Let’s go back in time to March 1975 and the Homebrew Computer Club that met in Silicon Valley, CA. This is generally acknowledged to be one of the first computer clubs that focused upon computer hobbyists and the then-new microcomputer. Such notable individuals as Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, Lee Felstenstein (designer of the Osborne 1) were members. At these meetings a popular component was called Random Access. Even that name needs to be put into context. At that time the most common method for entering programs into a computer’s memory was from paper tape, or later by using an audio cassette tape. For example the Tandy/RadioShack TRS-80 “Trash 80” used a cassette for loading programs and reading or writing data files. (Author’s note: My original IBM PC even had a port for connecting to a cassette recorder. I never used it. This feature was discontinued with the introduction of the PC/XT.) To access a program on the tape you had to position the tape ‘serially’ – i.e. skip through other files until you got to the one you wanted. With the introduction of floppy disk hardware and operating system support it became possible to position to an arbitrary (that is, random) location to read or write a file. Steve Wozniak, co-founder is best known for his design of the DOS II disk controller and software that gave the Apple II floppy disk capability. So the question and answer sessions held at computer meetings became popularly known as “Random Access” as a member would toss out a question and hope that a random participant would come up with an answer.
As with other computer user groups, DACS adopted the concept and started its monthly meetings with a “Random Access” component, later renamed to “Ask DACS”. It usually lasted about 40 minutes. I moderated this session for many years and wrote them up as a column in DACS.DOC. Eight years ago when I became vision impaired such that I couldn’t see attendees or work with the podium’s screen Jim Scheef took over and has run it since.
But times have changed. Personal computers have become commodities – open the box and the machine works. They typically have all of the things you want or need installed already. The machines are a lot ‘smarter’ now in that they can self-configure. In the old days you had to understand interrupt vectors and port numbers to install hardware. Technologies such as Plug-and-Play (or in its really early days – Plug-and-Pray) or IBM’s MicroChannel Architecture led the way, and now devices often have a USB interface and the system queries the device and determines how to support it within seconds of the device being attached. Operating systems and applications have become more sophisticated, containing ‘Wizards” etc. to guide you through complicated operations. Vendors have moved to online support, often with links to YouTube video tutorials. Vendors support user-to-user support forums etc. And these things are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week rather than the 40 minutes or so once a month at a user group meeting. The Internet never sleeps. If you can spell Google and know how to pose a question by judicious use of just the important words you can probably find an answer to your question on the first page of your search results.
End Of File and Rewind
As a result, over the years we have found that there is a great reduction in the volume of questions posed to Ask DACS with the result that there are often ‘deadly silences’ during the session. After much consideration the DACS Board of Directors has decided that it would be best to realign our monthly general meeting, and we have come up with this revised schedule.
- The meeting will start at 7:30PM. We will not publish a “doors open at ____” in our publicity – it is confusing to say “Doors open at 6:30 (and no one is there) and reference ‘casual networking’ and then say the meeting starts at 7:00 but it doesn’t really, and the presentation starts at 8:00 etc.. Broadway Theaters, movie theaters, etc. don’t publish a doors open time, you are expected to be there and be seated at curtain time.
- There will be about 5 minutes allotted for ‘DACS business” – announcements and the like. The announcements shouldn’t be unexpected as we have the DACS website updated in a timely fashion, a forum for user to user interaction, we publish weekly broadcast messages via email, and we have multiple social media accounts such as Facebook, Meetup, and LinkedIn.
- There may be a short presentation, again held to 5 minutes duration that describes the activities of a SIG.
- The featured presentation will start at 7:40PM. There will NOT be an intervening break. Presentations are expected to last about 60 minutes, with perhaps 15 minutes for Q&A follow-up.
- After the featured presentation there may be a general Q&A session of a Random Access flavor, it will last only as long as there are questions and responses.
- After the featured presentation attendees are encouraged to participate in networking with other attendees. SIG leaders are encouraged to be present to promote their group. This may take place within the auditorium (subject to hospital curfew) or move to the traditional “Pig SIG” held at a local restaurant.
We realize that this may come as a surprise to many members, but the board feels that it is time to acknowledge that times have changed and while Random Access/AskDACS was an important component of the DACS community, it has been replaced by other technologies and it is time to retire it.