The helpful web

(re)Learning how to Tie our Shoes

2011-12-11T09:31:00.001-08:00

We didn't have internet back when I was learning how to tie my shoelaces; and I only knew one way.
Some months back I learned a better way to tie my shoes, when Terry Moore shared with TED talks (video below) a 'strong form of the knot'. It's a small variation of the traditional method I was taught; he pulls the string around the loop the opposite way from what I originally learned.

Tying them this way he says is much better as they're less likely to untie. And I've noticed I haven't had to re-tie my shoe in a while now.

Today I came across this article on Health.net 'Lace Them Up: How to Stop pain With Shoelaces', teaching me three new ways to tie my shoes if I ever experience foot pains or loose heels.
Or if the shoes are too tight, I can use two laces per shoe like in the picture to the left.

Thanks to the internet, our kids can now grow up knowing several ways to tie their shoelaces

Ipad 2 Vs. Kindle - Ereaders and the Kindle fire vs Tablets

2011-10-29T17:07:00.000-07:00

Many people say they'd rather just read on an iPad, or try to compare the iPad and other tablets to e-readers like the Kindle or the Nook.
Those of us who use ereaders for book reading however use it for that specific purpose.

Ereaders use electronic ink (E Ink) and not a back-lit screen. This is much better for the eyes, and it feels much more like reading a real book. They also have very long battery life since they don't use any battery while resting on a page, only while changing pages.
The drawback is that you need a light source to be able to read on an ereader.

The kindle is the most popular ereader out there now, and the basic Kindle has reduced the price to only $79 last time I checked.
There are other ereaders out there that may be even cheaper, and that still use the electronic ink technology. I bought one for $70, the BeBook club, about a year ago; which is all I need to read epub, txt, pdf, and other ebook formats. It can also zoom in and out and make the letter bigger or smaller like all ereaders can. But doesn't have text-to-speech, dictionary, and wifi like the kindle does. That's pretty much all I need for book reading and I'm very happy with it.

Kindle Fire

is Amazon's way of competing with tablets like the iPad. It's about half as cheap and almost as powerful, but it lacks access to the apple marketplace for apps, or the android marketplace (at this time), they have their own application marketplace with games, movies, etc. It's good enough for browsing the web, writing and so forth, as well as watching movies. Lots of movies available on the Amazon marketplace.

Kindle Fire Vs. iPad 2 vs Nook - Specs and features

Updated prices and links:

Gmail can pick up your emails from other places..

2011-09-26T02:35:00.000-07:00

Which is pretty amazing. =D

Hotmail for example doesn't like when you set up auto-forwarding to Gmail.
At least not last time I tried, it basically said "Sorry we don't like to do that" even though it has settings for auto-forwarding, I guess they don't like Gmail, which is understandable since they're competitors.

Other e-mail services might do the same thing. But Gmail is pretty amazing so there are ways to get around it, you can basically tell Gmail to log into your Hotmail or Yahoo (and maybe other places) and pick up your emails automatically every day, and they'll end up in your Gmail inbox. It will also pick up all your contacts and put them in the Gmail contacts folder, if you want.

It made the switching over a lot easier for me.

To do this, you:

Log into your Gmail.
Click the Settings icon in the top right corner
Click the Accounts and Imports tab
Click import from an email address
Then you type in your (old) email that you want to pick up from.
Continue, and type in the password you used for your old email inbox.

Next:
You can keep all the checkboxes selected if you want to get contacts (addressbook) as well as mails. Labels makes it easy to tell when you get an email in your Gmail inbox that was imported. It can be anything you want.

You can also learn to set up filters to organize your Gmail inbox like a pro (if you don't want the mails to show up in your normal inbox, maybe right below it in a special inbox, for example? Or maybe you want special mails to go into special folders automatically, so they don't clog up your inbox where you get important stuff.

How to find out which plugins are crashing your Google Chrome

2011-08-30T01:35:00.000-07:00

Google Chrome has it's own task manager, you can find it by clicking Window - Task Manager

What to do if you dropped your gadget in water?

2011-06-03T11:46:00.001-07:00

My mom dropped her phone in water and this is what she did:
Put it in a bucket of rice over-night, it does a great job of "dehydrating", sucking out the water from the phone. Her phone works fine now =D

Not saying it will always work but now you know the first thing to do.

Okay, gotta help people find this article when they search:
Computer, iphone, Android, Laptop (doubt it will work, sadly), screen, mouse, electronics, stuff, clock, watch, in the bathroom or shower. Or into a toilet, sink, puddle, ocean, lake, river, lost, fell, slipped, damn, damnit crap, shit.
You know, people search some weird stuff sometimes when they're frustrated.

Write something in your language in the comments, gotta help people save the gadgets! =)

How to Convert AVCHD Video on Windows

2011-05-31T19:48:00.000-07:00

How to Convert AVCHD Video on Windows: "Advanced Video Coding High Definition (AVCHD) is a format of video used for playing back high definition video. AVCHD video is commonly used in high definition camcorders from brands like Sony, Panasonic, JVC, and Canon. AVCHD gives people high quality video that can be compatible with Blu-ray players. It is one of the best possible [...]

© Tech Fume

Can’t Embed YouTube Videos Anymore?

2011-05-15T08:09:00.000-07:00

Can’t Embed YouTube Videos Anymore?: "The 'embed' link in youtube is gone. Where the heck is it? It's still there of course."

Little Things That Ruin Your Website

2011-05-15T07:46:00.000-07:00

Little Things That Ruin Your Website: "

Pictures that aren't the right size can be pretty annoying sometimes. =D

It takes a long time to build a great website and get it optimized so that lots of people can see it. You need design skills, strong content that people actually want to see, then you need to create a plan and execute it by working your network. All these things take time and energy, sometimes a lot of them. But it’s really easy to undo all that hard work with just one or two little things that will completely ruin your site – whether it’s from an SEO or a usability standpoint. Really, if you have a site with great rankings, but is terrible to use, you’re not going to accomplish your goal anyway (make money, raise awareness, etc.).

Here’s just a short list of some things that can really do you in:

1. Music or Videos Playing Automatically: When you are watching TV or listening to the radio, you expect commercials, theme music, or other forms of audio and visual interaction and/or advertisement. Despite the fact that the internet is a powerful source of audio and video content, consumers are not used to getting “hit" with these media forms as soon as they log onto a website. The effect is disorienting at best, annoying (or downright enraging) at worst. There are more than a few users out there who will just shut down a site entirely if they encounter a video that starts playing automatically or a site with theme music playing in the background.

If you have a message to deliver in the form of a video, display the video prominently (but not annoyingly) with the controls (“Play,” “Pause,” etc.) clearly indicated. If you want to enhance the mood of your site with music, do the same: provide a player, and let the user control it. Providing a selection of music (instead of one track endlessly relooping) can be another improvement.

Lastly: if you’re going to add videos to your page in the way we recommend, make sure that their meta data is properly optimized for SEO.

2. Can’t Find Contact Info: You’ve gone through all the trouble of building a site and driving traffic there, don’t blow it now by making it difficult for your potential customers to actually get a hold of you. No matter how well you lay out your website and how much information you provide, there will always be a question here or there that you didn’t anticipate (Pro Tip: when you encounter these, integrate them into your on-site FAQ ASAP. Don’t have an FAQ? Pro Tip #2: Make one!).

The right answer to this unanticipated question could not only create a conversion (good!) but turn that person into a lifelong customer and a brand-champion (better!).

To avoid this little pitfall, make sure that your contact information is listed clearly in your top-nav and/or sidebar (whichever one you rely on more / use – or put it both places!). Dropping it in the bottom right corner of the front page isn’t a bad idea either – this was a common practice for many years and many readers still look for the contact link here.

To make things even more “idiot proof” you might even add a call to action somewhere in the welcome text of your landing page: “Can’t find what you’re looking for? Contact Us immediately and we’ll get back to you right away!” Pro Tip here: set up an autoresponse to your contact e-mail. Keep the reader/customer engaged.

3. Ads: Do we even have to say this one? Anyone who has been using the Internet for long enough has already become more or less immune to ads as anything other than a distraction. If I’m on your site for ecommerce purposes, then I presumably already want to buy from you (and not be redirected somewhere else to buy from somewhere else). Don’t “muddy the signal” by cluttering up your pages with ads for other people (or even yourself). Just let the user get in, get what he or she needs, and get out.

4. Outdated Design: “Outdated” can mean a few different things to different people. The first kind of “outdated” is when the site just looks like it was built in the 90s and never touched. Light colored text on a white background, flashing colors, and old-school fonts (read: Comic Sans) are all things that tell your site visitors “Hey, I made this site and never bothered to look at it to see if it was usable!” That’s definitely not the message that you want to send to your audience.

5. Not Updating: The next kind of outdated is conflicting messages. You put up a banner like: “New Products Coming Fall of 2010!” or “Check back every Monday for fresh content!” meanwhile, it’s spring of 2011. Maybe you even added new products, but never bothered to update the front page text. Similarly, if you say anywhere on your site that you upload new content every Monday (another Pro Tip: let your readers know your publication schedule. This keeps them coming back regularly), then you better make sure that you get that content out regularly.

6. Excessive Flash: Flash can be problematic for a variety of reasons. While it’s not the death-knell for SEO (there are ways it can be integrated with your pages without killing your rankings), it can be a drag. Sometimes Flash can slow your page load time, and it’s come out that Google is using page load times in its search algorithm. Simply put: longer load time = lower Google rank.

On another level, users just don’t want to deal with Flash sometimes. Just because you can use it in a specific place doesn’t mean that you have to or that it’s the best option. Keep your site lean and clean. Your customers will be happier for it. Just let them get right to the content or the shopping area. The fewer clicks between your front page and the checkout screen, the better chance you have of making the sale.

Post from: Search Engine People SEO Blog

Little Things That Ruin Your Website

How to Backup Your Firefox 4 Profile and Avoid Disasters

2011-05-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

How to Backup Your Firefox 4 Profile and Avoid Disasters: "

It has happened to all of us. You spend over 40 minutes typing eloquent prose, you bookmark an Alexander’s Library worth of game walkthroughs, you download a truckload of addons to improve your Firefox life; only to find all these things gobbled up by cyberspace gremlins! Losing the valuable content of your Firefox 4 profile is never fun and can lead to some major setbacks. Preventing such digital disasters isn’t rocket science. You can ensure that regardless of whatever calamity or crash you run into, that you are covered by a reliable insurance plan. Like a good ‒ sorry, I forgot we weren’t talking about car insurance. On to the tips!

Tip #1: Lazarus

Lazarus, just as its namesake implies, is an addon that raises your deleted typing from the dead. It can recover text typed into a variety of fields whether its a WYSIWYG editor or AJAX comment box. The addon ensures that any saved data retained is kept under secure encryption and stored locally on your PC. To use Lazarus all you have to do is right click on the field that you were typing in and choose the version of text that best corresponds with what you wanted to write. Lazarus eventually clears the database of stored text but you can ask it to do so at any time you wish. I definitely recommend this addon for bloggers who hate when their posts get mysteriously eaten.

Tip #2: Xmarks Sync

Xmarks Sync is a bookmark addon that heavily inspired Mozilla’s now built in sync extension. Mozilla’s extension still cannot compete with the ease of use and reliability that Xmarks has to offer, the difference in star ratings between the two attests to that. Xmarks secures your bookmarks on its website so that you can access them from any computer. It also offers to synchronize your bookmarks on logout if it detects you have added new entries rather than tax system resources and synch around the clock. I have never found a better bookmark app that worked so flawlessly with Firefox, I recommend this to regular and power users alike!

Tip #3: MozBackup

MozBackup is another contender that influenced Mozilla’s efforts in Firefox 4. This utility is a full fledged program however, that you need to download and install. The program uses a very simple wizard that lets you toggle checkboxes of what you wish to be backed up. Usually within less than 2 minutes, depending on how many extensions you have downloaded, MozBackup will save your entire Firefox profile as one tiny file. You can keep this file in your Documents, or on a flash drive, and restore your Firefox settings by running the program on any other computer. Using this utility regularly will save you a lot of headaches in the long run.

Tip #4: Save and Quit

Many heaved a heavy sigh when they noticed the useful Save and Quit dialog, a tool that allowed you to backup your prior session with the click of a button, had been axed in Firefox 4. Despair no longer! You can easily get this feature back with a few adjustments to your Firefox configuration settings. Here’s a list of pain free steps you need to follow:

Type about:config in your Firefox address bar. If you see a warning click on the “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

In the Filter box, type quitwarning and press the Enter key.

If you see the entry browser.showquitwarning, double click on the Value field so that it changes to true.

Thats it! From now on when you exit Firefox you will once again be offered the Save and Quit dialog when closing Firefox with multiple tabs open.

Thus ends my tips of how to apply damage controls to Firefox crashes and calamities. Have any other helpful Firefox addons or programs that you would like to share? Feel free to mention them in the comments.

How to Backup Your Firefox 4 Profile and Avoid Disasters is a post from: Dragon Blogger Technology and Entertainment Copyright 2009 Justin Germino. Share it freely, but please link back to this source.

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How to Use Twitter to Spy on Your Competition

2011-05-15T07:23:00.000-07:00

How to Use Twitter to Spy on Your Competition: "

This is a guest post by David Murton. In this post, you are going to learn how to use the power of twitter to spy on people so that you can copy his/her secret techniques to increase your internet business revenue. Hope you will get the brains like Sherlock Holmes after going through this post.

Mini-camera inside a pen? Check.

Lock-picking tools? Check.

The old hidden compartment inside the sole of the shoe trick? Check.

Twitter account? Che… Huh? Twitter account?

Yeah, that’s right – A Twitter account. The easiest, cheapest and most effective way to spy on those guys with the temerity to compete against you in the big, bad world of business. It’s also the most comfortable. As long as your favorite café has impeccable wireless access, then just kick back in the corner with that latte and muffin and let those clowns give away their circus’ secrets to you.

The key is in knowing how to use your competition’s tweets to infer what must be going on behind the scenes. Also, make sure that you are using a Twitter management client such as HootSuite or Tweetlater. This will be an essential tool in helping you manage of spigot of data your competition is unwittingly spewing your way. Here are some helpful tips to consider:

Follow the Current Leader

First, you want to follow your competition on Twitter, but not in a way that they know you’re there.

Create a private Twitter list that only you can see, adding your competitor’s tweets to your list. Also, make sure to check out the competitor’s website and get the names of their employees, adding their tweets as well. This will create a torrent of information, so make sure to create a separate stream for this data, giving it a cool name like ‘Operation Ubervoyeur’ or ‘Hidden Omniscience’ or something equally whimsical.

Get to Know Your New Tweeters

Once your spy stream is set up, you’ll want to make sure that you’re receiving the public’s comments about your competition as well.

This can be done by searching for your competitor’s @username. By trolling the public’s tweets about those guys who are trying to do the voodoo you do so well, you’ll be better able to copy what your competition is getting right and take advantage of where they are falling short. And, speaking of falling short, when you find someone making negative comments about your competition, don’t jump the gun and hit that unhappy customer with the hard sell; you’ll come off as a spammer, and everyone hates spammers, even their own mothers.

Instead, offer helpful suggestions. At most, give them your company’s website and invite them to contact you should they have any questions. Further, make sure to merge the power of Tweepi as well. This tool enables you to track your competition’s followers and figure who is the most influential as measured by their own following count.

These “top dog” customers can then be respectfully approached with special offers to check out your goods or services, essentially cherry picking your leading customers as it were. Also, by monitoring your competitor’s @replies, you can keep track of how your competitor’s replies are resonating with customers, establishing a benchmark for your own business to meet and exceed.

Creating Better Original Content…With Help

If Twitter is analogous to data rivers, then other social networks like YouTube and Facebook are analogous to data lakes or reservoirs.

Use your competitors’ Twitter feeds to go “upstream” and find their blog posts, articles and Facebook pages. Blog posts especially are important to keep track of. They are an ideal form of content marketing that both attract new customers and keep old ones coming back. By keeping track of your competitors’ blogs, you’ll not only be kept informed of your competitors’ products and plans, but you’ll set up a baseline for what you need to do to make your blog better and your products more appealing. The goal you are shooting for is to create a blog that generates a lot of retweets in your @replies.

Using Your Followers as Marketers

Assuming your blogs are well-crafted pieces of content marketing, this is the ideal situation as your own customers also become part of your marketing force, one that works for free.

In addition, make sure to use TwitterGrader to get your competitors’ Twitter score, thus providing you with their number of followers and updates. You can also keep track of keywords that are most relevant to your product or service. There are even suggestions on what you could be doing to improve your own rating.

The key, again, is to use social media to your advantage: keeping abreast of the competition, identifying and politely soliciting top customers, and creating your own following to market your products and services. To get started on your Twitter “spying” strategies, check out this site and follow the set up steps.

Fool Me Once…

Finally, as Twitter “spying” becomes more prevalent, and, no doubt, it will, then it will come to more and more resemble the hall-of-mirrors world of real spying, complete with disinformation – disinfotweets – that your competitors might point towards you, purposefully false information to lead you to incorrect conclusions about your competition’s intentions. Don’t give in to the temptation of dirty tricks; it’s tawdry and highly likely to boomerang.

Stick to the highroad, focus on providing a great product or service, and, by all means, use Twitter to your advantage.

Spy Training Complete

Now that you know some of the key tips to knock out the competition, it’s time to put them into practice.

Start off slow and keep your eyes peeled for what your fellow competitors are doing. Set the bar high and become the best by interweaving various marketing tactics and using the Internet to the best of your ability.

In the meantime, are there some other spy marketing tactics you’ve used or come across? Take time to study your competition, but be quick to attack with bigger and better projects and blogs. The better you become, the better chances you’ll have of being on top. Your comments are welcomed on this post. I am sure that you know where the comment form is… ↓

How To Set Up Your Twitter Account For GREAT Success

Top 7 Mistakes Made On Twitter By Bloggers And Internet Marketers

3 Twitter Monetization Models to Make Money with Twitter

15 Practical Strategies For Twitter Marketing

Increase Sales Using A Smartphone-Enabled Website

2011-05-15T07:22:00.000-07:00

Increase Sales Using A Smartphone-Enabled Website: "

“This is the time for us; now is the time for us to get behind this… We understand that the new rule is “Mobile First.” – Eric Schmidt, Google CEO

“One-third of all Google searches via the mobile web pertain to some aspect of the searcher’s local environment.” – Diana Pouliot, Director of Google Mobile Advertising

By 2013, Google expects that 50% of all internet traffic will be from mobile devices. The smartphone industry is growing faster than any segment of technology in history.

It is mandatory to have a smartphone-enabled website in order to have mobile searchers find you. A lot of effort and funding is going towards “find a business near me” technology. If you owned a restaurant, wouldn’t you want to reach the Blackberry user that performed a search on their phone to “find restaurants near me?”

Would it not benefit you to reach those with GPS that use Google maps? Practically every business and service can increase revenue by having a smartphone-enabled site. The applications are far-reaching. Virtually any product or service that relies on direct consumer contact would be able to saturate the market and reach consumers anywhere and everywhere.

Mobile sites are designed to provide the best possible viewing experience exclusively on handheld devices, including iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Kindle, etc. All pages must be scaled to read easily on a small screen. Most content is presented to facilitate thumb-scrolling, the most accepted method of reading content on a mobile device.

The number of “hallways” are reduced to help keep the viewer organized. The navigation buttons are placed where they are easily accessible. Since many devices do not have clear “back” buttons, these are provided on the site where appropriate. Flash is never used, as Apple’s CEO, Steve Jobs, has banned it from the iPhones, citing performance and bandwidth concerns. All websites must have detection and redirect scripting that senses which device is being used and sends the customer to the best site optimized for their device.

Over 70% of the world’s population now has a mobile phone, that’s over 5 billion mobile subscribers, and in places like the US, it’s 9 in 10 people.

So why aren’t more businesses optimizing their websites to mobile phone technology? Most website design firms have not pushed website owners because they know that the websites they have already created have not delivered the ROI the owner hoped for. Therefore, it is difficult for them to go back and revisit them about adding another piece of technology.

Since it is new technology and one whose full potential has not been realized, many smaller design firms have not taken the initiative to learn the new programming language. Many are waiting for technology which is expected to launch in a few years that will enable smartphones to access the internet and websites to display as automatically as desktops do now. Then there will be no need to learn the programming modifications.

Savvy business owners are reaching out and finding web developers to get to their target market where they live- on their smart phones and on the go.

For businesses wishing to gain a competitive advantage, a smartphone-enabled website now presents one of the most high impact means of expanding a client base and securing greater sales volume. Look at your competition. Lead your marketplace and establish your company where your prospects live before they do.

Wetcatwebs.com, Inc. is a cutting-edge website design, development and marketing firm specializing in web strategies and smartphone applications that produce sales results. We deliver a powerful online presence and supplement it with smartphone-enabled sites to bring tremendous exposure. Find out more about SEO and generating qualified leads at => http://www.wetcatwebs.com

How to auto Tweet news from your favorite sites

2011-05-13T15:48:00.000-07:00

Automatically share news feeds to your Twitter, FB wall, etc.

This guide teaches you how to connect your whole web to Google stuff (Youtube, Google Reader etc.).

How to share the latest videos from your subscriptions, as soon as they upload them, and make it post to your Twitter etc.

First - Autosharing your own Youtube activity:
It's pretty easy to set up your Youtube account to connect with Twitter automatically - so that it 'Tweets' your uploads, favorites, comments and stuff.

Go your account settings in Youtube and then go to the "Activity Sharing" tab where you can choose to connect to your Facebook or Twitter, etc.
See this video for more info on this Youtube feature.

Read pt. 2 here, Autosharing from your Youtube subscriptions, and creating RSS feeds, currently on my squidoo

Maintain a Good Posture While Using your Laptop

2011-05-10T23:00:00.000-07:00

Maintain a Good Posture While Using your Laptop: "

If you use your laptop computer for extended hours, which I think most of us do, you should not miss these shot and sweet animated movies done by Vodafone Spain.

The movies offer simple and actionable tips on how you can maintain a correct sitting posture while working on a laptop thus helping you avoid pain and tiredness. Thanks Inigo.

Video A: Using a laptop at home or office

Video B: Using your laptop while travelling or in a hotel

This article, titled Maintain a Good Posture While Using your Laptop, was originally published at Digital Inspiration under Ergonomics, Offbeat.

Fix for adsense link not opening - V3/App

2011-04-07T06:30:00.000-07:00

You might have the same problem I had, and the fix is pretty easy. This seems to be a problem if you're using the new Adsense interface in beta.

Try Google Chrome if you don't already have it. This problem seems to be with both Firefox 4 and Google chrome. On the Firefox page a lot of people have reported this "blank page" problem recently
Turn off your Adblock Plus for that site, or any similar ad blocker program you have running.

I had this problem today when I tried to go to the link https://www.google.com/adsense/v3/app#home
It simply showed a blank page. Being kinda lazy and tired I couldn't figure out what was wrong right away so I googled the thing to see if anyone else had the same problem. And I noticed a lot of people did.

I also remembered that Google updated their Adsense a few days back, and the new beta interface is having problems, so I figured turning the Adblock Plus off would help, and it did!

Another option is to go to this address instead https://www.google.com/adsense/v3/disablebeta

Notice replace the word App with Disablebeta.

Hope this helps.

Some tips and articles from our readers and friends

2010-07-01T05:49:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the June 30, 2010 edition of tutorials carnival. Where we present articles from our friends blogs.

Bailey Digger presents 50 iPad Apps for Web Designers posted at Web Design Degree, saying, "If you need help creating a flawless site or simply need to kick your creative juices into high gear, check out this list of 50 iPad apps for web designers."

Alvaro Fernandez presents What is Brain Fitness? How to Enhance Brain Fitness? posted at SharpBrains, saying, "Train your brain and reap big benefits. Understand the pillars of brain training."

EDUmobile.ORG presents Android Development Tutorials-On Completing The Android Development Tutorials, You Will. - Android Tutorials For Beginners posted at Android Tutorial Online, saying, "Learn Android Programming via these simple weekly tutorials for Android developers. Download learn Android online videos and weekly Android development assignments. Access our experts any coding and conceptual problems that you are facing."

aiwendel presents Top 10 ways to make money online with Paypal posted at TubeBlogger, saying, "I've tried a couple different sites and online ways of making money and I ended up using some of these for years. This guide focuses mainly on how to make money on your Paypal account, since Paypal seems to be the safest online."

axel presents How To Prepare For A Meditation Retreat posted at axel g.

Biswajit Basu presents Issues on initialization of Array posted at Technolocus.

Jena Ellis presents 8 Reasons Why You Can’t Stay Awake posted at Online Certificate Programs.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of
tutorials
using our
carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our

blog carnival index page.

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Countries you DON'T visit for the food

2010-06-20T03:01:00.000-07:00

According to Amazing facts, these are the Countries With The Worst rated Food In The World: "

United Kingdom 24.6% - The U.K was never known for it's food. So I have to agree here.

United States 10% - Everything is fat and gives you a heartburn. I didn't even know what heartburn was until I visited the U.S.

China 3.8% - Chinese food is great UNDER perfect circumstances. It's actually my second favorite. But 90% of the restaurants you will find, as a tourist, are questionable.

Russian Federation 3% - Russians are always busy with something. But it rarely has to do with (spending a significant amount of time on) food.

Germany 2.7% - Germans tend to like things; plain, or in simple shape. Not very much into seasoning or mixing stuff together?

Australia 2.2% - I think they have the same problem as Germany.

Ireland 1.9% - Even the chef knows people don't go to Ireland for the food, they go for the beer.

Philippines 1.8% - I don't think I've ever trie d Philippine food, maybe there's a reason it's rare to come across.

The Netherlands 1.7% - Too many things slip under the radar politically in holland, it probably does it the kitchen too.

How to get the "Read" More" link and article preview on homepage

2010-06-20T02:43:00.000-07:00

Read More link to blogger posts without HTML changes: "This is really a very helpful post I believe. Most of the times I write long posts and explain each and every part in the solution I found. So, I really need to show only specific length of each post and add a link called Read More at the end of the post on the blog home page. So, that users get chance to see more posts and look more posts. And the loading of the main page will be faster as the content is less. So, there are lot of advantages by placing the read more link on the home page for each post.

I have tried so many solutions and didn't impress by any of them. Some of them are disturbing my HTML as after specific characters add the read more link. Another option is, strip the HTML from the post and add the read more link after specific characters, but that also removes the blog styles for P tag, div Tag or any other custom styles we have applied. Sp, to get this working either we need to change the Blog HTML or add bunch of Javascript code to do that. This is not very easy to maintain and useful. So, what to do, can't I do it? So, after a very long research and read so much I want to give better user experience to my users to read what they want on my blog. Finally came up with a nice and simple solution which do not need much HTML changes or customization.

What is Jump Break and what it will do?
This is the option which is available in blogger by default and not known to most of the people. Lot of people are doing lot of customization to add read more links to their blogs. With this feature we don't need to do anything as it provides everything for us.

Solution:

Go to create post or edit post and place the cursor in the content where you need to add the read more link. Once set the mouse cursor, from the editor toolbar find the option 'Insert Jump Break' as shown below.
Now, it will insert a bar which represents the Jump Break [see below image how it looks like]. This can be dragged to the place wherever you need it. First set the position of it. You are half done by doing this.
Now, publish the post and go to Edit HTML option from the blog navigation links Layout or Design[Tab name changed recently].
Take the backup of the full template before do any changes.
Now, check the option 'Expand Widget Templates'.
Search for the tag in your HTML <data:post.body />.
Add this simple HTML text, just below the above tag.

<b:if cond='data:post.hasJumpLink'>

</div>

</b:if >

Here, it just finds whether the data in the post has the jump link set, if yes, then it will insert the anchor text for read more, otherwise it skips the line. You can place whatever text or image or any other HTML tag instead of anchor tag in the above example code for read more.
Now, save your template and just go to your home page for testing the functionality.

The great advantage is very simple. People like it to use it or maintain it. Very simple and easy right? The only thing you need to do is, just follow the same for each post where you want to place the read more. Don't think like, if your blog already had 100's of posts then the first question in mind will be 'Do I need to apply the same for all those posts?'. Not needed. Read more is only useful most of the times for only home page posts. So, add to the current home page posts and to new upcoming posts.
Hope this gives you good idea on how to add read more link for your blog posts. Like it? then please share it.

Google advanced search tips

2010-06-12T14:54:00.000-07:00

Some things you probably didn't know you could do with Google.

Search Google For Mp3's

For other files you can try adding "filetype:" to your search, for example ASSCI art filetype:txt

To search for mp3 files with google, copy the text below and replace artist, or just click the link above to get to google.com with the text already added, into the search box.

"parent directory" mp3 OR wma OR ogg OR wav Green Day -html -htm -download -links

Replace Green Day with the artist or song you want and paste the text above into the google search bar.

You can also take out the OR's, the wma's, and ogg's to search for just mp3's and Wav's etc.

Some special searches in Google give you answers directly without having to open any links or do any further surfing.

Ask Google

Some quiz type of questions show results right on the search page, try things like birth place of, or earth surface area.

World Time

Flight Checker

Currency Checker

Definitions

Define a word with define:word

If you don't know the meaning of a word or subject, for example

define:morbid gives a few definitions and links about the word "morbid"

Phone Directory

In the google search box, type in a person's name or a business name, followed by city and state and you should get telephone number.
To specify your results even more, you can use "rphonebook:" for residential listings or "bphonebook:" for business listings.
Example: rphonebook: Hansen, Los Angeles, CA.
It also functions as a reverse phonebook.
Type in a phone number to see who owns it

""

Put your searches in quotes to search for exact phrases.
Good for when you have a problem and are searching for a solution, for example "lost my software key" will display pages that have that exact sentence in the text, adding words outside the quotes helps to search within a certain topic.
For example
"lost my software key" windows xp
will display pages with the text "lost my software key" that are most likely related to windows XP.

intitle:

searches only the titles of webpages and documents and not in the entire text, for example intitle:happy hour will search for pages that have happy hour in their title.

intext:
searches only in the text of webpages, and not in the title.
for example intext:happy hour will search for pages with happy hours in their text.

-"www.sitename.com"
Exclude certain sites from a search, for example you're searching for "chocolate donuts" but don't want to show results from your own page, just replace the sitename with your address. remember to include the quotation marks.

stocks:
If you start a search with the [stocks:] operator, Google treats the rest of your search terms as stock ticker symbols, and will show links to pages with stock information for those symbols. For example, [stocks: intc yhoo] shows information about Intel and Yahoo.
Also works if you search just on the stock symbols ,without using "stocks:", and then click the "Show stock quotes" links on the results page.

Search By Number

For tracking mail you can use parcel tracking numbers from UPS, Fedex, USPS and UPC.

Just enter the number into the search box and hit enter, no special codes or commands.

Also get information on cars by typing in Vin numbers, find out where area codes are located by typing in the three digits and get information on patents by posting their patent number.

WEBMASTERS TOOLS

site:
To see how many pages of a site Google has indexed use site:http://sitename.com in the search box and press Search. Replace sitename with the site you are trying to find the statistics of.

link:
To see who is linking to a site type link:http://sitename.com in the search box and press Search. Change sitename with the site you are trying to find the statistics of.

related:
To see sites similar to a certain site/blog type related:http://sitename.com
A good way to find out your competing sites.

cache:
To see your sites cache stored in Google use cache:http://myblog.blogspot.com
This will give you an indication of when Googlebot last visited your site.

info:
For information about a site use info:http://sitename.com

Supplemental Index
To see if your site has been placed in the supplemental index (which means you have been spamming too many similar keywords)
USE
site:www.yoursite.com *** -sjpked

OR
site:www.yoursite.com *** -sljktf

Links:

Give Me Back My Google
A different google start page.
Not officially part of google but a useful tool nonetheless, when searching for something that always has a lot of advertised results use this page to filter out the fake top results, and get better results like overall check out.
It will take your search to the regular google page but add some extra tags that filter out certain pages.

Suggest
A different google start page/search page.

Gives you suggestions while you are typing in a search.
Similar to Google's "Did you mean?" feature, except that it works in real time.
As soon as you start typing words will come up that start with the letters you type, next to the words it will say how many google results there are for that word.
Quickest way to find the most popular combination of the words you use when searching the web.

Open Question: Purchasing/installing new speakers in my car?

2010-06-10T00:03:00.000-07:00

"I bought an old, relatively crappy '97 Suzuki Swift from my friend before he went on his mission. Everything's working out fine, except the speakers/audio receiver are terrible. I am really good with electronics (computers/home theater) but I have no clue about anything when it comes to cars.

Not only do these cans sound like cell phone speakers, but they short out a lot when you turn the volume knob, or even hit a bump in the road. So I'm pretty sure I'll need to replace both the speakers and the tape deck. I'm definitely gonna upgrade the receiver to something better, something with a cd player and hopefully a 3.5mm input. I couldn't care less about the speaker quality though.

Anyway, if you didn't read anything else, read this: I want to get new speakers and upgrade the audio receiver in my car. How would I go about doing this cheap, and without getting ripped off? Since I am so clueless, I think it would be really easy to get ripped off.

Also, is self installation difficult? I've put together computers before, but I don't know about working with a car..."

Answer: You can try Amazon. They have a new car parts search thing.

And they also have the best books you can find so get the manual for your car.

How to record home videos / VHS or TV to your computer

2010-06-07T22:51:00.000-07:00

Recording Video to your computer.

Depends on what type of device you wish to capture from.

A home video camera usually comes with the right cables for connecting to your computer, and also the right software.
To record from a TV read my guide on How to record TV or HDTV to your computer
For any other device (such as a VHS or your DVR that came with your cable company) or if your camera didn't come with any cables you can use a device that converts regular video to USB
For Mini DV tapes etc. you can also use your camera, but the more professional option would be to get a capture deck, like editors use.

Convert Video To USB

This piece of hardware called Diamond is an awesome device

Plug some RCA cables from the OUTPUT of your device (your TV, VCR, Camera, or even gaming machine) into the Diamond, and then plug the Diamond into the USB port on your computer.
Comes with a software that lets you record.
To record from a gaming machine you should read my guide on how to. Because you won't be able to see yourself play while recording unless you get a splitter. (don't worry it's pretty cheap too)

Another device with the exact same features as the Diamind is the Dazzle. It's slightly more expensive because it comes with an editing program to edit your videos (better than windows movie maker).

Video Capturing with capture deck.

Do you have dry mouth?

2010-06-03T04:21:00.001-07:00

How The Causes Of Dry Mouth Can Endanger Your Health - Fast Deals

Dry mouth is a sign that may have some causes. Two of the most dominant causes of dry mouth will be particular medicines and certain diseases. These 2 extensive classes cover lots of people and allow to explain why dry mouth is so frequent.

How to get a flat stomach

2010-06-03T04:20:00.001-07:00

Flat Stomach Exercises – Three Top Tips

Most of us are conscious of the proven fact that to achieve the goal of having a flat stomach, it is going to be necessary for us to exercise. Although diet plays an enormous part in reducing our body fat as well , it’s the exercise that is going to cause our abdomens to be flat and lean. There are some precise flat stomach exercises that you should be listening to , however , and these are going to be what makes the major difference in exactly how lean you look.

Tags: Health, flat abs, wellness

Quick ways to avioid back pains

2010-06-03T04:19:00.000-07:00

Fast Deals: Tips To avoid back pain

Back is one part of the body that enables us to stand upright. Just imagine what will happen if you do not have a proper back. You will not be able to stand, walk or even play. This is why it is vary important to take care of the back.

Prevent snoring; find the cause

2010-06-03T04:18:00.000-07:00

How To Prevent Snoring

Snoring is usually thought of as a sign that someone is in a really deep sleep and is also a source of amusement for many people in the presence of a someone who snores. Most times, snoring causes sleep deprivation in other people as well as to the snorer himself. Truth be told, snoring is no laughing matter and it may even be a sign that something is amiss in one's health, which is why you should look at some snoring cures that can improve your condition. In order to prevent snoring once and for all, one of the first things you need to do is to pinpoint the causes of snoring.

Tags: snoring, fast deals

Video skins

2009-11-22T18:29:00.000-08:00

Click Here!