Mailing List Archive

Analog newsletter, November 2001
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Dear analog users,

Welcome to the latest instalment of the analog newsletter. It's a bit of a
long one this time, but with lots of important news!

1) VERSION 5.1 RELEASED
-----------------------

The current version of analog is 5.1, which I released last week. Have a
look at http://www.analog.cx/docs/whatsnew.html to see what's new in this
version, and download it from http://www.analog.cx/download.html.

2) CHANGE OF ADDRESSES
----------------------

I left the University of Cambridge at the end of September. This means
that any email or web or FTP address with cam.ac.uk in it will stop
working very soon. I changed my addresses some time ago to
Email: analog-author@lists.isite.net
(but for user support see http://www.analog.cx/docs/mailing.html !)
Web: http://www.analog.cx/
This is your final warning that the old addresses are about to stop
working! So if you have still got any out of date links/bookmarks/address
books, please update them now.

3) HELP WANTED
--------------

I've been slightly disappointed at the number of volunteers to write
How-To's for analog (http://www.analog.cx/how-to/). There are three
excellent ones in the current version, and two more being written at the
moment, but that still leaves five on my initial list for which I don't
have any volunteers.

People often complain that analog is hard to get to grips with at first,
and I have some sympathy with that. But I see the How-To's as one of the
most important ways to help people. As task-orientated documentation, they
can provide a step-by-step method to help people accomplish common jobs.

Now I, or one of the other analog experts, could write these, but that's
not the point. We don't see analog the way normal people do! The best
people to write them are not those who've mastered the program, but those
who've solved the particular problem themselves, and then write the
documentation they wish they'd had available.

Anyway, have a look at the list of topics at http://www.analog.cx/help.html.
I'm also happy to accept other topics if people can think of some. And if
you don't feel you can do one of these, there are other some jobs on that
page too!

4) LIST OF ANALOG-FRIENDLY ISPs
-------------------------------

I said I was going to do this 18 months ago, and I apologise for not
getting round to it then. I'm going to have another go now.

I'm planning to make a list of ISPs and web hosting services who offer
analog reports to their clients. If you're in this category and want
to be on the list, mail me at analog-author@lists.isite.net with the name of
your company, where you're located, and whether analog is a free service
or one with an additional charge.

5) DONATIONS
------------

I've been developing analog for six and a half years now, and probably
thousands of hours of development time. I have never asked for, or
received, any money for it up till now. I've always programmed just for
the love of it -- and besides, we Brits are self-conscious about asking
for money. :-)

But I'm currently unemployed; and also some people have asked me how they
can make donations. So I have set up a PayPal account for people who want
to do this. By going to
http://www.analog.cx/donations/
you can send me some money from your credit card or PayPal account.

I want to emphasise that analog will remain free software for all users.
This is just for people who want to express their thanks financially.

Donations of any size will be gratefully received. Even small donations
can add up! But you might consider that a commercial logfile analyser
would cost several hundred dollars or more per licence, and a shareware one
several tens of dollars. How good is analog compared to those other
programs? How much have you or your company saved by using analog instead?

-------------------

That's all for now. Until next time,

--
Stephen Turner, Cambridge, UK http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adelie/stephen/
"This is Henman's 8th Wimbledon, and he's only lost 7 matches." BBC, 2/Jul/01