| Status: | Active, open to new members |
| Convenor: | |
| Group email: | Computer group |
| When: | Monthly on Thursday mornings 1st Thursday of each month at 10.00 |
| Venue: | Naphill Village Hall |
| Cost: | Suggested 30p towards the cost of refreshments. |
We are a group with mixed abilities but a common interest in all things computing,
You would be very welcome to pop in for a no obligation look at what we get up to, and join us for a cup of tea and a biscuit. Just email me using the link above.
"There are 10 types of people in this world. Those that understand Binary, and those that don't."
Ian Stewart
News
A long password is a good password.
With 94 characters on a regular keyboard, you could create 6 quadrillion unique 8-character passwords. Finding this password could take a computer 8 hours.
Increase this password to 10 characters and it would take 8 days. Extend it to 12 characters and the same machine would be working on it in the year 2086.
Source: Computer Active
Next meeting
There will be no meeting in August due to our Summer break
We will meet again on the 3rd of September 2026
Previous meetings
Thursday July 2nd 2026
Many thanks to Computer group member Steve who gave a fascinating lecture on Networking on the Fundamentals of Home Networking entitled ‘From your laptop or phone to the world's web servers’.
Steve’s lecture broke down in detail exactly happened when you searched the World Wide Web.
The lecture was of great interest to the members at it put a lot of detail on the meeting in May when we touched on networking.
Wednesday June 10th 2026
Who would have thought?
At our July Computer Group meeting, we were treated to a fascinating 90-minute presentation by group member Simon on the Bletchley Park codebreaker Alfred Dillwyn "Dilly" Knox.
There were several surprising elements in Simon's talk. Firstly, Dilly Knox lived in a large house just over a mile from the Naphill Village Hall, the hall where we hold our computer group meetings every month. Secondly, living with 'Dilly' were two fellow codebreakers, Alan Turing and Hugh Foss. The house which is about an hour's drive from Bletchley Park, a drive which terrified Alan Turing as Dilly Knox had a reputation for being a very fast driver along the country roads.
In 1937, Dilly Knox donated a tree to the village, which was planted just outside our hall near the entrance to the car park, accompanied by a commemorative plaque. This tree became known as the "Christmas Tree" and is still illuminated every year during the festive season. There is also a plaque in his honour on the wall of the Village Hall.
Our Computer Group feels honoured to hold its meetings so close to the home of three eminent Bletchley Park codebreakers who, it is said, helped shorten the Second World War by several years.
Once again, many thanks to Simon for his incredibly well researched presentation, and we look forward to his next one.
May 13th - Networking
With a change of date to the May meeting, I was pleasantly surprised how many members made it, so many thanks you to all who did.
Because I was out of the country for 3 weeks since our April meeting, I selected a set of videos in which we looked at elements of networking including; Routing, Cache and Cookies, and a 5-minute video of how the internet works!
We also had time to squeeze in how QR codes work and Passkeys.
April 2nd 2026 - Google 'mymaps'
This month the computer group listened with interest to Mike’s presentation on Google 'Mymaps'
One of the most useful features of Mymaps is something called layers.
These let you organise your map into categories — for example, one layer for places to visit, another for routes, and another for accommodation....
You can then turn these layers on or off to keep the map clear and easy to use.
After a refreshment break, we looked at an amazing resource owned by the National Library of Scotland. The resource contains many historic maps with modern overlays including LIDAR.
Warning, you may lose many hours of your time if you enter this website.
March 5th 2026 - Looking back
Simon C. once again visited the Computer Group to give us a talk. This time on the computer technology of the 80's where he worked as a Geophysicist for a company specialising in Seismic surveying.
February 5th 2026 - Artificial intelligence
Our group enjoyed Two videos about AI. Mike tried to bring the group up to date in this fast changing subject.
The first video was a mix of how AI is continuously learning and assisting.
Find patterns
Make predictions
Learn from mistakes
Improve over time
Examples of use are - Recognise a face in a crowd, Predict the next word in a sentence or spot an abnormality in a medical image or record.
The second video we looked at generally left the members unimpressed. They felt it was promoting products rather than educating.
After our break we had a look at NASA's Artemis II mission to send 4 astronauts to swing around the mood in a shake down of the Space Launch System for (Artemis IV) which will be landing astronauts on the moon in 2028.
We started with a short talk on the computers in the Orion Spacecraft followed by a video looking at the details of the Artemis II mission.
Links
u3acommunities A new Fabulous resource of upcoming online lectures and previously recorded meetings.
High Wycombe and district u3a Facebook site
The National Museum of Computing.
How did the Apollo computer get men to the Moon - Opens in YouTube.
All Computer group meetings are 10am on the first Thursday of the month at the Naphill Village hall. Unless stated otherwise.