From sulrich at botwerks.org Mon Jan 9 21:32:39 2006 From: sulrich at botwerks.org (steve ulrich) Date: Mon Jan 9 21:34:18 2006 Subject: [tcwug-list] administravia: ora user group newsletter References: Message-ID: ================================================================ O'Reilly UG Program News--Just for User Group Leaders January 9, 2006 ================================================================ -"PHP Hacks" Author Available to Speak to SF Bay Area Groups -New--Put Up an O'Reilly ETech Banner, Get a Free Book -New--Put Up a MySQL Users Conference Banner Get a Free Book -Promotional Material Available -Safari Affiliate Program for User Groups ---------------------------------------------------------------- Book Info ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Review Books are Available Copies of our books are available for your members to review-- send me an email and please include the book's ISBN number on your request. Let me know if you need your book by a certain date. Allow at least four weeks for shipping. ***Please Send Copies of Your Book Reviews Email me a copy of your newsletter or book review. For tips and suggestions on writing book reviews, go to: ***Discount Information Don't forget to remind your members about the 30% discount on O'Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, SitePoint, and Syngress books. Just use code DSUG. ***Group Purchases with Better Discounts are Available Please let me know if you are interested and I can put you in touch with our sales department. ---------------------------------------------------------------- General News or Inquiries ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Jack Herrington, author of "PHP Hacks," is available to speak with Northern California groups. Let me know if you are interested. ***New--Put Up an O'Reilly ETech Banner, Get a Free Book We're looking for user groups to display our conference banner on their web sites. If you send me the link to your group's site with our O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference banner, I will send you the O'Reilly book of your choice. ETech Banners: ***New--Put Up a MySQL Users Conference Banner Get a Free Book We're looking for user groups to display our conference banner on their web sites. If you send me the link to your group's site with our MySQL Users Conference banner, I will send you the O'Reilly book of your choice. MySQL Users Conference: ***Promotional Material Available: The following items are available for your next meeting. 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For more information and to sign up for the Safari Affiliate Program, go to: ================================================================ O'Reilly News for User Group Members January 9, 2006 ================================================================ ---------------------------------------------------------------- Book News ---------------------------------------------------------------- -Information Dashboard Design -Understanding Linux Network Internals -QuickBooks 2006: The Missing Manual -Google Maps Hacks -AppleScript: The Definitive Guide, Second Edition -Window Seat -Active Directory, Third Edition -Excel Scientific and Engineering Cookbook -Google Advertising Tools -RFID Essentials -We the Media -PSP Hacks ---------------------------------------------------------------- Upcoming Events ---------------------------------------------------------------- -Peter Krogh at ASMP PixelCash Seminar, Montclair, NJ--February 9 -Peter Krogh at ASMP PixelCash Seminar, New Haven, CT--February 16 -Photo Marketing Association International Convention and Tradeshow, Orlando, FL--February 26-March 1 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Conference News ---------------------------------------------------------------- -MySQL Registration is Open -ETech Registration is Open -40% discount for ETel--Early Registration Pricing Ends January 9 ---------------------------------------------------------------- News ---------------------------------------------------------------- -O'Reilly Books on Amazon's Best of 2005 -IP Telephony: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet -MacVoices #521: Getting the Most Out of eBay with Nancy Conner -Clone Pong, Using Only SDL (and Your Brain) -Top 7 PHP Security Blunders -Inside NetBSD's CGD -O'Reilly Happenings at Macworld SF -The Power of mdfind -Mac Users and the Macs They Use -Unit Testing in Visual Studio 2005 Team System -Just-In-Time Data Loading For DataGrids -10 Easy Steps to a Horrible Ecommerce Site -Web 2.0 Connectedness -Using Global/Distributed Transactions in Java/JDBC with Oracle Real Application Clusters -Maven Project Reporting and Publishing, Part 1 Introduction to Camera Raw -Andy West: From Dregs to (Software) Riches -Calling all Digital Crafters! -MAKE Forums ---------------------------------------------------------------- From Your Peers ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***SCALE 4X, Southern California Linux Expo, February 11-12 ================================================ Book News ================================================ Did you know you can request a free book to review for your group? Ask your group leader for more information. For book review writing tips and suggestions, go to: Don't forget, you can receive 30% off any O'Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, SitePoint, or Syngress book you purchase directly from O'Reilly. Just use code DSUG when ordering online or by phone 800-998-9938. ***Free ground shipping is available for online orders of at least $29.95 that go to a single address. This offer applies to US delivery addresses in the 50 states and Puerto Rico. For more details, go to: ---------------------------------------------------------------- New Releases ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Information Dashboard Design Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596100167 Dashboards have become popular in recent years as uniquely powerful tools for communicating important information at a glance. This book will teach you the visual design skills you need to create dashboards that communicate clearly, rapidly, and compellingly. The greatest display technology in the world won't solve this if you fail to use effective visual design. And if a dashboard fails to tell you precisely what you need to know in an instant, you'll never use it, even if it's filled with cute gauges, meters, and traffic lights. Don't let your investment in dashboard technology go to waste. ***Understanding Linux Network Internals Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596002556 A no-nonsense guide to Linux networking, "Understanding Linux Network Internals" offers a clear view of the underlying concepts and teaches you to follow the C code that implements it. Topics include system initialization, network interface card (NIC) device drivers, bridging, routing, ICMP, and more. ***QuickBooks 2006: The Missing Manual Publisher:O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101848 If your company is ready to minimize paperwork and maximize productivity, control spending and boost sales, QuickBooks 2006 can help you make it happen--but only if you know how to use it. And it doesn't come with a manual. Lucky for you, there's "QuickBooks 2006: The Missing Manual," the comprehensive, up-to-date guide to saving time and money while beefing up business with QuickBooks. ***Google Maps Hacks Publisher:O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101619 The nearest pizza, the cheapest gas, the best meeting place for a group--"Google Maps Hacks" shows you creative ways to add to and customize the satellite images and underlying API of Google Maps for applications serendipitous or serious. Written by Schuyler Erle and Rich Gibson (with a foreword by Google Maps tech leads, Jens and Lars Rasmussen), Google Maps Hacks shares dozens of tricks for combining the capabilities of Google's Keyhole map feature with your own datasets, so you can create interactive maps for unlimited personal and commercial applications. ***AppleScript: The Definitive Guide, Second Edition Publisher:O'Reilly ISBN: 0596102119 Fully revised and updated--and with more and better examples than ever--this new edition of the top-selling "AppleScript: The Definitive Guide" shows anyone how to use AppleScript to make your Mac time more efficient and more enjoyable by automating repetitive tasks, customizing applications, and even controlling complex workflows. It's perfect for novices, developers, and everyone in between who wants to know how, where, and why to use AppleScript. ***Window Seat Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596100833 "Window Seat: The Art of Digital Photography and Creative Thinking" is a complete view of a creative project from the artist's perspective. Julieanne Kost, a Photoshop and creative thinking guru, has taken her own experience shooting images out of airplane windows to create a unique seminar in three parts: a manifesto of ways to stay creatively alive; a portfolio of stunning photographs, with commentaries describing her experiences and thought process; and a technical appendix that includes the details of the images were shot, manipulated, and prepared for printing. A sample excerpt, "The Art of Creative Thinking," is availble online: ***Active Directory, Third Edition ISBN: 0596101732 Fully updated to cover Active Directory for Windows Server 2003 SP1 and R2, this third edition is full of important updates and corrections. Discover how to design, manage, and maintain a small, medium, or enterprise Active Directory infrastructure. It's perfect for all Active Directory administrators, whether you manage a single server or a global multinational with thousands of servers. ***Excel Scientific and Engineering Cookbook Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596008791 This quick, look-up reference is perfect for anyone in the science and engineering community who wants to improve upon their Excel skills. You'll learn how to leverage Excel to perform both routine and complex calculations, and then visualize the results for presentation. Features practical data analysis techniques and real-world examples from a range of scientific disciplines. Chapter 9, "Solving Equations," is available online: ***Google Advertising Tools Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101082 This comprehensive guide takes a close look at advertising on the web--how it works and how Google's advertising programs can turn your site into a money-maker. Tasks include delivering image ads precisely targeted to your site, and generating text ads that accompany specific search term results. After reading this book, you'll know Google's AdSense and AdWords services inside and out. ***RFID Essentials Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596009445 Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is rapidly changing the way businesses track inventory and assets. From Walmart and Tesco, to the U.S. Department of Defense, early efforts are already showing benefits, but software, integration, and data processing for RFID still present a challenge. If you are a developer or an architect charged with developing an RFID system, this book is for you. ***We the Media Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596102275 In "We the Media," nationally acclaimed newspaper columnist and blogger Dan Gillmor shows how anyone can produce the news, using personal blogs, Internet chat groups, email, and a host of other tools. He tells the story of this emerging phenomenon and sheds light on this deep shift in how we make and consume the news. Journalism in the 21st century will be fundamentally different from the Big Media oligarchy that prevails today. "We the Media" casts light on the future of journalism, and invites us all to be part of it. ***PSP Hacks Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101430 "PSP Hacks" shows you how to make the versatile and powerful new PlayStation Portable (PSP) do more than you ever imagined--and more than Sony ever intended--with 50 innovative hacks, tweaks, tricks, and how-tos for customizing your PSP and taking full advantage of features, capabilities, and functionality far beyond what's listed in the PSP user manual. ================================================ Upcoming Events ================================================ ***For more events, please see: http://events.oreilly.com/ ***Peter Krogh at ASMP PixelCash Seminar, Montclair, NJ--February 9 Author Peter Krogh (The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers) gives a three-hour comprehensive overview of Digital Asset Management techniques for the professional photographer. ***Peter Krogh at ASMP PixelCash Seminar,New Haven, CT--February 16 Author Peter Krogh (The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers) gives a three-hour comprehensive overview of Digital Asset Management techniques for the professional photographer. ***Photo Marketing Association International Convention and Tradeshow, Orlando, FL--Febuary 26-March 1 Stop by our booth( #2117) to check out our new titles. Orange County Convention Center West. ================================================ Conference News ================================================ ***MySQL Users Conference Registration in Open Join us at the 2006 edition of the MySQL Users Conference, the largest gathering of MySQL developers, users, and DBAs. It is the only event where you will be able to join the core MySQL development team and over 1000 users, open source innovators, and technology partners under one roof. MySQL Users Conference, April 24-27, 2006 Santa Clara Convention Center, Santa Clara, CA User Group members who register before March 6, 2006 get a double discount. Use code "mys06dusg" when you register, and receive 15% off the early registration price. To register for the conference, go to: ***Register for O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference We're five years into the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference and the stuff of which it is made shows no sign of abating: bandwidth continues to broaden, storage grows ever larger and cheaper, and content keeps streaming from the firehose. How do we visualize all of this digital data, filter it, remix it, and access it in meaningful ways? The coming technical challenge is not about generating digital content-we have more than enough already. It's time to do something with that data. It's time to build The Attention Economy. O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, March 6-9, 2006 Manchester Grand Hyatt, San Diego, CA User Group members who register before January 16, 2006 get a double discount. Use code "et06dsug" when you register, and receive 20% off the early registration price. To register for the conference, go to: ***New 40% discount for ETel Join us on January 24-26 in San Francisco when telephony's key figures, like Jim Van Meggelen, Peter Cochrane, Mark Spencer, Norman Lewis, and Clay Shirkey, convene to provide a high-level perspective of the future of telephony. And as a special offer to our friends, save an additional 40% when you register using code etel06lms. To register for the conference, go to: ================================================ News From O'Reilly & Beyond ================================================ --------------------- General News --------------------- ***O'Reilly Books on Amazon's Best of 2005 "Head First Java," "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual," and MAKE magazine were voted Best of 2005 in the Computers & Internet category of both the Editors' Picks and the Top 10 Customers' Favorites lists. In addition, "iLife: The Missing Manual," "Mapping Hacks," and "Revolution in the Valley" were all chosen as Editors' Picks in the Digital Life category. Thanks! ***IP Telephony: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet Developers now have the right tools and the right motivation to build a wide range of new desktop applications, telephone services, and corporate phone systems that integrate voice with the Web, IM, WiFi, and more. Ed Stephenson talks with program cochair Surj Patel about what's emerging in telephony, and what you can expect to learn at O'Reilly's upcoming Emerging Telephony Conference. ***MacVoices #521: Getting the Most Out of eBay with Nancy Conner Didn't get what you wanted for the holidays? Need to get rid of what you did get? Or maybe you just are looking to get a great deal on anything? Nancy Conner, the author of "eBay: The Missing Manual" talks about getting the most out of the online auction service. Tips for both novice and experienced users cover the many types of auctions on eBay, basic and advanced bidding and sales techniques and ways to protect yourself when buying and selling. Want to know how to snipe auctions? What all those eBay ratings mean? Nancy covers all this and more. --------------------- Open Source --------------------- ***Clone Pong, Using Only SDL (and Your Brain) One of the great things about the games of yore is that they tended to be pretty simple, and as Josh Glover explains, Pong is one of the simplest to implement. In this first article of a three-part series, Josh shows you how to clone Pong all by yourself. ***Top 7 PHP Security Blunders PHP's availability, ease of use, and support makes it the first choice for many budding developers. Yet the potential for the unwary coder to overlook certain key aspects of security lands countless developers in hot water. Pax explores the key security holes, common issues, and typical oversights in this hands-on primer. ***Inside NetBSD's CGD Security-minded laptop users live in fear of theft, not only of their computer, but also of their precious secret data. NetBSD's CGD project is a cryptographic virtual disk that can protect sensitive data while acting like a normal filesystem. Federico Biancuzzi recently interviewed its author, Roland Dowdeswell, on the goals and implementation of the system. --------------------- Mac --------------------- ***O'Reilly Happenings at Macworld SF Macworld SF 2006 is shaping up to be a busy show for O'Reilly Media. We have great specials, lots of books, a full speaker lineup, and a menu of activities. Here's a comprehensive overview. ***The Power of mdfind In addition to the little blue magnifying glass in the upper-right corner of your desktop, Tiger provides the mdfind and mdls commands for searching. Andy Lester discovered them while working on his updates to "Mac OS X Tiger In A Nutshell." Essentially, they provide the power of Spotlight in the Unix shell. Here's how it works. ***Mac Users and the Macs They Use When you read the articles and weblog posts by prominent Mac users and Mac pundits, do you ever find yourself wondering what kind of computer setup they're using? Giles Turnbull does. He recently contacted a spat of Mac professionals and asked them what they depend on. Here's what they had to say. --------------------- Windows/.NET --------------------- ***Unit Testing in Visual Studio 2005 Team System Unit testing is one of the tasks that every programmer worth their salt needs to do. Wei-Meng Lee shows you how to use the new Unit Testing feature of Visual Studio 2005 Team System to auto-generate the code needed to test your application. ***Just-In-Time Data Loading For DataGrids One of Jesse Liberty's clients has a problem: she has a database with 2 million records and wants to display these records in a data grid, but does not want to load them all into memory from the database. She wants them loaded "just in time." Jesse shows how to use the new DataGridView to neatly solve the problem. --------------------- Web --------------------- ***10 Easy Steps to a Horrible Ecommerce Site If you're about to launch into the world of ecommerce, or want to boost an existing site's revenue in the coming months, this article is for you. Jason's tongue-in-cheek advice will help you hone your approach to ecommerce, boost customer satisfaction, and your bottom line! ***Web 2.0 Connectedness Kevin Yank urges Web 2.0 Developers to stop creating the next killer app, and instead think of ways to improve on what's already out there. --------------------- Java --------------------- ***Using Global/Distributed Transactions in Java/JDBC with Oracle Real Application Clusters Maintaining transaction integrity, and rolling back failed steps, becomes more difficult on a cluster. One option is to move some of the load balancing decisions to your code, and account for which cluster nodes you're using. Sachin Shetty shows how this works in the context of an Oracle Real Application Cluster. ***Maven Project Reporting and Publishing, Part 1 Maven's not just about building; it's about viewing, understanding, and managing your projects. In this first part of a two-part excerpt from "Maven: A Developer's Notebook," authors Vincent Massol and Timothy M. O'Brien introduce Maven's reporting features for issue tracking, dependencies, code style, and more. --------------------- Digital Media --------------------- ***Introduction to Camera Raw Adobe's Camera Raw is arguably the most popular RAW-format converter available today. In this video, Deke McClelland introduces you to this tool and shows you tips for making image adjustments. ***Andy West: From Dregs to (Software) Riches Dixie Dregs co-founder Andy West discovered that virtuosity can be a liability in the music world, but a benefit in technology. Now this four-time Grammy nominee programs computers by day and pursues his amazing music at night, drawing the best from both disciplines. Here's how. --------------------- MAKE --------------------- ***Calling all Digital Crafters! Do you like to knit robots? Do you make jewelry out of old computer parts? Share your crafty projects with us and you may see them on the MAKE: Blog. ***MAKE Forums MAKE now has forums They're just getting started, but feel free to go over and check them out. . ***Meet Your Fellow Makers Find and post events, exhibits, and more with Maker events listings: ***Try a Sample Project from MAKE: ================================================ From Your Peers ================================================ ***SCALE 4X, Southern California Linux Expo, February 11-12 The fourth annual Southern California Linux Expo will be held February 11-12, 2006. SCALE continues to grow year after year, and increasingly attracts the movers & shakers in Open Source software. SCALE is not strictly a commercial Expo; its primary focus is and always has been education. Expo booths are provided not only for commercial exhibitors, but also for non-profit organizations. On the commercial side, exhibitors include IBM, Google, Ticketmaster, Tolis Group, and Centrify. On the non-profit side, Ubuntu, KDE, Debian, and NetBSD are among the many groups that will be manning booths. Speakers include Chris Dibona, John Terpstra, Aaron Seigo, and Hans Reiser. For 35% off Expo admission use the promo code ORELY at: ***Don't forget to check out the O'Reilly UG wiki to see what user groups around the globe are up to: -- steve ulrich sulrich@botwerks.org PGP: 8D0B 0EE9 E700 A6CF ABA7 AE5F 4FD4 07C9 133B FAFC From benmgroup at earthlink.net Fri Jan 13 07:27:44 2006 From: benmgroup at earthlink.net (Ben Nelson) Date: Fri Jan 13 07:28:22 2006 Subject: [tcwug-list] Discussion about public wifi Message-ID: Thought I?d pass this along. It?s open to the public, and should be interesting. B The Minnesota Global Forum WI-FI in Minneapolis: Public Ownership, or Private? The City of Minneapolis plans to allow a single, private company to own and operate a citywide wireless information network. Hundreds of other cities around the U.S. -- Saint Louis Park, Minnesota to Corpus Christi, Texas -- have chosen public ownership, and have been overwhelmingly satisfied with the choice. Join us at the Minnesota Global Forum to learn why publicly owned infrastructure is vital to Minnesota's information future. Speaker: Becca Vargo Daggett, Research Associate at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and co-author of Who Will Own Minnesota's Information Highways? Acadia Cafe, 1931 Nicollet (Nicollet & East Franklin) Wednesday, January 18th, 5-7 p.m. (Arrive in time to get refreshments!) Sponsored by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy?& the Minnesota International Directory (an IATP project) For more information, call Katie Fournier, 612/331-5615 or kfournier1@mn.rr.com -- Ben Nelson 612.685.9116 cell benmgroup@earthlink.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://shadowknight.real-time.com/pipermail/tcwug-list/attachments/20060113/13285ece/attachment.htm From becca at ilsr.org Fri Jan 13 13:45:10 2006 From: becca at ilsr.org (Becca Vargo Daggett) Date: Fri Jan 13 13:46:21 2006 Subject: [tcwug-list] 10 Questions Minneapolitans need to ask about that RFP Message-ID: <65CA6544-91F5-46B2-9838-6669EC778AB1@ilsr.org> It?s been a not-so-quiet week in the good fight for control of our information future. A hearty thank you to East Harriet Neighborhood Association and Seward Neighborhood Group, which have added their voice to the call for the Minneapolis to consider public ownership of the citywide wireless network. Once again, the votes were unanimous. We had an article in the Monday Star-Tribune business section. If you missed it, read it at http://www.newrules.org/info/010906strib.html We are getting ready for next week?s Minnesota Global Forum, hosted by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. Please join us to discuss the benefits of public ownership, and why a robust information infrastructure is vital to our city?s future. The conversation will take place at Acadia Cafe (corner of Franklin and Nicollet), from 5 to 7 pm on Wednesday, January 18. I?ve been told you should come a little early to get refreshments. They sell beer and wine as well as all the usual cafe fare. Finally, the City Council has gotten your letters, but they do not yet seem to have gotten the message. City Councilors have said it is true that they did not seriously consider public ownership, but it is too late to do so now. We disagree with that assessment. So I was thrilled today to read a column that authoritatively sums up what a legitimate process does, and does not look like. It is a commentary on San Francisco, but the parallels to Minneapolis are clear. I?ve included some of the ten questions below. The full version is available at http:// roisforyou.blogspot.com/ January 11, 2006 10 questions San Franciscans need to ask about that RFP by Craig Settles, author of ?Fighting the Good Fight for Municipal Wireless: Applying lessons from Philadelphia?s WiFi story? There seems to be quite the dust up in San Francisco over the RFP for a WiFi network, and from all sides of the political spectrum. The conservative view is the standard free-market arguments about government in the private sector?s business. The heart of the left and moderates argument is that the RFP doesn?t seem complete nor responsive to the needs of the people. You can read an article and a blog that lay out some specific issues of contention. Having looked at S.F.?s RFP, re-read Philadelphia?s RFP and knowing the many steps Philadelphia took leading up to their RFP, I believe there are a few vital things missing in the city by the Bay. If groups supporting muni WiFi in San Francisco or any city ask the following questions in the context of the process that Philly followed, many cities would get a better start to their initiatives. Don't imitate every step Philly took. Ask the questions they asked and answer them in a way that best fits your city. 1. Is there a steering committee for this initiative that is reflective of the city? The mayor of Philadelphia selected an executive steering committee of 15 people representative of various community and business constituencies, and two from the city government. The committee brought in a consultant firm proficient in muni WiFi deployments for guidance. In S.F., the Techconnect review panel has seven members: three from the city, two from the Public Utility Commission, one community rep and the consultant firm Philadelphia retained. 2. Does the steering committee have a deeply thought out, clearly articulated vision of where they think this initiative should go? Philadelphia?s committee worked together as a group in one session to complete an eight-page workbook in a vision-development exercise. They defined what a wireless network should and shouldn?t be, what services it should deliver to the communities, and worked through 30 values to determine ?What values drive the development of this community technology program?? 3. Was there, or is there a plan for, an aggressive needs-analysis process that reflects the diverse city? The committee conducted 20 extensive focus groups with about 15 people each, and each group represented a key constituency, including ethnic groups, neighborhoods, health care, education and business. Even the incumbents were invited to a focus group, which they declined. Participants were recruited and selected based on their recognized standing (formal or informal) as a leader within their respective constituency. All economic strata of the city were represented. 4. Is there a business plan? The executive committee, in 90 days and before the RFP was issued, created a 72-page business plan for the wireless initiative. As with any multi-million dollar business venture, the plan included ROI projections, business model analysis, an analysis of best practices, infrastructure definition, stakeholder analysis and plan for marketing the network to the various constituencies. 5. Has there been a technology feasibility study? For nearly a year before the RFP was issued in Philly, there was a series of ?proof of concept? deployments of WiFi networks, spectrum analysis, RF testing and five pilot projects in different parts of the city that each brought together a different set of vendors? products. S.F. cancelled their plans for a feasibility study. 10. Does someone have the political will to put the brakes on something that might not be a great idea? Whatever you want to say about the Philadelphia initiative, the people driving the process showed a willingness to slow down, revise, re-write or whatever was necessary to get the job done right. If you look at some of the dissent about the S.F. project, it?s about too few people making key decisions who aren?t plugged in enough with citizens. Even though the RFP calls for this network to be build for free, everything comes with a price, often paid by those citizens. Citizens are saying they want to see enough to know enough so they can determine if this RFP is a good idea. And they want it changed if it isn?t good. Bottom line. Many cities are racing to be one of the first with muni WiFi deployments. They see what Philly is doing and they want to be part of that. When you look at these first couple of cities that are deploying, you see the political fights, the early network build outs and the first couple of failures. What you don?t see is all of the preliminary work that went into (or should have gone into) these launches. It?s a staggering job to do this muni WiFi thing right. Yet with the stakes being what they are, don?t you owe it to your city to ask these important 10 questions, with an understanding of how these pioneering cities addressed the issues? Provided by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, www.newrules.org Contact: Becca Vargo Daggett, 612.379.3815 x209, becca@ilsr.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://shadowknight.real-time.com/pipermail/tcwug-list/attachments/20060113/0f5a6643/attachment.htm From sulrich at botwerks.org Sat Jan 28 16:22:54 2006 From: sulrich at botwerks.org (steve ulrich) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 16:22:54 -0600 Subject: [tcwug-list] administravia: ora user group newsletter References: Message-ID: <651AC4B9-1599-43ED-8E28-157A96E426C6@botwerks.org> ================================================================ O'Reilly UG Program News--Just for User Group Leaders January 27, 2006 ================================================================ -RSS Feeds--Do You Use Them? -Put Up an O'Reilly ETech Banner, Get a Free Book -Put Up a MySQL Users Conference Banner Get a Free Book -Promotional Material Available -Safari Affiliate Program for User Groups ---------------------------------------------------------------- Book Info ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Review Books are Available Copies of our books are available for your members to review-- send me an email and please include the book's ISBN number on your request. Let me know if you need your book by a certain date. Allow at least four weeks for shipping. ***Please Send Copies of Your Book Reviews Email me a copy of your newsletter or book review. For tips and suggestions on writing book reviews, go to: ***Discount Information Don't forget to remind your members about the 30% discount on O'Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, SitePoint, and Syngress books. Just use code DSUG. ***Group Purchases with Better Discounts are Available Please let me know if you are interested and I can put you in touch with our sales department. ---------------------------------------------------------------- General News or Inquiries ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Do you use RSS Feeds? Does your group site offer an RSS feed? What are your favorite RSS Feeds and what applications or web sites do you use to read them? Send me an email and let me know. ***Put Up an O'Reilly ETech Banner, Get a Free Book We're looking for user groups to display our conference banner on their web sites. If you send me the link to your group's site with our O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference banner, I will send you the O'Reilly book of your choice. ETech Banners: ***Put Up a MySQL Users Conference Banner Get a Free Book We're looking for user groups to display our conference banner on their web sites. If you send me the link to your group's site with our MySQL Users Conference banner, I will send you the O'Reilly book of your choice. MySQL Users Conference: ***Promotional Material Available: The following items are available for your next meeting. Let me know the item and the amount you'd like: -MAKE Magazine Volume 4 -O'Reilly Catalog -30% UG Discount bookmarks -ETech Conference brochures -ETel Conference brochures ***Safari Affiliate Program for User Groups Give your members access to content from Safari's thousands of technology books right on your site and raise money for your user group at the same time. Use custom designed search boxes, show the latest releases, or display your favorite book cover with our easy to use tools. For more information and to sign up for the Safari Affiliate Program, go to: ================================================================ O'Reilly News for User Group Members January 27, 2006 ================================================================ ---------------------------------------------------------------- Book News ---------------------------------------------------------------- -Podcasting Pocket Guide -Learn to Program -Dreamweaver 8 Design and Construction -C# Cookbook, Second Edition -Baseball Hacks -Essential Microsoft Operations Manager -Learning Windows Server 2003, Second Edition ---------------------------------------------------------------- Upcoming Events ---------------------------------------------------------------- -Digital Photography Fundamentals Workshop with Stephen Johnson, Pacifica, CA--January 28-29, 2006 -II Conferencia Internacional de Software Libre, Malaga, Spain--February 15-17 -Derrick Story at NCMUG, Rohnert Park, CA--February 21 ---------------------------------------------------------------- Conference News ---------------------------------------------------------------- -Upcoming 2006 O'Reilly conferences -MySQL Registration is Open -ETech Registration is Open ---------------------------------------------------------------- News ---------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------- -Early Access to Cutting-Edge Technology -What Are Syndication Feeds? -Hacking Online Applications for Location Awareness -PHP Easter Egg -Simplify PHP Development with WASP -Running Commercial Linux Software on FreeBSD -Putting Google Video onto Your iPod -Adding a New Style Preferences Window to Your App, Part 1 -Using the Windows Mobile 5.0 Emulators in Visual Studio 2005 -An Inside Look at IPSec in Vista -What's Your Link Reputation? -Building a Web Community with Bribes -Head First's Cover Model Contest -Using Lucene to Search Java Source Code -Spring: Integrating iBATIS -O'Reilly's New Podcasting Site -Connect the Video iPod to TV -Jack Herrington Interviews Founder of Fake Science -MAKE Contest on Digg ---------------------------------------------------------------- From Your Peers ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Photos from Macworld ================================================ Book News ================================================ Did you know you can request a free book to review for your group? Ask your group leader for more information. For book review writing tips and suggestions, go to: Don't forget, you can receive 30% off any O'Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, SitePoint, or Syngress book you purchase directly from O'Reilly. Just use code DSUG when ordering online or by phone 800-998-9938. ***Free ground shipping is available for online orders of at least $29.95 that go to a single address. This offer applies to US delivery addresses in the fifty states and Puerto Rico. For more details, go to: ---------------------------------------------------------------- New Releases ---------------------------------------------------------------- ***Podcasting Pocket Guide Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596102305 Whether you're a listener or an aspiring podcaster, "Podcasting Pocket Guide" is a non-technical guide for the non-geek who wants in on this revolutionary new medium. This handy guide shows you how to tune into unique and interesting podcasts and download them to your favorite portable device and contains an introduction to creating, recording, publishing, and finding an audience for your own, professional-quality podcasts. ***Learn to Program Publisher: Pragmatic Bookshelf ISBN: 0976694042 It's now easier to learn to write your own computer software than it has ever been before. Now everyone can learn to write programs for themselves--no previous experience is necessary. Chris Pine takes a thorough, but light-hearted approach that teaches you how to program with a minimum of fuss or bother. Starting with small, simple one-line programs to calculate your age in seconds, you'll see how to have your web page send you email, to shuffle your music more intelligently, to rename your photos from your digital camera, and more. You'll learn the same technology used to drive modern dynamic websites and large, professional applications. ***Dreamweaver 8 Design and Construction Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101635 Whether you're an absolute beginner or you're switching web design programs, "Dreamweaver 8 Design and Construction" gets you up to speed quickly and efficiently. With speed as its watchword, Marc Campbell's practical hands-on guide focuses on rapid prototyping techniques for constructing both interactive and static web sites. Clear and thorough, it emphasizes learning by doing with short, task-oriented chapters that use screen shots, illustrations, and sample layouts to demonstrate theory through design solutions. ***C# Cookbook, Second Edition Publisher:O'Reilly ISBN: 0596100639 Completely revised for C# 2.0, this updated bestseller offers more than 100 new code solutions to common problems that you're sure to face as a C# programmer. Nearly every solution or "recipe" contains a complete, documented code sample showing you how to solve the specific problem. Covers .NET Framework Class Libraries, interoperability, design patterns, and much more. ***Baseball Hacks Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596009429 Whether you're a fantasy baseball fanatic, casual fan, or just a statistically inclined mathematician, "Baseball Hacks" has something for you. This comprehensive guide walks readers through the sport's core statistical categories, and then demonstrates how to use this data to truly understand baseball. Statistical analysis, data mining, probability, forecasting, and other valuable tools are examined. ***Essential Microsoft Operations Manager Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596009534 This comprehensive tutorial gives system administrators a solid foundation for planning, implementing, and administering Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005. Learn how to program MOM so it automates burdensome and lengthy diagnostic tasks, making your life as a troubleshooter easier than ever. Features practical, real-world advice from MOM expert Chris Fox. ***Learning Windows Server 2003, Second Edition Publisher: O'Reilly ISBN: 0596101236 This compact guide provides the nuts and bolts for installing, configuring, securing, and managing Windows Server 2003. Topics include patch management, Active Directory replication, network access quarantining, server clustering, and more. Designed for system administrators of all levels, "Learning Windows Server 2003, 2nd Edition" has also been completely updated for Service Pack 1 and release R2. ================================================ Upcoming Events ================================================ ***For more events, please see: http://events.oreilly.com/ ***Digital Photography Fundamentals Workshop with Stephen Johnson, Pacifica, CA--January 28-29 Photographer and author Stephen Johnson ("Stephen Johnson on Digital Photography") presents a two day class designed to provide you with the background and understanding to transition your work into the digital realm. The digital basics are covered here, in real world terms, with care to make sure the concepts are understood and the complications simplified. Those basics are built on to tackle the thorny issues of camera design and choice, data storage, color management and printing. ***II Conferencia Internacional de Software Libre, Malaga, Spain--February 15-17 "Innovation and Freedom" is the theme of the Second Open Source World conference organized by both the Andalucia and the Extremadura Regional Governments. Stop by our booth to check out our new titles and get 30% discount on all purchases. ***Derrick Story at NCMUG, Rohnert Park, CA--February 21 Author Derrick Story ("Digital Photography Pocket Guide, 3rd Edition," "iPhoto 5: The Missing Manual," and "Digital Photography Hacks") presents "Dumb DigiPhoto Tricks" to the North Coast Mac Users Group. There are so many serious things to do with you Mac that sometimes we forget to play. Join Derrick as he shows you how to entertain yourself (and friends) with digital photography toys and your Mac. ================================================ Conference News ================================================ ***Upcoming 2006 O'Reilly conferences -O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, March 6-9 in San Diego, California -MySQL Users Conference, April 24-27 in Santa Clara, California--early registration discount ends March 6 -Where 2.0, June 13-14 in San Jose, California--registration opens in February -O'Reilly Open Source Convention, July 24-28 in Portland, Oregon-- Call for Participation ends February 13; registration opens in April -O'Reilly European Open Source Convention, September 18-21 in Brussels, Belgium--Call for Participation ends March 6; registration opens in May -Web 2.0, November 7-9 in San Francisco, California For up to date information on each conference, go to: ***MySQL Users Conference Registration in Open Join us at the 2006 edition of the MySQL Users Conference, the largest gathering of MySQL developers, users, and DBAs. It is the only event where you will be able to join the core MySQL development team and over 1000 users, open source innovators, and technology partners under one roof. MySQL Users Conference, April 24-27, 2006 Santa Clara Convention Center, Santa Clara, CA User Group members who register before March 6, 2006 get a double discount. Use code "mys06dusg" when you register, and receive 15% off the early registration price. To register for the conference, go to: ***Register for O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference We're five years into the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference and the stuff of which it is made shows no sign of abating: bandwidth continues to broaden, storage grows ever larger and cheaper, and content keeps streaming from the firehose. How do we visualize all of this digital data, filter it, remix it, and access it in meaningful ways? The coming technical challenge is not about generating digital content-we have more than enough already. It's time to do something with that data. It's time to build The Attention Economy. O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, March 6-9, 2006 Manchester Grand Hyatt, San Diego, CA User Group members who register with code "et06dsug" receive 20% off the conference pricing. To register for the conference, go to: ================================================ News From O'Reilly & Beyond ================================================ --------------------- General News --------------------- ***Early Access to Cutting-Edge Technology O'Reilly's Safari Books Online has just announced a new service called Rough Cuts that gives you early access to content on cutting-edge technologies months before it's published. Rough Cuts allows you to purchase work-in-progress manuscripts of selected titles. You'll even have the chance to shape the final product by sending feedback to the author and editors. The beta version just debuted with four works-in-progress covering Ajax, Ruby, and Flickr. For more information, go to: Titles now available: Ajax Hacks: Rough Cuts Version Flickr Hacks: Rough Cuts Version Ruby Cookbook: Rough Cuts Version Ruby on Rails: Up and Running: Rough Cuts Version Rough Cuts FAQ ***What Are Syndication Feeds? O'Reilly recently commissioned Shelley Powers, a specialist in technology architecture and software development, to create a comprehensive PDF document that would help webmasters manage their incoming and outgoing feeds. Shelley produced nothing short of a must-have reference for online publishers, titled "What Are Syndication Feeds?" You can download it today from the O'Reilly shopping cart. ***Hacking Online Applications for Location Awareness Based on his work developing a stable wireless mesh platform that allows true peer-to-peer multi-hop network connectivity, Chris Ngan discusses some proof-of-concept applications that demonstrate the power of this network infrastructure and the ease with which text/chat, voice, and video applications can be made location-aware. --------------------- Open Source --------------------- ***PHP Easter Egg The Easter Bunny has come early. Kevin Yank uncovers a little-known PHP Easter Egg. http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2006/01/08/phps-doggie-easter-egg/ ***Simplify PHP Development with WASP Where are the all-in-one PHP frameworks that make building well-factored and maintainable applications as easy as building simple sites? Brian Fioca shows how to make a simple database-backed site with WASP in just a few lines of code. ***Running Commercial Linux Software on FreeBSD One intriguing feature of the BSDs is their ability to run binaries for Linux distributions. This can be very useful for running commercial software. Michael W. Lucas demonstrates how to configure and use the Linux compatibility layer on FreeBSD. --------------------- Mac --------------------- ***Putting Google Video onto Your iPod There's some pretty interesting stuff on Google Video. In this article, Erica Sadun shows you how to download videos, convert them to an iPod-friendly format, and load them onto your new 5G video iPod. ***Adding a New Style Preferences Window to Your App, Part 1 In this first of two articles, Martin Redington shows you how to add a new style preferences window to your application that behaves in all respects exactly like the Apple preferences windows. --------------------- Windows/.NET --------------------- ***Using the Windows Mobile 5.0 Emulators in Visual Studio 2005 Emulators are a must-have for anyone developing mobile applications. To get you started, Wei-Meng Lee shows you how to use the emulator tools that shipped with Windows Mobile 5.0 and Visual Studio 2005. ***An Inside Look at IPSec in Vista IPSec management tools are not particularly intuitive in XP. But things are going to be better in Vista. Mitch Tulloch, author of "Windows Server Hacks," takes a look at IPSec support in Vista, and clues you in on what you can expect. --------------------- Web --------------------- ***What's Your Link Reputation? Forget Pagerank: as Gord explains, this measure no longer allows us to accurately or consistently predict how a page will perform in the search results. Here, he unravels the concept of link reputation, explaining why it's important and what it means for your site's ranking. ***Building a Web Community with Bribes Building a community on the Web is one of the hardest things to do. Chris explains some shortcuts that you can take to drastically speed up the process. --------------------- Java --------------------- ***Help Choose a Cover Model for the Next Head First book JavaRanch is hosting a contest to choose a cover model for the next Head First book ("Head First Objects"), due out this Spring. Examine seven wannabe photos, decide which would work best, then craft an essay or poem describing why. Try your luck at winning one of five fabulous prizes, including the chance to have your name appear in the new book. Deadline for entries is January 29th. ***Using Lucene to Search Java Source Code Most uses of the Java-based Lucene search engine are for searching typical text documents. But what if you want to search Java code itself? Renuka Sindhgatta argues that this would be a boon for finding reusable code, and shows how to adapt Lucene to parse Java code for maximum searchability. ***Spring: Integrating iBATIS iBATIS is one of the object-relational (OR) frameworks embraced by the Spring framework, and it's an ideal choice for those seeking a middle ground between full-blown OR and hand-written JDBC. In this excerpt from "Spring: A Developer's Notebook," Bruce Tate and Justin Gehtland show how to integrate iBATIS with Spring. --------------------- Podcasts --------------------- ***O'Reilly's New Podcasting Site Check out our latest podcasting shows and selections: "Distributing the Future" hosted by Daniel Steinberg O'Reilly Media's weekly podcast show features the technology and the people behind what you're using now--and what you'll use next. This half hour program includes interviews and commentary on science, technology, related social issues, and is good fun, to boot. "MAKE Audio and Video" hosted by Phil Torrone Each week MAKE magazine delivers audio and video of amazing Makers, inventions, do-it-yourself projects, and lab tours. Phil also showcases how all kinds of things are made, from wireless microphones to cigar-box guitars. "FOO Casts"--Podcasts from Friends of O'Reilly FOO Casts feature great audio interviews from O'Reilly's editors, authors, conference presenters, and other friends. Get a whole new perspective by hearing an author explain a concept in a new way, or speak on new tech topics, gadgets, and tips and techniques. "In Our Ears & Pick of the Week Selections"--Highlights what O'Reilly editors, authors, and readers recommend. http://www.oreillynet.com/podcasts/ --------------------- Digital Media --------------------- ***Connect the Video iPod to TV Did you know you can use your Video iPod with your TV? Best-selling author Derrick Story details how you can connect the Video iPod using standard cables and share your content on a TV any time you visit with friends and family. ***Jack Herrington Interviews Founder of Fake Science James Polanco, founder of Fake Science, chats with Jack about his popular radio show and how he started podcasting to cover digital music news, reviews, and to showcase favorite artists. James reveals his gear setup for recording and editing the show. --------------------- MAKE --------------------- ***MAKE Contest on Digg MAKE and Digg.com are testing the delivary of the latest news and top stories from Digg using MAKEbot. On AIM/iChat, just add MAKEbot to your buddy list and then type "subscribe digg 1" or "subscribe diggall 1" to get the latest/top stories from Digg every hour. ("1" is the number of hours, but you can change that. You can also just type digg or diggall at any time). MAKE will randomly pick a user of the MAKEbot and give away a high-speed flash photography kit, T-shirts, a year of MAKE, and our new book, "Makers." So add the MAKEbot and start Digging to win! If you need help with the MAKEbot, just type "help"during your chat. ***Meet Your Fellow Makers Find and post events, exhibits, and more with Maker events listings: ***Try a Sample Project from MAKE: ================================================ From Your Peers ================================================ ***Photos from Macworld Check out photos from User Group University and Macworld. Thanks to Maria O. Arguello, Main Line Macintosh Users Group, for sharing these with us: (See if you can find the photos of Tim O'Reilly saving the day by bringing more copies of "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Tiger Ed" to David Pogue's talk at the O'Reilly Booth!) ***Don't forget to check out the O'Reilly UG wiki to see what user groups around the globe are up to: -- steve ulrich sulrich at botwerks.org PGP: 8D0B 0EE9 E700 A6CF ABA7 AE5F 4FD4 07C9 133B FAFC