2006/2007 CONTEST for BEST NEWSLETTER ARTICLE

CONTEST IS CLOSED

VOTING IS CLOSED

(see "Winners" below).

In an effort to generate more content for our popular Ottawa PC News, the Board of Directors (BOD) has decided to bring back the contest for best article written by an OPCUG member. The contest will launch in September 2006 and run until June 2007. Members of the BOD cannot participate.

Computer related topics are preferable, but not mandatory. Articles can be submitted from June 1, 2006 to April 22, 2007. These will be published in the Ottawa PC News between September 2006 and May 2007 (inclusive). Articles will be published in the order they are received. If a large number of articles is received, some may not be published due to space restrictions as we approach the April deadline. And in that case, in order to have as many contestants as possible, an article submitted by a new participant will be published over one submitted by a returning participant. Participants will be offered a choice of having unused articles published after the contest period or having them destroyed. Only those articles published during the contest period will be eligible for the contest. Articles from members not interested in participating in the contest will also be accepted (these members should mention that they are not interested in participating).

All articles must be original and written by the participant. There is no word limit. Lengthy articles will be made available online from the OPCUG website and two or three pages will be published in the newsletter. If an article can be broken into two parts of two or three pages each, then it may be published in two subsequent monthly issues, space permitting. Only members of the OPCUG may participate (BOD members are excluded). The BOD reserves the right to refuse an article because of improper or questionable content and the article will be returned to the author for revision or retraction. Individual participants may submit more than one article over the contest period.

Voting will take place online at the OPCUG website. Instructions will follow once the system is in place and voting time approaches (May-June). The winner will be presented with a prize at the June meeting of the OPCUG (prize to be determined).

Send submissions to between June 1, 2006 and April 22, 2007. Articles may be written in any basic text editor, MS Word, or Corel WordPerfect.

Good luck and good writing!

Brigitte Lord
Editor, Ottawa PC News


List of 2006/2007 contestants and their articles:

Micheline Johnson, Printing from the Web, RTF, 19.8KB, September 2006
Peter Hawkins,
Upgrade Envy, RTF, 27.6KB, May 2007

The Prize

The contest winner will receive a copy of McAfee VirusScan and a Kensington universal laptop docking station (laptop computer not included) from Harley Bloom of Bloom MicroTech (http://www.bmtnet.com). The winner will be announced at the June 13th general meeting and be presented with the prize.

Please show your support and vote. Voting will remain open until June 11th, 11:00PM. The winner will be announced at the June 13th general meeting and be presented with the prize:

How to Vote (VOTING IS NOW CLOSED)

Voting for the best newsletter article will be done electronically. Voters must be registered users of The PUB, the private side of the OPCUG website.

Creating an account on The PUB

As mentioned, the information [public] side of The PUB is freely available to anyone with a Web browser at http://opcug.ca. However, to access conference and file areas, you must be a registered user. Registering is easy. The simplest method is through a web browser.

Browse to
http://opcug.ca and click The PUB button on the left side of the screen. New information will appear on the right. Click the button labelled New User.
Leave the radio button at the top set to Dynamic HTML and fill in the other three boxes. For name, use your real name, and separate your first name from your last name with a space, as in Sam Spade. Choose a password, plug it in the two remaining boxes, and click the Continue button.
A dialog box will pop up asking you to log in. Do so using the exact same information you just provided. You will then be prompted to input a location you want to be considered from and whether you would like others to be able to page you while you are connected to The PUB. There is an on-line chat feature on The PUB that may be used, if users choose to.

Once you have completed this process, you are presented with the web interface to the private areas on The PUB. However, you will still have limited access. In order to have your account upgraded to member status, you need to send an e-mail to
. Include your name as it appeared when you registered on The PUB, your postal address, and your membership number, if known. Once your membership has been verified, your account will be upgraded and you will have complete access to all member areas on The PUB. This generally happens within 24 hours.

Voting is now closed.

So show your support and vote. And don’t forget to be at the June general meeting where we will announce the winner after our annual BBQ.

Winners:

2005/2006: Lionel Wagner Are you ready for Linux? Linux is ready for you. RTF, 82KB, December 2005

2006/2007: Peter Hawkins, Upgrade Envy, RTF, 27.6KB, May 2007