Sydney PC User Group Incorporated Members helping Members for over 25 Years Visitors are always welcome
WEEKLY SIG MEETING UPDATE 12 - 17 NOVEMBER 2012
1st Floor Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts 280 Pitt Street, Sydney http://www.sydneypc.com Sydney PCUG's Blog Repairing the club's computer The manner in which the club members went about repairing the club's computer can be seen in the SPCUG Blog above. UPCOMING SIGs 19 - 24 November 2012 Tuesdays Seniors SIG Genealogy SIG Digital Photography SIG Exploring Windows 8 A quick-start guide can be seen here. Robert Israel's latest links can be seen here.	Hello and Welcome, Next week it is the turn of the Programming and Web Design SIGs to meet at the club's meeting rooms. Details are below: *Tuesday 13 November - Programming - N. Hoffman - 5:30pm - 8:30pm* At the October meeting Alex led a discussion on logic analysers and oscilloscopes. The main difference is that an oscilloscope displays variations in voltage; an analyser only displays digital (on/off) waveforms. Logic analysers have more signal inputs than the two channels provided by most oscilloscopes, and can be very useful for debugging complex logic circuits. He described the Bitscope pocket analyser, an affordable high bandwidth PC-based unit that combines a dual channel digital storage oscilloscope and an 8 channel logic analyser. Also mentioned were the PicoScope, a compact USB plug-in device for a PC; the Network Bitscope BS445N, a high performance 12 channel oscilloscope and data acquisition system; the Saleae Logic analyser, a powerful logic analyser in a tiny package; the Rigol DS1000 series digital oscilloscopes; and the Bus Pirate, a low-cost troubleshooting tool that communicates between a PC and embedded devices. Alex also showed pictures of a UV lightbox he built for making PCBs. He used 4 tubes of 6 watts from RS, and electronic ballasts from Compaq. Stuart showed us an article he wrote "Math Routines using dsPIC Features", published in Circuit Cellar magazine October 2012. This magazine is a source of embedded electronics engineering information for designers and developers, and is downloadable by subscription. We again linked by Skype to Martin in Jakarta, so he was able to watch the screen and hear the discussions. We are getting better at this. Members of the group will demonstrate some new microprocessor applications and programming examples at Tuesday's meeting. Visitors are always welcome. Neville Hoffman *Saturday 17 November - Web Design - R. Hume - 1:30pm - 4:30pm* At last month's meeting the group installed XAMMP on the desktop of a member's computer before they moved on to finish the repair work on the club's computer. At this month's meeting the group hopes to update their website as the club's computer problems have hindered this task during the last three months. They also intend to include new links on the website to some free Web design programs such as Allycode. It is also expected that they will follow up the earlier demonstration of Joomla! by loading XAMMP on the club's computer so they can broaden their website design scope to include MySQL data bases and content management systems like Joomla! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cheers, John Mathews Please remember if your e-mail address is changed for any reason at all, unless you tell me your new address you will not receive these weekly updates! Any change of address should be notified to changedetails@sydneypc.com
Information for Members and Visitors: Sydney PC User Group's FREE newsletter: Subscribe Send to Friend Un-subscribe Go to Sydney PC User Group's: Website Events Calendar Please note that all Meetings, except where specifically stated, are held on the 1st Floor, Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts, 280 Pitt Street, Sydney. DISCLAIMER: This Newsletter is provided “As Is” without warranty of any kind. Each user or reader of this Newsletter assumes complete risk as to the accuracy and subsequent use of its contents.

Tuesday 13 November - Programming - N. Hoffman - 5:30pm - 8:30pm

At the October meeting Alex led a discussion on logic analysers and oscilloscopes. The main difference is that an oscilloscope displays variations in voltage; an analyser only displays digital (on/off) waveforms. Logic analysers have more signal inputs than the two channels provided by most oscilloscopes, and can be very useful for debugging complex logic circuits. He described the Bitscope pocket analyser, an affordable high bandwidth PC-based unit that combines a dual channel digital storage oscilloscope and an 8 channel logic analyser. Also mentioned were the PicoScope, a compact USB plug-in device for a PC; the Network Bitscope BS445N, a high performance 12 channel oscilloscope and data acquisition system; the Saleae Logic analyser, a powerful logic analyser in a tiny package; the Rigol DS1000 series digital oscilloscopes; and the Bus Pirate, a low-cost troubleshooting tool that communicates between a PC and embedded devices.

Alex also showed pictures of a UV lightbox he built for making PCBs. He used 4 tubes of 6 watts from RS, and electronic ballasts from Compaq.

Stuart showed us an article he wrote "Math Routines using dsPIC Features", published in Circuit Cellar magazine October 2012. This magazine is a source of embedded electronics engineering information for designers and developers, and is downloadable by subscription.

We again linked by Skype to Martin in Jakarta, so he was able to watch the screen and hear the discussions. We are getting better at this.

Members of the group will demonstrate some new microprocessor applications and programming examples at Tuesday's meeting. Visitors are always welcome.

Neville Hoffman

Saturday 17 November - Web Design - R. Hume - 1:30pm - 4:30pm

At last month's meeting the group installed XAMMP on the desktop of a member's computer before they moved on to finish the repair work on the club's computer.

At this month's meeting the group hopes to update their website as the club's computer problems have hindered this task during the last three months. They also intend to include new links on the website to some free Web design programs such as Allycode.

It is also expected that they will follow up the earlier demonstration of Joomla! by loading XAMMP on the club's computer so they can broaden their website design scope to include MySQL data bases and content management systems like Joomla!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cheers,

John Mathews

Please remember if your e-mail address is changed for any reason at all, unless you tell me your new address you will not receive these weekly updates! Any change of address should be notified to changedetails@sydneypc.com