First, click the Screen Options button at the top right of the WordPress admin section.

Click the Link Target checkbox.

Now you can set the “target” element in the dropdown for the menu item.

See, I told you it was easy!

Signals for local search ranking

Google has disclosed that it uses three types of signals for local search rankings. These are relevance, prominence and distance. Relevance refers to the keyword matching of a business with the query of a user. Prominence is composed of signals that Google uses to evaluate overall popularity of your company in comparison to similar businesses. Distance is one of the prime local ranking signals for Google Maps. Businesses that are located close to city centers have major advantage over the businesses located further from city.

Need for correction

There are several areas where Google Maps are prohibited from mapping. These areas include private roads, military areas and sensitive areas. There are countries like China that prohibits use of longitude and latitude coordinates within their country for mapping. Driving directions from local search of Street view may begin with instruction like “go east”. Most of us, who are unlikely to carry a compass while driving in a city, may feel confused with such instruction. If you need to rely heavily on Google Maps while driving then you need to consider these factors.

Updating or correcting Google maps is crucial. There are some businesses that are closed or have shifted locations since last update. If these locations feature in the maps while driving then they are likely to misguide the users. Any user facing such problems wasn’t sure how to report it to concerned authority.

GPS Solution

Google came up with a solution for reporting incorrect addresses that uses Social Networking and GPS. Sending observers for updating locations and places is a clumsy and time consuming process. However, this has been simplified with portable navigation system and online mapping services. Many online mapping services provide options for individual users to make suggestions for corrections of maps. These submissions are reviewed and approved by an expert before getting incorporated. Submissions of users who have a history of correct reporting and gained substantial credibility with the mapping service may be approved without review.

Driving directions as ranking signal

In rhythm with such developments there is a growing possibility for including requests of driving directions as ranking signal for some businesses. This is proposed to be done with the help of a framework that takes into account location of a user along with collection of nearby places as arguments for producing ranking of desired places. The framework generates a range of direction queries that are exploited for ranking. This is followed by an algorithm and accompanying data structures that are able to rank places in response to hyper-local web queries. An empirical study is done with very large directions query logs after this. This gives an insight into the potential of direction queries for ranking of places and proposes the algorithm suitable for real web search engines.

Conclusion 

Position of a business plays a crucial role in local search ranking. Google Maps have several challenges regarding updating. Social networking and GPS is playing important roles in updating locations. There has been a growing possibility for considering requests of driving directions as one of the ranking signal.   

About the Author:

Roxanne P. is a Freelance and Staff writer who writes informative & creative articles on Technology for various technology company. Her expertise are in writing articles related to internet providers, broadband , Social media etc.

The rules haven’t changed – the more content you have out there the more you get indexed; and the more you get indexed the more frequently you hit those coveted top spots. No, it’s the method by which we get there that has altered so drastically. So here’s my short crib guide to getting ahead in social networking:

1: Who Let the Blogs Out?

Blogging is the core content in social media streams. A blog is where you get to express yourself, provide links of your own to other interesting content and deliver information that enhances your customer’s experience of the products you sell and the services you provide. Tweets are great for analysis but unless they go viral they aren’t so great for raising your profile in the right social spheres.

The key thing to remember about blogging is this: people don’t really like it when companies or corporations blog at them. For a while there, we were all convinced that simply entering the blogosphere as “OurCompany” and spamming everyone with a load of corporate sales messages would be good enough. And we found out that it wasn’t.

Quite right too. If we’re going to work the social circles to get more exposure for our brands, let’s at least realise that we have some proper work to do before we get our rewards. The social stream is not like the internet we used to know. It requires genuine engagement, action, reaction and interaction. Otherwise we fail.

2: Give it Away Now

Businesses have to learn to give stuff away for free if they want to get ahead in the social media universe. The internet is all about free stuff – so if you’re not prepared to toe the line then be prepared to get out of the kitchen. Give away resources, links, mentions of other people and thanks to members of your social circle. The more generous you are with other people’s reputations, the better you will be received. An example: I have recently been blogging on behalf of a building company that got such glowing mentions for its work in the social stream of a heated skirting board manufacturer, that it switched all of its supply to the skirting boards in question.

3: Keep an Open Door

Social media is about exclusivity, sure, but it is also about openness. If you are not open to receiving connection from other people in your social circle, then you will rapidly fall out of the picture. You can see this simply by looking at someone’s Facebook activity. A person who uses Facebook every day is bombarded with conversations and links. A person who does not, isn’t – even though they are in the same social circle.

4: Make a Comment Every Day

And that’s a bare minimum. Comments are your calling cards, the things you leave behind to remind everyone else in your social network that you are around. The more positive, relevant and engaging your comments are the better. Do not use comments to plug your brand or product. Someone else’s conversation is their own. You comment to support them and add something valuable to the discourse. Plugging yourself in someone else’s conversation or in a comment is like responding to an update that your best friend is getting married, by inviting everyone to your birthday party. Unforgivable, in other words – and be advised, the social media stream doesn’t forget half as easily as your best friend.

Social media is a whole new world for rankings. You need to unlearn half of what you know and keep hold of the rest – but use it in a different fashion. At least it’s intuitive! And if you do it regularly and well, it is extremely fruitful.

About the Author:

Roxanne P. is a Freelance and Staff writer who writes informative & creative articles on SEO and Social Media for various UK SEO Companies. Her expertises are in writing articles related to on page and off page SEO, social media activities etc.

The background

According to the information available from recently published Steve Job’s biography by Walter Isaacson, this was the pet project of Job. He set his eyes on e books because he felt that the $8-billion dollar business of Apple was ripe to become stagnant. He believed that expanding the app base and simplification of e book creation would give a new impetus to the company. While Apple would not likely foray into content creation but it would strive to bring more textbooks for its users and inspire their creativity.

Rationale for the tools

Apple has so far used ePub2 standard for its iBooks. It added a large number of HTML5 based extension to this standard for inclusion of audio video and limited interaction. Recently updated ePub 3 standard calls for extensions because in most cases the iBook formatted e books are incompatible on other e reader platforms.

Digital books are believed to boost social learning and enable interaction among textbook users. Digital texts would allow students to interact with information in visual ways like graphs, videos and 3D model. It would also allow users to create links to audio, video and additional text and share them with peers. Obviously, there is a huge market of such potential users. Apple is unlikely to miss this opportunity and decided to unveil e book creation tools.

Concept of “GarageBand for e books”

Creating standards compliant e books is not as simple as creating a Word document. The current state of software tools are complicated and continue to irritate the authors and publishers. Several of them have expressed their frustration and are searching for a simple app. They are expecting an app that can simplify the e book creation and make it as easy as creating a song in “GarageBand” app of Apple.

Professionals and experts in the e book industry believe that such a move is very much in synergy with the business plan of Apple. The company has already sold thousands of iPads to several institutions. However, these iPads don’t have much content to offer and currently not in a position to replace the textbooks. Although, Apple is not likely to provide content directly, it is expected to create a user friendly platform to create and publish them.

Conclusion

Apple has been providing industry leading tools like Final Cut Pro and Logic, for creating content. The company has also offered tools like GarageBand and iMovie that simplified creation of music and movies. With a growing competition from Samsung in the business of tablets and smartphones, it has become necessary for Apple to come up with some unique offers. The new set of e book creation tools may be a turning point in the industry.

About the Author:

Roxanne P. is a Freelance and Staff writer who writes informative & creative articles on Television and Technology for various technology related companies including broadband expert. Her expertises are in writing articles related to internet providers, broadband connections, social media etc.

With today’s high-speed broadband Internet providers, browser games have evolved from simple text-based affairs to fully graphical games that can rival even the most sophisticated downloaded games. The real benefit of these games is that because all of the player information is stored online, they can be played from almost anywhere. In fact, if you have a WiFi connection available for your phone or your tablet, they can be played on the go. Check out these top five browser games to see some of the best browser games available.

1. A Mystical Land

(Picture courtesy of OnRPG)

A Mystical Land is a fully 3D MMORPG contained within the browser. Facebook is needed to access the game since it runs on the Facebook apps platform, but the variety of activities that are possible makes this game one of the best to check out for those who want to play something unique. Several different professions are available, including cooking, tailoring and blacksmithing.

The standard fighting monsters and raising skills are available, so those who are familiar with larger MMORPG games such as World of Warcraft or Aion will feel right at home with character creation within Mystical Land. You can interact with thousands of people within the world and even share your accomplishments on Facebook to encourage your friends to play with you. Mystical Land is free-to-play and is one of the best 3D MMORPGs available for browsers.

2. Minecraft

(Picture courtesy of kenming_wang)

Minecraft is a run-away hit indie game with over 4 million players. The game has simple 16-bit graphics but features unlimited worlds for you to eplore and survive within. Often described as virtual legos, players can build houses and cities, spelunk into deep caves to find treasure and even manage livestock and crops. The game can be played directly within the browser or it can be downloaded for even more fun with texture packs and mod support from the community.

The game recently released after having been developed first in a public alpha and then a public beta. The main appeal of the game is the survival mode, where players can build and explore during the day, but when night sets in monsters will spawn and try to invade. Creative mode is also available, which is an unlimited building mode. Instead of gathering resources for projects, creative mode gives you instant access to everything available within the game.

3. Battlestar Galactica Online

(Picture courtesy of PopCultureGeek.com)

The Battlestar Galactica Online MMORPG is based on the Battlestar Galactica series and remains true to the series as much as possible. There are numerous ships and customization options you can apply to your character with massive battles for resources spread out through the galaxy. The story of the game takes place within the show’s second season and explores an untold branch of the story in which the Cylon and Colonial fleets are both stranded.

Players can join either faction in an effort to claim resources in uncharted areas of space in order to help their chosen fleet gain an edge over the competition and prevail once and for all. The game is managed by Bigpoint games and features astounding graphics for a browser game, but players will need fast broadband Internet providers in order to play since the game relies heavily on player versus player combat.

4. Lord of Ultima

(Picture courtesy of UO Journal)

Lord of Ultima is a 2D city-builder strategy game that is based on the still running Ultima Online world. Players are given control of a civilization and must gather resources, complete quests and conquer their neighbors in order to progress. The game is only won by players in alliances that achieve 8 simultaneous goals, so friends in Lord of Ultima is a must. The player community is rather large since it is an EA-backed game. It is based entirely in Java as well, which makes it playable with a mobile browser.

5. Dead Frontier

(Picture courtesy of Wikipedia)

Dead Frontier is a top-down 3D zombie shooter with co-op elements. Players must survive in a post-apocalyptic world infested with zombies. There are safe zones where players can trade and form groups, though traveling through the streets of the city is dangerous. There are numerous classes for players to choose from that are based on real life jobs, such as police officer, fireman, Army officer and doctor. Each of these professions imparts different skill bonuses.

Overall, the types of games that you can experience are varied. RPG and RTS games are definitely the most popular when it comes to browser-based strategy games, but action games like Dead Frontier are becoming more popular. As technology improves, so will the graphics and mechanics used in browser based games.

This is a guest article by Ruben Corbo, a writer for the website Broadband Expert where you can find broadband internet providers in your area and compare prices on different deals for your mobile broadband needs.

There is also a video tutorial that goes along with this article so that you can follow along visually.

Here is our final product which we will be making in this tutorial

Step I: Create the 3d Text

Create a new document in Photoshop (Ctrl + N) with a width of 800px and a height of 400px, and a resolution of 300 pixels/inch.

Using the gradient tool, fill the background with white.

Using the text tool, write the word “Christmas” in all capital letters. I used the typeface Helvetica. If you don’t have Helvetica on your computer, you can use Arial or any other typeface that you would like. Make the type bold, 24pt, and change the color to green (#33cc45). Note: you can adjust the spacing between the letters by holding alt+left/right arrow keys.

Now create the letters “merr” in a different text layer using the text tool. (The “Y” will be created separately).  Give the “merr” a red color (#cc3333), font size of 36pt, typeface: Helvetica, font-weight: bold. Position the “merr” just like the image below.

Finish up the text by adding the “y”. Use Helvetica bold, the same red color (#cc3333), and a font size of 52pt. Position the “y” like in the image below.

Now we are going to make the text 3D. Duplicate the green “CHRISTMAS” text layer by right clicking the layer in the layers panel and selecting duplicate layer. Change the color of the duplicate layer to a darker green (#009908). Using the move tool, move the new duplicate layer down and to the left. Then bring the darker green image layer below the lighter one on the layers panel.

Repeat the same process for the “merr” and “y” layers. Make the color a darker red (#990003).

Create a new layer in between the two green “CHIRSTMAS” layers. Grab the polygonal lasso tool and select the add to selection button on the top of the screen (see image below). This will make it so that each selection with the lasso tool will be on the same layer.

Zoom in with the zoom tool and connect the corners of the two C’s in the “CHRISTMAS” layers like the image below. (Click on the image to enlarge it).

Once the selection is made, use the paint bucket tool and fill the dotted lines with the darker green color (#009908).

Now the “C” looks like it is 3D. Continue this process for the rest of the letters in “CHRISTMAS”

Repeat the same process for “merr” and “y”. Fill the selections with the same dark red color (#990003)

Now our text is all set and we can move on to wrapping it in Christmas Lights.

Step II: Wraping the text in Christmas Lights

Select the pen tool and in the top options bar, select the Paths option. (See image below).

Using the pen tool, make a path like below

Now we are going to fill in the pen path we just created. In the color swatch box pick a dark green (#006b00). Select the brush tool and set the brush to a 4px hard brush. Then create a new layer above the rest of the text layers. Select the pen tool again, right click on the path that you previously created, and select stroke path.

Click OK in the Brush Stroke box that pops up.

Now we have the string for our lights.

With the string layer selected, click the Add layer mask button on the bottom of the layers panel.

Grab the brush tool and press “x” on your keyboard so that you have a black brush color.

With your layer mask selected, use the black brush to go over the line and mask parts of it to look like the line is wrapping around the text

Next we are going to add some Christmas bulbs. To make the bulb see my last tutorial: How to make a Christmas Light Bulb in Photoshop. If you want to skip ahead, you can grab the PSD at the bottom of the tutorial.

Pull the light bulb into the “Merry Christmas” document.

Resize the bulb and rotate it (by hitting Ctrl+T on the keyboard) and place it on the green string line. Hit enter to accept the changes.

Select the bulb layers, and with the move tool selected, hold down alt/option on your keyboard and move the duplicated bulb to another spot on the string.

Use Ctrl+T to rotate the bulb.

We are now going to change the color of the second bulb. If you are using or have created a bulb using my previous post, select the folder named glow and the bulb layer beneath it from the layers panel and merge them by right clicking and then selecting Merge Layers . This will allow us to add an adjustment layer.

To add an adjustment layer, select the new, freshly merged layer, then go to Layer -> New Adjustment Layer -> Hue / Saturation. When the dialog box pops up, select the Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask checkbox.

Slide the Hue slider until it turns to a color that you like, then hit OK.

Select the second bulb and repeat the duplication/color changing process until the whole string is filled up. Be sure to put some lights behind the text by dragging the bulb layer underneath the text layers.

Step III: Adding shadows

The final step will be to add some shadows under the lights to give them some depth. Create a new layer directly under the green string layer. Grab a soft, 9px black brush and paint shadows under the lights that are on top of the text. Set the opacity for the shadow layer to 30%.

Then, on the same layer and grab a 4px soft, black brush, and paint a shadow for the green string.

Finished Product

There you have it, the finished product

Conclusion

There you have it – how to wrap something in Christmas Lights! Be sure to check out the video tutorial!

Download the finished PSD here:

Download: Merry Christmas PSD (879.43KB) Description: Download the Photoshop file that goes with this tutorial

Final Image Preview

Step 1: Creating the Bulb

Start working by creating a new document (Ctrl+N) in Adobe Photoshop with a size of 300px wide by 500px high (in RGB color mode).

Fill the document with a black background using the Fill Tool

Create a circle in the middle of the document by using the Ellipse Tool. Don’t worry about the color for now since we will be changing it shortly. Make sure to hold down shift to make a perfect circle.

Grab the Direct Selection Tool (located under the “Path Selection Tool”) and then click at the very top of the circle to show the very top anchor point.

After clicking on the top of the circle with the Direct Selection Tool, hold shift and pull the top up to make the bulb shape.

Now we want to give the bulb some color and glow. In this tutorial we are going to start off making a blue bulb, and once the bulb is finished, I will show you how to change the color. In order to give the bulb some color we are going to change some blending options for the layer.

Click on Add a layer style icon for the bulb layer from the bottom part of the Layers panel and click Gradient Overlay:

Click in the color bar to open the Gradient Editor and set the color stops as shown. Click OK to close the Gradient Editor dialog box.

Then add an Outer Glow with the following settings:

Finally add an Inner Glow with the following settings:

We are going to add a little more glow to the center of the bulb. Create a new layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) and name it “Center Glow”. Choose a 150px soft brush. Make sure to have the color white selected. Set the opacity of the brush to 20%. Then click in the center of the bulb 2 or 3 times with the brush. Don’t go over board with this, too little is better than too much.

We are going to add some shine to the bulb using the pen tool. Create the shapes that I did below and then set their layers to 30% opacity. (Note: the pen tool can be tricky for some beginners, if you are having trouble, check out the video tutorial).

The bulb is finished for right now, let’s move on to the base.

Step 2: Making the base

Start off by making a green rectangle like below using the Rectangle Tool. Don’t get too hung up on the color since we will be changing it in a minute.

Now take the Add Anchor Point Tool (located under the Pen Tool) and add two new anchor points to the rectangle. One in the middle of the top line, and one in the middle of the bottom line.

When you have added the two new anchor points, grab the Direct Selection Tool, and click the top new anchor point, hold shift, and then click the bottom anchor point. This will select both of the anchor points together. Keep holding shift and drag the point up just slightly to give the rectangle a curve.

Next we want to add an ellipse to fill out the bottom. Select the Ellipse Tool and a slightly darker green (I used #009b0f) and draw an ellipse beneath the previous rectangle. Once the ellipse is drawn make sure to move the ellipse layer under the rectangle layer.

Next is the second half of our base. The process is the same as the top rectangle, just start out by making a taller and slightly thinner rectangle.

Next, lets add a little depth to the base with a gradient overlay. Select the first, smaller rectangle and click on the Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and select Gradient Overlay. Use the following settings:

Click in the color bar to open the Gradient Editor and set the color stops as shown. Click OK to close the Gradient Editor dialog box.

Add the same layer styles to the second, longer rectangle. Your base should now look like this:

Step 3: Adding Streaks of Light

The last thing to do is to add one more light layer on top of all of the other layers.

Select the Polygon Tool and give it 15 sides. (To add sides see the toolbar at the top of the screen) Draw a small, white polygon in the center of the bulb. (It will look like a circle since the size is so small.)

Using the Direct Selection Tool again, click on the new white circle and pull out four points in different directions.

When the four points are pulled out, your result should look similar to this:

Apply a Gaussian Blur (Filter > Blur >Gaussian Blur) with a radius of 1.5 px.

Then set the opacity of the layer to 30%.

There you have it a finished light bulb and base!

Step 4: Changing the color of the bulb

Changing the color of the bulb is simple using Adjustment Layers. Merge the bulb layer with the 2 pen shine layers. Add a Hue/Saturation layer (Layer -> New Adjustment Layer -> Hue/Saturation) make sure the “Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask” checkbox is checked.

Now slide the Hue bar to change the color of the bulb.

Finished Product

There you have it, finished multicolored Christmas lights from scratch in Photoshop. Be sure to check out the video tutorial if you get stuck or confused. Also check out part two of this tutorial where I show you how to use a light bulb to make a string of lights.

Download the finished PSD here:

Download: Light Bulb PSD (161.19KB) Description: Click to download the accompanying Photoshop file.

The Process

1. The first step is to put the following line of code in the WordPress theme’s functions.php file. If you do not know how to access the functions.php file, see my post on how to access key WordPress theme files.

   1	add_image_size($name, $width, $height, $cropBoolean);

   The add_image_size(); function has 4 parameters. $name is the name that you want to call your image with. $width is the width you want the image to crop to in pixels. $height is the height you want the image to crop to in pixels. $cropBoolean is a true or false parameter. If set to true the image will crop itself automatically.

   In the example below, the name I use to call the cropped image is “featuredImageCropped”. The height and width are 250px and 200px respectively, and the image is set to crop.

   1	add_image_size('featuredImageCropped', 250, 200, true);

2. The next step is to reference the new image size in your theme. Place the following code wherever you would like to see your cropped image:

   1	<?php the_post_thumbnail('featuredImageCropped'); ?>

Conclusion

There you have it. Now when you add a featured image to a post, the image will not need to be resized or cropped beforehand. WordPress will do it for you!