Monthly Archives: October 2009

DoFollow and Twitterlink Comments

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I’ve added DoFollow and Twitterlink Comments plugins to the comment form. What does this mean? This means that when you comment on my blog you will now receive link juice from Google because the “no follow” attribute is removed from comments making them “do follow”. Now your comments will count as links to the search engines giving your site more relevance. I advise everyone to do this as this is the new trend around blogosphere and it will surely boost your comments. You’re welcome!  

The Twitterlink comments will allow you to add your Twitter username when you comment. A follow me link will then be displayed along with your comments. The Twitter link will always be shown as long as you comment at least once with your username.

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Popularity: 10% [?]

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Thinking About Upgrading To Windows 7?

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With Windows 7’s recent release you may be thinking more seriously about whether you’re going to upgrade to the new system. Microsoft’s track record with OS upgrades has been bad lately and the company is determined not to repeat the same mistakes. One area in which the company took a lot of bad press was the unavailability of device drivers for Windows Vista. Microsoft says they have that resolved now. Upgraders should expect to find an abundance of drivers available for Windows 7 which should make the process of upgrading smoother.

If you’re upgrading your system from Windows Vista, you should have a smooth ride. There’s one caveat: if you’re running Windows Vista Home Basic, there’s no upgrade path for you. You’ll need to install the full Windows 7 product. If you’re upgrading from Windows Vista Home Premium, the upgrade to Windows Vista should be relatively easy. Your computer is already very likely to be capable of running Windows 7, and unless you have some very old or very dodgy devices, you should be in luck when it comes to drivers.

If you’re upgrading to Windows 7 from an older version of Windows (like XP), there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that Windows 7 contains a virtual environment in which you can run Windows XP. This will work for you if you have an older, irreplaceable piece of hardware or software that must run on XP. When you need to operate it, simply fire up XP virtually and run like the wind. Your XP drivers will work from the XP virtual environment. That won’t be the case if you attempt to run devices using XP drivers from the Windows 7 environment, though.

You’ll also need to verify that your older hardware is in good enough shape to run Windows 7. Microsoft offers a compatibility checking tool that will give your hardware setup the once-over to see if you need to make any hardware modifications before installing Windows 7. Older devices, smaller hard disks and minimum memory requirements are most likely to trip up old hardware.

If your hardware is really old you might want to consider just purchasing a low end desktop system that comes with Windows 7 already installed. Really old hardware is unlikely to meet the requirements of Windows 7.

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Amazon Kindle How-to: Help! My Kindle’s Frozen!

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You just got your new Kindle and have loaded it up with e-books and audio books. After playing a while you decide to make a few phone calls. When you come back, you find your Kindle screen is frozen! Unresponsive. The Next Page and Previous Page buttons don’t work. The <Alt> (Aaa) doesn’t “wake it up.” Nothing seems to bring your Kindle back to life. That old-school screen saver just stares back at you.

First of all – don’t panic. As with any other electronic device, the Kindle occasionally has a few hiccups. There are a few things you can do to get your Kindle running again good as new.

1. Plug-in your charger. Sometimes the Kindle battery can get run-down enough so that it will “freeze.” Plugging the charger in and giving your Kindle battery some much needed power often will un-freeze the screen.

2. If that doesn’t work, try what is called a “soft reset.” To do a soft reset on your Kindle press the <ALT>, <Shift>, and <R> keys simultaneously. Your Kindle screen should go blank or dark and then slowly come back to life.

3. When doing a soft reset doesn’t work, you will occasionally have to do a “hard reset.” To do a hard reset -

- Make sure your Kindle’s battery is charged (about an hour of charging time should do it)

- Remove the charger cord from your Kindle

- Open the back of your Kindle

- Locate the small hole under the word “Reset”

- Open a small paper clip

- Insert the paper clip end into the hole and press GENTLY for about 10 seconds

- Your Kindle screen should go blank (or black) and then the Kindle should re-start

4. When a hard reset doesn’t work you can try to remove and replace the battery in your Kindle. This is a bit more complex but not too difficult -

- Turn your Kindle off

- Remove the charger cord from your Kindle

- Open the back of your Kindle

- Locate the gray battery, and the finger-notch for removing the battery

- Gently press the battery toward the back of its compartment, then lift the battery out

- Locate the connector that attaches the battery to the Kindle

- GENTLY pull the battery connector out of the Kindle

- With the battery out of the Kindle turn it on for about 5 seconds

- Replace the battery and close the back cover of your Kindle

- Turn the Kindle on

If your Kindle is still “frozen” after completing the steps above, your next move is to contact the Amazon Kindle support team. Go to your Amazon account page – select “Manage my Kindle” and contact the support team from there. You can find the link at the top of the “Manage my Kindle” page on the far right side.

There is a good chance, however, that the steps above will get your Kindle un-frozen and by now you’ll be back enjoying your favorite e-book or audio book. 

Congratulations! You’ve now learned how to do a soft and hard reset on your Amazon Kindle wireless reading device.

Popularity: 14% [?]

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Amazon Kindle How-To Series: Five Cool Things You Can Do With Your Kindle 2

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You’re spending a relaxing afternoon reading an e-book on your new Kindle 2 e-book reader and the thought strikes you – “I need to check my e-mail to see if I’ve heard back from my daughter!” Now normally that means that you have to stop reading, put down your Kindle, and check your e-mail account on your computer. But, if you have a Gmail account you can read and respond to e-mails right on your Kindle!

First, go to your Kindle’s built-in basic web browser (Home > Menu > Experimental > Basic Web). Next, make sure that Javascript for your Kindle’s browser is turned on (Browser > Menu > Settings > Enable Javascript). Finally, go to the Gmail Internet address (Browser > Menu > Enter URL > www.gmail.com), enter your Username and Password.

IMPORTANT – use the standard Gmail URL and not the Google URL provided by default in the Kindle’s bookmark folder. If you try to access your Gmail from the URL provided in your Kindle you will be prompted to load a Google Gmail application. Applications cannot be loaded onto your Kindle so this will fail – you need to use the URL provided above to be able to use your Gmail account.

Are you a Twitter user? If you’d like to send a “Tweet” to your friends and followers about the great new book your reading on your Kindle you can do it right from your Kindle. This popular microblogging service offers a mobile version that works great on your Kindle.

Go to your Kindle’s built-in basic web browser (Home > Menu > Experimental > Basic Web). Next, make sure that Javascript for your Kindle’s browser is turned on (Browser > Menu > Settings > Enable Javascript). Finally, go to the Twitter Mobile URL (Browser > Menu > Enter URL > www.m.twitter.com), enter your Username and Password.

IMPORTANT – The standard Twitter URL is too complex for your Kindle to display properly. Use the URL above for best results on your Kindle. Have you ever wanted to “save” a page you were reading to share with a friend? The Kindle has two different ways to do this. The first way is to take a screen shot of the page you wish to share. To take a screen shot hold down the and the keys then press the “G” key. You will notice that the Kindle screen will “flash” showing that the Kindle created the screen shot.

The screen shots are stored in your Kindle’s “documents” folder as image files with a .gif extension. You can get them by plugging your Kindle into your computer using the USB cable that you got with your Kindle. Open “My Computer” and look for the Kindle drive icon. Double click on the icon to open up your Kindle and then double-click on the “documents” folder. Look for files that end with .gif and you’ll find the screen shots you just made.

To share them with your friends you can save the files to your computer and then attach them to an e-mail message. You also can print-out the screen shots by opening them in a graphic program such as Windows Paint or Windows Internet Explorer. The quality is not great – but is certainly acceptable for sharing several pages.

There is another way to capture and share passages from Kindle e-books. When you highlight passages from Kindle e-books and make notes your Kindle saves them to a file in the “documents” folder called “My Clippings.txt”. You can open this file with a program like Windows Notepad and copy your highlights to save in another program or share.

To do this, go to the passage you wish to share. Move the Kindle cursor to the beginning of the passage you want to save and click the navigation button. Now move the cursor to the end of the passage you want to save and press the navigation button again once all of the text is highlighted. This will save the highlighted text to the “My Clippings.txt” file.

Plug your Kindle into your computer then look for the Kindle icon in “My Computer.” Double- click on the Kindle drive icon then double-click on the “documents” folder. Locate the “My Clippings.txt” file and double-click on it to open it in Windows Notepad. Find the text you highlighted on the Kindle. It should be at the bottom of the file. You can copy the text and paste it into a program like Microsoft Word to save it. Or you can copy and paste the text into an e-mail message.

Up to now we’ve been talking about text – now let’s talk about graphics. If you haven’t noticed, your Kindle 2 offers the ability to enlarge graphics so you can actually see them! To do this simply move your cursor over the graphic and it will change to a magnifying glass. Press the navigator button and your Kindle will zoom-in on the image so that it fills the Kindle’s screen. This is very handy when you are reading books with technical graphics or screen shots. The Kindle 2′s screen is enough better quality that these graphics are worthwhile reviewing as you read through your books. To return to the original page view, press the button or the button.

Congratulations! Now you can use your Kindle 2 to check your Gmail, Twitter, take screen shots to save or share, save or share passages from Kindle e-books, and make graphics in your e-books more relevant by using the Kindle’s “zoom” feature.

Popularity: 11% [?]

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Ten Most Popular Firefox Plugins of Web Designers | Web Design Ledger

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I’ve written about this before and I, myself, use many of the plugins mentioned.

Firefox is the browser of choice for most web designers. Not only does it display websites the way they should be displayed, but it also gives users the ability.

Follow this link:
Ten Most Popular Firefox Plugins of Web Designers | Web Design Ledger

Popularity: 9% [?]

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Fences

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Today I’m going to tell you about a really cool download that will help you organize and keep your desktop clean and tidy. The program is called Fences and you can get it here. These are the same people who make ObjectDock which is clearly an idea they got from Apple.

Fences

With Fences you can add files and folders to the application on your desktop by simply dragging and dropping the items into the “Fence”. You can make as many Fences as you wish, the default is two, and name them whatever you want. The “boxes” you create can be resized just like a window by dragging the edges and corners. Depending on the size of your Fences a scroll bar will appear and grow according, just like a window, dependent upon how you sized them on your desktop.

You can move every box to wherever you want to on your desktop. And, there is a feature where a double click on the desktop will cause your boxes to disappear. Another double click will make them reappear.

All in all, Fences is a wonderful program for the unorganized and a bonus to those who are already organized and wish to remain that way. Fences is totally customizable. You can change the color scheme or take snapshots of your layout at any time.

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Popularity: 9% [?]

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Download

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When you download a file, document, photo, music, or video you are going from a server to a client. This process is the complete opposite of an upload where you are going from a client to a server. Think of it this way: A download is a receive and an upload is a send.

Many people utilize downloads on a regular basis and there is an expanding barter in supplying hubs where people can get at a wide variety of downloads. Many downloads come in a compressed/zipped format so that the download process is quicker. Users need to decompress/unzip the file or files upon completion so that they can use it.

Someone who wants to partake in making something available for download will need to have access to a server. If the file or files are significant, it may be helpful to compress them for faster transmit times. Once the file or files are ready for download they can be uploaded to the server and users can send the URL address of the file to anyone they want to access it. For private materials users can password protect the directory allowing only approved users access to the file or files.

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Popularity: 11% [?]

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SEO Tips – Search Engine Optimization Tools For Better Rankings …

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If you use SEO to drive traffic to your website, your life will be much more easier if you will use some SEO tools. This article comes with tips to a few very important SEO tools that may help you to optimize your website more …

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SEO Tips – Search Engine Optimization Tools For Better Rankings …

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Upload

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When you upload a file, document, photo, or music you are going from a client to a server. This process is the complete opposite of a download where you are going from a server to a client. Think of it this way: A upload is a send and a download is a receive.

The prerequisite for a upload is that you have the file on your computer. You use a FTP program such as FileZilla to do your uploading. Once completed your files are readily available for your use. This is the way I upload to my forum web site and to this site when need be. It is really quite easy once you get used to it by sheer repetition.

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Popularity: 9% [?]

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