THE ICON-Newsletter of the Interactive Computer Owners Network February 2016

WHAT’S INSIDE Page

February & March Program Schedules ………. 2

Word of the month ………... 2

Interesting Sites to

Visit on the Internet ..……… 3

Manage passwords & use

Dropbox………..……….... 3,5

Smartphone & Tablet Symbols

………………….………. 4,5,8

The Internet of Things . 6,7,8

Computer Tutor—iPad ..….. 9

Brokestuff Mountain….. 10-11

Downloading vs Stream-

ing ................................ 12-13

Minutes………….………… 13

Cards Sent …….…………. 14

Basic Computer Classes .. 14

ICON Membership.

Applications …….…...…… 15

ICON Officers ………...…. 15

Announcements ……........ 16

Mission Statement …....…. 16

Andrew Cummins President, ICON Computer Users Group

andrewcummins@yahoo.com

Future Topics and How You Can Help

Last month I attempted to look back over the progress of comput-er technology of the previous year, yet I could only scratch the surface, as technology is progressing so rapidly in every respect. Likewise, just the anticipated advances in this New Year are something I could hardly do justice in this short piece. Of course, everything will be faster, smarter, smaller (or bigger, if bigger is better), cheaper, easier, and better by whatever meas-ure you may use.

This past January was the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) which allows the industry to give a preview to the public of prod-ucts that are coming this year. And, yes, that’s better by whatev-er measure you may use. I’ve always thought old sci-fi shows erred in underestimating improvements in existing technology. The old Star Trek show had teleporters and warp drive, but Cap-tain Kirk was still using relatively bulky video monitors and mas-sive computers. The USS Enterprise still needed a large bridge crew in spite of those massive computers onboard.

In the 24th century, all space travel will be a pleasure cruise for all

on board. And, technology will have become inconspicuous to the point of being invisible. Alternatively, going with a favorite theme of fiction about the future, technology has nearly peaked and the far future will be a bleak post-apocalyptic world. As for me, I’ll go with the optimistic forecast.

In the here and now, we’ll continue to see new things, incremen-tal improvements that keep technology fresh and interesting. And, sometimes something very different appears. At ICON, we’ll continue to see demonstrations of new technology and new soft-ware. ICON is also very much about helping you use the tech-nology you already have. Helping you with what you have is re-ally our greater mission.

For our greater mission, as always, we need to hear from you to know what topics to cover. Every year we rely on input from our members for topics to cover in class. What topics would you like covered? What troubles are you having with your PC or tablet? What are you interested in discussing?

We also need people who are willing to share what they’ve learned. You can give a demonstration of that app or software that you use frequently. Tell us how you get the most benefit. If you get a new tech gadget, bring it and do a Show and Tell. The more we get from each of our members, the more we all benefit.

ICON President, Andrew Cummins.

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Be sure to check the website before leaving home

for any last minute changes

Program Preparations for February 2016

Saturday, February 13 Library Station (Frisco Room)

10:30 a.m. Digital Media SIG —

11:30 a.m. Brown Bag Lunch and 1-on-1 Help Desk

12:30 p.m. Mini–Seminar

1:45 p.m. General Membership Meeting

Saturday, February 20 The Library Center (Harrison Room) 4:00 p.m. Using t he Linux Operating System

Saturday, February 27 The Library Center (Room A)

10:30 a.m. Genealogy SIG —

11:30 a.m. Brown Bag Lunch and 1-on-1 Help Desk

12:30 p.m. Windows SIG —

1:45 p.m. Advanced Technology Forum

Program Preparations for March 2016

Saturday, March 12 The Library Center (Room A)

10:30 a.m. Digital Media SIG —

11:30 a.m. Brown Bag Lunch and 1-on-1 Help Desk

12:30 p.m. Mini–Seminar

1:45 p.m. General Membership Meeting

Saturday, March 19 The Library Center (Harrison Room) 4:00 p.m. Using the Linux Operating System

Saturday, March 26 Brentwood Library

10:30 a.m. Genealogy SIG —

11:30 a.m. Brown Bag Lunch and 1-on-1 Help Desk

12:30 p.m. Windows SIG —

1:45 p.m. Advanced Technology Forum Discussion

Technology Word of the Month

“Femtocell”

Find the definition elsewhere in this issue

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INTERNET ARCHIVE According to Wikipedia, “The Internet Archive is a San Francisco-based nonprofit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digit-ized materials, including web sites, software applications/games, music, movies/videos, moving images, and nearly three million public-domain books. As of May 2014, its collection topped 15 petabytes. In ad-dition to its archiving function, the Archive is an activist organization, advocating for a free and open In-ternet.

What is means for you is a lot of stuff to look at and listen to! There are something like 459 billion pages of Internet history to browse through; 900 old arcade games to play; three million books to read and who knows what else! This should get you thru the wintertime blues with plenty to spare. https://www.archive.org

PEACE OF MIND WITH ONLINE SHOPPING Every time I buy something online, there is the fear that a scammer will catch me. Online shopping is fast and easy and I'll continue doing it, but with more knowledge to back me up. The Simple Dollar web-site has a most informative article about the advantages of using your credit card rather than your debit card for online buying. It's basic information, but knowledge is power. http://www.thesimpledollar.com/credit-vs-debit-which-card-should-you-use-online/

LI-FI 100 TIMES FASTER THAN WI-FI? I'd never heard of this before I ran across this article, but the site explains it well, if briefly. It seems im-possible when we think of how recently we had to use a phone line to download e-mail! Anyway, we can look forward to the new speeds pretty soon if technology continues as it has for the past thirty years. http://www.guidingtech.com/53661/gt-explains-li-fi/

LEARN SOMETHING NEW IN FIVE MINUTES A DAY I'm sure I've mentioned Highbrow before. You can sign up for all sorts of mini-classes that arrive in an e-mail and can be absorbed in five minutes. Currently, I'm “taking” one that is a short story every day. The entire course is only ten days long, so you can get a lot of variety in a hurry. There are many classes to browse at www.gohighbrow.com

How to manage passwords and use Dropbox Meeting Review by Mike Hancock, Contributing Editor, Golden Gate Computer Society, June 2015 issue, GGCS Newsletter, www.ggcs.org, editor@ggcs.org

LastPass GGCS guru Steve Shank told us that LastPass Password Manager is a powerful and flexible password manager that keeps your login information secure without your having to memorize all of it. You can au-tomatically log in to any website once you have entered the username and password, once. This is achieved by setting up an account with your email address and a strong, complex master password that should be at least 12 characters long, include upper and lower letters, numbers, and special characters.

All your passwords are encrypted “locally,” that is, on your computer before the encrypted version is stored on your computer and is encrypted by a LastPass algorithm for every site you wish to access.

Continued on page 8

Interesting Sites to Visit on the Internet

Nancy Preffitt ICON Member

Ngpreffitt (at) juno.com

Thought for the Day

“What the world needs is more love and less paper work.”

——Pearl Bailey

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 4

Become Familiar With and Understand the Symbols on your

Smartphone and Tablet

Julie Mahaffey ICON Member

Cejmmahaffe (a) gmail.com

When navigating smartphone apps it’s important to be aware, and become familiar with symbols that help you to choose your next smartphone action. Below are just a few symbols you will see at the top or bottom corners of the smarphone screen. It’s most helpful if you have understanding of the action each symbol represents and look for them when completing tasks.

+ - add an item to the screen. Ex. Adding a new contact name.

Edit - make changes.

Cancel – stop an action you have begun.

Clear – clear everything from screen.

Search – type in a name to search

Done – takes you back to the previous screen.

-- compose a new text, note, or email.

Smartphones also have a status bar at the top of the screen that contains symbols with useful infor-mation about your phone or tablet. With just a quick glance, you can view which settings are enabled on your device, the strength of your cellular connection and more. Visit these websites to see a complete list of status bar symbols.

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/26/iphone-101-status-bar-symbols-and-what-they-mean/

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/get-to-know-the-icons-on-the-iphone-status-bar.html

Works Cited

Baig, Edward CC, and Bob LeVitas. "Get to Know the Icons on the IPhone Status Bar." - For Dummies. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2016. Web. 10 Jan. 2016. <http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/get-to-know-the-icons-on-the-iphone-status-bar.html>.

Hodgkins, Kelly. "IPhone 101: Status Bar Symbols and What They Mean." Engadget. AOL Teck, 24 June 2014. Web. 10 Jan. 2016. <http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/26/iphone-101-status-bar-symbols-and-what-they-mean>

Continued on page 5

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Continued from page 4 Smart Phone Symbols

"Bring Your Own Device" Smart Phone, (including Android and iPhone/iPad). Tuesday, February 16, 2016 9:00 AM - 11:00 AM , Class Room is located near the Smith Glynn Phar-macy, just inside front door to the right. Smith Glynn Callaway Clinic, 3231 S National, Springfield, MO 65807. Instructor Julie Mahaffey If you are new to mobile technology, but ready to discover how apps can help you to simplify tasks, stay connected while you’re on the go, and keep you in touch with people and interests in your life, this begin-ner course is for you! Join us for a workshop that will empower you with smartphone skills from Touchscreen Basics, to Texting, Taking & Sharing Photos, Downloading Apps and more. Instructors and helpers will be available to answer questions and guide you in learning about your new smart phone, i pad, or tablet. Bring your own smart phone, i pad, or tablet. Class size is small and will repeat twice a month on first and third Tuesdays. You must register for each class. Seating is limited.

For more information call, (417) 841-0333 or 1(800) 909-8326 Class will cancel if Springfield Public Schools closes due to weather issues. More Information: https://www.mercy.net/springfieldmo/service/senior-services

Continued from page 3 How to manage passwords and use Dropbox

After creating your account, the LastPass download will appear as an add-on shortcut icon in your brows-er (LastPass works with all browsers). After you log in once with your Master Password, LastPass will then auto-fill all your passwords for you.

The plug-in also has a shortcut to your vault of existing passwords and can generate new, super secure passwords for new websites.

A mobile version, LastPass Premium, is available for $12/year. LastPass also allows you to save credit/debit card info, addresses, bank accounts, driver’s license, and contact info. Having demonstrated LastPass, Steve also confirmed that it can handle certain multi-factor authentications that might apply to bank accounts, investment managers, etc., and even to your Master Password. It would be best to check with your facility to see if it’s multi-factor service works with LastPass.

Finally, be warned that, if you forget your Master Password, you will not be able to recover your individual passwords, and LastPass cannot help you, because it doesn’t keep your Master Password. So, it is es-sential that you be responsible for it.

LastPass does provide support, primarily through email. Your only fallback is to go to each website and use their method of password recovery, which can vary. Some sites may simply send you an email with a password reset. Others might require the answer to challenge questions. Perhaps your bank may require you to come into their branch in person.

Dropbox Another GGCS guru, Marcelino Nogueiro, pointed out that, while many cloud storage programs, such as OneDrive, Google Drive, and Amazon Cloud Drive, exist, Dropbox has been around the longest, has the most users, and is the simplest of the cloud-based storage and file synchronization tools. This online stor-age service helps you share files between computers and mobile devices with the app installed. You can store and sync files by simply dragging and dropping them into the Dropbox shortcut icon on your desk-top. These files are also available over the Internet using the Dropbox web interface.

You can share files (photos, for example) with others by creating a share file or folder. You can password-protect folders you share via email or if you share by sending a link the link is encrypted but anyone with the link can open the folder or file. Files are encrypted when you upload them and stay encrypted on the DropBox servers. Shared files are not encrypted after they are downloaded by the recipient.

When the DropBox program is installed and active, a green checkmarks appear on top of files and folder icon that have been synced and are up-to-date. By default, Dropbox syncs only files stored in a single, dedicated folder and subfolders. The default

Continued on page 8

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THE ‘INTERNET OF THINGS’ OR IoT MORE COMMON

AND HACKABLE

by Ira Wilsker Golden Triangle PC Club

Beaumont TX Iwilsker(at)sbcglobal.net

Submitted by Ira Wilsker on January 7, 2016 – The Examiner

A few years at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, I was intrigued by the numbers of both prototype and production items that were evolving into what is now known as “Internet of Things,” or “IoT.” For the majority of us, when we think of the Internet, we think of our computers, tablets and smart phones. What many of us are not well aware of is that the Internet of Things is beginning to be much more common, and the IoT is already around us in a big way.

When I was last at CES, I was amazed at how Internet connections had already made their way into household appliances, and other electronic devices. At CES I saw products being introduced by major appliance manufacturers that had connected intelligence built into them.

Among some of the most impressive items that I saw demonstrated were what appeared to be conven-tional residential kitchen refrigerators that had a flat screen on the front of the door, as well as other types of sensors and readers built into the appliance. The tablet on the front door could be connected to the In-ternet via Wi-Fi and used to order groceries from participating supermarkets, display recipes, and create shopping lists. A small bar code reader was installed on the door that could read the UPC codes on prod-ucts, adding those items to a digital shopping list that could be remotely printed, or sent directly to the chosen supermarket. The tablet on the refrigerator door would also display digital coupons and other pro-motions, enabling the owner to instantly add the promoted item to the grocery list.

This Internet connected refrigerator, as well as IoT connected washers, dryers, dishwashers, air condi-tioners, stoves, ovens, microwaves, and other major appliances, also incorporated a “service connection” that monitored the physical operating condition of the appliances. Utilizing their Internet connection, typi-cally Wi-Fi, these appliances would report their operating condition, suggest repairs and maintenance, provide or order a list of replacement parts, display do-it-yourself repair instructions, or contact a repair service if necessary. Most of these devices would actually send an e-mail or text message to the appli-ance owner alerting him or her of the issues.

Many auto manufacturers currently offer “OnStar,” “BlueLink” or other types of cellular or Internet con-nected monitoring systems that can report on maintenance issues, service reminders, and other issues, as well as providing a method of emergency communications. My wife’s car periodically sends her an e-mail listing the mechanical condition of each of the major components on her car.

We are seeing much more of our homes being controlled or secured by the IoT under the general topic of “building and home automation.” Most modern home security systems can be remotely accessed and controlled by cell phone; security cameras can display their images on remote devices anywhere. Lamps can be remotely controlled to turn on or off by remote command. Even our utility usage and thermostats can be accessed remotely. The very popular Nest thermostat, along with an increasing number of com-petitors, offers Internet connected control of household temperatures, as well as smoke detectors and re-mote cameras. My new “smart TV” is connected to my home data network and allows me to use my smart phone as a fully functional remote to not just control the TV, but to also search through dozens of streaming media services to watch countless movies, TV shows, videos, and other content, all connected by my home Wi-Fi network.

Local industry, health care facilities, public utilities, transportation systems and other commercial enter-prises are rapidly becoming more involved with the IoT. Look at your water, gas and electric meters; Continued on page 7

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Continued from page 6 INTERNET OF THINGS OR IoT MORE COMMON & HACKABLE

many are already Internet connected in order to automate “meter reading,” saving time and money. In the medical field, health monitoring and diagnostic equipment is becoming more connected to the Inter-net. According to Wikipedia, “These health monitoring devices can range from blood pressure and heart rate monitors to advanced devices capable of monitoring specialized implants, such as pacemakers or advanced hearing aids. ... Other consumer devices to encourage healthy living, such as connected scales or wearable heart monitors, are also a possibility with the IoT. ... Doctors can monitor the health of their patients on their smart phones after the patient gets discharged from the hospital.”

While much of this current IoT technology is infringing on what used to be in the realm of science fiction, there is also a dark side. Already hackers are breaking into Internet connected devices other than the traditional computers and data networks in order to illicitly control these IoT devices, alter or steal data and personal information, or shut them down on demand. In terms of connected medical devices, there have been some serious concerns expressed about complying with HIPAA and other privacy and securi-ty rules and regulations.

It has been well documented that some common household smart devices, most notably smart TVs, have actually spied on their owners. This was reported about two years ago in Forbes magazine by Jo-seph Steinberg, in his exposé “These Devices May Be Spying On You (Even In Your Own Home).” His January 2014 article in Forbes said, “Televisions may track what you watch. Some LG televisions were found to spy on not only what channels were being watched, but even transmitted back to LG the names of files on USB drives connected to the television. Hackers have also demonstrated that they can hack some models of Samsung TVs and use them as vehicles to capture data from networks to which they are attached, and even watch whatever the cameras built in to the televisions see.” Internet connected coffee makers, which can be remotely programmed to make morning coffee may disclose to hackers when you may be waking up, and even what time you might be returning home, valuable information for residential burglars. The smart refrigerator may be selling your shopping information to third parties. In an unexpected and unusual case, Steinberg reported that a smart refrigerator was used to send out spam e-mails. Also in that Forbes article, companies providing DVR, satellite and cable service have been alleged to have sold information of shows and other content watched in the household in order for advertisers to better target their advertising. It is also widely known that many Internet service providers compile lists of websites visited; since may people get their TV and Internet from the same provider, these companies could combine that information, which Forbes warns, “a single party may know a lot more about you than you might think.”

Another popular target for hackers and other miscreants is common household video capture equipment, such as a Webcam or a home security camera; remote baby monitors are similarly targeted. Forbes dis-closed that malware on a computer can remotely turn on and off the Internet connected cameras. In one notable case referenced in the Forbes article was how a Miss Teen USA was allegedly blackmailed by a hacker who controlled her laptop’s integral Webcam, “ ... and photographed her naked when she thought the camera was not on.” The images of home security cameras, often transmitted unencrypted over the Internet, can be captured by burglars, informing them that not just is the home currently unoccupied, but also the location of the potentially incriminating cameras!

Information about specific items connected to the Internet is readily available, and even searchable as easily as any other Internet data. The Shanghai based website Shodan (shodan.io) describes itself as “the world’s first search engine for Internet-connected devices.” Just as an experiment, I registered on Shodan with a disposable e-mail address, and did a quick search of my neighborhood; I found nine po-tentially vulnerable IoT connected devices within a small radius of my house. I also found that some local service stations monitor their gasoline inventory in real time, transmitting their data in real time over an unencrypted Internet connection. For example, when searched, one particular major refiner branded sta-tion reported, “IN-TANK INVENTORY Regular 7263 (gallons), Temperature 51.74 degrees” as well as other inventory information. This was one of 45 “Automated Tank Gauges” reported by Shodan in this area. This gasoline tank information was just a very small snippet of the millions of such Internet con-nected devices that most of us have no idea even exists. Continued on page 8

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Continued from page 7 INTERNET OF THINGS OR IoT MORE COMMON & HACKABLE

In a Dec. 28, 2015, article published by Cnet, author Laura Hautala explained the vulnerabilities of household IoT. Employees of a Sunnyvale, California cybersecurity company, Fortinet, used the Shodan search engine to find a video stream in Saudi Arabia, 8100 miles away. Using the too common factory default username and password of “admin,” they were able to view the streaming video. According to Fortinet engineer, Aamir Lakhani, the Shodan search engine can display “ ... a huge trove of Internet-connected devices, from baby monitors to cars, cameras and even traffic lights.” Sadly, many of these devices still use factory default usernames and passwords, and transmit their data over unencrypted In-ternet links. The Cnet article goes on to state, “Billions of sensors will soon be built into appliances, secu-rity systems, health monitors, door locks, cars and city streets to help manage energy use, control traffic, monitor air quality and even warn physicians when a patient is about to have a stroke.”

The Cnet article stated that a well-respected market forecaster, Gartner, predicted that in 2016 there will be 6.4 billion Internet connected devices in use. Many new IoT devices will be displayed and demonstrat-ed at this year’s CES in Las Vegas. Among some of the risks of an insecure IoT could be a variety of ma-licious vandalism, as well as outright identity theft, terrorism and crimes of opportunity. Tanuj Mohan, co-founder of Enlighted, gave one such potential example of vandalism. He was quoted in Cnet as saying, “That connected coffee maker in the office — it wouldn’t be much of a stretch for a hacker to put it into a continuous loop and brew coffee throughout the weekend, flooding the office. When computers hold the reins, criminals can grab control in unexpected ways.” At present, there is no coordination or uniform standard for IoT security, and many manufacturers of Iot devices do not incorporate adequate default se-curity into their devices, making the aggregate vulnerability of the devices potentially catastrophic. Mohan warned that manufacturers are not paying attention to the potential security vulnerabilities of many of their products. “They’re not yet aware of how everything they build can be exploited. Safety last.” We, as users of IoT products, need to take some personal responsibility for the use of our connected products. We should never use any default usernames and passwords such as the “admin” used to give total access to video link mentioned above, but instead use difficult to guess passwords. Since many of the devices offer some form of encryption as an optional setting, it would be wise for all users to engage that option, and set a complex pass phrase for a decryption key.

The Cnet article closes with a very prophetic statement. “Baby monitors, thermostats, kitchen gadgets and other “smart” devices add convenience to our daily lives. What are manufacturers doing to make sure they don’t make life easier for criminals too?”

Continued from page 5 How to manage passwords and use Dropbox

Dropbox folder usually locates itself in C:\Users\(username)\MyDocuments\Dropbox. Dropbox offers 2GB of storage free, which is not a lot compared with competitors, but this amount can be increased to 16GB by introducing friends to the service, at 500MB/friend. Paid personal plans, called Dropbox Pro, include 1TB of space for $9.99/m or $99/year.

For file collaboration, competing services, such as Google Drive, are better than Dropbox. It has applica-tions for Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, and Blackberry, and your files are available on any Internet-connected machine where Dropbox has been installed or has a web browser.

Once a folder or file has been synced, it is in Dropbox’s cloud storage and can be deleted from your computer. Any time you use the Dropbox icon on your desktop, however, the files are also stored on your machine, so you haven’t actually saved any storage space on the machine.

You can choose whether or not to sync automatically by turning off the instruction to sync in the Dropbox settings. A word of caution: if you have automatic sync turned on, files that you delete from the Dropbox folder on your computer will also be deleted from the Dropbox cloud storage.

If you only want to use Dropbox as a storage location in the cloud while being able to delete files from your local drive, do not use the sync feature; instead, use the Dropbox website to upload the files that you wish to store in the cloud.

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 9

Q1. How do I delete email addresses on an incoming email on my iPad, before forwarding? A1. In order to delete or change anything on an incoming email you need to tap on “reply” or “forward.” Tap at the end of the last email address and use the “X” key to back out the text. When all the text is deleted you are ready to forward or reply to your incoming text. Alternatively you can tap on one of the words to create a blue box with “handles” that look like blue dots. Grab hold of a dot and drag it over the text that you wish to delete. Tap the “X” button to delete the blue Highlighted Text.

Q2. How do I get rid of the coloured text and lines that appear when I forward an email on my iPad?

A2. When you forward an email on your Apple iPhone or iPad you will find that the text colour changes and a coloured line appears on the left side of the email. Every time this email is forwarded the colour changes and another coloured line appears next to the first one. If this email is forwarded many times on an Apple unit the lines will increase.

In order to get rid of the coloured text and lines is a simple process. Follow the steps below to make your forwarded email clean and crisp: 1. Click “Forward” on the selected email. (The portion of the email shown below was forwarded twice. You will see each time that the colour changes and an additional line is added.) 2. Highlight or Select the text. A bar of options will appear.

3. Click on “Quote Level” and then on “Decrease” and the coloured lines will disappear and the text will turn back to black.

COMPUTER TUTOR

iPad

From the Desk of Pamela Tabak DEDICATED TO THE COMPUTER

EDUCATION OF SENIORS website: http://computertutorinc.net

http://www.computertutorinc.net/frequently-asked-questions-2/

For additional resources, click the above link to Pamela’s FAQ page (frequently asked questions.)

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 10

Brokestuff Mountain By Greg Skalka, President, Under the Computer Hood User Group, CA September issue, Drive Light www.uchug.org president (at) uchug.org

One of my greatest fears is broken stuff. As an engineer, my work days are filled with problem solving, which often involves trying to figure out why something does not work as expected. At home, I’m looked upon as the builder and fixer of the family. My experience with electronics, electrical items and mechanical things won’t allow me to plead ignorance when someone in my family has a computer problem or a malfunctioning device. It seems all I do is solve problems and fix broken things. If heaven and hell are personalized, then I know what mine would be like. Heaven would be a place where every-thing works perfectly for eternity, while hell would be a place where everything is always broken.

This month I’ve been confronted with a mountainous pile of broken stuff. Some problems I’ve solved, oth-ers appear to be continuing, and some are fixed for now, but the can may only be kicked down the road a short ways.

Windows 8, Lay Them Straight

My daughter started graduate school this fall and sought my advice on getting a new computer. The old Windows Vista laptop I bought her for college carried her through to a bachelor’s degree, but it has got-ten filled up with junk over the years and she wants a fresh, new start. I paid for her first degree, so she realizes this new endeavor is on her own dime. She bought herself an iPad tablet after graduating, but even she does not think it sufficient for college work. She would have liked a MacBook Pro, a small, light Apple notebook computer, but she is on a budget, and so fortunately chose an Asus Q301LA touch screen laptop instead. It is a lot like the MacBook; small, thin and light, with no optical drive or removable battery. It does have a powerful Intel i5 processor, a 13.3” touch screen display and a 500G hard drive. She got a good deal by purchasing a factory refurbished unit from Amazon for a third of the MacBook’s price.

She brought it down with her on a visit with us a few weeks ago, so I got to spend a few evenings with a Windows 8.1 touch screen laptop. My assignment was to get it set up for her to use at school. It took me a little while just to figure out how to get around in Windows 8.1. The touch screen gives Windows 8.1 a tabletly feel; one of the ways to get to Control Panel was to swipe the screen from right to left.

My first order of business was to back up the existing system as delivered, so I could recover from any mistakes I might make. I knew the Acronis True Image 2015 backup program I use can support Windows 8 touch screen PCs, but without a CD drive, it was going to be difficult to install or boot from the program CD. Fortunately, I have a Samsung external USB CD/DVD drive (I also have external USB 3.5” floppy and Blu-ray drives). I use an external USB3 hard drive to store my back-up files; it took me a little time to insure both external drives were being recognized when connected. I decided to run True Image from the bootable CD, but it again took a while to figure out how to change the boot options. I didn’t see any ap-parent BIOS screen when booting the laptop, so finally had to search for the manual on-line to find out which function key allows you to enter the BIOS screens. Once I got it booting from the CD, the backup went smoothly.

My daughter wanted me to install Windows 10 and Microsoft Office (I have an unused 3-user copy of Of-fice Home and Student 2010), but I was running out of time and there was no Windows 10 upgrade icon in the system tray. I finally figured out that there were over a hundred updates yet to be installed for Win-dows 8.1. Once that was done (an all-evening process), the Win10 upgrade icon was present, but my daughter’s visit was almost over. I just barely had enough time to install Office 2010 (once again using the external USB CD/DVD drive) and make a final backup before she left. I figured she could live without Windows 10 for a while.

My daughter called me yesterday to tell me she had decided to install Windows 10 herself, but had run into a few problems. Something had happened to her cursor, but she was able to search online and find a fix for it. She also asked if I had installed Office, because now she couldn’t find it. I don’t know what

Continued on page 11

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Continued from page 10 Brokestuff Mountain

settings she used to install Windows 10, but I hope it did not wipe out my installation of Office 2010. Why am I suspicious that Microsoft might do something like that, so she would be enticed to subscribe to Of-fice 360? I guess this problem lives on.

Assault and Battery

One nice thing about laptops is that they come with a built-in UPS (uninterruptable power supply). When running off of ac power, they will automatically switch to battery should line power fail. This is not a standard feature of desktop computers, so unless you want to risk losing valuable data or even messing up your system, an external UPS is a necessity.

I have an external UPS for each of the desktop PCs in the house, plus a smaller one to run my network drive. A UPS uses ac power to charge an internal battery; battery power is used to create 110 VAC to run your computer. I use a 350 VA (200 W) UPS for each desktop computer; the APC model BE350G is one I have several of. It has three outlets that provide uninterruptable power and three that are only surge protected from the switched input power. When the ac power goes out, you can have up to 15 minutes to shut down your computer gracefully. These UPS units work very well, but the internal bat-teries typically last only a few years, and are pretty expensive. I some-times buy the whole UPS on sale at a price that is the same as a replace-ment battery, so I have a few UPS units I’ve bought on sale in reserve.

This particular model, which I use with my wife’s desktop, puts out a loud, high-pitched tone when the battery is on its way out. This is unfortunately something you cannot ignore - it is so annoying. I came home recently to my wife’s almost equally loud complaining that she could not use her computer at all that day because the UPS had started putting out the low battery tone.

I had no spare UPS batteries, but I did have a couple of new, spare UPS units. I swapped out the UPS on my wife’s computer for a power strip, so I could get her running again. I then opened up the new UPS units, hooked up the batteries and plugged them in to charge overnight. A new UPS is shipped with the battery disconnected and uncharged.

The next day, I turned on the two UPS units. One appeared to work, but the other put out the screeching low battery tone. Perhaps I’d had that one in the box for too long. I could have used the good UPS for my wife’s computer, but though it was the same model number, it had a different mounting hole pattern (I mount the UPS to my wife’s computer desk so she can use the UPS switch as a system power switch). I found the good UPS unit used the same battery as my wife’s unit, so I swapped batteries and hooked her UPS back up. Now I need to start looking for replacement batteries or UPS units for the next time the battery goes bad.

Wi Fi Fo Fum

While I was working out the UPS battery problem, my wife complained that she could no longer get onto our home Wi-Fi, and was using up too much data on her iPhone data plan. I have installed a Wi-Fi ac-cess point near the center of my house, as my wireless router is located at a corner of the house for bet-ter routing of wired Ethernet, and does not provide good coverage throughout all of the house from that location. I also have the access point powered through a power strip, so I can turn it on and off easily.

I logged into the wireless access point through its wired connection and turned off encryption on the wire-less link. Even then, though my iPad Mini could see the SSID and connect, I could not get any data through the access point. This access point was bad - time for a new one.

I had fortunately bought a few low-cost Wi-Fi access points on sale, thinking I might use them for travel. I opened up a TP-LINK TL-WR700N mini pocket router I had bought and set it up per the manual. It had the advantage of being capable of more secure Wi-Fi encryption than my old access point, so I set it up for stronger encryption and installed it in the same location in the house. Now my wife is happy again - until the next thing breaks.

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 12

Downloading Vs. Streaming – What’s the Difference? By Phil Sorrentino, Contributing Writer, The Computer Club, Florida http://scccomputerclub.org Philsorr.wordpress.com philsorr (at) yahoo.com Downloading is something most of us do, almost without thinking about it. Streaming is something we rarely do, unless we watch a lot of movies from YouTube or another such video streaming service. Downloading refers to receiv-ing data from a remote computer. The data comes “down” to you from another system. The received data is typically a data file of some specific type, like a pic-ture or a video, which is then stored on the local computer, for use in the near or distant future. The received file is called a download. The downloading process will progress as fast as the server computer can send the data to your computer.

That process will be affected by (1) your computer’s capability, (2) the communications equipment be-tween the server and your computer, and (3) how busy the server computer is at that specific time. The download really comes in many pieces, and the network protocol software in your machine reconnects all the pieces so the received file is identical to the original.

Downloading is done for many reasons. New software is typically acquired by downloading. (I’m sure you already have Google Earth or Picasa on your computer. Both of these were acquired by a down-load.) Email attachments are obtained by downloading. (Isn’t it is nice to have those pictures of grand-children and pets?) Documents are transferred by downloading. (Remember the User’s Manual you downloaded when you bought your camera?)

Just as a little aside, here. Downloading and Streaming are both supported by network software includ-ed as part of the Operating System. There are many network protocols used on the internet, two of which are HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) and FTP (File Transfer Protocol). HTTP is the predomi-nant protocol used on the internet and really defines the World Wide Web. Most of our computing activ-ities are on the WWW, so it is HTTP that allows our computers (clients) to connect to web server com-puters in order to accomplish things like checking our email, making hotel reservations, purchasing something on line, downloading a picture or video file, or streaming a movie. FTP is used mostly to transfer computer files from one computer to another, and most of us will rarely, if ever, use it.

So, now we know that downloading is the acquisition of a file, from a remote server computer, for future use. You may be thinking; if downloading is receiving a file, is there a way to send a file? Well, you guessed it, as you might have thought, it is called uploading. Until recently, the only uploading most of us may have done was to attach a document or picture to an email.

The act of “attaching” was actually uploading a file (the attachment) to the email server, so it could be sent with the body of your email. But now with Cloud Servers like OneDrive, Google Drive, and Drop-box, the way you get your files to the cloud is by uploading them. Uploading your pictures and videos, or any file that you want to share with others, is probably the first thing you will do after you have set up an account with one of these Cloud services. (By the way, if you haven’t tried a Cloud Service yet, give one a try. OneDrive and GoogleDrive will give you at least 15GB of storage space, free. OneDrive is hosted by Microsoft, and you guessed it, GoogleDrive is hosted by Google.)

Downloading is receiving a file from a remote server for future use. (In fact, the file cannot be used until the complete file is received and stored.) Streaming is similar, in that it is the transfer of a file from a remote server to your local computer. But the difference is that the file pieces, as they are received, are immediately used and typically are not stored for future use.

So, as you can imagine, the software to handle streaming is different in that it must process the pieces of the file, in real-time as they are received, and do it fast enough so no pieces of the file are lost. So, streaming is the process of receiving sequential pieces of a file and using those pieces immediately as they are received while the transmission continues its progress to the end of the file. Streaming data is

Continued on page 13

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 13

Continued from page 12 Downloading Vs. Streaming – What’s the Difference?

provided by video and audio file streaming services. YouTube is an example of such a video streaming service, as is Netflix and Vimeo. (By the way, you can upload your favorite videos to YouTube and Vimeo for sharing.)

So, streaming is used to view, in real-time, a video file, like a movie, or listen to music in real-time from a music source. In video streaming, each of the file pieces is a frame of the video and the frames are se-quentially displayed on the computer monitor, thereby providing motion to the picture on the monitor. Video frames may have to be displayed at rate of 60 frames per second, so the streaming software has to get all of its work done within 1/60

th of a second so it can be ready for the next frame. If the hardware

and software cannot process the frames fast enough, frames may be dropped and the resultant picture will stutter or jump. Audio streams are slower than video streams but they too have to produce the audio sound from each file piece before the next piece arrives. (Pandora is an example of an audio streaming service.)

So, now you can see the difference. Downloading is receiving a complete data file and storing it for fu-ture use, while Streaming is receiving a file and processing the contents, piece by piece, sequentially from the beginning to the end of the file transmission. Now to experience them, first hand, try both a download and a streaming video or audio. Try downloading Synctoy from Microsoft, a utility that will help you handle your data backup (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15155), and Stream something from YouTube to help you with setting up your data backup. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiNZPzFxoSc).

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY FROM YOUR LOCAL GROUNDHOG.

Minutes of 9 January 2016 Brief General Membership Meeting

The meeting was called to order by Secretary, Mary Phillips. No minutes read. No treasurer’s report given.

In the absence of the President and the Vice President due to cold weather, and because so few were in attendance, the motion was made to postpone the meeting by Mick Topping. Second by Jim Stewart. Motion carried.

Meeting was adjourned so several members could attend the Ozarks Genealogical Society conference next door.

Respectfully submitted, Mary Phillips, Secretary

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 14

PLEASE! Please Notify us of Change of Address. Each time the newsletter goes to the WRONG ADDRESS, the Post Office charges ICON an additional fee of $0.70 post-age to notify ICON of a change of address. So when

you move or go out of town, please e-mail: mary@iconusersgroup.org

THE CONTENTS AND OPINIONS OF THE ARTICLES IN THIS NEWSLETTER ARE THE OPINIONS OF THE AUTHORS. NOT

THOSE OF THE ICON USERS GROUP.

BASIC COMPUTER CLASSES

Basic Windows 7/8.1 computer classes are taught by ICON members Mary Phillips and Art Irish with ICON assistants for nine sessions monthly except April, August and December. Classes are held in Conference Room A in the Smith-Glynn-Callaway Medical Bldg basement, 3231 S National, Springfield MO. New classes will be held March 7.

Students should bring a Windows 7/8.1/10 lap-top, power cord, and mouse or plan to borrow one from an instructor. Sign up by calling Mercy Older Adults Services 841-0333.

For help, you can log onto ICON’s Forum at www.iconusersgroup.org and post your questions. Free registration is required in order to post questions and then you need to wait a day or so for an email confirmation to complete the registration. However, while you’re there, click on Search and enter the topic about which you’d like information and see if someone has already started a ‘thread’ — a series of questions and responses. All questions and responses can be read without having to

If you know of someone in our group who is ill or has suffered a loss in the family, please contact Susie McSwain 883-2811 waynemcswain @sbcglobal.net

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 15

ICON MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION Make Check to ICON — Mail dues to: ICON Users Group

1325 W Sunshine #169, Springfield MO 65807-2344 NAME _______________________ E-MAIL ADDRESS ______________________

ADDRESS _________________ HOME PHONE __________________ CITY ________________________ STATE _____ ZIP ______________

SPONSORED BY ______________________________________________________ DATE _______ YEARLY DUES $20.00 — PLUS $5.00 APPLICATION FEE

Please submit articles for the March issue of THE ICON by February 15, 2016 to Mary Phillips at mary@iconusersgroup.org

VISIT ICON’S WEB SITE AT

www.iconusersgroup.org

GO TAKE A LOOK!!

ICON OFFICERS

ICON’S NEWEST MEMBERS AND RENEWALS

MAY YOUR ASSOCIATION WITH ICON USERS GROUP BE A HAPPY AND FUN-FILLED TIME.

THE ICON February 2016 PAGE 16

Return Service Requested

ICON Users Group 1325 W. Sunshine #169 Springfield MO 65807

———- ———-

ICON (Interactive Computer Owners’ Network) is a non-profit organization dedicat-ed to sharing information about technology, and helping others more effectively learn to use computers and emerging technology.

We provide instructor led “Hands-on Classes”, “Moderated Workshops and Group Discussions”, “One-on-One Help Sessions”, and “Presentations” by individuals ranging from college level instructors, public service organizations, the business community, and our own members who are knowledgeable about specific topics.

Classes cover everything from beginner level to advanced skills, and discussions cover a wide range of topics from managing the various operating systems, to dig-ital photography, genealogy, office applications and web development.

Visitors are always welcome at all ICON functions

Check out our current schedule inside this newsletter...

Or by visiting: www.iconusersgroup.org

Visit the “Calendar” to find the time, date, and location of topics or classes that interest you and attend as often as you wish.

Hope to see you soon!

———-

ICON members,

Wishing you all a joyful, happy Valentine’s Day!

Barbara Wilkinson &Mary Phillips