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PUBLISHER'S LETTER www.siliconchip.com.au Publisher & Editor-in-Chief Leo Simpson, B.Bus., FAICD Production Manager Greg Swain, B.Sc.(Hons.) Technical Staff John Clarke, B.E.(Elec.) Robert Flynn Ross Tester Rick Walters Reader Services Ann Jenkinson Advertising Enquiries Leo Simpson Phone (02) 9979 5644 Fax (02) 9979 6503 Regular Contributors Brendan Akhurst Rodney Champness Garry Cratt, VK2YBX Julian Edgar, Dip.T.(Sec.), B.Ed Mike Sheriff, B.Sc, VK2YFK Philip Watson, MIREE, VK2ZPW Bob Young SILICON CHIP is published 12 times a year by Silicon Chip Publications Pty Ltd. A.C.N. 003 205 490. All material copyright ©. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher. Printing: Macquarie Print, Dubbo, NSW. Distribution: Network Distribution Company. Subscription rates: $59 per year in Australia. For overseas rates, see the subscription page in this issue. Editorial & advertising offices: Unit 8, 101 Darley St, Mona Vale, NSW 2103. Postal address: PO Box 139, Collaroy Beach, NSW 2097. Phone (02) 9979 5644. Fax (02) 9979 6503. E-mail: silchip<at>siliconchip.com.au ISSN 1030-2662 * Recommended and maximum price only. 2  Silicon Chip Sending mail by email We learn by doing, don’t we? And the production of our web-site has been a big learning experience for us at SILICON CHIP magazine. First of all, there was all the learning involved in getting the web-site operational and there was more learning involved in fixing the obvious and not-so-obvious faults. Even now, it is not perfect but it has generated a very good response amongst our readers. Another learning experience has involved our experience with email. It certainly comes in as a flood and if we are unable to answer it for a few days, as happens when you’re running a magazine which must meet deadlines, then the email flood becomes a deluge. We do try to answer the email as promptly as possible and generally log-on at least once a day to pick up the new messages and send replies. However, often the answer to a particular email is not available on the day it comes in and in fact, it might not get answered for a week or two, as happened recently when I was away on a long-overdue holiday. Having said that, people can make it much easier for us to reply to their email by following some fairly simple rules. First, please keep the letters and the questions, as simple as possible. The more questions you ask and the more complex they are, the harder it is for us to answer them on the spot. Second, please, please, do not send us email with attach­ments unless you really need to do so. Too many people are send­ing us an email to say that the attachment, often a Word docu­ment, is really the letter they are sending. Then, instead of answering the letter on the spot, we have to separately open up the document, produce the answer as a text file, then load it back into the email program and so on. The process is often made harder because people like to use all the fancy formatting avail­able in Word and other programs; that makes it harder to draft quick answers. If you want to ask us something, do it by email, plain and simple. Sending an email with a letter as an attached document is even sillier than those people who send a fax along with a fax cover sheet to say that they are sending a fax. Why do people do this? It beats me! Third, if you really want to send us a document as an at­tachment, send it as a simple text file. You will find it is much quicker to send it at your end, and it is heaps quicker for us to receive and read at our end. Fourth, if you want to send us images such as .TIF, .BMP or GIFs, do not make the files too small as they will not be suit­able for use in the magazine. For example, an image sent at 72 dpi would look very “bit-mappy” if it was published in our maga­zine. We realise there is a conflict here. You may not want to send a big image file because it takes longer to send. But if it is a too low in resolution and we want to use it, we are going to have to ask you to send it again. Oh and finally, if you are sending us email, please include your mailing address and perhaps a fax number. If an email “bounces” as they occasionally do, we can then send the answer via fax or mail. Also we like a mail address for any contributor so we can pay them! Leo Simpson