Tag: Tech

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Web Development News

So…you forgot that this blog used to focus more on web development and the Internet, didn’t you? No? Well I seem to have, so here’s a re-qualifying post to try and get things back on track.

Since I added SeoMoz.org to my regularly-checked RSS feeds, I’ve enjoyed many of the informative posts they have made. Recently, they featured two articles which hit home with me.

How to convince a client their site doesn’t need music was a good one. Web sites that force music upon you really grate on my nerves. Luckily, I have never had to make such a site on purpose or on accident, though I have had people ask. The explanation that usually wins the conversation for me is the one about visitors to a site already having music playing in their speakers. Just hit Myspace on any given day, and discover how annoying it is to have people’s favorite songs start blaring at you when you load their profile.

Along the same lines of client coercion relationships, they posted How to Convince a Client They Don’t Need a Splash Page. Splash pages were cool in 2000, but have since given way to usability and search engine approachability. At least in the parts of the Web where common sense rules, anyway.

My favorite quote from the article:

When we have clients who are thinking about Flash splash pages, we tell them to go to their local supermarket and bring a mime with them. Have the mime stand in front of the supermarket, and, as each customer tries to enter, do a little show that lasts two minutes, welcoming them to the supermarket and trying to explain the bread is on aisle six and milk is on sale today.

In other news, Sitepoint just released a PDF report titled The State of Web Development. The interesting part was that AJAX is quickly gaining popularity (as if I had to tell you that), and looks to overtake Flash within the next couple of years. Wow. From one inaccessible technology to another! This is progress!

At least AJAX isn’t so proprietary.

Lastly, Google announced Google Code Search today, which looks like it could be pretty useful. I haven’t played around with it enough to find out what it can really do, but they say it can find any crawlable code. I doubt this means server-side technology such as PHP, but you could at least use it to find people who have ripped off your WordPress layout.

Oh, speaking of WordPress, ThemePress just launched, which allows you to upload a layout, and converts it to work with WordPress. It costs $10, which sounds pretty reasonable if it works well. I plan on trying it out for TheBestOfYoutube.com soon, so I’ll let you know what I discover.

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Fun With Google

Google never ceases to amaze me. I am now a GCal addict, having organized my life for the next 55 years, WITH text messages being sent to my phone to remind me of upcoming events. I have been smitten with Google Adsense, I am a big fan of GMail, and I cannot get enough of Google Earth.

So maybe Google really is trying to take over the universe, but doggone it, I am OK with that as long as they keep the steady supply of geek toys flowing. And if they offer me a job some day.

While revelling in my little Google stupor, I discovered a cool, free PDF called 55 Ways to Have Fun With Google, which to my amazement, introduced me to 55 entirely new reasons why Google rules. If you care anything about the next hour of your life, you will read this PDF.

The book is offered by 55fun.com and can be purchased in print from their site.

And for those of you who still can’t find something on Google, come tell me about it.

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The Death Star

“It would take 10^21 United States-worth of generators–as in a billion trillion Americas–to generate the same amount of energy that the Death Star superlaser released in one second.”

That’s insane. Some guy decided to figure out how much energy it would take to blow up a planet in a similar fashion to how the Death Star blew up Alderan in Star Wars Episode IV. As it turns out, it would be much easier to liquify an entire planet than to disinegrate it. Read the whole article

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Powers of 10

I remember seeing this movie first in a middle school science class. I saw it again in my Math for Liberal Arts course when attending Warren Wilson College. I’m glad to see it has surfaced on the internet, and is free to view.

The film is a 10 minute journey that boggles the mind. I’d love for someone to make an updated version that reflects discoveries made since the original was made. Still, this is totally worth your next 10 minutes of life.

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I want a ____ to ____

Need some free software to get something done? Check out I want a freeware utility to… where the list of over 400 applications keeps growing. Many of these I use often.

Now you can double your pleasure with “I want a Firefox extension to…”. A great way to learn why the world’s best web browser keeps getting better.

With many of the applications and extensions on those two sites you can then carry your life on a thumb drive or ipod, which is always cool.

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My Favorite Web Apps

These are some applications (free and not free) that I have been using a lot, and that I would now consider myself unable to live without. All of them are web-based in that they are accessible from the internet and can be logged into from anywhere. This makes working from home, from the office, and from the coffee shop a breeze.

Backpack – http://backpackit.com/
This application is excellent for anyone doing any sort of project management, freelancing, or collaboration. I was skeptical at first when I signed up for the free trial, but then I realized the power after using it for a few weeks. I was hooked when they lowered the price of the mid-level package.

Backpack allows you to set up projects (Pages, as they call them) for each of your projects. Each of these Pages has to-do lists, Notes, file uploads, the ability to share this content with someone, Writeboards, and more.

One of my favorite features is the Reminder feature, which will send you an email and/or a text message on your phone when an event is about to occure. Also, there is the ability to send an email to Backpack and have it be added to a Page automatically. Pretty darn cool.

TimeTracker v2.0 – http://www.formassembly.com/time-tracker/
After trying numerous time-tracking apps that run off my PC, I landed at the TimeTracker web site. I can now set up projects and keep track of how much time I have spent on each. Slices of time can have notes appended to them so I can keep track of what I did during any given time. This makes billing clients for work I have done a breeze. Oh, and it’s free!

ForPerfect CInvoicer – http://www.forperfect.com/seo/cinvoice.php
This is an online billing/invoice system that you have to download and install on a web site yourself, but it does everything I need it to do, albeit a little confusing. I wanted a tool to keep track of client invoices, send out reminders, send out recurring bills automatically, integrate with Paypal and 2checkout, and be reasonably easy to use for clients. This does it all. Configuring it to look and act like I wanted took a little time, but once it was done everything is running smoothly.

It costs $39.95 and requires a little MySQL knowledge to install it. There is a live demo on their web site (linked above).

HipCal – http://www.hipcal.com/
I have talked about HipCal before, and I still love it. It is more feature-rich than any of the other online calendars I have toyed with. For a while I thought 30Boxes was going to trump HipCal, but when their developers showed a lack of interest (if not a defiant stance) in enhancing the repeatability of events, I gave up on them. They are shooting themselves in the foot if you ask me, but I digress…

HipCal rocks, and after their first couple of rocky months (bugs, server issues), things seem to have stabilized and I am enjoying the free calendar a lot. It will send me reminders of events, and has a simple to-do list on the side.

Netvibes – http://www.netvibes.com/
Netvibes keeps getting cooler and cooler. It’s a ‘start page’ of sorts that allows you to customize the layout and content to your liking. You can add your favorite RSS feeds, widgets, email interfaces, and more. They just launched a major upgrade that has a ton of great features. I have tried other similar start pages, but they all suck and are clunky compared to Netvibes.

Summary
That about wraps it up.

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Internet Explorer

Still using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser on your Windows machine? Stop already!

With the most recent critical, unpatched security exploits running wild, reports are coming in regarding otherwise innocent web sites silently installing malicious programs that steal your passwords and other sensitive information.

Do yourself a favor and install Firefox or Opera, both free browsers that provide a much better, safer Internet experience. There is no reason not to do this now, unless you like other people having access to your computer and everything you do on it.

If you are still using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer on your Macintosh computer, well, you are missing out on the Internet as it is today. This browser is not subject to the same exploits that the Windows version is, but it is no longer updated or supported by Microsoft, and doesn’t take advantage of many of the newer features of the World Wide Web as we know it. You too can upgrade to Firefox for free.

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More Pics, Other News

I just added the pictures from February to the Ye Olde Photo Gallery. I still have one hour and 12 minutes left before March starts. How you like them timely apples?

I figured I better go ahead and get them up there as I am about to get slammed with a bunch of side projects. That is a good thing though. They all seem to come at once, and really haven’t let up much since October or so.

At my day job I finally got Apache 2 talking to Tomcat via the mod_jk connector. It has been a problem that has had me befuddled for the last couple of weeks. Turned out to be not anywhere near as simplistic as it was in the Apache class I attended a few weeks ago. I found it odd that not until I was a week into this did I learn that mod_jk2 is depricated, and that mod_jk is what I should have been dealing with all along. Seems like they would have mentioned that in the class. The silver lining in the cloud is that I am now much more familiar and confident with both Apache and Tomcat now.

TTFN

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