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The following is a Plus Edition article written by and copyright by Dick Eastman.
Would you like to double the size of your computer's screen? There is a simple method of doing that: add a second monitor. It is surprisingly easy and cheap to do so. In fact, right now I have two monitors on the computer I am using to write this article.
Did you recently purchase a new, large monitor? If so, is your older, smaller monitor gathering dust? Put it to use! The process I will describe works with almost any monitor, large or small.
I have written often about the advantages of cloud computing. Presently, I am using three different cloud-based services: DropBox, Google and Amazon. I like the security of having encrypted copies of my important files stored off-site.
Now Apple has jumped into the same business with a brief mention in a press release of "iCloud®, Apple’s upcoming cloud services offering." Details apparently will be released at the company’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) next Monday.
The following announcement was written by the Allen County Public Library's genealogy department in Ft. Wayne, Indiana:
With more than 6 billion historical records and in excess of 20 million family trees available, Ancestry.com is the world's largest genealogical database. Have you explored what Ancestry.com has to offer? Or are you needing guidance to navigate the website? Come learn from the experts at Ancestry.com and The Genealogy Center on July 23, when both groups collaborate for "Fort Wayne Ancestry Day." Experts will present five classes and provide answers to your questions during this full day event at the Grand Wayne Center in Fort Wayne, IN.
The following announcement was written by the U.S. Federation of Genealogical Societies:
National Genealogy Conference Continues to Tap into Social Media
May 31, 2011 – Austin, TX. The Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), along with local host Illinois State Genealogical Society (ISGS), announce the Official Bloggers for the upcoming FGS 2011 Conference - Pathways to the Heartland – to be held in Springfield, Illinois, September 7-10, 2011. The Official Bloggers are:
Ten days ago, I published an article in this newsletter entitled Malware Found on Macintosh Systems. It described a newly-discovered Trojan Horse program called Mac Defender (there are other variants called Mac Protector and Mac Security). Luckily, it is a minor problem, easily avoided and, if installed, easily removed. You can read the article at http://goo.gl/7Xop3.
Now Apple has released a security update that neutralizes the problem. If Mac Defender or any similar software is encountered on a web site or in email, it will be blocked. If Mac Defender or its variants are already installed on the system, the new update will remove them. It also installs safeguards against similar future malware (malevolent software) programs.
The following announcement was written by the Federation of Genealogical Societies:
May 31, 2011 – Austin, TX. The Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) announces that nominations for this year’s FGS Youth Award will be accepted through July 15, 2011.
The FGS Outreach Committee is accepting nominations for the FGS 2011 Youth Award, which honors volunteers under the age of 18 who have made a significant contribution to an FGS member society.
Nominees must be affiliated with an FGS member society, and be eighteen or younger as of July 15, 2011.
The following announcement was written by the Guild of One-Name Studies:
The Guild of One-Name Studies is to offer a special extended membership to new joiners at the forthcoming Yorkshire Family History Fair being held at the Knavesmire Exhibition Centre, The Racecourse, York, UK on Saturday 25th June 2011.
Normally membership of the Guild of One-Name Studies costs £15.00 and covers a period of up to a year with renewal on 1st November 2011. This special extended membership will cost £16.00 but will include a full year's extra membership, renewal not being due until 1st November 2012. The aim of the scheme is to attract even more new members and to encourage these members to stay with the Guild for longer and to appreciate and utilise the various benefits available to members.
The following announcement was written by GeneaBloggers:
May 31, 2011 - Chicago, Illinois: GeneaBloggers, the genealogy community's resource for blogging, announces the creation of GeneaSpeak.
GeneaSpeak is a community-driven resource that allows genealogy speakers to post their own profiles and speaking engagements in order to publicize their presentations. GeneaSpeak replaces the GeneaBloggers Speakers Bureau which resided at the GeneaBloggers website since 2009.
United States Navy cruise books have long been created to commemorate a vessel’s deployment. The books are not official Navy publications, but rather are keepsakes created by Navy volunteers. They typically contain a lot of pictures. The Navy has provided about 3,500 cruise books to Ancestry.com. Vessels deployed from 1918 through 2009 are represented by a staggering 4,857,924 searchable records now available in the collection. These include more than half a million images.
Access to the cruise books requires a paid Ancestry.com subscription but you can see a sample of them free of charge in an article by Michael Kolomatsky in the New York Times' City Room blog at http://goo.gl/qMrw3.
>A new addition to the City of New Westminster's web site allows anyone to search the city's history and photographs from a smartphone, tablet computer, laptop, or desktop system. Not only can users search the database but they can also share with others and comment on photographs and other records.
Archivist Barry Dykes said in a press release, "I was able to search and retrieve images using my own smart phone. However, until the time when we get the bulk of our photographs online, people will still need to visit the archives. In any case, this is still a great start."
When was the last time you heard a U.S. President say "Thank you" to a genealogist for the research she did, much less give her a hug in front of thousands of people? You can watch and listen to a video in which President Barack Obama does just that at http://megansmolenyak.posterous.com/.
Megan Smolenyak was the first genealogist to document Barack Obama's Irish ancestry. She later had an opportunity to meet the President in Dublin during his recent trip. You can watch a video in which he said "Thanks to the genealogist" at http://megansmolenyak.posterous.com/. Then scroll down a bit to see a still picture of the hug.
This is a reminder about the "Vendors' Ads" section of the EOGN Members' Discussion Forum at http://members.eogn.com. We invite genealogy vendors to post conservatively-worded announcements describing their products and services. We welcome announcements from professional genealogists, records researchers, photo restoration experts, and others.
Quoting from the introduction:
Do you sell genealogy-related items or history-related items or provide services to genealogists or historians? This is the place to list your goods or services, FREE of charge! All genealogy and history vendors are welcome here!
We suggest you limit your advertising here to one ad per month.
The British Library is one year into its plan to digitise 40 million news pages from its vast 750 million collection, housed in Colindale, north London. This autumn, the library will reinvent its cavernous vaults as a website, where amateur genealogists and eager historians will be able to browse 19th-century newsprint from their home computer.
About half a million newspaper pages have been scanned to date. Fewer than a dozen staff clean, copy and upload roughly 8,000 pages a day – about enough to cover a football pitch. When it goes live, the site aims to display more than 1.5 million pages, with 4 million pages uploaded by the end of next year.
The following announcement was written by The National Institute for Genealogical Studies:
The Ontario Genealogical Society and The National Institute for Genealogical Studies Announce a Partnership
At its recent 50th Anniversary Conference in Hamilton May 13-15, Nancy Trimble, President of the Ontario Genealogical Society (OGS), and Louise St Denis, Managing Director of The National Institute for Genealogical Studies, signed a mutually beneficial partnership agreement. Both organizations will remain as independent entities but will work closely with one another for the advancement of genealogical research. Reciprocal advertising arrangements are being developed. As well, free or discounted courses, and other promotions, will benefit OGS members. Free use of The Institute Live Meeting Room will be made available for Society and Branch online communication for committees, meetings, workshops, and speakers. This will allow OGS members to be a part of their Society and Branch activities regardless of where they may live.
The following is a Plus Edition article written by and copyright by Dick Eastman.
Almost all of today's ebook readers and tablet computers advertise that you can use the device to read documents and books. Doing so is a great way of taking your information with you. Whether it is a document from the office or a white paper you downloaded or a report from your favorite genealogy program, being able to read information at the beach, on a commuter train, on an airliner, or in a hotel room is a great convenience. There is but one problem: most owners of ebook readers and tablet computers never use them for documents or books other than the ones that can be downloaded from the online bookstores.
Almost all owners of these devices download commercial books, newspapers, and magazines. In my casual conversations with owners of these devices, I have often asked about converting other documents to suitable formats and copying them to the handheld devices. The most common response I receive is, "I don't know how to do that" or "I need to learn more about that" or some similar words. I decided to write this article with "how to" instructions.
You can follow new articles posted on this newsletter's web site or on any of hundreds of thousands of other web sites in a variety of methods. Of course, you can always open a web browser and go to the web site of interest every day or even every few hours. Millions of people do that.
A much more convenient method is to use an RSS newsreader to conveniently check as many web sites as you wish. Most people who switch to an RSS newsreader find they love the convenience. You can read more about RSS in my earlier article, A Really Simple Explanation of Really Simple Syndication (RSS), at http://goo.gl/kKO81.
However, an even older technology works well and is less complicated to use: email. Using the free or low-cost services of Feed My Inbox, you can have all the latest articles from a web site automatically delivered to your email in-box. You spend a minute or two initially to specify the web site(s) whose articles you want delivered. After that, everything is automatic: you simply check your email, and all new articles from the web site(s) you specify will be there.
For years, I have sent the Plus Edition newsletter by email to everyone who subscribes to it. Unfortunately, not all of these email messages get delivered. The most common problem is that spam filters in the receiving mail servers see the lengthy email message and make an erroneous decision that the message is spam. Sometimes the mail servers simply place it in the recipient's spam folder, but many times it is completely blocked. The recipient never sees it at all.
The problem has become worse over the years as real spam increases. The mail server system administrators of most email services are constantly "tweaking" their spam filters. The Plus Edition newsletter may be blocked one week, then appear normally the following week, then get blocked again in the next week's mailing. In any week, the long email message may get through one company's spam filters but will be blocked by another company's mail servers. The following week, the results may be reversed.
For many Americans, Memorial Day weekend marks the unofficial start of the summer and an opportunity to gather with family and friends. For veterans and their families, it is a day of rememberance for those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service of their country.
Stephen K. Robinson of the U.S., Air Force wrote a great about the Origin of Memorial Day, formerly known as Decoration Day. You can read his article at http://goo.gl/zDmdY.
Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, city officials have made searching records for loved ones at Riverside Cemetery a genealogist's dream. It has taken several years to accomplish, but all Riverside Cemetery records are available online.
There are more than 9,000 burials at Riverside Cemetery. It took seven years, and several volunteers to get the job done but all burial records are available online. The Mt. Pleasant Genealogy Society helped with the project.
The challenge is: how do you identify and catalog more than 100,000 images that do not contain any descriptive “metadata,” or data about data? Dartmouth College digital humanities and film and media studies professor Mary Flanagan may have found a way: let college students play games.
The Rauner Special Collections Library plans to tag and archive thousands of photos when the software is released in summer 2011. The new open-source game will not only change how institutions archive data, but will allow people to utilize games as functional tools, Flanagan said.
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