of time is used for downloading of new graphics. Their cost per hour, after your first five that are included in the monthly fee, is $2.95. Prodigy's additional cost per hour is $1.00. Earthlink is a flat rate service, $19.95 per month, unlimited use.