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How to Increase Visitors to Your Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 06:35:00 +0000

Since creating this blog I have used various methods to increase visitors, in an attempt to establish a useful avenue for people to learn something. I started promotion in about 30 forums, blog directories, social sites, commenting on similar blogs/sites, article writing, search engine submissions, and related interlinking from my other similar themed blogs. All these methods involved engaging heavily with other sites and blogs, their visitors, and other bloggers. But this takes a lot of time, resources and passion, which I now only occasionally perform, because of limited time. Image of World Visitors By ilco at SXC.

But have changed for my blogger blog by applying on-page and off-page search engine techniques (SEO), i.e.query searched keywords in content, relevant link gathering (internal and external); template optimization (enhanced visitor usability), visual based customization, html editing, researching/testing other bloggers and blog layout ideas, to name a few. I keep updated for content writing tips, search engine algorithms, keyword research, competitor analysis, back linking strategies, analytical metric and visitor trends, by subscribing to authorative SEO and SEM blogs. Plus use online tools such as Webmaster Tools, Keyword tools, Google Analytics and Open Site Explorer for back link strategies. It seems to be working because of increased targeted visitors for a lot less work, since learning and applying what I have learnt. The again, social out reach is becoming important as well, as I believe (from many articles I have read) Google is using signals from such platforms.Thanks to those who own SEO and related companies, and publish their experiences, ideas, and concepts online. Image of SEO By svilen001 at SXC.

Listed below are avenues to increase visitors to a blog, most of which I have done and seen varying results. Often I found you have to keep bit of a presence in forums and social sites, track query search trends, enhance on page elements for increased engagement, update dated content, read current search trends, search engine updates, and so on. Primarily I do this to increase targeted visitors or audience to satisfy them. This is important if you want to make money, get subscribers, leads, or some sort of conversion, in a niche blog. Each of these techniques below are perhaps at a basic level, as there could be extensive testing (e.g. for template modification, html editing), reworking (e.g. article writing-rewriting, keyword refinement, Google Operator search techniques for back link targets, careful commenting, keyword refinement, and enhanced social media strategies).

Anyway hopefully this list is useful for bloggers to start to get traffic. But you should expand within each avenue, and find what suits you without causing stress, excessive time, and loss of interest in blogging. For me it's now the less demanding SEO approach, which I found gives me more time to create other blogs of interest, rather than forever navigating, following, and even promoting others on social networks. This list is in no particular priority/logical order, but of what I know from 3 years of blogging and SEO and limited online marketing research.

Methods and Avenues to Increase Blog Traffic:

1. Good quality content - Well researched, written, unique content that you believe will attract and maintain readers. "How to" based content, with external tutorial links/references seems to attract visitors for this blog. Sometimes I add relevant videos, charts (if applicable), and link out to relevant web sites. Controversial or Provocative topics can bring attentions. Also I think a series of posts that are focused on a tutorial.
2. Submit your blog or re-purposed article (don't duplicate) to popular blog and article directories. Popular are Blog Catalog, Blog Engage, Go Articles, Ezine articles, Article dashboard, etc. Perhaps get a little involved in their forums, and can get content ideas from directories and article platforms.
3. Comments - contribute, earlier on (i.e. try be the first to comment) with meaningful comments in related and perhaps authorative blogs/sites. If you can, add your link (with anchor text) with your blog url and name. Should really use a mix of anchor text, i.e. diversity for various comments. But make sure if they are do follow links if you want to get ranked, or that it's a authorative site, which may signal trust or authority to the search engines.
4. Also leave a link in forum posts, if highly relevant to the question. I have done so sparingly, knowing that it will intuitively help. Again make sure if do follow links (Don't bother me anymore, because I like to share, and help others). Be a genuine active poster - i.e. a helpful contributor.
5. Also leave a link (with targeted anchor text related to your keyword) to your blog, in the signature/resource box, sometimes with a useful text title reference.
6. Allow visitors to subscribe both by rss feeds and email, and display the graphics/widget box prominently. Visit Google feed burner for optimization ideas.
7. Commenting - As noted above contribute with something helpful on other blogs and sites, with your website's url (and often email address). But also reply in a timely manner to comments on your blog. I have missed opportunities by not replying in a timely manner. Also watch out for repeat commenter(s) that leave the same comment with a link to a company or product they are trying to promote. You may have to delete them (once took me two hours on this blog) if they are solely referring their products or services.
8. Social Media marketing and networking. Maybe join facebook, Twitter, Google+, Facebook, Mylot, Pinterest, etc to help promote your blog, though carefully, but consider how much time and work. Probably best to concentrate on one platform (unless if have others to help). It's about branding, reputation management, and engagement to reach out to others. Social media is constantly evolving, so need be kept in the loop (if important to you), by following blogs such as Top Rank Blog, Social Media Examiner, Mashable, Search Engine Land,WebProNews, and TechCrunch. Also embed the "share" widgets to your blog (e.g. add this button - This site has a Google page rank of 10. Proof I guess that social media is important for online web properties), to easily allow visitors to "like" or vote your posts.
9. Perhaps join blog carnivals - communities to share topics of interest. I don't know how much about them today. In fact I rarely hear about them in all the numerous SEO/SEM newsletters I receive. It's always seems to be about SEO and Social media. So I advise to research about carnivals.
10. Create key worded and unique engaging content that relates to your post title, and your url. For tutorial blogs the "How to" or "Top 10" titles is a good starting point. People often search starting with "How to..." (and Google seems to auto suggest many "How to titles when you enter that term on their search page. Include at least one keyword in the title, and that it relates to your content.

Introduction to SEO

View more presentations from Rand Fishkin

Keyword research is important (well for niche/income related or business/eCommerce blogs and sites), and almost every experienced SEO person/niche blogger/Agency talks about it. Always. Too much for me to explain here, as others have done better than me. But I have read (and learnt) from most of their articles. Examples: Niche Pursuits, Keywords Blogger, Smart Passive Income, and many more. But also read SEO guides, e.g. from Google, (32 page PDF direct link) SEOmoz (Keyword Research, with optional PDF), Keywords Blogger (Beginners Guide, e.g. seed brainstorming, searchers intent, Google's tool tutorial, and finding low competition, high volume queries) and Pole Position Marketing (web site with PDF download). But also follow articles by author, for keyword research, such as Stoney deGeyter (SEO 101 - 15 articles), Tom Schmitz, (higher level keyword research), Josh Dreller, (Refer his article the Giant List of Keyword Tools), and Brad Geddes, for example. They all contribute to SEO and related blogs, so perhaps sign up to such blogs, and search for earlier articles.

Intensive for first timers, but becomes easier, and even tedious, unless you use automated software (e.g. Market Sumurai, Lontail Pro, etc), online service (e..g Word Tracker), outsource, including SEO agencies, and advertising and display networks. For large websites (e.g. eCommerce) and blogs, this may include enterprise companies such as Google Adwords, BrightEdge, Conductor, Matrix, seoClarity, IgnitionOne, Covario, Efficient Frontier, and Marin Software. But then again, if you are an expert in your field, you may not necessarily need intense keyword research. But probably better to research, or utilize SEO agencies (depending if commercial goals) as searchers may search with queries or brands (that have high number of searches) that you do not know or thought off.

Infographic of Keyword Research

(Click image and zoom for a larger view)

From: Promodo.com

Videos of Google Keyword Research Tool
(Expand to full screen - bottom R/H corner - for better view)

Keyword Tool Part 1/2	Keyword Tool Part 2/2

Promote your Blog - Link back to your blog with targeted anchor text

11. Write with good grammar, medium fonts, maybe a white background, and with paragraphs. Readers want to read clear posts, if that, as many would skim through a post. Matt Cutts (Youtube Video) from Google said that grammar is a "fair" quality signal. Maybe read Google's Webmaster Guidelines and refer to what counts as a quality site (from Google Web Master Central). Has questions relating to trust, relevancy, authority, and interestingly about providing information for your credit card. Such questions, I think means you need to put in a lot, with research for your content, to make it more insightful, engaging,original and useful to your visitors. Content needs to stand out today to last for tomorrow and beyond.
12. Include relevant or interesting images (free at sxc with link attribution) and use the alt tags to describe/reference your blog's post. Maybe title tags and captions. Aslo helps break up long posts (like this one!), rather than too much wall to wall text. I once spent 2 hours on a blog found randomly, published by a Chinese couple, because they had fantastic luxurious images of their countryside. Break from tech stuff I guess.
13. Use a language translator - Visit Google gadgets or Google Translate to embed in your blog. This might be important, for example if you are targeting non-English speaking regions.
14. Add your blog link to your emails if suitable. It's about spreading your blog. Then again you can get readers to sign up as well to your blog (e.g. email sign up from feed burner, Google Reader, etc by using rss feeds), and perhaps get visitors to opt in for marketing initiatives (once you are established online), e.g. for creating and selling eBooks. One blogger (or affilate marketer) I found recently who is good at this, and helpful from his posts, is Steve Scott. If interested visit his How to Earn Money Online. He has good info tutorials. Approach I feel like doing, i.e. eBooks, as a "next step". I felt like adding that info, since niche blogging I can do, but want a change.
15. Include a easy to remember name in your url, and include a relevant topical or business name. Though of course you should use your own domain. Hopefully visitors remember it. Apparently I read, not to include numbers (e.g. might get misrepresented as dates). Google recently included a "freshness factor" for ranking. So having numbers in a url may erroneously indicate a older article post. Not sure though. But I have removed dates from some of my url's.
16. Perhaps use your url name (if appropriate) as your user name in forums, directories, etc. These can show up in search engine results. It's a form of branding and visibility. This also ties into Google Places, Directories, Yelp, Yellow pages, etc where you want consistency not only for your url, but consistency for contact details across the web
17. Maybe create hub pages/squidoo lens, articles (e.g. ezines), etc, to promote your blog. Many interlink them strategically in due course to their main sites/blogs. Perhaps don't make them too popular relative to your main blog, as they might rank ahead in the serps (search engine results pages). Happened to me. However I think Hub Pages got demoted in the Panda updates. I have seen the odd article appear on page 1 of the search results. I also read somewhere from a senior Google employer, to primarily write content for your own blog or sites. Build authority, trust and credabilty within your own domain, blogs, and sites. I also read about owners of article directories using their members articles by "spinning" them for their own use. Also I have read the pro's and con's of automated article writing to submit to numerous directories. To do or not? If your online positive reputation or brand is important, or if avoiding true insightful content, then maybe avoid article submission as described as a somewhat shady practice.

Perhaps apply different types of good and unique content formats (including text, graphs, infographics, images, slideshows, embedded documents, Google fusion authority data tables, etc) for your blog and perhaps re-purpose it (key content initiatives) on article, video, document (e.g scribd), blogs, and slideshow sites, etc. I now hardly generate articles for directories. Why? I believe I have got better in writing and engaging visitors from my blogs, don't need articles any more, but I know that pro affiliates (and perhaps SEO agencies) use them excessively (with article writing software) for ranking and traffic purposes to their main sites.

Videos of Google Engineer Matt Cutts - "Great Content has to be the Foundation of a Good Site"
(Expand to full screen - bottom R/H corner - for better view)

Content or Links?	Get Better Visibility on Google

18. Similarly maybe create a simple promotion site to refer to your other blogs/sites. Perhaps a free host/web creation site might help, like Weebly, Google Sites, Snap Pages, Edicy Pages, etc. I have read of bloggers, doing this if they decide to abandon a blog, then use those articles on such a website, and linking to their niche blogs. Perhaps issue press releases if you have something newsworthy. Though of course today, social media platforms seems to be the way to go for reaching out, engagement, communication, etc.
19. Get fresh ideas/news from rss feeds. I have embedded a rss Google gadget for articles from popular tech blogs and freeware. I use news feeds (from Google code) in blogs of mine to provide recent and relevant information.
20. Sign up for Google alerts or similar if you do product reviews. Get the latest to help generate fresh ideas. Perhaps visit shopping sites for ideas from products, and reviewers, top selling products, etc. Amazon comes to mind.
21. Give a link if relevant, - helps to be more community based. Google perhaps ranks sites based on links that are useful to visitors. So having a few relevant outbound links to authorative sites (or even as I do, link to non authority but relevant blogs - help a blogger out I guess helps, like a resource gateway. Hopefully such visitors may link to you if they see you as a resource, or inform others.

Learn and apply Search Engine Optimization Techniques (SEO)

22. Apply SEO techniques. I have learnt a lot. Still do. Sign up with authorative SEO/SEM/Content tip blogs. Also read and bookmark the articles (I have read many from experts on search engine land (good articles on research tools - Google algorithm, B2B conversions, search queries, back links, etc - from people that make a living in such industries), search engine guide, and search engine journal. SEO can be a research intensive process (if done manually by yourself), reading articles and applying various tools and techniques on keyword research, back link strategies, content optimization, competitive analysis, call to action, landing page optimization, blog visitor statistics, trending and segmentation (e.g. new vs returning visitors), goals (e.g. increased visitor traffic, niche authority, increased subscribers, etc). See the guides above (No. 10) if you are new to SEO. Otherwise you need pay for SEO services (e.g. Agencies) or use specific software.
23. Do link exchange, but better to get a one way internal link if you can, based on link worthy content, without asking for it. Avoid links farms, paid links, link manipulation (of sorts), as Google frowns on them, and you could get banned from their search engine database. Again great articles to be read at search engine guide and others. You also have to follow about link strategies, Google algorithms, and techniques to get a maximum but optimized back link profile. Again this is another topic (like keywords) described extensively. Always. Because back links are seen as a ranking signal, or vote of confidence from the search engines. Unsolicited endorsed back links are the best I guess. See article by Eric Enge about the changing nature of back link strategies based on Google's signals.
24. Following SEO techniques, use and understand Google's tools for analysis and customization - they are very helpful: Google's Webmaster Tools, Keyword Tool, Google Trends, Google Insight, Ad Planner, Google Analytics, Google Alerts, and Website Optimizer. There are SEO tools like SEO for Firefox, Quirk's Search Status, SEO Quake and I have seen/applied many more. There is also SEO Book (my affiliate link) and many others. There are paid software and online services to dramatically speed up research, but generally used by pro niche publishers and marketers. Many might be running dozens or hundreds of blogs, web sites, and other web properties.

Infographic of All in One SEO Guide

(From Datadial View Full Version then Zoom In)

Customize and Streamline your Blog: Template Modification, HTML scripts, Add On, etc, - To focus sections for readers and searchers

25. Ask visitors to bookmark/email a friend, etc, and link back. There are widgets for these. But as noted earlier use social media buttons. They are everywhere on the web it seems.
26. Cross promote your blogs or relevant posts within a blog. The aim is to help your visitor with extra but useful information. This includes linking out to relevant and authorative web pages.
27. Add recent comments box. Lets you know to comment back as soon as. Or at least view/read comments on your dashboard (and posts), and as noted earlier follow them up by replying.
28. Perhaps create regular polls or surveys - helps to engage your readers. But also gives ideas for content, if you ask visitors what they want. Some use PPC (Google Adwords), or sign up online with survey software, or even use Google Docs.
29. Customize/modify or import/upload a template if suitable, including editing html. This is to allow easy navigation, add more useful page elements/widgets, and perhaps to have a attractive template. This can be a big field to tackle, but their are excellent blogger blogs to help: blogger tips and tricks (step by step help for hacks), Blogger tipandtrick (plenty of mods/hacks), Blogger Know How (easy layout of tips/hacks), Blogger Buster (plenty of concise tips, hacks, and templates), Tips for New Bloggers (mods, hacks for overall template) and the full on blog doctor (massive topics on javascript/html to change about anything in blogger- might suit advanced users).

Wordpress has several themes and templates, and of course plugins for SEO, content writing and much more. Note: Over a long time, I have noticed that the most content rich blogs have the least widgets/add ons, etc. In other words don't over do your blog with fancy gadgets/ads/images - you could deter visitors from your blog or it may load slowly. Site speed is a ranking factor in Google.
30. Use video if practical and try promote on YouTube. There are now Youtube channels. Refer How to promote content on Youtube (from Basic Blog Tips).
31. Have an affinity with your visitors, i.e. be helpful in comments. I also include links to the above blogs, tools, and relevant sites to help visitors that comment. Mention to come back/subscribe and to book mark.

Engage with your readers and forums - Try a Pillar Post (like this one) and learn from other blogs

32. Try Entrecard and Blog Engage to help promote your blog. I notice both are relatively active, and will increase visitors to your blog, but not sure if targeted/relevant visitors.
33. Perhaps set up other writers/bloggers to create a community/group blog. You get more ideas, and of course content to generate. Tech Crunch I think is a example of this.
34. Include a popular post/link page to your popular posts. Because blog posts create separate url's that display in search results, you increase chances of visitors navigating from one of your post's (url) to another post (url).
35. Get forum members to review your blog. I think Digital point and Bloggeries have a section, because you might get new ideas.
36. Use a favicon ( explanation and tutorial) to help brand your blog, and easy to find in someone's browser book mark list. You need a graphics program, some coding and maybe a FTP program like CoreFTP lite. There are also online generators to create favicons.
37. Similar to Popular post category, create a categories page/links to showcase. You can edit/customize the coding in categories and other blogger elements for visitor ease of use. Refer the above blogger tutorial links.
38. Occasionally research Google's keyword tool (queries may change over time, particularly in technology topics) and insights for trends to help find popular (or loss of popularity) keywords/topics relevant for your blog, if you want to keep blogging. It might show for visitors and your regular readers, if not updated or not with current trends, and readers may go elsewhere. You need to focus on why you are blogging. Perhaps to share, educate, monetize, advertise, display writing skills, or whatever. Just think how to approach your blog in a holistic manner, but trying to employ at least some of the above methods.
39. To help your blogging in terms of content writing, marketing, monetization, SEO, etc then search and try to find tutorial blogs, and specific blogs in your niche/topics. Currently I subscribe to about 10 optimization and specific/niche blogs. Visit Skelliewag, Problogger, Blogger Tips and Tricks, Blog Doctor, and the blogs noted above, including individual contributors. I still do. They all have relevant content for general and specific blogging and SEO concepts. Once you learn the basics, you still have to keep tuned in, if you want to increase visitors, rankings, ideas, and visibility in search results. That's why I edited this post, to try regain visibility, as it was a little outdated. Perhaps refer these articles relating to semi advanced SEO and Blog traffic:

1. 10 advanced SEO tactics to increase blog traffic 2. 21 quick actions for your blog's massive success
3. 10 SEO mistakes to avoid 4. SEO strategy for small business sites 5. How to get free website traffic

Blog for Purpose...But perhaps with passion

Hope the above helps for those getting in to blogging to increase visitors, and remember many say it takes time, effort, and passion to sustain a quality blog. This will be evident once visitors become regulars, accompanied by quality inbound links and hopefully your blog evolves into a authority or well regarded blog for all visitors. This will be reflected in the page rank/comment numbers/subscriber numbers/ and general visibility for your blog. But for now, any additional avenues/methods to add to the above? Please add to the comments below...

Related Post -
SEO Tips (Keyword and Meta Description Optimization for Blog Post)

Google Advanced Search Tips For Research

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 05:45:00 +0000

Search to Research

Applying Google's advanced search operators in their search engine can help produce more focused and relevant results when performing a search. More so than a regular Google search, of which filtering occurs for the displayed results. Utilizing such techniques can quickly find not only targeted websites, but also the type of website, whether it be a blog, general website, pdf file, forum, excel file, and top level domain formats such as .com, .co.nz, .edu, .govt.nz, and .org. Generally their are four types of searches - Navigational, Informational, Transactional, and Commercial.

Online research generally involves informational searches, and applying specific query intent parameters can easily filter out unnecessary information. Plenty of it. Doing so is useful for a student or researcher who wishes to find relevant information, and from specific web formats and domains quickly. Additionally there are also specialist search engines, online research tools, and other Google properties that can greatly help for researching. I'll explain such tools in another article.

Advanced Operators, Keywords and Research Terms

There are many operators, some little known, to laser target a search result from a keyword that is searched, which we will call our core keyword. I will concern ourselves with some of these operators, and terms:

Operators: "" (quotes for exact match), intitle: allintitle: filetype: inurl: inanchor: and the site: commands.

Terms and Domain Extensions: your core keyword (i.e. search query, e.g. NZ Scholarship), .com, .co.nz, .govt.nz, .edu., pdf, .xls, and .doc(x).

Note: There are many useful research terms that can be used, with your core keyword(s) in search queries, such as:"resources", "library" "planned research", "articles" "related sites", "related urls" "related links" "recommended reading", and other similar descriptors such as: report, institute, author, workshop, editors, policy, informational, citation, table of contents, references, association, federation, resources, abstract, publication, material, methodology, analysis, systematic, journal, biographies, Ph.D, review, technologies, conference, referee, international, problem, scholarly, literature, training, manual, exploring, evaluating, examining, developing, characteristics, predictive, documented, hypothesis, and observation.

These are common research related terms used in links and text in authorative and informational web sites, research papers (e.g. white papers), and government documents. Try online dictionaries (e.g. research haven, one-look dictionary), thesaurus online, suggestion and keyword tools (e.g. ubersuggest, Google Suggest and Keyword tool) and synonym websites to aid in supplementary and alternative terms.

Varying Your Search Queries - Focused Intent

Google operators can be used, either in isolation or in combination, perhaps with changing your core keyword(s) when searching. Generally fewer search engine result pages (often referred to as the "SERPS") are displayed as you further refine your search. It's best if I work through an example. You may of course have your own methods, avenues, and resources to search or research online, as their are many sites, that you may know - such as Wikipedia, Government, University, District Councils, Library, and Professional Institution websites, (e.g. for New Zealand - Study Link, Ministry of Education, Inland Revenue, Auckland or Otago University, Ministry of Science, etc), forums, databases, and collaborative research sites. Or perhaps software, bookmarlets, addons, scripts, and online tools, but our approach is by applying enhanced queries in Google Search.

Video- From 2012: Using Site/Exact/Wildcard//Plus -Minus Sign/Advanced Search Tab

How to Search and Refine for a Scholarship Online using Google - Example

Initial Basic Search

For searching information for a NZ scholarship one might start with a simple query such as: Scholarship NZ or further targeted as: NZ Bank Scholarship. These are broad based searches (of which a combination and similar terms are used for actual searching), but you can try including quotes, which adopts a exact match phrase search, which should display exactly in the title of web sites in the search results.

Google Site and Intitle Commands

If no relevant results appear on the first few pages, then we can apply the advanced operators like this: site:.co.nz banking scholarship; or variations such as site:.co.nz nz bank scholarship (adding the term nz). Google then searches for all .co.nz domains. Perhaps replace .co.nz with .org.nz or .govt.nz for a similar search. Our intent is to quickly find NZ sites that have anything about banking scholarships, and that you get a feel for adopting this type of search/research technique. To further refine we can include the intitle (or allintitle command):site:.co.nz intitle:banking scholarship, and maybe add or change our initial core keywords slightly, perhaps including standard research terms as noted above for better targeting.

Refine with PDF File Type

To further refine, we now include file types - as many research papers and online application forms are in PDF, and to a lessor extent, Word (.doc). Excel (.xls), Power point (.ppt), and maybe .txt. Thus our search becomes: site:.co.nz intitle:banking scholarship filetype:pdf or perhaps exclude the intitle command, if you want more search results. Often similar sub domains are displayed. Sometimes the filetype command may not be required, adding PDF (without filetype:) as a term with your core keywords may suffice to find relevant document(s).

More Information with other Document Formats

For the other document formats, simply replace PDF and select another, e.g. .doc or combine them using the pipe command: | i.e site:.co.nz intitle:banking scholarship filetype:pdf | filetype:.doc | filetype:.xls or perhaps change our core term or keyword phrase to bank scholarship, i.e.: site:.co.nz intitle:bank scholarship filetype:pdf | filetype:.doc | filetype:.xls should result in more search results or hits. Generally a bit of mix and matching is required when refining searches, to improve reach to yield our target results within the SERPS. Often the target or web property is easily visible on page 1 of the search results.

Advanced Google Search Using Site, Intitle, File Type and Format Terms
(Click for larger View)

So varying sequences of refined searching might be required as indicated below

(Note: kk2=2 core keywords, r=research term, .xx =domain extension (e.g. .co.nz, .gov, .com), pwe=pdf, word, excel document)

kk2>site:.xx kk2>site:.xx intitle:kk2>site:.xx intitle:kk2 filetype:pwe>pdf document found

or kk2k3>>site:xx intitle:kk2k3 "r" filetype:pw>>word and pdf documents found
or kk2>site:.xx kk2>site:.xx intitle:k-k2 filetype:p>> 1 pdf document found

- If too may hits, then try allintitle:
>>kk2k3>site:.xx kk2k3>site:.xx allintitle:kk2k3 filetype:p>>website and pdf document found

Table of Google Advanced Queries starting with nz bank scholarship

Search Type	Search Query	No. of Hits
basic search	nz bank scholarship	2,660,000
site operator search	site:.co.nz bank scholarship	28,100
intitle operator search (replacing intitle with allintitle = 897 hits)	site:.co.nz intitle:nz bank scholarship	25,200
filetype search with pdf, doc, and xls	site:.co.nz intitle:nz bank scholarship filetype:pdf \| filetype:.doc \| filetype:.xls	66
file type search with pdf (nz removed, as too many hits)	site:.co.nz intitle:bank scholarship filetype:pdf	22

Searching with the .edu, .ac.nz Domain Extension for Research Documents
Along with .gov, govt.nz, there are the .ac.nz academic (e.g. university) domain extensions (e.g. .ac.nz for Otago, AUT, Massey, Canterbury, etc in NZ). Also .edu is valuable for finding research documents particularly in conjunction with using filetype:pdf. Using the site: .edu (or site:.ac.nz, site:.ac.uk, etc) domains instead of the site:.co.nz command is useful for finding post graduate reports and research papers.

Many research documents are housed on university servers, but mostly overseas (USA) institutions, e.g. Harvard, Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, for .edu based searches. If you want to find specific papers, e.g. for Chemistry: site:.edu intitle:organic chemistry filetype:ppt | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc (~7, 260 hits) or for local (NZ) search, use .ac.nz, i.e. site:.ac.nz intitle:organic chemistry filetype:ppt | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc (~ 79 hits). Then can further refine searching if need be with your own core keywords, additional research term(s), operators, custom dates, exact phrase, site searches (within a domain, e.g. site:www.otago.ac.nz) etc, if required.

University Selection for Scholarship

(Click for Larger View)

source: created from graphical dictionary Visuwords, derived from Wordnet, Princeton University

Note: To search for educational and library domains, maybe start with inurl: (or allinurl:), or inanchor: (or allinanchor:) with (or without initially) a combination of core keywords, and commands (e.g. intitle:). For example to search libraries in NZ: inurl:library yields 20 Million hits. Then refine your search if required, as described above.

Video -Quick search tips: Calculator/Time/Metric Conversions/.org and .edu search

More Refined Search Options

For Further refinement, once search results (SERPS) are displayed, you can use the "more search tools" in Google's L/H side to order by date, "reading level" "verbatim" (exact phrase), social, and other options should they suit. If you want to quickly display the home page website for a open PDF, then "back track" by deleting part of the the URL address in the browser address bar. Delete to the home URL (often to the first slash /), then press enter to try open up the main home page website. Though this process may not always display a home page, as you may end up at a folder directory (e.g. for certain .edu sites), or a direct download may occur when you first click on a PDF document in the search results.

Infographic of Student Search and Research Tips

(Visit Hack College for complete navigation)

Tips and Summary

- Get to know the various and relevant operators and terms, and save them in a document, then paste in Google search for easy research.
- More operators and examples can be found at Google Guide and more commands here.
- Try different combinations of search operators, url extensions, and search terms (queries) including other operators from the Guide and Google help center.

- Similar searches can be performed at the site level for web sites, from a domain, e.g. for the Ministry of Education Website like this: site:http://www.minedu.govt.nz/ pdf or specifically site:http://www.minedu.govt.nz/ scholarship filetype:pdf.
- Firebox addons (e.g. search selected for site level searches) and Bookmarklets, i.e. scripts can help for power searching, e.g. site search from Milly's Bookmarklets.

PDF File Tips
- If you come across a forum or website, with several images, consider converting the website to a PDF file. Convert it's URL to PDF online, e.g. with PDF my URL, then save it. Bookmarking websites in the browser sometimes does not help, as I have found the site has disappeared offline, or the images converted to links, when revisited later. Though the wayback machine (internet archives) can help for retrieving removed or earlier version websites.

- Likewise save any important PDF's you do find online, and back them up, or maybe collaborate with other researchers, and share at Mendeley.

- Try document search engines, such as DocJax or Voelspriet (displays file types as explained above) to find a range of document types. Zanran search finds statistical data and chart related websites.

- Try Google Docs Viewer for creating emailing a link, html code creation, or embedded link, and quick viewing of a PDF URL link in Google Docs within your browser.

- Visit how to do "everything" with PDF files, which has links to online tools for converting, editing, adding watermarks and more.

Improve your Google search skills by adopting search operators, with your core keyword and common research orientated terms. Specifically search for PDF documents of which many online forms, manuals, user guides, specification data, and research documents reside. Many PDF's are written or compiled by Researchers, Scientists, Policy Analysts, Engineers, Senior Marketers, Historians, often from research institutes, Government departments, authoritative or branded businesses, blogs and websites. Become a skilled researcher to easily find specific format documents, by learning and appreciating the usefulness and power of advanced Google operators.

Authority Topic Blog - Learn It or Knowledge

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 14:32:00 +0000

Learn - Maybe Earn

Authority web sites or blogs topics can be created, I believe by learning and researching your topic or a vast knowledge that you may have, or from people you know or can contact for collaboration. You can therefore become a source of trusted relevant knowledge to your readers, the search engines, and internet sources that link to your site. External linking (and hopefully authoritative) sources can include newspaper sites, heavily frequented forums, social media platforms, educational sites, related sites, and heck even Wikipedia. Happened to me for a relatively short post about avoiding malware. Image of book by Svilen001 from effective com.

Or my pillar content heavy post about increasing blog visitors - still no. 1 to 3 in Google for over 2 years. Authority can get you on or near page1 for Google search results. Might take a few pages (1 long page for one of my blogs), or for some computer blogs I follow, hundreds or thousands of pages. Different topics and any diverse related popular categories and any pre-established web presence for similar topics, seems to translate to different online competition structure of search results. May need more pages to get there. Maybe one page. Or other means.

Work It to Rank

May not work easily to get to page 1 of Google for branded (e.g. Hotels, Social sites, Tech products, Global corporates, etc) and well established money related sites (e.g. Finance Companies, Insurance, Business, Make money online sites, etc), unless if you have a ton of unique, insightful quality content pages, and a strong and diverse back link profile. But also possibly employing paid advertisement campaigns, building a massive intricately linked blog/web farm approach, "manipulative" linking processes, advanced scripting, to name a few, to help create, support and sustain your perceived (initially) authority site. It's work of sorts, but ideally relating to useful content that meets a need.

Search Engine Optimization Needed or Not

Then of course you may need do SEO and related marketing activities to get the right mix of leading and secondary (long-tail) keywords and phrases, perform insightful competitive analysis, link out to authority sites, relevant link prospecting and collaboration, social outreach, visitor and key word query statistical analysis, surveys for user search intent, user friendly site information architecture, landing page and conversion optimization, a/b conversion testing, and so on. This involves on-page and off-page SEO with their useful elements - Meta tags, Key-worded titles, related terms, alt tags for images, and so on, to attract the engines and therefore your intended or targeted visitors - Or rather your niche audience. The ones you want to satisfy their needs, desires, pain points to engage with, and maybe convert somehow.

I learnt SEO techniques and still do, or at least refresh - and you can too from...authoritative sites, blogs, and forums: Search Engine Land, Search Engine Journal, Search Engine Guide, Steve Scott Com, SEOmoz, Smart Passive Income, Shoemoney, Keywordsblogger, Vandelay Design Blog, Grizz make money, taming the beast (true name but good mix of brief, relevant articles about internet marketing, SEO, E-commerce, etc) Pro-blogger, Warrior Forum, Digital Point Forums and so on. I subscribe to their articles, and follow particular authors. Bookmark their pages. In my case hundreds. Maybe down load many PDF guides and White Papers - now even the periodic table for SEO, and Google SEO starter guide and many others. Read them all. Then reread, adopt then adapt, and maybe test. It works, albeit perhaps slow for starting out for organic rankings...and hopefully building trust, authority, and stability in the rankings. Could take 4 months, 8 months, 1.5 years (I discovered), depending on competition, brand or product space, and if adopting free or paid avenues and competition/keyword tools, tracking changing search trends, level of web/social presence, amongst other aspects. And of course your content strategy and techniques to come up with more and better content. Again learnt from well known blogs and sites, e.g. Copy Blogger.

Then there's passion...probably need it for the long run. To remain authoritative but interested, and importantly to keep visitors and the engines tuned in: To you and for you - to remain and get near the top. But importantly for your readers or searchers - looking for a good solution - that you can hopefully satisfy. Heck make money if you want. I now do...since I believe I have given so much in my blogs, and several forums I'm involved in: To help people, since I mainly do tutorials and user reviews. Teach and earn online. Pay a few utility bills. Buy a nice mobile phone. Simple to earn online in theory. But a lot of work and learning constantly how to in practice, and to remain so.

Indeed anyone could become SEO and online marketing competent, and couple that with learning intensively a topic online to rank and become an authority. I know I have somewhat for various topics and products. Still learning, along with thousands online I suspect. Skilled and experienced marketers and affiliates know how, and many teach legitimately (thankfully) to do so. I have fortuitously learnt from them. I still subscribe. Get the latest (and sometimes refined and redone) about search engines, conversions, content affiliate marketing, and so on.

Helpful Knowledge without Search Engine Optimization

But I wonder if those that have long term knowledge, skills, certification, not about any of what I talked about above - but in their respective fields or skill-set: Diesel Mechanic, Property Lawyer, Computer Technician, Landscaper, Security Guard, or whatever. Where to find them? Specific knowledgeable topics or at least helpful, I have found are in forums, Youtube, and niche blogs. Not learnt (or know or care) about SEO that I can detect, but yet have an specific knowledge for their topics. I have come across many enjoyable blogs, which I seem ought to be authoritative, interesting, with insightful and beneficial content, that offer worthy content.

I have saved dollars repairing my vehicle, read interesting travels, learn recipes, and learnt many other things. I noticed too, that such blogs/sites/forums have plenty of "at home" or at work photo's relating to their topics. Not only beneficial, but sometimes pleasurable reading such inherently knowledgeable sites, and stepping aside occasionally from SEO and online marketed key-worded niche sites (includes me a little), which I think prevail heavily on the web. But of course there maybe more at stake, particularly as a business, for online affiliates and SEO's. But my thanks for such "knowledge only" sites and forum contributors, because they too contribute their specific authority that help us all - to learn, to save money, to guide. Should we need it. I'm sure we all do - need knowledge. Helps to learn, and if you want, you can earn. Online.

USB Drive Security with Rohos Mini Drive

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 07:42:00 +0000

Locked USB Drive

Create a secure password protected partition on any USB drive with the freeware Rohos Mini Drive for storing your sensitive and important documents and other files and software applications. Small flash, pen, or "thumb" drives are excellent media for transferring, running portable applications, saving, backing up, with other benefits, including ultimately protecting folders and data. Therefore encrypted folder and file storage becomes important for personal and business related documentation. Rohos Mini Drive allows folder access to the secure hidden partition, with password unlocking from any computer. When unlocked you can edit or run your files as you normally would on any computer or laptop hard drive. Image of pen drive and lock by clix.

After downloading, then installing with a USB drive connected, the utility will detect it, then ask to create and encrypt a partition, up to 2MB. It will take a few minutes, and it's best to have only one USB drive connected for the program to encrypt with a secure algorithm. Administration privileges are not required to password open the pen drive on another guest's computer. You can hide and protect folders with applications (see image below), it appears for any folder from the PC/laptop. This means that applications, such as browsers, within those folders cannot be run unless the thumb drive is inserted.

Encrypting Flash Drive
(Click for larger view)

There are are a few applications that interrelate for the entire program (see image below) -

- Mini drive desktop utility (similar to the green thumb drive in the above image). Here you can browse the disk contents within Windows explorer, change password, delete disk, protect folders, and other options.
- The Rohos mini drive portable application viewable on the USB drive. New partitions can be created within the drive. Once you click the yellow folder then enter the password, folders should become visible, and opening them should reveal your files. However you might find files cannot be imported, and that a "opened for read-only" dialog box appears. Earlier you may have received "connect as read-only" after password entry. This maybe because the full version is required. To add or copy files and folders you do so in the virtual drive beneath the USB drive in the directory...
- The virtual drive, e.g. Rohos Disk (S:) or similar should be visible (See image below), of which you add your files, which will connect to the mini drive portable within the USB Drive.
- The Rohos mini.exe (yellow icon) which a license upgrade to the full version is required for it to work. I think it allows connection between virtual image as a real disk on computers with administration privileges (according to the Rohos website).

Directories of USB and Virtual related Drives

(Click for larger view)

So it seems in my tests a useful and important security utility to have for a USB flash drive, with a attractive and user friendly interface, though perhaps a little limited in terms of direct or fast file copying and importing. But unsure if due to me not using it effectively or being freeware with it's limitations. Though if file protection is important for your USB flash drive, then with it's strong and automatic encryption code (AES 256 bit key length) based on NIST standards, the Rohos Mini Drive would be an important utility for sensitive and confidential file protection.

View USB Devices and Properties

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 04:42:00 +0000

USB Pen Drive

View USB properties of devices connected, including recently, to your computer or laptop with USBDeview, and also perform certain operations. Maybe you want to compare properties of two flash drives, e.g. driver versions, or vendor ID, or power rating (in mA). Not sure if it would be strictly beneficial, but might be for comparing a "no name" memory drive against a known branded USB pen drive if both are available. Or to display the device information (e.g. as a form of specification), if selling or promoting a USB external product. Particularly for little known local or regional brands, if you think it works good, and perhaps verified somehow (with further research) with a list of it's USB property information. Image by svilen001.

The small utility displays many properties, including driver class, protocol, device class, specific description, firmware revision, power rating, serial number, and other information. You may have to research such data (or specs) for further significance. This approach might be more useful for larger or more expensive USB hardware, e.g. external drives, DVD burners, and web camera's. But can quickly retrieve a list of information, and export to text, HTML, and XML report format for either all or selected items within the program.

List of USB Devices

(Click for larger view)

You can perform operations and auto start custom string type commands when a device is connected (i.e. when inserting), and also when removing the device. Standard commands include enable, disable, change drive letter, speed testing (for read and write speeds),auto play, opening in registry for editing (did not seem to work), and a few others. Command strings include %device_name%, %service_name%, %device_type% and other user specific parameters within the advanced options. So what user specific commands would be useful here? And to what degree of complexity? As a guess, and if you know how to script or program a little then perhaps...

Auto Run Scripts from USB Drives - Ideas

* execute a virus, malware or spyware scan for itself when first inserting a USB flash drive (particularly if you have used portable scanners from itself on an infected computer)
* Conversely auto virus or security scan when external drive is connected to another system, e.g. laptop, or desktop. Ideally with the portable apps suite (part of my review).
* Auto run a player from a thumb drive with a custom play list of video clips or mp3 files (worth a try).
* Set (i.e. program) a time to auto restart or boot into dual boot operating system
* Create any task (well maybe), depending on your skills or experience, e.g. for USB diagnostic auto launch (i.e. auto play) utilities and common software such as portable players, browsers, text readers, and so on.

Properties for USB Lexar 4 GB Pen Drive

(Click for larger view)

Perhaps USBDeview is useful for those that want to quickly get information from various connected devices, compare USB properties, check speeds, and quickly disable and enable devices. But perhaps importantly, apply and run custom commands for auto launching of a USB portable utility for computer convenience and optimization purposes.

Related: My article on USB Flash Drive Benefits and External USB Drive Enclosure (2008)

Online Text Analysis Tool - Textalyser

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 01:48:00 +0000

It's Only Words...

Textalyser (http://textalyser.net/) is a useful tool for analysis of word groups or sentences, to extract meaningful statistics with phrase and expression patterns. Evaluation of the informative data and stats in a structured table format indicates an appreciation of this tool for easier further analysis. Hence those involved in writing or content generation, such as writers, bloggers, students, teachers, and content researchers, might find this utility quite helpful. It's also beneficial to apply with other text analyzer related tools, such as online dictionaries, keyword databases, permutation word generators, search engines, and as I discovered some Firefox browser add-ons or plug-ins. Image of words by tome213.

Specific Text Applications

You can use Textalyser for grammar improvement, essay, ad-copy, or content comparison, keyword density and diversity grouping and research (with other tools). Can perform readability analysis (and therefore enhancement), authoring validation, and perhaps other text related functions - importantly for keyword research. I found the single word and 3 phrase frequency interesting and useful, as a Blogger. Many niche bloggers and web publishers, will find this tool useful for analyzing either their own articles or that of their competitors. You might be able to find 3 or 4 phrase patterns, known as long tail keywords, or perhaps discover related (but uncommon) words to use in your articles.

Deeper Text Research Insight - Comparisons

In-depth analysis with Textalyser might involve inserting lengthy articles, including adding several sentences from various sources online. This is what I did for comparing the reviews of two popular hair straighteners. The idea was to try get an overall summary, feedback, or emotional "feeling" about the two items. Though some reviews are obvious as to which is better or worse (i.e. the good against bad or cheap vs expensive, etc). However, I wanted to evaluate if I could extract more, perhaps subconscious or underlining thoughts or feelings that may not be so apparent. I believe I did extract more info, but with the help of another tool, called Wordle, which is a "text cloud" generator. The bolder or larger the text (i.e. font), the more prominence assigned to it, suggesting more relevance or significance.

Table of Word Frequency Count for Hair Irons

(click for larger view)

Example of Textalyser Application: Comparative Evaluation

Rather than me rambling on about textual results, it may be better to read the hair straightener text review analysis (note it's a long article, with images). It did show, I believe important, even refined differences of dozens of reviewer's thoughts.

Other useful Word Analyzers and Related Search Tools

As noted above, if you really want to get analytical, particularity for keyword research, and as those that do (and probably know), their are other complimentary online research tools to help improve word phrase diversity, synonyms, semantics, definitions and so on. Maybe apply these utilities as well...

Text Analyzers

Wordle (http://www.wordle.net/)
Creates a range of images with different cloud sizes of text, based on prominence.

Lexical FreeNet (http://www.lexfn.com/)
Discover relationships and connections between pairs of words.

Related Terms and Meanings

*Thesaurus Com (http://thesaurus.com/)
Well known site for finding synonyms.
Dictionary Com (http://dictionary.reference.com/)
Also popular- find meanings, and has translator.
One Look Dictionary (http://www.onelook.com/)
Find an array of definitions by using wild cards, meaning you can find words and phrases either "starting, in-between, and ending" with letters and characters that you specify. Creates textual variations of your custom selections.
Urban Dictionary
Stores, and I think collects new "urban" or "street" definitions, for reference. I use this site to try find new terms that may crop up, so as to incorporate them in my blog articles. You can get a "new word a day" emailed to you from their site.

Google Tools

*Adword Keyword Tool
The ever useful keyword research tool for finding popular search queries, related terms, search volumes, monthly trends. Includes broad, exact, and phrase search terms for different regions. Also can add or subtract terms, choose closely related suggestions, etc.
*Google Sets and Squares
Find permutations and subsets of main word. Visit article by Search Engine Land
* Google Suggest and Instant
I think you know the one - Do search and Google suggests or instantly displays common, authoritative or related terms.
** Ubbersuggest (http://suggest.thinkpragmatic.net/). Extend Google's suggestion even further, and includes alphabetical selection. Great suggestion tool - need to set to english version before using it.

Search Engine Visualization and Cloud Suggestions

*Deeper Web (http://www.deeperweb.com/)
Powered by Google, displays cloud prominence results, in addition to search results - which include answers, news, Wikipedia, blogs, resources, and more.
Yippy (http://search.yippy.com/)
Categorized search results, including for clouds, sources (e.g. Bing, Yahoo, Directories), and domains.
*Primal Search (http://think.primal.com/)
Display interesting related or semantic words and phrases, based on search query. But can also "expand" your thoughts by using the "storm" selection. For example, enter text analysis, select "storm" then see adjacent, distant, general, and specific terms, e.g. Latin, document, information retrieval, and more. Bound to find a related term easily, that you may be unaware of.
*Keyword Eye ( http://www.keywordeye.co.uk/)
Displays clouds of results, including in 3D, monthly search volumes, level of web site competition by colour codes, and can download panel results as CSV file for excel.
*Soovle (http://soovle.com/)
This merges search engines, including Google, Wikipedia, Amazon, Yahoo, etc, and provides a mix of suggestions on a "rotating" results wheel. Interesting and useful, and can select alphabetically the current top keywords/search terms.

Keyword Combination and Permutation Tools

Rearrange your phrases, from Textalyser results into all possible combination's to help merge/add them into your content for more meaningful sentences.
*Keyword Lizard (http://www.keywordlizard.com/)
Yield all possible combination's from your phrases, by adding them in columns
*Search Phrase Builder (http://kw.tre.sk/)
Based on Google's Adword tool, add keywords for up to two columns to combine for a phrase.
*Combine Keywords Builder
Merge two or three sets of words to combine them, but can include numbers and characters (e.g. space, hyphen, etc)

Firefox Addons

I use a few search based addons with results that are generated from Textalyser, to either get more information using specific search parameters, or from various search engines. Also to retrieve related terms, synonyms, and latest "trendy" keywords.

RC Search
Provides advanced and varied search features in Firefox right click context menu. Highlight a word, then right click to select RC Search, then select Google normal search, exact phrase, images, news, dictionary, maps, etc. But also can select YouTube, eBay, IMDB, and urban dictionary - useful to find new "urban" keywords from Textalyser results.

Google Semantics
Great tool for getting synonyms form within your text, so as to expand your keywords for article writing, blogging, content generation, etc.

Search Selected
Little similar to RC Search, but use keyboard short cuts for your selected text, to open up search engines in new tabs. Select s for web search, w for Wikipedia, i for Image search, etc and can use numbers for favorite search engines.

Read It Later
Perhaps you get plenty of phrases, or related text using the addons from different pages. Then perhaps save them later for actual writing with this addon.

Zotero
Also save later but can create folders, collect info from various sources, manage, and add citations for your research sources.

There are many other text analyzers, textual cloud displays, visual keyword mappers, and search engine segmentation/categorization/graphical tools. All helpful and important for phrase optimization techniques, including creation, text cross referencing, relative association pairing, semantic analysis, in order to yield more interesting but extremely useful keywords or phrases to work with in content generation.

Windows PC Problems And Resolutions

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 18:15:00 +0000

Errors on a Windows PC come in various forms. One common type of error that often plagues Windows users is file type errors. However, unlike many other computer errors, file type errors are not complex and there is no reason to be afraid of them. With the help of some simple guidelines and the right software, the average computer user can easily resolve file type errors on their own.

In this tutorial, we will discuss the following topics:

Description of three common file types
Causes of file type errors
Steps to resolve file type errors

Three common file types in Windows

.wps file extension – The .wps file type is used by Microsoft Works, a basic word-processing application.
.mso file extension – The .mso file type is used by Microsoft Organization Chart, an application used for creating and editing organization charts.
.cur file extension – A .cur file is also called a Windows Cursor file and is used for storing the mouse pointer design. Users can customize this file to change the appearance of the mouse pointer on their Windows computers.

Causes of file type errors

Generally, file type errors occur due to the following reasons:

Software that handles the file type is not installed on the computer.
Malware Infection.
Registry Errors.

Resolve file type errors

Install the required software

Different file types open with different programs. For instance, while a .doc file opens with Microsoft Word, an .xls file will open with Microsoft Excel. When the required software is absent, then you are likely to receive a file type error when you try to open a file. For instance, as mentioned above, .wps files are associated with Microsoft Works. In case Microsoft Works is not installed on your computer, you may receive a file type error when you try to open a .wps file. To resolve the issue, you may first try to open the file with other installed programs. To do this, right-click the file and select Open With. Next, select the installed programs one-by-one and see if the file opens. If the file doesn’t open then to view the file, you need to either install the required software or use a file opener software.

Run a virus scan

If the required software is installed on your computer but you are unable to open the file, then chances are the file in question is infected. Malware programs, if present on your computer may corrupt files, making them unusable. To fix the issue, it is recommended that you first update your anti-virus software with the latest virus definitions and then run a virus scan on your entire computer.

Run a registry scan

Another common cause of recurring file type errors is a corrupt Windows registry. Information related to your files, such as the name of the program with which a particular file opens is stored in your registry. In case this information is wrong, the Windows operating system may fail to fulfill your request for opening the file and instead return an error. To fix the issue, scan your registry using a professional Windows registry cleaning utility.

Fast Fixes For Computer File Type Errors

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 19:53:00 +0000

File type errors may occur due to various reasons. The most common reasons are corrupt or missing files, poorly installed applications, malware infection and registry issues. In this article, we will discuss in detail how to resolve file type errors, such as the .mdb file extension error.

When you encounter a file type error, perform the following steps in the sequence they appear to diagnose the cause and troubleshoot the problem.

Uninstall and reinstall the application

Commonly, a file type error message lists the name of the file that has developed a problem. Write down the name of the file and then use the built-in Search utility to determine if the file is present on your computer or not.

If the required file is reported to be missing or is corrupt, then depending upon whether the file is an application file or a core Windows file, perform either of the actions listed below.

Application file – In most cases by uninstalling and reinstalling the application with which you are receiving the file type error you can fix the issue of missing or corrupt application files. However, if the file listed in the error message is a DLL file, you may find that the issue persists even after you have reinstalled the application that is generating the error. In such a case, you can resolve the issue by procuring the missing DLL file either by downloading it from a reliable online DLL directory or copying the DLL file from a Windows computer that has a similar configuration as your PC.

Core Windows file - In case the file listed in the error message is a core Windows file, run the SFC (System File Checker) command to replace the missing or corrupt file. System File Checker is a run time utlity included in Windows that scans Windows protected files and replaces any damaged or missing files from the original Windows installation disc. To run the SFC command, perform the following steps:

Important: To run the SFC command, log-in as an administrator and keep the original Windows installation CD with you, as you may be prompted to insert the installation CD.

Click Start and then select the Run utility.
In the Open box, type cmd.
At command prompt, type sfc /scannow and press Enter.

Use a file opener program to open the file

This is applicable only when you receive a ‘cannot open the file’ or a similar error while trying to open a file. A common cause of such errors is damaged or corrupt file openers on a Windows system. To fix the issue, open the desired file using a reliable Windows file opener program.

Run a malware scan

Malware programs can corrupt your files, such as .pcb files and cause errors. You can fix file errors, such as .pcb file extension errors that are occurring due to virus infection by running a malware scan on your entire computer using a robust protective software.

Perform a registry scan

Another common cause of file errors, such as .pgm file extension errors is a corrupt or damaged Windows registry. To resolve the issue, scan your registry using a reliable Windows registry cleaning software to get rid of any incorrect registry entries and restore the integrity of the data stored in your registry.

How to Remove Viruses, Malware and Spyware

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 10:04:00 +0000

For those that are unfamiliar with installing and running various security tools, then a basic, but perhaps tedious procedure for removing virus, malware, spyware is to create a new folder and download various free security based and anti-virus programs in that folder. Often a computer is likely to be loaded with infections, if it’s running slow, switching off, redirecting at websites, prevention of entering usual programs, start up screen not displaying properly, or ads popping up in abundance - e.g. fake security software, and other seemingly strange occurrences. Then install, update, and run or scan the computer, with the security programs separately in full scan mode. This could take about an hour or so for each program.

Do not use the quick scans for a suspect infected computer; quick scans are often used when everything is back to normal (i.e. when all or most viruses have been removed). Then optionally keep some of the programs active in the system tray (at the bottom of screen) near the task bar, to work in “residence” or background mode, of which they are installed in their respective folders (usually program files folders), or as short cuts on the desktop and start menu. Image of infection bug by ines.

Updates - Important to implement

It’s important to update them all before scanning. Updating installs the latest anti virus detection files, but the programs themselves will also update (or upgrade) less frequently. Any anti-virus program is only good to scan or run with its latest updates. Look in the anti virus programs for an update option, which might be in the help or about us tabs. You must check or set to auto update daily or at least every few days.

Downloads - Free Security and Anti-Virus Software

Start by downloading the following free versions into the new folder, and maybe give it a name, e.g. Security tools…

1. SuperAntispyware (at http://www.superantispyware.com/)
2. Malwarebytes (at http://www.malwarebytes.org/).
3. Trojan Remover (at http://www.simplysup.com/ or better at http://www.simplysup.com/tremover/download.html - free but a trial for 30 days)
4. Spybot Search and Destroy (at http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html or http://www.safer-networking.org/en/spybotsd/index.html).
5. Avast 5 Free Anti Virus (at http://www.avast.com/free-antivirus-download). This will also install in your system tray - but that’s OK. Leave it there - and set or check to allow automatic updates.
6. Microsoft Security Essentials (at http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/) Often called MSE or MSSE (Use XP version if that’s what you are using). This should install in the system tray, and if it does then deactivate real time protection. Open the program, and then click on settings tab to turn it off. That is, click on the arrow in real time protection (i.e. residence protection), and click on save changes to turn it off. If you don’t, it may conflict with Avast 5, which is what we want for real mode protection. MSE should turn from green to red in the system tray when turned off from residence activity. Or alternatively install MSSE and scan with MSSE, after scanning with Avast and then uninstalling Avast.

MSSE is now becoming a effective program for detections. You may decide to keep it activated in real time later, in preference to Avast 5, which should be uninstalled. I use both, with Avast in real time mode on the PC, and MSSE on “standby”, i.e. it's installer stored on a USB pen drive, ready if required, for full PC installation and then updated before scanning.
7. Hijack This (at http://free.antivirus.com/hijackthis/). This popular program helps to detect programs trying to “hijack” your computer.

Perhaps optionally include the following freeware utilities for optimization

8. CCleaner (at http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner) - Good program to clean out unused files, temporary files, missing references, etc.
9. Smart Defrag (at http://www.iobit.com/iobitsmartdefrag.html). This is a better free alternative to the standard XP defrag. Defragging reorders files that become scattered after intense use of programs. You should defrag your computer about once a month. Defraggler (Maybe visit my review) is another choice, for you can select individual files for defragging.
10. Private Firewall 7.0 (at http://privacyware.com/PF_support.html - This is the firewall (one that I use as it’s relatively simple and effective - there are many others, and Windows 7 has it's own firewall), and is important to keep active (i.e. don’t turn it off), to detect intrusions and programs starting up - when you open any program, or when browsing the Internet. It should install in the system tray, and dialog boxes will pop up when opening/installing programs, or when on the Internet. If it does, generally you can allow them, but you may want to read by clicking the details tab. I have found it’s OK to allow them. It will also display dialog boxes when starting up or turning on your computer, if you have previously removed or changed or updated any programs. Again, I generally allow or keep the settings, except if I have uninstalled programs previously.

Downloading sites - Make Sure it’s the Free Software

Be careful when you are at the above internet security sites - you only want to download free versions, and not pro, paid, or advertisements, etc. Some sites may be confusing, as to what or where are the free programs. So navigate the site carefully, and read before you click the free download program. If you can’t find the free programs at their sites, as sometimes they direct to other sites or mirror servers, for the actual downloads, then Google Search for them. The search terms will all drop down in the Google Suggest box, with slight search term variations, for quick retrieval from the Internet. All of the above programs are popular and trusted programs, used by millions of users worldwide. There are others, and more specialized utilities (e.g. root kit removers or targeted virus removers, e.g. tds killer, or the advanced combo fix) which you can find by searching Google with “best free Malware remover”, “best free spyware” or “root kit removers”.

If you cannot connect to the Internet to download the security programs, then use, or get someone to download the above installers to a removable USB drive, pen drive, or similar. Perhaps also install portable versions of anti-virus and spyware, such as Portable SuperAntispyware, which may be helpful for removing stubborn rogue malware such as Anti Virus Live (see link below for removing such malware). Then transfer or copy the programs to your new folder on your computer. The removable drive may become infected as well, so also scan the removable drive to remove any infections.

Uninstall Installed Different Anti Virus Programs

Also, you should uninstall anti-virus and spyware programs that are on your computer not related to the above downloaded programs. Otherwise, conflicts are likely to occur with the above programs. Some package anti-virus programs may not uninstall easily, e.g. the Norton’s trial security suite or related programs. In this scenario, download the free Revo uninstaller (http://www.revouninstaller.com/); Remember we want to use free tools! (Navigate their site carefully to find the free version, usually by clicking a download link to display the free version), and also download the Symantec Removal Tool at Norton's Web Site (http://www.symantec.com/), which may be version dependent. Again navigate carefully to try find the removal utility.

Uninstall Norton’s suite with Revo first, in advanced mode (be careful in the registry section later), and do not restart the computer when the Norton Uninstaller finishes, as Revo may not be able to remove the remaining fragments. Then run the Symantec removal tool, and maybe followed by CCleaner. Perhaps install and run a dedicated registry remover for extra measure, such as Reg Seeker (http://www.hoverdesk.net/freeware.htm), but exercise care, by backing up the registry within the program.

Security Diagram of Free Anti Virus, Malware, and Spyware Utilities

Running the Anti Virus and Malware Scans

Once you have downloaded them in the new folder, then install them. Make sure to opt out from any other programs that they may want to install during installation. For example the Privacy firewall program might ask to also install a “vault” program, or Spybot may ask to install the Yahoo search bar, etc. Just click the boxes, or whatever, to not install them. Also, some of programs may not install, or run effectively, and for increased system security, unless the Windows Service Packs (e.g. Service Pack 2 or 3) are installed and are updated. Therefore turn on Windows update, to allow automatic downloads, or selective downloads for installation. For XP click on Start - Right Click My Computer - Properties - Automatic Updates Tab - and click on one of the download options (usually automatic).

Sequence of Running the above Downloaded Anti Virus and Related Programs

Unfortunately it could take a few hours, but you can run them at certain intervals. It is best to run in safe mode (with networking selected) for seriously compromised computers
But for now, try running in the standard normal mode. First turn off system restore, as the restore files are also likely to be infected. Click Start - Right click My Computer - Properties - Click System restore tab - then click the tick in the box for turn off system restore for all drives. Also remember to scan all disks, USB removable drives, that you have copied files from your computer. Again remember to boot scan with Avast and Trojan remover. Perhaps disconnect from the Internet, and any networked computer prior to scanning.

Open then run/scan with the programs separately in full mode in the sequence below. If any infections, virus, etc that are found, then delete them or at least “quarantine” them. The firewall should be on and left running. It’s likely to display multiple dialog boxes that will pop up when opening the programs, so allow them to run. Image of Spyware by arinas 74

Again - Make Sure to Use Updated or Update all Programs before running them in Full Scan Mode and uninstall or close any unrelated Anti Virus, Spyware Programs already on your Computer

Run and Scan in Full Mode in this Order Separately

Super Anti Spyware
Trojan Remover (Perhaps optional to run Trojan Remover; Maybe include a boot scan)
Malwarebytes
Spybot Search and Destroy (Also consider and apply the immunize function, and note that it's "tea timer" function runs in the background to detect malicious processes trying to start)
Avast 5 (open from system tray to scan in full mode, and consider to also do a “boot” scan later as well - you may need to be at the computer, as some prompts or commands may display, asking for actions to perform)
MSSE (e.g. for XP) (open and run - but keep inactivated in the system tray, when it’s finished scanning, if Avast is your preferred choice)
CCleaner (Internet browsers need to be closed; To use: Open program - cleaner brush image should be highlighted/selected and click on the Analyze tab - then click on Run Cleaner tab - and click the OK tab to effect cleaning; Also click on the registry image - click on scan for issues - click on fix selected issues - then yes or no to back up; I have often clicked no, with no issues significant issues occurring
Hijack This Internet Browsers need to be closed. Click the main menu tab and click to do a system scan and save a log file - the generated files can be very confusing to beginners - see below for more details
Smart Defrag (Click analyze, then Go, and use fast optimize option, to fragment files) or perhaps Defraggler; Perhaps evaluate My Review of Defraggler.

Fake Anti Virus and Malware Activity Infection - Try the following processes in safe mode if the above normal security software tools won't run

Your computer may be acting strangely due to certain malware from rogue or fake anti virus malware listed as Anti-Virus Live or Advanced Virus Remover. There are many other credible but fake software titles. Such malware try to get you to buy their software, but not without preventing downloading, updating, or running your anti - virus software, displaying explicit warning alerts or infection messages, stalling certain commands, including internet browsers, and other undesirable activities. Drive-by Downloads often cause or create these rogue malware, by fooling PC users to click to download them, by displaying alert banners or warning pop ups. Or sometimes displaying banner ads to download free screen savers or music files, etc. Ignore them, and don't click such bold deceptive messages. Period.

Visit the tutorial at how to geek com to remove rogue and fake malware, if you are experiencing such activity. Also read the comments section to get other ideas. Perhaps also visit to download the free Remove Fake Anti Virus Utility to remove common rogue malware, which displays fake infection alerts on your computer. The site conveniently lists several fake anti virus software, e.g. Antivirus 8, Your PC Protector, Security Tool, and more.

Or perhaps download Rkill and save, then boot in to safe mode (often by pressing F8 per 2 seconds), then run RKill, then the above security/spyware programs (at least Malwarebytes, Spybot, Super Anti Spyware, etc). Then perhaps run the programs again in normal mode. RKill attempts to prevent or terminate any present malware processes from running, to allow the standard security/spyware programs to run properly. You may have to either alter the download name of RKill, or download substitutes from different servers as explained at the Bleeping Computer Site which details what it does, and how it works.

Computer Optimization Overview

Hopefully the computer should run better once infections are removed, and for good measure perform quick scans (if you feel like it!) and it’s best to do quick scans every few days, and a full scan, including smart defrag about once a month or more frequently depending on what Internet sites you visit. Peer to Peer sharing sites, such as Bear Share, Kazza, etc, I think are known for adware and spyware. There are almost daily updates for Avast 5, MSSE (XP), Super Anti Spyware, so you must check/allow those updates. Spybot generally has weekly updates.

I update Malwarebytes once a week, and check to update program upgrades for CCleaner, Private Firewall, and Hijack This every few weeks. For Hijack This, try to learn online by visiting forums to find what needs to be deleted or repaired. Best to sign up at a computer forum and post the log file and ask for someone to analyze and ask what files should be removed. This is done by clicking “fix checked”. Perhaps read this informative tutorial about how to apply Hijack This when dealing with computer system hijacks. Also once you think your computer is stable and infections are removed, then turn on system restore.

Summary

There maybe alternative procedures to removing a serious infected computer system, but the above sequence has proved adequate for me in optimization performance and removal of heavily infected computers. Often it’s due to inexperienced or inattentive PC users downloading files or software from certain web sites, display banners, and email messages. But it’s best to prevent or reduce the probability of viruses and infections infiltrating your computer in the first place. So it’s about being vigilant when browsing the Internet, or when adding files externally from USB drives or discs, opening unknown email attachments, or downloading and installing free software.

But it’s also important to run security programs in the system tray, i.e. in residence, and perform periodic automatic and manual regular quick scans. Also perform at least occasional full scans to remove viruses, malware, spyware, and Trojans, before they have a chance to reduce computer system performance. Not doing so, may well cause undue frustration to you as a user. It’s about being security conscious, and more importantly to implement the essential procedures. Train your computer to be secure and safe, so you and your computer are working seamlessly together. Prevention is the cure to reduce (and prevent) any infections in your computer, and a loss of satisfaction and control when using your computer.

My related articles:

How to Avoid Malware for Error Free Computer
Top Tips to Avoid DLL Errors
How to Keep Your Computer Safe From Harmful Viruses and Trojans
Troubleshooting PC Windows Errors
Fast Fixes For Computer File Type Errors
and...
Top Tips for PC Shutdown Issues

USB Flash Drive Benefits

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000

USB flash drives, or memory, stick, "thumb" or "pen" drives are becoming as common as a standard writing pen. Perhaps it's no wonder due to a wide range of brands (and non brands), widespread availability in retail stores and online sites, significant price reduction, larger capacities (i.e. more file storage), small thumb size for pocket portability, and practical easy file transfer between computers. I brought a 128 MB memory drive for $70 NZ in 2007-08, and recently a Lexmar 4 GB for $ 15. This translates to a massive cost reduction of 55 cents/MB down to 0.004 cents/MB. Or another way, $560 for 1 GB in 2007 and about $4 on a strict linear cost calculation. But more likely like $252 (I recall) against $10 today at adjusted retail and market prices.

The advent of USB memory drives can certainly make file transfer, i.e both from and to a computer very easy and fast with minimal effort. It's worth considering advantages and disadvantages, and perhaps future advantages for these removable (and rewritable) flash memory data storage devices. In some instances they may be a critical lifesaver for a computer, by restoring a virus affected PC to it's working state.

Advantages of an USB Flash Drive

Software Benefits

* Easily and quickly copy files to transfer to another computer: - e.g. photo's, documents, music, pre- installation software, internet browser bookmarks, and software utilities.
* PC configuration settings: - Optimize a computers environment and settings: e.g. diagnostic software files, components, drivers, etc. Thus helpful to troubleshoot, optimize, and even to help recover a PC to an ideal working state.
* PC Anti-Virus and Malware removal and maintenance: - Load critical install anti-virus, malware, spyware, trojan software in to a virus affected PC. Then install to the affected PC, download updates, then scan to attempt removal. I keep critical and free install programs in my USB pen drives. Then update them and recopy them again as a quick alternative backup to my usual methods. Note - It may pay to scan for malware/anti-virus your USB pen drive, between swapping computers.
* Portable PC USB Player: After loading in your favorite music mp3 files, than can play on another computer. Perhaps use a personal customized portable software player as well - with a playlist if possible.
* Operating Software -For the technical and ambitious, USB's can boot up operation systems, using varying methods, modifications, "slip streaming", reloading condensed windows, etc. It's a bit intensive and challenging but if you want to give it a go... best to search online for further information, or visit putting "windows in your pocket". I have seen at least three other tutorials/links online and from our NZ forum - Press F1 at PC World NZ.
* USB Portable Software - Some software also have a portable version, which is a condensed version and generally work similar to their full versions. The popular CCleaner, Revo Uninstaller, Anti-Virus, Firefox Browser, Open Office, etc, have portable versions. Their are also websites that offer fully featured application suites - i.e. USB housed software (e.g. the portableapps suite from www.portableapps.com). These can include many utilities - e.g. games, players, task managers, calendars, encrption security-password tools, and so on.

Image of Portable Apps - Image from snapfiles freeware

Brands, Design, Costing, and Portability Benefits

* If you are brand conscious their are many to choose from, and include Kingston, HP, SanDisk, Lexmar, Corsair, A-Data, Patriot, etc. You may want enhanced features, such as high read/write speed, capacity (in GB), inbuilt security and management software, connectivity (e.g. wireless), cap protection, key chain, wrist band, sleek appearance, ideal weight, write protection, compatibility for mac's, windows, and linux. You can also get personally branded or printed USB pen drives for business promotions. Also check warranty and the brand's website for updates on the pen drive and any associated software.
* Costs have decreased markedly over the years, thus a benefit if you are budget minded, since their are many to select (in price and models) - seem to be predominant in electronic and appliance stores. I have personally seen specials at New Zealand stores, such as Bond and Bond and Harvey Normans ($9 for a 4GB drive)
* Portability - i.e. Stick in your pocket. Easy to transport. Easy to Use. Handy. Perhaps they may get much smaller. Or translucent to varying degrees with flashing lights. Or transmit signals - e.g as a remote for TV, double as a portable torch, or auto save and save emails, or otherwise. What would be the next stage of significant development for USB flash drives? Who Knows? Any Ideas - then please add comments...

On Page Optimization SEO Tips

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 05:09:00 +0000

If you want to increase your website's or blog's ranking in the serps (search engine results pages), to increase visitors or traffic then applying simple SEO (search optimization techniques) will help. SEO optimization is becoming more important, both for changing search engines techniques to extract relevant content from search queries, and also from blog and website publishers whom are now becoming much more experienced or better trained in SEO methods. SEO on page methods, tutorials, and techniques, are comprehensively described at various SEO websites, and also in forums - perhaps more so than ever.

In some forums, many are now describing at length SEO techniques (many true and tried) rather than merely asking for SEO help - a bit of a reversal from a few years ago. I believe many are now learning and adapting SEO more intensely to try reach out - and now it is more important - because the web is becoming increasingly cluttered and very competitive in many topics, niches, article sites, e-commerce shopping sites, social platforms, and video upload sites. Just visit article directories - their are many quality articles in certain topics, but essentially describing the same theme. The same with many e-commerce sites - more or less of the same products, services, reviews, affiliate products and so on.

Thus it's important to "SEO enhance" a web site, with quality and relevant content to attract the engines, but also at least a steady stream of visitors that will return to find a relevant solution to their needs. I saw a forum on TV with Ken Auletta (a media expert - whom I never heard off - but authored the "Googled" book) which was interesting as he talked about the digital age, i.e. the internet vs traditional news papers. One point he mentioned was something like the rate at which people learn/adapt to new major communication concepts that reach 50% of Americans. The spans between new ideas/concepts are becoming much shorter - and included the internet's role, and thus could apply to SEO: Many want to learn now, adapt it, refine it, and further optimize to reach out to the masses.

Anyway, I have listed (yeah I guess like elsewhere online), some on page optimization techniques, which should be applied. This list is nothing entirely new, but hopefully at least a reminder for future reference, and can be applied with my popular post: How to Increase Visitors to Your Blog. It's a bit of work - but only part of it, as their are also "off page optimization" techniques as well. This is partially covered in other posts of mine.

On Page SEO Tips

- Try them if you have not already. Really it all revolves around primary keywords, secondary keywords (called "long tails" in the SEO industry), and related terms or "LSI" words (latent semantic indexing - closely related words between pages that are relevant for indexing). Image of Global Search By topfer.

Title
Use keywords or relevant business name in the title tag that primarily relate to your business or topic. Should be short and relevant, as title tags get indexed and displayed in search results. Try include heavily searched for keywords in the title, that you think would be appealing to a searcher's query.

HTML Header Tags
Apply html H1 (Site Title), H2 (Page or sub titles), H3 header tags to reach out to Google to reference as important. Also use bold and/or italic html text to highlight important points throughout your content. Visit html sites for the suitable tags to use, which may include the new html 5 code for better placement.

URL Title
Try to use keywords or relevant url name, though I think some authoritative sites have no such relevance. Amazon for example - the url name does not relate to selling - but it correlates well as it has become a major online selling authority.

Keywords in Content
Important - particularly for at least semi competitive niches.
- Try to lightly incorporate searched for primary keywords and long tail phrases in your content. Use Google's Adwords Keyword Tool or Word Stream or similar. You need words that people are searching online for visibility ranking.
- Use a bit of diversity and density for keywords. Try online dictionaries, synonym generators, permutation generators, niche title generators etc, and even the Google Suggest Tool when conducting a search.
- Perhaps use qualifiers with your keywords that add emphasis or relevance if suitable. so terms like the "latest" or "best" may help.
- Their are many keyword strategy articles tools to read about, which are important source of current info. So visit SEO blogs/sites like Search Engine Land and Search engine Journal.

Meta Description Tag
I use and I believe it helps for competitive or similar posts on the search engine results pages. So include a relevant and brief description pertaining to your site to increase the likelihood of a visitor click through. Include keywords similar to your title and content, of which I did for my post about increasing blog traffic.

Google Maps: Create and claim
List your business on Google maps, add relevant content, and make sure to "claim" your map. many listings (e.g. Hotels, fast food outlets, etc) are listed in the serps as a "map pack". I made a user generated map that I embedded or link to my Auckland Hotels and Motel Supplies NZ blogs to reach out and to add a more insightful user experience.

Internal Navigation: Links and Site Map
Perhaps add a internal site map for a large site, and Google have recently mentioned a video map. Internal links to other posts may help. I searched a term, and one of my links on a search result post was displayed in the search results, more so than the actual post that the link pointed to.

Images: Add tag attributes
Because search engines cannot read images, then you need to optimize with alt tag attributes, ideally with a primary keyword. I also add the title attribute that displays relevant keyword text when the mouse is hovered over the image (like a tool tip). You can add captions as well, and a relevant title to the image to increase optimization.

Associated code for the above globe image, to indicate keywords in the alt and title tags. Hence alt ="Your keywords" (for the engines to read and interpret) and title ="your keywords" (to display tool tip on mouse over)

So applying on page SEO techniques will help get your site ranked up in the search results, but it could take anywhere from 3 months to 18 months or longer (in my experience) depending on the level of competition. It would be easier for competitive niches, to effectively control/introduce keywords, e.g. starting with low competition keywords and terms then gradually towards higher competitive keywords in content posts. You would need to track search queries to possibly introduce additional keywords over time. Also need to keep in touch with changes in Google's search algorithm, by subscribing to SEO news blogs or similar.

Then their are more slightly complex issues at the site's structure/design level, e.g. url redirects, language search/translation/server issues for multi international sites, "breadcrumbs" navigational structure, load times, css scripting enhancements, creating and analyzing visitor segmentation statistics (e.g. in Google Analytics and Webmaster tools), and so on. But start with the basic SEO fundamentals (as above), then apply more advanced on page techniques if relevant, which you can learn from subscribing and reading expert articles from authoritative SEO sites and blogs.

Screen Capture Review

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Fri, 14 May 2010 11:50:00 +0000

If you are wanting a simple, easy to use screen capture, screenshot, or image capture software utility, then ScreenGrab would be an ideal capture screen software. Specifically a Firefox Add On, ScreenGrab is an easy to use, minimal, free, and functional utility for copying or saving once a "windows capture" has been performed. Previously the Alt - Prt Scrn keys, and other similar key combination's were used to copy a entire visible window screen (or dialog box) into other applications, often Microsoft Word, or an Image Editor for cropping, enhanced editing, and perhaps uploaded to the internet.

ScreenGrab which resides at the bottom of the screen along the status bar, awaits to be clicked to perform a selection of copying or saving functions. I found it useful, and I'm sure many do as well, to quickly copy plenty of diagrams, images, and portions of web pages, or Google search results into a photo editor (e.g. Ulead Photo Express) to upload to my blogs and web sites. Nothing complicated, but get's the process done with relative ease.

I recently did a lot of "Screen Grabs" for my Hair Straightener NZ Blog, and Best search tips for hair irons, but spent a bit of time cropping, and enhancing (or trying to) in my photo editor. Not necessary really, only because I could easily capture, and insert dozens of screen shots and images in the photo software to play around with. The easier something is, perhaps the more it benefits for other things, i.e. from copying relevant screen shots for editing. Perhaps more important, if a picture tells a thousand words, to visitors of a blog or website, then it should be easier for them to assimilate your information as a image screen shot - see below)

Note: Click on images for clarity

Search results screen shot using ScreenGrab (The results "cloud" is from another Firefox Add On called Search Cloudlet). It was better to display the effect of the incrementally larger - and hence important search words...

Google's Wonder Wheel Search results captured with ScreenGrab - to effectively display categorized search results...

Maybe visit my Blog on how these captured screen shots were incorporated to help search for the Best NZ Hair Straightener Flattening Irons.

For the ScreenGrab utility, the same secondary options are presented from the Save and Copy selections when clicked on the ScreenGrab utility. The options are

- Complete page/Frame
- Visible Portion
- Selection (Which I think is the most frequently used)
- Window

Once you have selected your specific option, then either paste in to your application, or download the saved screenshot (or portion) to a folder, once the dialog box appears. For image editing in a photo editor, you may have to adjust or crop a little to eliminate unwanted white space from the edges, and to achieve a suitably sized or presentable image(e.g. suitable photo dimensions, file size, or pixel count, etc). As noted earlier, ScreenGrab easily and quickly captures (if you have a steady hand for selective screen shot regions) what's displayed on screen for further processing or editing if desired. Hence a very useful Windows capture utility to make copying, saving, and editing screen shots a bit easier.

Email Back Up and Online Storage

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 03:22:00 +0000

Emails and online back up storage alternatives, are a daily important feature for millions of internet users to keep in contact with family and friends, receive the latest articles from subscriptions sites, signing up for online services, notifications for online auctions, and many other web based functions. However if your email software suddenly becomes unusable or problematic, then often anxiety, inconvenience, and even out right panic can set in (as I discovered when bidding live online). Therefore it is important to have a remote back up solution or back up email program or alternative strategy at hand to easily implement to keep information a current two way street online.

Email Not Working - Check Account and ISP Provider

If you suspect your email program is non functional, then perhaps check the account settings (e.g. under tools - options), or contact your ISP (i.e. telephone call) or visit online for the help and/or email set up procedures. If there is a known issue, and if immediate online email contact, is important then immediately set up another (or more) email account. This can be easily done with GMail or the temporary 10 minute mail, (for signing up with online forms) to create other email back up accounts. Hence you can at least remain in email contact, whilst your (primary and disabled) email account is being attended to. Image of an Email by hoefi at SXC.

GMail - Avenue to many Applications

In fact I ended up using my secondary GMail account, as the primary account , as I found it more reliable in most instances, with easy to use features (labels, filters, alerts, and labs). Also it can be used for storage, due to it's generous size for storing emails. Perhaps a downside, is that you need to inform many others of your new email address, but another upside, is it opens avenues to the vast empire of Google. That is, you can sign in with your Gmail user name to Google accounts and use their many web applications, such as Google Docs, Sites, Blogger, Web Master Tools, Codes, Apps, Adsense, iGoogle, and much more.

Online Storage for Backing Up and Sharing

Sometimes legitimate emails may get redirected into spam folders, or on the server, or just vanish. Hence when conversing with your ISP, explain specifics, and they may be able to readily fix it, with testing, unless if it's a larger or complicated issue. Hence the more reason for signing up with a back up email program. Perhaps consider a free, secure host site, e.g. Microsoft SkyDrive, or Mozy Online Backup: 2GB Free. Automatic. Secure.- to store documents, images, music, etc, for security. Online storage can be useful for large file size documents, or numerous images (e.g. Flickr); Perhaps your own server (or your ISP), can be used for sharing your larger files. There are also the social sites (Twitter, Facebook) to connect with family and friends, and with suitable plug ins/add on tools to help streamline communication.

Plan Current Online Communication - Not only Email

Hence if email is an important and daily medium for you, then setting up a another web based email, signing up with free host sites, online social connection, instant messaging, ISP server, Skype, etc, would be helpful to not only yourself but others (friends, family, and services) to keep in current contact with. Thus as we should back up our hard drive's important files, software, audio, videos, etc, then adopting a back up communication strategy will help ease the two way flow of relatively instant online communication. Image of www email by jayofboy at SXC.

Top Tips To Avoid DLL Errors

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 21:11:00 +0000

If you work on a Windows computer, you most likely have come across a DLL error at some point in time. DLL or Dynamic Link Library files were developed by Microsoft to make programs running in the Windows environment more efficient and less of a system hog. The ability of these files being swapped allows your Windows computer to save hard disk space and memory. This is the reason why, the overall performance of your computer is greatly improved due to the utilization of DLL files.

What Causes DLL Errors

Since DLLs are essential for applications to run on Windows, you can expect a few DLL errors to appear once in a while. A malware infection, a corrupt hard drive, an accidental deletion of a vital DLL file or overwriting a newer DLL version with an older one are some of the reasons that cause DLL errors.

DLL errors such as the dimsntfy.dll error or advrcntr2.dll error may sometimes pop up, preventing you from running certain programs or performing a particular task. Dimsntfy.dll belongs to the Windows operating system and it’s stored in the Windows folder under the ‘DLL Cache’ directory. Basically, dimsntfy.dll is the DIMS Notification Handler and is an important component of Windows OS. While advrcntr2.dll is a file related to Ahead software’s Nero CD and DVD Burner. If you have installed Nero to burn and rip files, you need that file and an advrcntr2.dll error would not allow Nero to burn your CD’s and DVD’s.

Tips to Avoid DLL Errors

Fortunately, it’s pretty easy for you to fix DLL errors, if you follow some of these top tips to avoid DLL errors:

Always try to avoid deleting shared DLL files when you’re uninstalling programs from your computer.
Do not install unnecessary programs or programs from unknown developers. Incessant installation of programs may lead to DLL errors as well.
If you have a backup or test PC, install new programs there first and then install it in your main computer. In this way, you’ll be able to protect your valuable data stored in your main computer, if the program turns out to be malicious.
Always keep your computer protected with a reliable antivirus and anti-spyware program. Make sure you regularly scan your computer with them. DLL errors are sometimes caused when a virus has corrupted your DLL file.
Use the System Restore utility of Windows. When your computer is running error free, create a System Restore Point manually. This would allow you to restore your computer to the most recent Restore Point, in case a DLL error crops up.
Try to steer clear of ‘DLL Download’ sites, as some of them might actually offer you viruses which are disguised as DLLs.
Most importantly, buy a good registry cleaning software and run it on a regular basis. Registry cleaners are one of the best ways to fix DLL errors in your computer.

The registry cleaning tools save you from the tedious task of manually searching for DLL errors in the Windows registry to fix DLL errors.

Clean Your Computer

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 23:55:00 +0000

It's advisable to clean your computer internal hardware of dust, particles, and other materials that may be present inside it's case. I found this out, after my mother's desktop computer (2 years new or old) was running a bit slow, and intermittently switching itself off. We had done all the common computer system cleaning procedures, by applying Anti virus, spyware (e.g. Avast, Malwarebytes, HiJack This, What's Running (background activity) Adware, etc. Also applied diagnostic hard drive clean up targeted methods and trouble shooting windows PC errors - altering and running mscongfig - startup, services, ccleaner, defrag: defraggler, uninstalling unwanted programs, check disc, system restore, and more.

Hardware Problems Exist

But still the computer's issues existed, after running numerous software and comprehensive diagnostics. But I never really though about to clean the computer's interior hardware until a while later. I think many people, understandably think a system process, and spyware, adware, etc, is the cause, and like me jump in an attempt to find and fix it. But if standard trouble shooting, produces no noticeable result or improvement - then the hardware is generally considered suspect. There are also hardware diagnostic/information freeware that can help target specific issues. (e.g. Fresh Diagnose, PC diagnostics Freeware 1.0.0.8, PC Wizard, S/W System Information, etc). Image of pc by marinm at SXC.

Computer Location - Dust Absence
Even though I clean my PC's internals about every 3 to 4 months, hence I suspected a dirty computer - simple. Thus I dismantled the computer case, and man what a dirty dusty mess inside. The PC system must have been struggling (i.e. dust interference with electrical circuitry?), overheating slightly, surely affecting it's performance. But I think it's unsuitable environment must have contributed, because the hard drive lives in a boxed up corner on thick carpet, adjacent to two windows of thick curtains, and next to a bed with a thick bedspread. Also I think trees large outside, may have contributed, with it's pollen grains (evidence on the adjacent outside balcony). Hence an unnoticeable dusty surroundings, without any air circulation. So a simple, but cautious cleaning operation was undertaken, to expel the trappings of dust and other particles, within the computer.

Power Supply and Fan

This was removed and carefully cleaned and dried, with a moist cloth, a fine artist brush, and blowing by mouth. Ideally a can of compressed air would be quicker, and of course after the computer's power is turned off. Pays to separate the screws for the entire case, power fan, and it's shroud, as I got them a bit mixed up. I considered testing the fan's efficiency (flow rate?) or somehow for voltage or current input. But it spun fast enough, so OK by me. Image of PC Power fan By veredgf at SXC.

Motherboard Circuitry

This was carefully cleaned, and in fact layers of clumpy dust/particles were picked and brushed off, and blown out, and also within the hard drive enclosure, memory, modem, and within the front panel. I believe a anti-static strap should be used, but I have never used one, in about 10 years. I also used a mini USB vacuum cleaner, which helped a little. I also carefully slanted and shook the case sideways and foward- backward. Image of pc innards by saejinn at SXC.

PC Case Vent Holes

For my PC I clean the case vent holes externally every few weeks, but this PC had to be washed and dried around the vent holes from the inside. Application of paper tissues/wipes, cotton swabs (for PC's), rubbing alcohol (or similar) could be used on the computer case vents - but make sure they are dry before re-attaching. There was grime and dust cluttering the vent holes. So don't know if the computer was breathing properly, but should breath better after a thorough clean.

CPU Fan and Heat Sink

Carefully cleaned the CPU and it's surroundings, as it's important for it too stay cool to allow the computer system to function properly. Their are utilities to monitor CPU functions, including temperature (e.g. Core Temp: www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/). Your PC system or driver disc may have a such a utility, which you may want to use for monitoring. Image of CPU heat Sink By thefork at SXC.

Increased Computer System Performance

After cleaning we found the computer went noticeably faster, without switching off. But we felt it should be faster still. Extra ram, and a new CPU (my Mother's idea, and I did not know until later) were installed, certainly increased the computer speed, and now all working good - at speed. But I don't know, or can easily figure out, if having a dirty computer over 2 years, may have had a detrimental effect on the hardware components, thus causing for components to be replaced for increased performance. At this stage, some may want to run their anti virus, spyware, defrag, and cleaning programs to round off a computer's hardware cleaning. But to clean your computer, is generally straight foward, and if implemented with care, and on a regular basis, can reduce a loss in performance. Image of Digital Dreams By flaivoloka at SXC.

Related Posts: Hard Drive Clean Up and Computer Hardware and Software Service

Widgets For Your Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 05:23:00 +0000

Embedding widget, gadgets, and banners to your blog can add a bit of attractiveness and useful information to yourself (and about yourself), including your visitors. There are many widget types (e.g. visitor stats, advertisements, affiliate links, chat, information, bookmarks, etc), that can project a sense of status, authority, relevancy, and of course professionalism to your blog. Displaying such widgets perhaps also indicates that you have a sense of pride, and additional worthiness (in addition to your content of course) in your blog, because you have taken the time (and maybe trouble) to insert the html/javascript codes, sometimes with url links, to adjust to fit, and then to position carefully or strategically within your blog.

Many blog content widgets can also aid in search engine optimization (i.e. a possible SEO tool), depending on the site you signed up, and it's procedures, for utilizing the widget. I have observed some of my blog's content widget appearing higher ranked in Google search engine results pages, than the actual blog themselves for certain search terms. Also, I think if a search term includes text (i.e. keyword) in your content, and of the widget name, then your blog can be displayed on search results pages. The BlogCatalog directory site, is an example of this nature (based on current google indexing methods).

Below are some free widgets, which I think are present in many blogs, and include some which I have applied (and later selectively removed), that can at least initially, add an enhanced look and feel within your blog - and hopefully to your visitors. Bearing in mind though, a blog is about quality relevant content (mostly), and widgets perhaps should be used as an extension tool to help visitors mainly to connect, engage, and perhaps strongly associate (e.g.as in popular freeware sites and blogs, social media, news sites, blog directories) with your content. Many popular blogs, news sites, download sites, etc, provide widgets which include the popular rss feeds widgets.

RSS Feed Widget (e,g, feedburnergoogle.com): Used by thousands of blogs and websites to attract visitors to sign up to the latest articles or posts. In fact the generated code, is often used in many other widgets or purposes, such as site maps (based on XML code), or content based widgets for your posts. Often a associated e-mail widget is includes as well, and for Google's Feedburner there are many options to help optimize, monetize, and promote your blog. I embedded their feed map, and rotating post banner on my profile in a few social media sites.

Widgetbox (widgetbox.com): You can create attractive colourful widgets, that display your content post's, optionally with images. There are several options, for sizes, colors, styles, and you can add a widget to their site as well. Also includes social media widgets for Facebook, Blogger, MySpace, and other platforms. Produces a streamlined informative article/post box to embed in your blog.

Comment Box (From madtomatoe.com): This simple, but very useful widget text box, once embedded, display visitors comments for you to easily view from your home page. This instantly lets you know, so that you can reply in a timely manner to your viewers.

Shoutmix (shoutmix.com): Basically a live chat box, to allow interaction with others, and I have seen in some tutorial based blogs.

Google Friend Connect: Engages and attracts visitors to your blog, and you can invite from contacts, and social media sites.

Twitter: Where you can submit your blog, and of course promote on your blog with twitter embedded buttons and widgets. I have seen many twitter widgets emerging to help simplify your twitter posts and connections. Many new twitter widgets I have come across from SEO sites, such as search engine journal, and search engine land in their e-mail feeds. Too many, with advanced functions - but quite useful (if you tweet that is).

BlogCatalog: The popular recent visitors with their profile image (and other people based widgets), evident on thousands of blogs. I know many promote themselves to varying degrees, to join in messages, forums, and groups.

MyBlogLog: Similar themed people based widgets as BlogCatalog. But their are many other blog directories that provide banner or widgets (Blogged, BlogTopList, Blog Engage, Entrecard, etc -See blog buttons below on the L/H side), not only to their sites, but for other factors, such as widgets for rating, voting, most visited content, and more.

Feedjit: The free version widget displays recent visitors (see R/H side), you do have a few options from their site. But I only embedded it, once I got sufficient visitors, with their popular stats widget.

Google Gadgets: Hundreds of easy to embed and customizable gadgets. I use the news gadget (based on RSS feeds), the translate widget, calendar, and maybe others, as displayed in my Auckland Hotels Blog. There are many other gadgets - currency converters, world time, audio output, weather reports, quotes, and more. Though the code can be a bit long, so be careful when copying and pasting.

Google Maps: Sign in to Google Maps, and create a map to embed/link to your blog. Maps are popular with commercial/corporate businesses, e.g. Hotels, Pizza Outlets, Tourism, etc. Note though, Google has implemented a "10 pack map display" for business and their maps in Google search results. Sometimes a "3 pack map" is displayed. I read about it in a SEO article, and can be a targeted approach to display prominently a business in search engine results.

Weatherbonk (weatherbonk.com): Mash up of a real time weather forecast on a Google map, with alerts, satellite, radar and other information.

Share (from add this.com): Popular social bookmark widget that allows visitors to bookmark your blog to social/bookmark/forum sites (example below - hover your mouse over the share widget) such as Facebook, del.icio.us, twitter, etc.

Technorati favorites: Widget to add your blog to the blog indexing and search site Technorati. here a popular blog can get rated by Authority.

Digg: The widget when clicked, places your blog post on Digg, a social news site, and if popular, then perhaps get listed on the first page. This has potential to increase visitors to your blog.

Ad Affiliates: These widgets display ads, as a monetary source for your blog, and widgets can come in a range of sizes, styles, display modes, with visibility options (e.g. only display via a search engine results, e.g. Chitika ads). Notable ad affiliates are Amazon, Click Bank, Chitika, AdToll, Stock photo sites, and others.

Widget Advantages: Adds attractiveness, visitor user interaction, monetization (ads), authority or status (voting widgets), popularity (stats widgets), with probably more advantages.

Widget Disadvantages: Can be slow to load your blog, visitors may leave your blog quicker by clicking away on widgets, may involve constant customization and searching to change/replace with better widgets, and may become too standard and hence visitor inactivity on certain widgets.

Thus there are several widgets that can be embedded and customized to suit certain needs for your blog. Perhaps to enhance a blog's overall layout, highlight/show case visitors numbers, allow sign ups (rss feed widgets), engage readers (content widgets), and increase search optimization. But widgets should be used carefully, so as to merge in with the general layout and theme or relevance of your blog, without creating too much clutter or irrelevance.

MP3 Duplicate Finder and Remover

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 09:52:00 +0000

If your computer has numerous similar or duplicate MP3 or other format audio files, then the freeware "Similarity" a MP3 duplicate finder and remover will be useful for audio and hard drive organization. Excess duplicate audio files are unneccessary, become unused, and can take up space on your hard drive. Perhaps you may want to remove duplicate audio before systematically organizing your audio files, with a freeware software such as MediaMonkey or to rename audio tracks based on their tag information. Similarity, a freeware utility, supports various audio formats such as MP3, WAV, OGG, WMA and others, and can easily scan your computer for duplicate audio files. It performs comparison sound analysis of audio files based on sound characteristics, and finds any embedded tag information, e.g. album, artist, and track entries.

Ease of Use and Audio Results Verification:

The attractive interface, similar to windows explorer for navigation, is easy to use, scans MP3 duplicates relative quickly, provides optional sensitivity and scan content/tag settings for finding audio files. To help ease of audio file removal, a list of duplicate and similar MP3's, with a percentage bar for content and/tag information is displayed in the Results tab. Depending on your settings, the percentage can range from 0.5 % to 100%. The higher the percentage (I found above about 75 %), then the most likely the MP3's are exact duplicates, i.e the audible audio output are a exact match when listened to.

Similarity - Easily Search Audio Duplicates, Verify, then Remove

You can verify the MP3 duplicate results, by viewing tag/file information and directly playing the side by side audio results at the bottom, after clicking one of the listed audio file results. The audio file should play in your default player, if the format is supported. Any or all of the duplicate MP3's can be sorted, deleted, played, and exported to a play list.

Testing and MP3 Duplicate Results:

I tested by comparing two folders, and created duplicates in one folder, and altering the file name and tags for a few tracks. Similarity was able to quickly determine the audio files as duplicates, with 97% similar content comparison (and 27 % similar tag information), from about 350 files total in about 2 minutes. Another set of duplicates had about 73 % audio content comparison, but with 80% tag similarity. Thus tag information can be useful - i.e. to complement or prove that the audio files are duplicate if tag results are a high percentage.

Sensitivity and Customization:

But in my view the real strength is in the sound analysis comparison, as many of the files were not tagged (or incorrectly/incomplete). Interesting to note, that for the some of the same artists, but with different MP3 audio songs, there were around 40% to 55% content comparison analysis at the default settings. This indicates the level of sensitivity for finding, and perhaps reliability/accuracy of this software. So to target similar audio for finding exact duplicates, the option scan settings are customizable and can be easily adjusted. Overall a good useful freeware MP3 duplicate finder and remover, to help streamline and organize you audio collection, and to regain hard drive capacity for you computer. Similarity can be found at www. music-similarity.com or download directories.

Related articles from MP3 Free Software Downloads:
Free MP3 Utility Tools and Free MP3 Audio Organizers

SEO Tips

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 07:37:00 +0000

Applying basic search engine optimization (SEO) tips is a procedure (of sorts) to optimize your blog to rank highly on their search engine results pages (called "serps"). Perhaps having your blog title displayed within the first three results pages would be ideal. This is important if you want to gain targeted visitors, and perhaps subscribers to your blog. There are many blogs, web sites, articles, manuals, etc that offer quality SEO tips to achieve this, and which I have adopted, in an attempt to quickly gain visitors. For this blog, I only explain the basics that I have applied for on site optimization.

Applying SEO techniques is not really new, but worth applying properly if you want to attract visitors, that you feel should engage with your blog's content. In many blog forums, I have seen numerous questions relating to SEO. Conversely, I seen many forums posts replying with quality SEO tips, and including links to SEO PDF files, SEO blogs, sites and PDF's. SEO blog optimization, I believe is becoming increasingly important for blogs, as there are so many blogs for a wide range of topics, which are becoming increasingly competitive for those topics (or keywords).
SEO Image By svilen001 at SXC.

You can of course research to find a less competitive blog topic that you might want to relate to a competitive topic - often called a niche blog. But for now, for on site (i.e. within your blog's content and template layout) SEO procedures, I have adopted basic content SEO procedures and some blogger based template/script changes, that do help increase visits. Specifically visits from search engines, for visitors that want relevant/targeted information by searching - before they even know your blog exists. Hopefully your blog title displays prominently (i.e. with relevant post title introduction) on the first few pages of the serps for a targeted search. Then hopefully visitors click on the displayed link, then read with enthusiasm your blog's content. Then ideally visitors return, along with daily new visitors.

SEO Keywords for Blogger Layout:

You need to apply keywords with your blog url if possible (I have for new blogs I have created),and the same or very similar keywords for your blog description, blog post title, and blog body content. I research popular keywords and keyword phrases (by Google search visitors) by using Google's keyword tool. I use keywords in the introduction, sparingly throughout the body post, and at the end to summarize. I also apply associated keywords (called secondary or long tail keywords) that closely relate to the primary keyword (e.g primary might be Blog and secondary might be Blogger, or say Hotel then Accommodation). I think Google with it's massive database would know that those primary/secondary keywords are highly associated. Of course you need to write unique quality content as well.

But you need to write naturally and intuitively try to configure your keywords within the content to create a natural blog post. Not only natural but to keep within focus to engage your readers, with what you want to essentially convey. You need to balance your content, by not using too many keywords, as this might be unfavorable to Google. There are also html tags to consider, and perhaps highlighting (e.g. bold) some of your keywords and their associated secondary keywords. For html tags, their are the header type tags. Though I have not really used html tags for SEO, but they are known to help.

If adding images, use keywords and a short relevant sentence that describes the image in the alt attribute html of the image; alt ="" might be alt = "Increase visits by keyword search tips using SEO tips at My Blog (Title)". Remember people do image searches, and hopefully they may find your blog from your alt attribute. I think it helps to have a convincing title to target visitors, particularly if there are numerous other similar blog title or post content. I use "How to repair" (then keyword phrase) which has attracted visitors, or apply popular keyword phrases that specifically relates to the post body.

Blogger script modification/hacks for SEO:

I also applied a few html/JavaScript changes in my blogger html template from a SEO perspective. Many others have as well, and such script changes increase the chances of visitors clicking on your blog from Google search results. The main script changes for me are:

1. Adding meta tags 2. Displaying the post (1st)- blog title (2nd) in search results and 3. Adding scripts/links/widgets for popular or relevant posts.

Meta Tags For SEO

Adding meta tags, particularly a relevant blog or post description, will prominently display what you post is about and more targeted in terms of SEO. Having a relevant description (and using keyword or related terms from Google's keyword tool) will increase visits - important if there are hundreds of similar posts, forum posts, blog directories, news sites, etc (and that don't have a relevant description). Best to visit online for specifics and how to add meta tags, e.g. bloggertricks com.

Image of Google search results for Computer Tech Links
a. Meta description tag: How to increase Visitor Traffic to Your Blog: 36 Tips from personal experience. b. Post Title displays before Blog Title and C. Key worded image description added to alt attribute (view source code)

Post and Title Display SEO Optimization Tip For a Blogger Blog

Typically Google search results for Blogger blogs are in the form Blog Title then Blog Post Title. You can reverse that order to Blog Post Title then Blog Title. This is a important SEO script tip as the end of the overall text (the Post title) will be trimmed off, if either the blog title and/or the post title is a bit long. Hence reverse it to help prominently display the Post Title (remember appropriately key worded) first - to increase the chances of targeted visitors to click to your site. Visit and search bloggerplugins.org for a simple explanation and the script code.

Add Links to Popular Post Tip

To help keep visitors on your site, and to possibly return, I add links in the sidebars to popular/relevant posts as determined by Google Analytics. Or you can automate by applying labels or widgets box type scripts. Some scripts require the rss feed address for your blog to be added to the actual script. Some blog directories provide such scripts, also feedburner (a script called feedmap I think), and blog tutorial sites (The blog doctor, bloggertipandtrick, blogger know how, and others).

These are basic on page SEO tips that I use, and actually can be applied more in depth to achieve advanced SEO techniques (e.g. optimum keyword density,"semantics" keywords association, optimum keyword phrases for titles, specific html tags in sub category titles in the posts, Blog template and script optimization, and more). More advanced SEO optimization tips can be found at SEOZombie, Search Engine Land, Make Money for Beginners (Grizz blog), and Blogger based tutorials. But best to start with basic SEO blog tips, and then more advanced with further SEO research and monitoring. It helps to learn SEO if you want to increase targeted visitors to your blog on a daily basis.

Related SEO/Blog Promotion Posts -

How to Increase Visitors Traffic to Your Blog. Tech Blogs (Links to Blogger Tutorials)

How To Keep Your Computer Safe From Harmful Viruses and Trojans

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 20:03:00 +0000

Most of us are blissfully unaware of the extent of damage that malware can cause until we actually face its wrath, and many times it is too late by then to do anything. A malware assault may result in data loss, identity theft, and system crashes causing substantial loss of money as well as time. Sometimes the damage caused by malicious software can be irreparable.

The epidemic is growing so fast that every year users are facing losses amounting to billions of dollars. The fight against this malware menace is to be fought at two ends. On one end, software manufacturers are working around the clock to make their applications more robust and plugging the possible security loopholes. On the other end, users are on their own in this fight and have to take the responsibility of dealing with malware and related errors.

The goal of this article is to help you understand the causes and identify the solutions to malware errors. It is important to take note that user vigilance is going to be critical while combating this problem. Please follow the list of Do’s and Don’ts below, which will help keep computer virus and Trojans away:

You must have a reliable anti-virus utility installed on your computer and use it to perform a complete scan of your system on a regular basis. You must also keep your anti-virus updated so that it is able to fight new viruses that are released almost daily. This is a very important task that users tend to shrug off once they have installed anti-virus software. Also, if you find suspicious files, such as d.exe running on your computer, you must immediately perform a full system scan. You must also scan your PC if you feel that something is wrong with legitimate Windows files, such as wscntfy.exe that belongs to the Windows Security Center.
Do not browse or download anything from sites that look dubious. You should also be careful of sites that offer freeware and shareware software. You should absolutely avoid the sites that offer keys and cracks and claim to enable you to install pirated software. Anything that is free from an unknown source should raise eyebrows and should be kept at arms length.
You should always perform a thorough scan of any CD or disk before copying any files or information from it. Often, we assume that CDs from known sources are free from any malicious software but you never know.
Do not open email attachments from sources that you do not know. Even if you know the sender, avoid opening files with dubious names and extensions as they may contain viruses and other malware. It could be a possibility that an email from a known source has been generated by a virus.
You must ensure that all software on your computer is updated frequently. This will make sure that your software such as operating system and applications are updated with the latest patches and security holes that are frequently misused by the viruses to enter your system.
In addition to anti-virus software, you must make use of a good registry cleaner to scan and repair entries that are corrupted by malware. Cleaning the registry with a good registry tool helps you ensure complete malware removal from your computer.

Defrag: Defraggler

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Sun, 24 May 2009 21:51:00 +0000

Basic review of Defraggler, a good free defrag software utility from Piroform for your computer hard drive, who created the very popular CCleaner and Recuva. Defraggler installs easily and quickly, and appears to runs faster than the standard Windows defrag software. It allows selection of individual files to defrag. Defraggler operates on all windows systems, and the settings menu has options to select or exclude file types and their folders.

Defragging is required for your computer's hard drive, to restructure the file fragments, particularly after extensive use, such as audio from video extraction, or other process intensive operations. So if your computer is slowing down, particularly during hard drive access, then running Defraggler may help. The standard windows defrag utility can be slow and even hang, as I found out when, I think it could not easily access some large ISO files. Other defrag utilities may also be slow, or required to be purchased. Defraggler being totally free from the reputable Piroform, you can be assured of a customizable, easy, and quick defrag scan to help optimize, and increase the speed of your computer.

Defraggler works quick and remains stable, even when using the computer. Often with windows defrag utility, restarting would occur during computer use. Of interest I like when after a analysis, you can click on any of the colored squares, of which file information is revealed. This can give you an idea of what file types are being fragmented frequently. For my computer, my kid's ISO back up games were often in a need of a defrag. It's possible to perform a deeper analysis to evaluate what files and their sizes are fragmented by using the search function.

The simple schedule option allows a defrag for your computer if you are going to be away, and to perform such an important optimization task, one cannot really do without Defraggler. Go try Defraggler from Piroform, it's a must have. Do add comments if you can about Defraggler, or other defrag and computer hard drive optimization utilities.

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Hard Drive Cleanup

Free Video Movie Editing Software

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Thu, 14 May 2009 06:34:00 +0000

Basic reviews of free video movie editing software that perform a range of editing tasks, including splitting, joining, frame extraction, noise reduction, colour depth/restore, format changes, frame rate edits, an more. Perhaps you want to perform similar tasks for video editing, then below are some free movie editors to easily help achieve such editing functions.

Windows Movie Maker 2: Simple to use drag and drop movie editor, with various transitions, 2D effects, and title options. Perhaps mainly for introducing basic movie editing for beginners.

Virtual Dub: Well known powerful editing software, with plenty of compression codecs, can convert, edit, render, capture and filter video files and more, with batch conversion. Can also apply third party video filters for enhancement.

Avedit: Integrated some advanced functions for AVI movie editing, e.g. colour restore, video warping, change frame rate, duration and size, with noise reduction. Imports MP3 files to add as music or sound tracks. Also import popular image formats to convert to AVI movie, and can post to your web site or blog.

Virtual Edit: Provides a slick interface for those aspiring to be "content" creators, by capturing video in to a project. Then add effects, music, and titles for enhancement. Has two modes: the basic DV Edit 123 and Multi Edit Mode from mixed formats and sources.

Wax: General purpose high performance and compositional special effects movie editing software. You can create 2D/3D effects, and work in two modes - stand alone and as a plug in to video editors for more professional editing.

Chopper XP 2.7: Video editing software to extract a segment of a dvd Vob file for removal, which includes video display and a good interface.

Zwei-Stein Video Editor (ZS4): Powerful video editing software, which can edit up to 256 video, image and audio segments including up to 64 effects chained in series. Custom effects are easily applied though automatic key frames.

Avidemux (2.4.4): Performs cutting, encoding, and filtering editing supporting various video movie formats (AVI, MPEG, VOB, MP4, ASF, MKV, FLV, etc) and codecs. Automation of tasks integrating projects, job queuing, and advanced scripting and runs on various platforms. The interface is similar to the VirtualDub editing software and includes many of it's features.

Related posts: Free Online Computer Video Editing Software, Which Video Format Converter Software, and How to Extract and Rip MP3 Audio From DVD VOB Movie

Related post from MP3 Software Downloads: Free DVD Movie MP3 Converter Software Downloads (Create MP3 Audio from free DVD converter downloads)

Top Tips For PC Shutdown Issues

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Wed, 06 May 2009 23:47:00 +0000

Murphy’s Law states that, “If anything can go wrong, it will”.

While we may call Murphy a pessimist, our interaction with computers, at times, frequently reminds us of this notorious law. Most of the time, we have no clue as to what caused our computer to display error messages on the screen. There are various things that may happen when you encounter a computer error. Sometimes it may refuse to start, refuse to run an application, slow down, shut down without warning and at times, even refuse to shutdown at all.

A majority of PC shutdown issues are caused by EXE file errors, which may occur due to various reasons. To make things simple for us, we need to understand that since each computer has a huge number of exe files, these errors are sometimes unavoidable. The good news is that there are tips which can help us reduce the frequency of these errors and also steps we can take to resolve these problems.

This article will discuss three exe processes, nvsvc32.exe, hpcmpmgr.exe, ccsvchst.exe that may adversely affect the PC shutdown process by slowing it down and in turn, causing frustration for computer users. We will begin by understanding what these different processes are and ways to fix the errors generated from these processes.

1. Nvsvc32.exe: This process is associated with NVIDIA video cards. Although it is an important process, nvsvc32.exe has one reported drawback - on certain machines, it has been known to consume huge amounts of computer resources causing delays in the system shutdown process. If you are one of those unlucky users, then it is recommended that you remove the nvsvc32.exe process from your startup sequence. In case you are not using a NVIDIA video card then you can also opt to disable nvsvc32.exe process.

2. Hpcmpmgr.exe: The Hpcmpmgr.exe process is associated with various HP printers like the Photosmart, Deskjet and All-in-One, and comes preinstalled on most HP computers. Many computer users who use HP printers and scanners complain of frequently experiencing hpcmpmgr.exe shutdown error messages. The error message pops-up during system shutdown, warning users that it is closing all open programs, even when there are no programs open. HP has acknowledged this problem and has prepared a guide to fix this error. You can easily resolve this issue by installing updates for the HP software that you are currently using.

3. Ccsvchst.exe: This process belongs to Norton Internet Security 2007. Many Norton users complain about high CPU usage resulting from the ccvchst.exe process. Other issues reported are slow system startups, as well as the error listed below at system shutdown:

“The instruction at "0x059a2df" referenced memory at 0x059a2df" the memory could not be written. Click OK to terminate the Program.”

You can resolve this issue by running live update. Symantec, the makers of Norton, also provide a fix for this error in the Support section of their website.

Although a computer without any errors is unheard of, with a little knowledge you can enhance your computing experience and say goodbye to PC shutdown related errors. It is also recommended that you use a good registry cleaner tool to maintain a healthy registry and prevent any system shutdown problems due to incorrect registry entries.

Related Posts:

Trouble Shooting Windows PC Errors How to Avoid Malware and Keep your PC Error Free

Troubleshooting Windows PC Errors

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:57:00 +0000

A large number of computer owners are amateur users who are not so technically inclined and have little idea of how to solve computer errors on their own. In offices, you may have an IT person who takes care of such problems or the job may be outsourced to an external IT company. However, a home or a small business Windows PC user does not have such a luxury and is mostly dependent on a knowledgeable friend whenever computer errors occur. Sometimes, after a few futile attempts to troubleshoot the error, a home PC user is forced to make the decision to seek help from a computer technician. Image of Virus Detection by woodsy at SXC.

However, with the amount of information that can be found on the internet today, such as discussion forums and online help sites, computer users have somewhere else to turn to solve their PC issues. With a little research, the common computer user may be able to resolve PC errors themselves.

So, as soon as you receive an error message, such as aacenter.exe has stopped working or you find that processes, such as consent.exe and tscd_win32.exe are slowing down your PC, try to search for a solution over the Internet. Most of the time, you are not the first one to receive that particular error message. So, it is quite likely that if you perform a search by using the error message displayed or with the name of the file or process that is generating the error, you will find a solution to it online. Once you find a solution, you must implement it to resolve your error.

You may also perform the steps below to ensure that no other issue is behind the error:

Update your antivirus and antispyware tools and perform a full system scan to detect and remove any malware infections. For better protection, you must use the latest versions of these tools, and try to opt for tools with real-time protection to ensure security for your PC at all times.
Next, use a good registry tool to scan and clean your registry.
Update your software and drivers, especially the software that generated the error.
If you recently installed a new software, uninstall it to see if the error goes away.
Use a reliable PC diagnostics utility to run a check on your hardware—if you find a faulty hardware, you may need to get this component replaced or repaired.
If you frequently download and install programs from the Internet then you must be sure of the following:

Download only from reliable sources, especially if you are downloading freeware and shareware programs—many of these programs are known to be bundled with spyware and adware.
Download over a fast Internet connection because a slow connection may interfere with the download and generate errors when you attempt to use the downloaded files.

Be very careful while opening email attachments. Open only those attachments about which you are sure- even if they come from known sources.

PC errors may occur due to a number of reasons. To prevent them, you as a user are required to be vigilant and perform regular maintenance.

How To Avoid Malware And Keep Your PC Error Free

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 20:20:00 +0000

Malware is the term used to describe all unwanted malicious software and files, such as aspimgr.exe, ipssvc.exe, and d.exe that may infiltrate your computer and cause various problems. The two main categories of malware are virus and spyware. Trojan horses, worms and back doors are variants of viruses. Spyware and adware programs belong to the second category. Viruses usually spread through open network shares, infected external media, infected emails attachments, and dubious web sites. While spyware and adware usually come packaged with other programs and stealthily install on your PC without your knowledge or consent. Image of virus/malware entry from ines at SXC.

There are some great antivirus and antispyware tools available today that you can use to remove malware programs from your computer. However, the real trick is to prevent these infections from occurring in the first place.

The following are a few simple tips that will help you achieve this goal to a large extent.

Tip # 1: Your first step to prevent unauthorized access to your PC is to implement a firewall. A good firewall helps you combat both viruses and hackers. Most home computer users get enough security by enabling the Windows Firewall. However, if you have more sensitive data stored on your PC, it is recommended that you use a more robust third-party firewall to provide you with better protection.

Tip # 2: You must not use file sharing applications such as Limewire. If you have any file sharing program on your PC, then there is a 99.9% chance that your PC will get infected with a malware. This is because there is no way in which you can determine the integrity and health of the content from the source you are downloading.

Tip # 3: Stop before opening any email attachments, unless you are sure about what it contains—even if it is from a known email address. Many virus programs, send infected attachments to email IDs in the Address Book of the infected computer. This is the reason why, even if your email is from a known source, it might contain infected email attachments. You may use a good anti spam software to scan both outgoing and incoming emails to your computer.

Tip # 4: Many times when you access a Web page, a pop-up display may appear carrying some type of advertisement. You must never click inside this pop-up box to close—not even the ‘close’ and ‘cancel’ buttons if they are within the box. Doing this may have adverse affects on your PC. To close this pop-up box safely, you must click the ‘X’ button given in the top-right corner of the dialog box.

Tip # 5: While working on your PC, you may receive a message informing you that your PC is infected with a malware, and that you must download a particular software and run a scan to remove the virus. You must never download this recommended software because they are most commonly rogue software that may cause further harm to your PC.

Tip # 6: You must avoid downloading free media and software because they are usually bundled with unwanted malware programs. Also, if you have to download something, then do so from a trusted website.

Tip # 7: Lastly, make sure to use a good registry cleaner tool to scan and clean your registry on a regular basis. This will help you remove any malware entries hiding deep within the registry tree and ensure complete virus removal from your system.

Privacy Policy

noreply@blogger.com (Profile - pcsourcepoint) — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 09:30:00 +0000

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If you have any questions or concerns please contact me at maw456@gmail.com. I hope you gain relevant information from this blog. This privacy policy was updated November 2011.