Old messages and discussions

A question - how does one "update" or replace an upload file? I updated the phone number and address on the downloadable .rtf sub form, but I'm not sure how to replace the upload file on the website...Warren Masterson

Just upload the file again with the same filename. The new version will replace the old one. Currently only the admin can delete files.

Good idea, I have added an info@mctv15.org address that will forward to you and Rachael.

The problem with the switcher in Weed is in the cable! I tested the one from Weed in Mt Shasta and it didn't work. I then used the one from Mt Shasta in Weed and I was able to program the switcher using the computer that's there. I'll go pick a cable up before I need it next. Glad it was that simple!

I've also contacted Leightronix to ask if there is an upgrade available for the event manager software.

We still need either a computer in the office for Rachael or in Mt Shasta to program the switcher. What about that donated computer that has Windows NT on it - could the hard drive be reformatted without knowing the admin pasword and then Windows 98 or 95 installed? Warren Masterson

I am happy to hear that it was just the cable that was at fault. I have not tried to do anything with the sad old NT computer since you informed be about your dad's old laptop. I might have problems getting it working since it is using a SCSI hardware that requires software drivers. I will have a look!

This must be a problem with your browser. I am using basic authentication between the server and the browser. Most browsers will 'remember' the authentication during the remainder of a session. The session is terminated when the browser windows is closed or a connection is made from a different IP address. If the problem is with your browser or it's settings, try having two windows open, one for Board and another for B Calendar?.

It must be something with my browser, as this seems only to be an intermittent problem - it has happened in the past as well. Anyway, it's working fine now... Warren Masterson

Two days later and my un/pw is still not being accepted for uploading a .rtf version of the Submission Form?. Warren Masterson

Hi Warren, I must have missed your original post. I just uploaded a test document without any problems! Remember that the password for uploading is different from the regular page view and edit. -John Cumming

D'oh - I completely forgot that there was a different PW used for uploads... Warren Masterson

Sounds good, start a wiki page and put up some more information.

If a line of text begins with a space it will be treated as preformatted mono spaced without word-wrap. Many lines in the form have spaces in front. Developing a web form that needs to be printed and filled out is a very bad idea. It is very unreliable to print a web page that fits a paper page. The printed page will also contain the header, left menu and the footer. Instead of a web page, all forms should be delivered in Adobe acrobat format ( PDF ), which print perfectly on all operating systems and printers.

Ah shoot. I had put the space before the lines intentionally to get the mono-spaced font. I didn't realize it turned off word wrap. I didn't know about using the double @ symbol until I was trying to find out what the trouble was with the formatting. Unfortunately I don't have a way to create PDF files. It copy-paste's into wordpad quite nicely as it is, though. Personally I know better than to try to print an HTML page, but I guess most people might not. Warren Masterson

The 'Whos Here' page is in a password protected area, therefore no spanbots can harvest it. It's would be visible only to people with the password.

OK thanks John, I'll go ahead & restore that page. Warren Masterson

Sorry, there is no web browser based interface to the base page template. You can create a table and change it's background color and the included text color. -John Cumming

Bummer. Could this wiki do a yellow bg with blue lettering, or even just a faded green background with purple or yellow lettering -I mean, could the whole theme of the wiki site be changed? - Where do I learn the color codes -like those you used in the program schedule?Warren Masterson

When color was introduced to the web, most computers were limited to an 8bit palette which resulted in a maximum of 256 colors. Since the operating system needs some colors to display its control surfaces, the web architects limited the web palette still further to 216 colors. Each of the 216 colors were named, and these names can often be used directly in html. Over the years displays have become more capable and can now display 24bit color ( 16.7million colors ), it does not make sense to name millions of colors. In the begin a second way of specifying color was introduction, this method was based on the colors 3 components red, green and blue and is expressed in hexadecimal notation. For examples Red becomes #FF0000, Green #00FF00 and Blue #0000FF. This notation allows access to all 16.7 million colors. A chart of the 216 colors expressed in Hex can be found at Lynda Web Colors

Add the following style modifier in front of the link%newwin%. http://www.mctv15.org will open in a new window.

Excellent! I love it! Warren Masterson

That's right, there is dangers allowing anyone access to the delete/remove page functions. John Cumming

Of course - it makes sense! Warren Masterson

You know that "new" JVC deck we thought would make a third broadcast deck that I then switched with the one in Weed (because I thought it was a better deck)... well, it SUCKS. It's worthless. Terrible picture when recording, bad picture & sound when used for playback. I'm going to buy three SVHS decks with the grant money, if wally-world really does have them for only $100 each... ~Warren Masterson

Hi Warren, I am sorry to hear you have been having problems with the JVC desk. Firstly I am unsure which deck you are referring too. Is it the JVC HR-S 29 U? or the JVC S 3911 U?? If the deck is indeed new it should be capable of 400 lines of horizontal resolution for both record and playback. If you are not getting this and have checked the cables, the signal, and are using a quality video S-VHS tape, then it's time to get it repaired / replaced under the warranty. Please note that a normal VHS tape will produce no more that 240 lines of horizontal resolution. This can be reduced even lower with poor quality tape stock. JVC are generally known for there good quality consumer products, and would be very surprised if the unit is working 'correctly'.

I guess it's the S 3911 U? deck. It's not the DV/SVHS dubbing deck, nor is it the black one that we use to record the Real TV shoots. No warranty -the reason I put quotes around the word "new" is because it is new to the station, but not newly manufactured. It's the one Vince donated to the station. I don't think he would intentionally give us a bad deck, but I don't think he'd give it up without some reason. ~Warren Masterson

I see, well if the deck is no good then MCTV 15 needs to give it back to Vince or get rid off it. No one should be wasting too much valuable time on junked out equipment. Question: What are the details ( make and model number ) on the $100 SVHS desks from Walmart? Markertek has new JVC SVHS recorder/player decks also for only $100.

I don't know about that, I was just going by what you or somebody said (who was saying that, anyway?). I'll stop by Wal-Mart (yech) today to check the details and get back to you on that one. If they're the same price & similar quality, I'd say let's go with Markertek, if that order is going to happen sometime within the next twelve years! I agree aobut ditching the bad VCR - I put it in the closet with a sticker on it that says "bad picture bad sound" ~Warren Masterson

Hi Warren, We ( Neva, Lisa, You and I ) were at the last board meeting were the equipment purchasing was discussed. Lisa was given a task to investigate getting a used Casablanca, I was tasked with investigating a suitable PC based non-linear editing. In that effort I requested a group meeting of tech heads to share/discuss our needs. That meeting took place last week. The plan as I understood it from that meting was to:

• Prepare summary and recommendations for next board meeting. Still gathering information.
• Refine the equipment list. The list on Equipment Purchasing has been updated with suggestions from our tech head meeting.
• Check for video edit preview on the Videonics Personal Title Maker character generator. Does not have video preview and therefore is unsuitable for our live production needs.
• Investigate the Videonics MX Pro? switcher for color correction and video pass-thru. the switcher can not color correction on both the selected channels at the same time. This makes it necessary to color correct the signal before it enters the switcher. The switcher does not have video pass thru for any of it's 4 input channels. This makes the color quad adapter to single monitor setup invalid. The switcher can preview all the input channels on it's preview monitor, but the spatial & temporal resolution are poor.
• Investigate the use of the Firewire hard drives on the PC. Untested, should work without problems after they are formatted
• Invite comment from C.O.S. ( Ray Berry )I have so far been unable to meet up with Ray. I'll be get back from Portland on the weekend and plan to meet with him early next week.

As you can see there is still some work to do in preparing the equipment list. I was/am planning to have a report ready from the next board meeting on the 8th. This report was to contain a summary, recommendations and a detailed equipment list. The final details was to be shared for comment and change with all interested parties the week prior to the board meeting. This evolving equipment list is significantly different from previous recommendations and therefore should be presented to the board. The board among other things have to decide between purchasing PC based non-linear editing system or the Casablanca system.

You had a trailing forward slash on the url[[http://mctv15.gotwiki.com/Main/AgendasAndMinutes/ Agendas & Minutes]]. You should be using local references such as [[Main/AgendasAndMinutes Agendas & Minutes]] or even just [[AgendasAndMinutes Agendas & Minutes]] as Agendas And Minutes? is in the same group as the Left Menu.

Using the magic of wiki, I reduced the prices for individuals and families and increased them alittle for bussiness members :)

I agree that the agendas & minutes need to be visible to the public. I would put them all in the Main group. The B Calendar? and Board is for semi-private collaboration and is therefore password protected. It is not possible to un-password protect individual pages within a protected group. I am not sure what you mean by 'lead back out to the Main group'.

I guess I'll just leave ALL public meetings and info off of the B Calander?, i.e. Board meetings, Real TV, etc. and move the Agendas & Minutes out to the Main group. ~Warren Masterson

There is nothing random about software other than what some designers develop. As for the calendar, it always will display a link that takes you to the period that starts with the current month, a link to the next period of three months and a link to the previous period of three months. It's not perfect, then again what is? The answer to that question is simple Got Wiki! Other options might be to spend endless hours learning and developing a database with SQL or Microsoft Access. Got Wiki has an extensive search tool, a format for print, and most web browsers allow you to search for text on a page.

OK, that makes sense. I had ass-u-me'd each 3-month calander page was static. I hadn't realized it was self-advancing. That's even better than my idea! ;-) ~Warren Masterson

Go Video have been around for a long time. They are known for their over priced consumer dual desk systems. Their so called S-VHS Quasi mode is designed to confuse the market place into thinking it's getting S-VHS quality. There machine records to standard VHS and is able to playback S-VHS tapes that were recorded in another system. During playback it manages to reduce the S-VHS 400 lines of resolution down to the same quality as standard VHS which is about 240 lines. I think most of Go Video's dual systems are consumer junk.

Thought you might have some insight into the product - glad I asked you! Guess I'll take it off my list then. Do you know of any dual-S-VHS dubbing decks? The Go Video was the ONLY one I could find online... ~Warren Masterson

I don't know of any dual system S-VHS systems. We already have want I would recommend, that is two separate S-VHS decks hooked up with S-Video cable and Stereo RCA. If we need more decks, then the JVC HR-S 3911 U? S-VHS deck is hard to beat for a mere $100.

''What I like about the idea of a dual-deck for dubbing tapes, is the one-touch dubbing feature, & the fact that both would start exactly (or pretty closely) simutaneously, eliminating this "video calibration" BS, and I would expect the quality of the copy could be slightly better. But if they don't exist, I guess there's nothing to be done... Also in a situation like this where many people will be coming and going and connecting and disconnecting equipment, etc., is that it would eliminate the chance of failure due to an improperly connected system. Maybe we should get one VCR that will always be connected to the DV/S-VHS dubbing deck, instead of using the one that currently leaves the station for remote shoots.

''OK, yeah - do you think we're ready to invite them all? I'm pretty satisfied - I'll be even more so when some of the content contains content - but that's all about group collaboration, yes? ;-)
So whatever happened to the folks that were invited? ~Warren Masterson''

Rome was not built in a day. I sent Doug York? an invite to the Wiki and pointed him at the equipment list, he promptly printed out the audio options section and is preparing to visit the audio sponsor with the information. An ever so small success story ... more will come.

That's good to hear!

The minutes page in the 'Board' group is defined as a free-link i.e it is enclosed in { } brackets as it was not a wiki word. You use free-links in inter-group linking the same way you use wiki words. e.g. Board.{{Minutes}} links to the Board.Minutes from any group.

Go to it, you got wiki :)

Done - I hadn't realizied it was just that simple...! ~Warren Masterson

Sorry, Wiki Words? can only have letters and numbers. So, Board/Agenda&Minutes can be either Board/AgendaAndMinutes or Board/AgendaMinutes

Yes, I noticed that too. Unfortantely it's the way the underlying CSS has been implemented. I would like to investigate but it is a low priority.

Ok, I have stopped making my comments blue :). I change the sytle sheet to use default link colors. As for the text on the Home Page, be my guest and change it for the better.

I have added an 'edit' password to Main.Operating Rules?. It uses the same password as the 'Board' and 'B Calendar?' groups.

Cool - I realized I had been editing Main.Air A Show? rather than the Operating Rules anyway... ~W

I fixed it, see note I left on your Warren Masterson page.

It will, this wiki engine in not based on authenticated users instead it uses a password challenge system at the site, group and page level. The fact that B Calendar? and Board are different groups that need protection results in a password challenge for each. I am thinking about reworking the security model to include rights management based on authenticated users. In such a system, the user would login once and have access to all areas that he has rights too.

Would it be easier to just put the B Calander? in the Board group? Just a thought... ~Warren Masterson

The calendar component needs it's own group inorder to manage the calendar date pages efficiently.

See note on your page for uploading to the Main group. Yes you can upload a number of file formats, these files would when be available for other wiki users to download to their system. But bear in mind that not everyone will be able to use the downloaded files. For example, I use Microsoft Word and Excel which save as .doc and .xls, I can upload these files to wiki and you can then download them, but the files will be useless to you unless you have Word and Excel.

*The new un/pw still doesn't work

I just uploaded the above graphic. I had to yet again put in the password for 'security'. The password for the 'Board' group is the same for all actions. The 'Main', 'Calendar' and 'B Calendar?' groups are open except for the 'upload' action, which requires the following password: 'newmctv'. Where are you trying to upload a file?

The same place. "newmctv" is a different password than the password you gave me to use on my Board.Warren Masterson page. ~W

Just tried it again with the new password - it worked this time!

My Bad I just gave you the admin password 'newmctv'. LOL that's cool! It worked, right? ;-) Let me try again. Full access to 'Board' and 'B Calendar?' uses 'mctvgotboard' as the password. 'Main' and 'Calendar' are open except for uploading which has a password of 'mctvgotupload'. In all groups you will have to enter a user name, i.e. FirstLast inorder to edit a page. The user name is only used to track changes and give you a fast link to your group page. I will be changing the admin password very shortly. Damn, for a minute there I had the keys to the kingdom, and I didn't even know... Sorry for my confusion that I passed to you.

It should be working now, give it a try.

Formating does not change the target location of a Wiki link. All your Real TV examples above do indeed goto the same wiki page.

I see, to link to a page in another group, you have to prefix the group name to the page name. There are a few examples for how to link between groups: Main.Real TV? Real TV? Real Television? Check out the syntax in edit mode.

Hi Warren, I have an open issue with the file uploading section of the site and will be working on it today. I will let you know when it's back up and running.

Deleting pages for Wiki is not recommended. Most Wiki engines do not allow for deletion. For example if someone was trying to case trouble they might delete large number of useful pages, after which it would not be possible to get to the page and use revisions to bring them back. Look at the change long for the Main group. I deleted the 'Delete Me' page, now you can't get it back which is very bad. The page is still safe on the server, but would require a sysadmin to make it visible in the wiki. I am looking into making page deletion an admin only function. Server time is still being used for date and time stamping I plan to change to our local time but it's marked as a low priority.

OK, sure, that makes sense. I think the problem is really that the calander table shows the day as marked, and when you click on it the day page shows as empty. It's good to keep a record of the deletions, but if it's an event free day, would there be some way for the calander table to "unmark" itself when the day page is empty? I really don't even know if this is possible, but it would help keep the calender from becoming cluttered with mistakes, etc. ~W

Done

Found it - love it - and I like the "add news item" link at the bottom of the Main page as well ~W

Me too :) See note I left on your page Warren Masterson

Wiki Bug - One of my edits disappeared! Anyway, I think wikis are pretty close to the way the web should have been designed. Tim Berners-Lee did have edit-ability in mind when he had the original idea for the web, but time to market pressures made him drop the editing part of the specification, a loss for us all.

I did delete the message you left for me on the board member page explaining that "group messages" shold be on the board's main page. --One of my edits got deleted too! It was on this page just now - apparently I clicked save at the same time(?) as you, and when the page came up, your new messages were here, and the one I added didn't make it... I guess you're making up for Tim Berners-Lee's mistake now! ;)

Well Hi, Warren, I am glad you like this site so far. Please be patient with me, I are still a few open issues that I am addressing with the password system. But, I think a private area can be set up this evening -John Cumming

I moved your questions to this page. Clicking the 'Changes' link at the top pf the page might have helped you track the move. Also note that the Changes link is used to display the changes in the current group. You call see site wide changes list by using the 'All Changes' link at the bottom of the page. The left-menu is unique to each group and can be edited using the link at the bottom of the page. -JC