Mark Your Calendar

COMING EVENTS

General Membership Meeting
	When:		February 14, 2001
	Where:		Heritage Hall
	Time:		10:00 A.M
	Topic:		Anatomy of a Web Page

Sign up at the Activities Desk for your copies of Assignments and Exercises. Video can be purchased at the Activities Desk.

Dates:	February 8,15,22, 2001
Place:	Channel 3
Times:	10AM & 3PM
Topic:	Computing I - Basics Video

Computer Courses 2001
	Computing I:		9:00 - 10:30AM		January 8,10,12,15,17,19
	Computing I:		3:00 - 4:30PM		January 15,17,19,22,24,26
	Internet Basics:		9:00 - 10:30AM		January 22,24,26,29,31,Feb. 2

Sign up for these courses at the Front Desk in the Activities Building.

March 14, 2001: Scanning

April 11, 2001: HELP!!

June 26-28,2001: Computer Expo 2001 at Javits Center in New York City.

Long term goals keep us from being discouraged by short term failures

Dig Deeper in the Internet with Sharper Shovels

Search engines can be pitifully inadequate, partly because they rely on Web-page indexes that were compiled weeks before. Not only is timely material missed, but pages deep within Web-sites are often missed, as are multimedia files, bibliographies, bits of information in databases and pages that come in PDF, Adobe's portable document format. In reality, traditional search engines have access to only a fraction of 1 percent of what exists on the Web. BrightPlanet.com, has tried to tally the billion pieces of content that are hidden from view of the traditional, most-used search engines. This area is called the "invisible Web" or "deep Web." Search experts believe that this online frontier may be 500 times larger than the surface Web and add to that the uncharted Web pages that are behind firewalls or part of intranets.

To dig deeper into the Web, a new breed of search engines has cropped up that uses a different approach to Web page retrieval. Instead of broadly scanning the Web by indexing Web pages from any links they can find, these search engines are devoted to drilling further into specialty areas - medical sites, legal documents, even Web pages dedicated to jokes and parody. Looking for timely financial data? Try FinancialFind.com. Seeking sketches of molecular structures or even scientific humor? Biolinks.com may help. To deal with this confusion, boutique search engines have decided to do some filtering. They will pick 40 sites related to a topic hoping to avoid irrelevant search results.

Some search engines go further, sending out finely tuned software agents, or bots, that learn not only which pages to search, but also what information to grab from those pages. Either way the theory is the same - the smaller the haystack, the better chance of finding the needle. Finding the smaller haystacks is a challenge in itself and is the same problem faced by patrons who walk into a library. People know to go to the library but often rely on a reference librarian to pinpoint their search. On the Web, people are usually left to fend for themselves.

Lately, a few specialty search engines have been popping up on lists of most-visited Web sites — evidence that people are learning to find them. One of the most popular is MySimon.com, a service that specializes in culling product prices and information across 2,500 shopping sites. According to Jupiter Media Metrix, an Internet research firm (which only tracks sites with at least 200,000 visitors a month), MySimon attracted 5,000,000 visitors in December. FindLaw.com, a search engine and Web-based directory of legal information, has as many as 900,000 visitors a month.

Moreover.com is a site that opened in 1999 with a search engine that gathers headlines from 1,800 online news sources. Last month the site was visited by approximately 340,000 people. There is no consumer marketing from the company. It offers the search engine free as a teaser for businesses to buy its search software. Moreover finds news stories because its bots have been designed to hunt only for specific pages within a specific realm of the Web. They are like sniffing dogs that have been given a whiff of a scent and are taught to disregard everything else. These bots are designed to hunt for very specific information. Initially, MySimon bots must watch the click-through routines of MySimon employees who have learned the ins and outs of particular online shops — which pages typically provide prices, sizes or shipping fees. Once trained, the bots follow those paths themselves, prowling shops for information to put into databases and then display. For example, one bot is assigned to Amazon.com bookshelves; another is assigned to its electronics merchandise.

General search engines such as Northern Light and Google have decided to offer smaller fields. Google has opened "Uncle Sam" where people can search for government material. Ask Jeeves tried to narrow the scope of its news items. Earlier this month when "chavez" was typed in a news story was pointed to but a few weeks later no news could be found on "chavez" because Ms. Chavez was removed from Ask Jeeves list of Bush nominees. However, using Moreover to search "chavez" showed 30 relevant stories, at least half of which had been posted that day. Unless the big search engines get better at delivering timely information, searchers may be better off with Moreover.com.

Many Web users are not aware that narrow searching tools exist. The hard part may be to change peoples' behavior. All the boutique search engines in the world will not alter the fact that the majority of Web surfers are still inclined to type a single keyword into a huge, general search engine and hope for the best. The thought of narrowing a search - by either going to a specialty search page or clicking through a menu of choices on a general search site does not seem to occur to most users. The question arises: Wouldn't search engines be more helpful if they would automatically narrow a search without requiring their users to make that realization on their own?               N.Y.T. - Lisa Guernsey

Specialty Search Options

Comparison Shopping: www.mysimon.com
News Stories: www.moreover.com
Legal Documents: www.findlaw.com
Financial Information: www.financialfind.com
Scientific Information: www.biolinks.com
Academic Materials: www.academicinfo.net
Local Businesses: www.northernlight.com
Government Info: www.google.com/unclesam
Adobe PDF Files: searchpdf.adobe.com
Online Images: www.ditto.com
Funny Stuff: www.humorsearch.comSearch Directories www.completeplanet.com
searchenginewatch.com/links/Speciality_Search Engines
gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~gprice/direct.htm
websearch.about.com/Internet/websearch/library/weekly/aa030698.htm

What is a BOT?

A bot is a software tool for digging through data. You give a bot directions and it brings back answers. The word is short for robot which is derived from the Czech work robota meaning work. On the Web, robots have taken on a new form of life. Since all Web servers are connected, robot-like software is the perfect way to perform the methodical searches needed to find information.

For example, Web search engines send out robots that crawl from one server to another, compiling the enormous lists of URLs that are the heart of every search engine. Shopping bots compile enormous databases of products sold at online stores.

The term bot has become interchangeable with agent, to indicate that the software can be sent out on a mission, usually to find information and report back. Strictly speaking, an agent is a bot that goes out on a mission. Some bots operate in place, for example, a bot in Microsoft Front Page automates work on a Web page.

Bots have great potential in data mining, the process of finding patterns in enormous amounts of data. Because data mining often requires a series of searches, bots can save labor as they persist in a search, refining it as they go along. Intelligent bots can make decisions based on past experiences, which will become an important tool for data miners trying to perfect complex searches that delve into billions of data points.

Bots were not invented on the Internet. Robotic software is believed to have been created in the form of Eliza, one of the first public displays of artificial intelligence. Eliza is a computer programmer that can engage in human conversation. Eliza asks the user a question, and uses the answer to formulate yet another question. Artificial intelligence is an advanced form of computer science that aims to develop software capable of processing information on its own, without the need for human direction. Bots.internet.com

Twelve Step Internet Recovery Program

1. I will have a cup of coffee in the morning and read my newspaper like I used to, before the Internet.
2. I will eat breakfast with a knife and fork and not with one hand typing.
3. I will get dressed before noon.
4. I will make an attempt to clean the house, wash clothes, and plan dinner before even thinking of the Internet.
5. I will sit down and write a letter to those unfortunate few friends and family that are Internet-deprived.
6. I will call someone on the phone whom I cannot contact via the Internet.
7. I will read a book.....if I still remember how.
8. I will listen to those around me and their needs and stop telling them to turn the TV down so I can hear the music on the Internet.
9. I will not be tempted during TV commercials to check for e-mail.
10. I will try and get out of the house at least once a week, whether necessary or not.
11. I will remember that my bank is not forgiving if I forget to balance my checkbook because I was too busy on the Internet.
12. Last, but not least, I will remember that I must go to bed sometime and the Internet will always be there tomorrow.

No echoes return to mock the silent tongue.

Letter to the Editor:

(Thanks to Ken Pelletier and his Web Group)

We were SO grateful to have found your inclusion of the Weekly Bulletin on the Web page. I suggested that we "snowbirds" would appreciate finding out about all the goings-on in the Village especially the trips that are being offered. There are many that interest us as well as some that make us green with envy since we'll still be in Florida when they are scheduled. Many thanks again!

Sincerely,

Pat and Bill Maurer

It’s That Time Again!!

Free Tax Software!

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For government tax forms:

http:/www.irs.ustreas.gov/prod/forms_pubs/pubs/

"Amazing Grace"

Grace Hopper, 1906-1992, is called the "Mother of the Computer." She also invented the term "bug." Upon discovering that a moth had wedged itself in a relay switch, causing the early computer she was working on to temporarily fail, this computer pioneer described the event as the "first actual case of a bug being found."

Hopper had worked on computers since the dawn of the data processing revolution and was dubbed "Amazing Grace" by her co-workers. She was the first woman to obtain a doctorate in math from Yale University. She shared responsibility for such innovations as the COBOL programming language and is credited with creating the first digital compiler, which made it possible for computers to directly translate written instructions.

She served in the U.S. Navy during WWII. After retiring from the Navy, she frequently lectured on computers, predicting that they would one day find themselves on desktops, serving even people with little or no programming skills. For more: www.wic.org/bio/ghopper.htm

New Members

Robert B. Jones
Ronnie Kamphausen
Samuel S. Klausner
May Rosenbaum
Bernice Burchman
Marion Conroy
Alice Fahringer
Harry Gaffney
Dorothy Guntner
Paula Hansen
Sherri Croley
Philip Liskin
Albert & Bernice Norman
Walter A. Petermann
Conrad & Anita Sabin
Edward M. Svetlik

Want to Cheat at Solitaire?

It's big trouble in Solitaire when you're drawing cards from the deck - three at a time - and the card you really need is sandwiched in between others. No matter how many times you go through the deck, you'll never hit the card. Unless, that is, you press Shift+Alt+Ctrl while clicking the deck. That lets you draw one card at a time, making sure you'll get every chance at the vital card.

Volume Control

If you have a Windows key on your keyboard, here's what you do. To turn the volume up, press Ctrl+Windows Key+V. To turn the volume down, press Shift+Windows Key +V.

Monthly Calendar: Changes occur, so please refer to Channel 3 or our Website to verify dates and times. In any event, visit our Website: www.heritagevillage.org/hvcc.html

Officers

Monthly Calendar

SOS - HVCC Help Line

HINT

MAC USERS

Straight Arrow Scroll bars are the slides at the right and bottom of documents and windows. They have arrows at the bottom that allow for scrolling up and down. Some people would rather have an arrow at the top and one at the bottom. If you would like to try this, open the Appearance Control Panel and click on the Options tab on the far right. Removing the check mark from Smart Scrolling will place arrows at the top and bottom/left and right of the scroll bars.

Put Mounted Disks Away the Easy Way

Anytime you have a Zip, Jaz, Floppy, CD-ROM, DVD or any other mounted media, you can easily have them ejected by clicking on it once and pressing Command-Y. This is the shortcut for Put Away under the File menu.

PC USERS
Full Screen Programs You can tell a program to always start taking up the full size of the screen.

1. Right click on the program's shortcut icon.
2. Choose Properties.
3. Click the Shortcut tab.
4. Look to the Run line and click the Down Arrow for the pull-down menu.
5. Choose Maximized from that menu.
6. Click OK.

Programs Running The next time you need to access the System Configuration Utility, just go to Start, Run and type: msconfig

Temporary Files Windows creates a lot of "temporary files" when it opens documents. It puts these files in the C:\WINDOWS\TEMP folder and intends to close them when the application is finished with them. Sometimes temp files can become permanent and eat up hard disk space. It is a good idea to open the folder periodically and delete these files. Make sure no applications are running when you do this.

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