Links from "Tarting up Your Blog" talk March 20th 2008

Pages and links from the Blogspot Presentation by Sylvia Winterbottom

•Club Information
http://javeacomputerclub.blogspot.com/

•Special Interest Group Info
http://jccvideo.blogspot.com/

•Tutorials
http://jccvidedtutorials.blogspot.com/

Events Calendar
http://wegroupcal.blogspot.com/

Help or Information Notes
http://wegroup.blogspot.com/

•Share Photos
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/group.we/Fallas

Holiday Diary
http://duosafari.blogspot.com/

Promotional
http://casamirande.blogspot.com/

Google Items for Download.. Picasa, Video Uploader
http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/options/

Macromedia Flash Download page if you cannot view Videos
http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash

Project for the Presentation
http://wegroupfallas.blogspot.com/

Receiving streamed video and downloading video

Links relating to the forum held at the Club on March 13th 2008

RECORDING STREAMING VIDEO

Youtube Downloader
http://www.download3000.com/download_19063.html

All about recording streaming video
http://all-streaming-media.com/record-video-stream/

GUIDES TO ON-LINE VIDEO

Online Video Guide
http://www.ovguide.com/

This one for a list of streaming video sites
http://www.blinklist.com/tag/streaming%20video/

WWitv Guide to Internet TV - 2674 online TV stations listed.
http://wwitv.com/portal.htm

STREAMING AND VIDEO DOWNLOAD SITES

Miro
Small, open source application for viewing, managing and saving on-line videos. (Elegant, featured in PC Plus Magazine March 2008)
http://www.getmiro.com/

Joost
Application - 20,000 TV shows; 400+ channels P2P (peer to peer, Highest ranked site in PC Plus magazine March 2008)
http://www.joost.com/

Revision 3
Website rather than application. Content made for the site. For the techies.(featured in PC Plus Magazine March 2008)
http://www.revision3.com/

Livestation TVLivestation delivers a range of live radio and television news channels to your computer over a broadband network.(Trial service using Microsoft's Silverlight for streaming Video)
http://www.livestation.com/

LiveTV Toolbar
http://livetvtoolbar.media-toolbar.com/


STUFF WE WANT but CAN'T GET

BBC iplayer - so far only UK, but they say they will soon be launching a worldwide service
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/

Channel4 4Od - only in UK like iplayer
http://www.channel4.com/4od/index.html

ITV Streaming and catchup - only in UK
http://www.itv.com/

FORUMS on attempting to get UK Internet TV

This forum has quite a bit to say
http://www.englishforum.ch/tv-internet-telephone/1772-internet-tv.html
and something here about using Firefox "foxyproxy" to view US and UK video streams http://proxy.org/forum/1199890897.html

PIRATES

This one is a website from which you can buy movies in several formats including ipod and DVD (illegal of course! - but looks professional - must be Russian!)
http://www.zml.com/
...and this one for streaming and recording 17 UK TV channelsfor 25 pounds (49 dollars) per month . It has a number of samples which can be watched for free.
http://www.liveuktv.com/ Definitely illegal - but looks professional.

TORRENT SITES

http://www.mininova.org/
"The ultimate bit torrent source"
Some of the torrents found lead to
http://www.thebox.bz/ which specialises in torrents of UK TV programmes.You need to have an account. Free, but limited users at any one time

SLINGBOX - an alternative

The Slingbox takes the picture (signal) from your (or your family's) freeview box, cable box, satellite, DVR, or DVD and rebroadcasts (aka “streams”) it to wherever you are using the Internet. You “dial-in” to your broadcast over the Internet from a computer or cell phone which has the Slingbox software (called the SlingPlayer) installed. You can change channels remotely.

http://www.slingmedia.com/
Main website with fun intro video (changes if you visit more than once!)
http://uk.slingmedia.com/
UK site
http://www.slingboxguide.com/
All about it

FREEware Links (from talk on 10th Jan 2008)

Scottie's freeware:
http://peteringata.googlepages.com/scottiesfreestuff

CB-J 's selection
CCCleaner
Clean up your PC of junk http://www.ccleaner.com/ Windows XP and Vista including 64 bit

VLC
VLC Media Player - Play many types of media file and lots of clever stuff http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ Windows XP / Vista 32 bit and 64 bit/ MacOs and Linux

MWSnap
Capture and save areas of screen http://www.mirekw.com/winfreeware/mwsnap.html Windows XP and Vista (32 bit)

FoxitReader
Fast reader of PDF files http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php Windows and Linux

DVD Shrink
Compress and Back up DVDs http://www.dvdshrink.org/what.html Windows

DVD Fab Decrypter
Decrypt encrypted DVDs http://www.dvdfab.com/free.htm Windows

Portable Apps
Run applications off a memory stickNo data goes on the host computer http://portableapps.com/ Windows

Avidemux
Video editor designed for simple cutting, filtering and encodingImports many file types (including VOB). Ideal for YouTube clips http://fixounet.free.fr/avidemux/ Windows, MAC and Linux

MAJOR FREEWARE YOU PROBABLY ALREADY HAVE

Open Office
Complete Office suite http://www.openoffice.org/ Microsoft Windows (98 - Vista), GNU/Linux ("Linux"), Sun Solaris, Mac OS X (under X11), and FreeBSD.Multilingual

Firefox
Internet Browser http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/Windows, Mac OS X, LinuxMultilingual

Thunderbird
E-mail Client http://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/products/thunderbird/Windows, Mac OS X, LinuxMultilingual

Picasa
Photo managerhttp://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/products/thunderbird/Windows Multilingual

Irfan View
Media Viewer http://www.irfanview.com/Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003/VistaMultilingual

AVG Anti Virus Free Edition
Anti Virus http://free.grisoft.com/Windows, Linux

AVG Anti-Spyware Free Edition
Anti Spyware http://free.grisoft.com/doc/20/us/frt/0Windows

Ad-Aware Free
Anti Spyware http://www.lavasoftusa.com/products/ad_aware_free.php

Spybot Search and Destroy
Anti Spyware http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.htmlWindowsMultilingual

Chairman's Report for 2007

The Javea Computer Club is now 23 years old. For the first time our membership fell over the year from 650 to around 550. This could be related to the fact that beginners’ courses are now run as small group affairs, rather than taking up the whole room….or perhaps PCs have been around long enough and are now so easy to use that people do not need help any more? Perhaps members who previously joined just to use our broadband connection, now have their own at home?…….perhaps our Club is at last returning to be what it started as: a group of computer enthusiasts who want to learn about computing in general.

As regards equipment, we bought a lot this year. Four new computers have been built by Vic and the Hardware group. These have been installed with different flavours of Windows Vista, including Vista Ultimate 64 bit. We have a range of flat screen monitors, with ever increasing screen areas and more wide screens. We also branched out and bought a beautiful Apple Mac. We now have a printer able to print on CDs and DVDs and a brand new DLP projector which gives a much brighter image than the old one.

Mondays as ever were busy Club Days. Tuesdays are now devoted to Special Interest Groups. The most active groups are: Genealogy; Flight Simulation; Digital Imaging; Video Editing; Linux; Desktop Publishing; Long Distance Wireless Networking and Hardware. The Special Interest groups received continued financial support from the Club in the form of the purchase of specialised software, hardware and magazine subscriptions. The Hardware group has been busy building some of our new PCs as well as refurbishing old ones for auction and sale to raise money for “Cancer Care Javea” which is the Club’s chosen Charity for this year (June to June). To date, we have raised over 1000 Euros from the sale of old computer bits and pieces. Our thanks to all who have donated their old kit, and contributed to this fund raising.

The Beginners’ course is changing with the times. Early last year we tried small group lessons, but now feel that formal courses are no longer necessary. With the use of self teaching aids, online help and one to one tuition we are trying a different approach. Once members have gained confidence and an understanding of the basics they can hone their skills by joining a special interest group. We also carried out some small group advanced tutorials on scanning, Excel and wordprocessing . Our thanks to all volunteer tutors.

Thursdays have seen our usual array of talks from members and guest speakers. Topics included Freeware, Vista, Google, Social Networking, computing in the near future, video editing, image editing, Wikipedia, Photostory, voice diagnosis using computers, and Wireless Internet. We also ran two Computer Fairs to which local computer shops and service providers were invited.

Club activities were totally disrupted for a couple of weeks by the flooding in October. I would like to extend my personal thanks to all members who gave their time and effort in the several cleanups (there were three!). We had the foresight to raise equipment off the ground after the first inundation and were lucky (and showed initiative) in rescuing flooded equipment. We used hairdryers and members took equipment home to dismantle and dry it. It was a case of “all hands on deck”, and the Club survived the crisis having lost only the A3 printer and one drive in our CD duplicator, plus our old network server and keyboards. Well done team!

The “Mesh” project to share Internet connections by long distance wireless continues, though we are hoping gradually to wind this down as Telefonica improves its reach of ADSL and commercial service providers move in to cover the need. Last year we made a surplus of income over expenditure of 2977.08 Euros which will be used for shared equipment. We had five uplink hosts and 74 clients. I would particularly like to thank Fredrik Wengelin, Ron and Gwen Rickett, Leif Christensen, Peter Bayliss, Andreas Wernli and Jim English for their work and cooperation in running this project. Also thanks to Harold Krol of Computer Care for his invaluable technical help.

There have been several administrative changes. We changed our bank from CAM to Bancaja (to get better service), and changed the Club’s ADSL connection from Ya to Telefonica (same reason, and to save money). The switch from Ya meant moving our Club website to a new host, and this coincided with the launch of a new web page design created by webmaster, Diane Wynne. Thanks to Diane, and apologies for any inconvenience in the switch over. The Club's service of delivery of UK Computer magazines to Spain continues through David Dales Removals, subsidised by the Club. Our thanks to David Dales for their cooperation and to Jacki Pamflett for collecting the magazines for us each week.

As usual I must thank the non-Committee people who have helped out in various ways: Cynthia Cutts, Jaqui Bayliss and Elaine Wareham who do the cash desk; all our tutors and everyone who has helped anyone to solve a computer problem, or just been friendly to a new member over the past 12 months.

Finally : Thanks to my hard working Committee: - Reg Cutts, Richard Wareham, Ann Jones, Diane Wynne, David Reed, Peter Bayliss, Derek Mawson, Win Jones, Mike Easter, Scotty, Fredrik Wengelin, Vic Tattersall, Cyril Greaves, Rob Westlands and Huw Griffith. Special thanks to Dave Reed who is leaving the Committee this year after his two year term of office. He has contributed much in organising the Beginners on Tuesdays. Thanks for your help and support Dave.


Christine Betterton-Jones February 2008

CRAFTING CHRISTMAS CARDS

Marjorie Jowett gave a fascinating talk on how to craft Christmas cards (Thursday 15th November).


Here is her slideshow of how to create home made greetings cards (click on each slide to move to the next)

Her list of local sources of craft materials has been modified in the light of recent developments.


La Rulla, Javea Old Town:- near church in main square. Turn right instead of going down steps near information.
Card, envelopes, A4 papel vegetal, A4 acetate for ink jet printers, some peel offs and bits to stick on, glue-sticks etc. Good prices.

La Rulla, Javea Port:- In the arcade, (near the English butcher who has now gone):-Christine says they have things, but I have not checked yet.

Botella Office Stockists, Javea:- Downhill from Correos on right. It is bigger than it first appears.
Card, handmade paper and envelopes, good quality paper and envelopes, labels,
glue-sticks etc . Good prices.

Nick Winter, Jesus Pobre Road, Javea:- On right going uphill after the bodega. Parking not good. I park at the bottom and walk up. Mornings only. English.
All craft items needed for card making. Good for peel offs. Good prices.

Art y Facts Arenal, Javea:- In same block as Cam Bank, opposite Spec Savers.
All craft items for card making. Fair prices. Very helpful. Mornings only. English. Art-Y-Facts is quite expensive and had very little stock.

Fiesta Crafts, Javea:- round corner in new building at roundabout near Barclays Bank.
New shop, interesting stock but a little pricey. Helpful. English hours. English.
Fiesta Crafts had a wide range of craft products and was very reasonably priced compared to the other craft shops.

Aladin’s Cave, Pedruguer:- On N332 towards Denia.
All craft items. English hours. English.

Creativity, Gata:- On N332 towards Benissa on right. Park round corner by new Correos
All craft items. Prices a little high, but good stock and help. English owned, Spanish hours.

Scrapbook Shop, Arenal, Javea;- Almost opposite Art y Facts. In service road near Pit Stop and Yorkshire Linen.
Interesting selection of card and scrapbooking items. A bit pricey for some things. Dutch owned, English spoken. Spanish hours I think.

WORD PROCESSING WORKSHOP

Evelyn Adams will be holding a special Wordprocessing workshop on Tuesday February 5th. She´ll be demonstrating how to make place name tags using Word. All Members welcome, but numbers limited to the first 12 who sign up, so please register at the Club.

The Registration List will be on the Cash Desk from Thursday 10 January.

EMAIL ADDRESSES AND BEGINNERS

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL

As a new year's resolution I request that if you have changed your email address during the year, and have not informed me, then please let me have your new one.

Please go to the foot of the JCC Website, Home Page and click on the envelope entitled "Membership Enquiries", then send me an email confirming your new email address.

We are trying out a new idea for Beginners to save them having to wait for the start of a new course. If you are an absolute beginner, and are not sure what to do when you switch on your PC, then ideally come to the Club on a Tuesday morning. Ask at the Cash Desk if you can have some help and we will try and ensure that there is someone to get you going and guide you through the basic things which you need to know.

Enjoy your computing and don't forget that your AGM is on THURSDAY 14 FEBRUARY.

JÁVEA COMPUTER CLUB RAISES MORE MONEY FOR CANCER CARE, JÁVEA

Monday 19th November saw members of the Jávea Computer Club generously support the Charity Cancer Care, raising 700 euros by way of an Auction of donated desktop PCs which had been refurbished and tested by the club’s Hardware Special Interest Group, together with second hand computer bits and pieces.

The Hardware Group continues to refurbish old(ish) PCs for future auctions in the new year, with the proceeds going to Cancer Care, Jávea, which is the club’s nominated charity from June this year (June to June)

Our photograph shows a delighted Club Vice President and Auctioneer for the day Reg Cutts with the 700 euros collected. Reg on behalf of the JCC committee would like to thank all members of the club for their generous support. For further information about the club please see our web page www.javeacomputerclub.org.

Summer time Video Clips - The Climber

Dave Parton made a nice short video clip which was by presented the Video Editing group at the Club recently.

We have stuck it up on Youtube
Here it is - "The Climber" with music by Pink Floyd
If you can't guess who the climber is...you are not a member of the Javea Computer Club!

ADVANCED WORD PROCESSING

As you may know, due to flooding of the Clubhouse, we were closed for two weeks. Consequently Advanced Word Processing will now take place on Tuesday 27 November and Tuesday 4 December.

If you have yet to sign up please do so as soon as possible as there are a restricted number of places.

Club House Flooding - images for the archives!

The Floods of October 2007 caused havoc in Jávea and in our Clubhouse
Here are some of the images to remind us all of that day!

1. First, take a look at a You Tube Video of the boats in the Canal de la Fontana being washed out to sea.

Here are some pictures and videos of the Club House :

2. The Club house is turned into a Water Feature (50 cents a visit!) :
The Arenal Clubhouse becomes a circulating Water Feature

3. More pictures of the Clubhouse floods

4. Our illustrious President appears on the front page of a regional newspaper

5. We have also posted some pictures of the second cleanup

6. Videos by Vic Tattersall -

Javea Flood Damage - a tour of the empty club house

Javea Computer Club - Chris wading in the Club

Javea Water dancers - Committee members larking about

She's a Star - Front page of "Las Provincias" Oct 19th 2007

Photo Caption: Una mujer camina con el agua hasta las rodillas por la Calle Tamarits del Xàbia
(A woman walks with water up to her knees in the Tamarits Road of Javea)

The disastrous floods in the Marina Alta have made headline news, and catapaulted JCC President, Chris Betterton-Jones to instant fame (albeit anonymously) as front page "girl" on the October 19th edition of "Las Provincias".
Says Chris:

"I was checking out the Club House to see how bad the flooding was when two reporters turned up. I knew one of them, Guiomar from "Xàbia al Día" magazine, but didn't know who the other one was. Guiomar speaks very good English and translated my comments for the other reporter, who must have been from "Las Provincias". This picture was taken when I took them around to the garages at the side of the Club building (Edificio Arenal) where much of the water came in. I was demonstrating how deep it was.

The reporter has employed a bit of journalistic license in her caption since the water in Avenida Tamarits was only calf-deep. It was a good deal deeper next to the garages....Well, the press needs to sensationalise things a bit !

However, I am rather disappointed that I haven't yet had an invitation to pose for the front page of Vogue, or indeed the centrefold of Playboy"

BEGINNERS INTERNET COURSE

We had over 20cm of flood water in the Clubhouse. The Club is closed to members tomorrow, Tuesday, and there will be no Beginners Course. We hope to open on Thursday.

You will not miss out as we will pick up, where we left off, next Tuesday. In the meantime, you could practice at home and go through some of the exercises on the Welcome Disk!

See you next week.

ADVANCED WORD PROCESSING

Hi all users of MS Word 2003 and MS Word 2007

We have been approached by a number of members asking if we could offer some tuition for those who are familiar with MS Word but who want to expand their knowledge of more adventurous techniques which are available.

To this end, Evelyn Adams has kindly offered to run a "Workshop" on Tuesday 20th and Tuesday 27th November.

Vacancies are limited (12 + 3 reserves), to ensure everyone can hear Evelyn and see the screen, so get down to the Club and sign up.

The Beginners should not fret, we will be running a course for word processing for beginners in the new year.

CHANGE OF EMAIL ADDRESS

Hi all JCC Members

When you change your email address would you please let me know so that I can update the Club's database.

You can either:
email me by going to the foot of the Club's Website Home page and click on the icon for "Membership Enquires", or
fill in the form "EMail Address Update" which is at the Cash Desk.

Those who have advised Chris, or other Committee Members, there is no need to repeat the info as it has already been passed on to me.

NEW BEGINNERS COURSE

Please note that the Beginners Course is now fully subscribed including a number of reserves, in case some people don't turn up at the start of the course.

Those who have not advised us what operating system they use, please let us know the next time you come to the Club or refer to the Club's Home Page and send an email to "Membership Enquiries" - the envelope at the foot of the page.

We hope that you find the Course useful.

Jávea Computer Club raises more money for Cancer care, Jávea

On June 7th 2007 Christine Betterton-Jones (right) presented 100 Euros on behalf of the Jávea Computer Club to Jean Booth of Cancer Care, Jávea (left). This money was raised through the auction of a donated desktop PC which had been refurbished and tested by the Club's Hardware Special Interest Group.

Since then we have raised another 205 Euros from the sale of second hand bits and pieces which had been donated to the Club .

Over the summer the Hardware group has been refurbishing more old(ish) PCs for auction to members. All proceeds of the auctions will go to "Cancer Care, Jávea" which is the Club's nominated charity for this year (June to June).

Members of the Club will also help Cancer Care to set up a website to inform the public about the charity's valuable support for cancer sufferers in this region. Members who wish to lend their time and expertise to this project are asked to contact the Club.

NEW BEGINNERS COURSE

The List is almost full so if you are still interested in joining the next Beginners Course, then please get down to the Club and put your name on the list. Don't forget to let us know which operating system you have on your computer.

Ubuntu / Kubuntu talk - July 26th

A message from Keith Scott...

"Just an update on the Kubuntu Linux operating system.

It is now installed on one of my laptops as a dual-boot with Vista.

Works fine and sets up a menu to boot Vista and Kubuntu.

I now have a dedicated Linux laptop set up including Kubuntu 3-D which will be shown on Thursday 26th July at the JCC.

Undoubtedly the best Linux yet with thousands of free programs installable via a graphic Add/Remove Programs utility similar to Windows."

Come and see this free alternative to Windows at work at the Club at 11.00 am on Thursday July 26th

NEXT BEGINNERS COURSE

The next Beginners Course starts on the Tuesday 18 September and runs, every Tuesday morning, until 6 November. It will be a similar format as the last Course ie as a separate SIGs Group. We will cover the operating system and the Internet. Only sign up for the course if you are able to attend the majority of the sessions.

Numbers are limited so come to the Club and sign up as soon as possible. Some members may have new computers with Vista operating system installed, so when you sign up, please advise which operating system you have.

Mike Easter, Membership Secretary