Talk:User group meeting agenda & minutes 30 Apr 2008

Please add suggestions for the agenda here. We welcome your contributions! Please remember to add four tildes (~) at the end of your entry to "sign" it with your name. That'll help us contact you if we need clarification on the item you'd like to address in the meeting. Molliewog 16:20, 12 March 2008 (MDT)

Images and other uploaded files
We have several BMPs that have been uploaded into the Wiki. I have downloaded, converted them to JPGs (using IrfanView), uploaded the JPGs, and fixed the articles. Now, the BMPs are not referenced at all. Who has rights for deleting the BMPs? Perusing MediaWiki, etc., it appears that the default is that BMPs, PDFs, etc. may not be uploaded. Do we really want BMPs to be uploaded (only Admins? If so, who may become Admins?)? They definitely do not display nicely. I suppose PDFs may be nice in certain circumstances, but the links generally are not very friendly (at least a couple of clicks to download). Do we really want everyone to be able to upload PDFs? The number of clicks can be reduced, but will that method be guaranteed persistent file names? Thomas Lerman 15:08, 23 April 2008 (MDT)

Follow-up: Something seems broken in the Wiki (maybe when using IE?)
Something seems broken in the Wiki seems to be, at least for A Guide to Research, a very bad problem. Can we find out at least what is causing the problem and possible resolution? It may be just the size, but seems to be something more as it seems like I was having the same problem just editing a section. It was brought up at the last meeting that the file may be corrupted. I would like to find out the problem for sure. I agree that the article may be too long, but it would be nice to resolve just in case we run into this again. Thomas Lerman 15:13, 23 April 2008 (MDT)

Found this wiki that may be using a slightly older versioning of the MediaWiki software. 

May be worth a look to see if they have large articles that were larger than the one that was causing the problem, and how they handled it. Its purpose is to support the main site which is at this link:



Given it's older, it also leaves the door open to there being a bug in the version we are using now. JamesAnderson 18:08, 23 April 2008 (MDT)

Recorded User Group Meetings
At least part of the time, the last meeting was recorded. After we get the kinks taken care of with sound (better microphone (less popping), microphone more mobile, etc.), can we record the meetings so they are available through the Wiki? I think that would be great for new people watch old meetings as well as those that may miss a meeting. If I cannot go to SLC for this meeting, I may miss it. Does the remote meeting work on Linux? I have only tried on Windows. Thomas Lerman 15:54, 23 April 2008 (MDT)

There are a couple ways to do this.

One is to record the meeting audio, rip it to mp3 using readily-available and free ripping software, an hour meeting recording will take only a couple of minutes to complete ripping to mp3, and posting it as a podcast can take place soon after. That way, someone like me who is able to come to the meeting can review the content later at home or wherever I might be headed next by putting it on a player and listening to it that way again.

Not everyone has a video iPod or other player or desires a video podcast, so if video is done, there is software available to lift the audio from the video for the audio podcast.

Having a podcast will bring even more people into the wiki. By the way, a good storage place to store podcast archives is |http://www.archive.org/ and DearMYRTLE uses that to store her archives, it's apparently free. JamesAnderson 10:46, 24 April 2008 (MDT)

I do not know what format(s) Acrobat® Connect™ records in, but my vote would be for the video (what I would see on the remote screen during the meeting) to be available with the audio. Obviously, conversions may or may not be needed. Thomas Lerman 12:41, 24 April 2008 (MDT)

Very true, Thomas, the video would be necessary for those that are able to use it, by all means we should include both.

As for getting the audio from the Adobe feed, there is software available that can grab the audio from the full feed while leaving the original A/V output intact, thus creating a separate audio file for those who need that separately. As for the Adobe feed, I know of one expensive program ($100 US) that claims to be able to move things from any format to any format, even those not invented yet as of the time the software was published. That way for those that don't have Adobe, the video content generated by the Adobe feed can be ported to .flv format (same as that used by YouTube) or even .wmv to make the video more readily accessible to even more users. Then the audio can be grabbed from that, put in mp3 format, then posted for those users who are only able to use that. JamesAnderson 13:18, 24 April 2008 (MDT)

Parking for those attending
Where? Token? Thomas Lerman 15:54, 23 April 2008 (MDT)

Old versus New Forum
This may have been covered in the last meeting, but I could not hear for probably most of the meeting. Is the old forum going to stay around?


 * If yes, when is it to be used versus the new one?
 * If no, will the pending issues and polls be moved to the new one? By whom? We probably should have a method for the old one to indicate that a thread is closed, does not need to be moved, or has been moved.

Thomas Lerman 16:23, 23 April 2008 (MDT)