When someone decides to start a blog or to simply create a family website it is very common for the person who is in charge of running the site to do some research about companies which provide a computer capable of serving web pages to visitors, most people don’t need to use a lot of bandwidth or applications in order to do what they want to do so they end up signing up for a virtual or shared hosting deal.

Virtual hosting has become very popular because of its price, some may even start at $1.99 per month however, in this case you do get what you pay for, don’t misunderstand this last phrase, price is no indication of the quality of a web host but considering the price it would be helpful for you not to have high expectations. Normal virtual hosting prices range from seven dollars all the way to $19 a month, this depends on the features that you will be using and the extras that you decide to sign up for, for most people the starter package will be just fine.

After you have started using a virtual server you will gain some information and knowledge about hosting a general, a virtual hosting account is basically an account which has been created on a web server which also hosts many other sites just like yours, this might not sound like something negative however, it can turn out to be just that. When you share a computer with several other websites you are basically sharing the same system resources so if the machine only has 1 GB of RAM if you install a script which uses 500 MB of RAM the other 50 sites which might be sharing the same environment will be affected because your site is already consuming half of the system resources.

Virtual accounts are normally advertise using phrases such as “unlimited bandwidth, high storage capacity, unlimited databases, etc.’ however, all of these unlimited features are regulated by the amount of system resources your website will use, if the scripts that you are running start to affect the performance of the other sites which are hosted at the same environment your account may get deactivated or your site might go down taking the entire server with it. In a nutshell, this is the most common limitation that virtual hosting accounts have.

Today I went looking for a free WYSIWYG HTML editor that was good enough that my students could use it instead of purchasing FrontPage or DreamWeaver. I found KompoZer. It was everything I was looking for and more.From what I understand, KompoZer is an update to Nvu. Both are open source programs, but Nvu is no longer being updated.

I was looking for a program that could switch between HTML and WYSIWYG modes while editing. I have tried to use the HTML mode in OpenOffice, but have found it to be more of a “convert your Word document to a web page” instead of a program that can be used to create a series of pages for a more complex project. KompoZer can handle a complex project complete with cascading style sheets.

I only played around with the program long enough to show it to my class. In less than half an hour I was able to figure out most of the features of the program. I was able to format text, drag and drop images into my pages and complete advanced table manipulates.

I have used DreamWeaver for more than seven years and don’t plan on switching to something new, but it is good to know that a robust program like KompoZer is available for free.

This is the age of micro-sizing all our gadgets. I remember my cell phone which weighed 350 pounds and looked like dirty tramp. These days we see improvements in the cell phone industry with cell phones going smaller and looking more and more attractive.

To reduce the size of the cell phone, flip phones were introduced. Soon it grew old. Sliders were the next kind of phones wanting to be small but could be constrained only when not operated.

NEC has introduced the next generation cell phones which have the dimensions of a credit card and the keypad has been eliminated by making use of the touch screen technology.

Slashphone reports - NEC N908 is one of the features rich slim phone this year, it is indeed a small gadget, but it comes with all the multimedia function you need. First the phone can play music and video files, it can read MP3 / AAC / AAC+ / 3GP / MPEG4 format. Not enough with the internal memory? Just grab a microSD card to store more files on the go. A 1.3 megapixel camera is at the back, you even get a dual stereo speaker at the 2 side of the camera. Quick access button for camera, volume control, power on/off, and keylock control is put at the side of the phone.

This phone will be available in Asia only and there is no word on pricing yet.

Text messaging, instant messaging, and VoIP are all pretty hot ways to communicate these days. So a few weeks back, Technopedia’s editor, Abhinav, asked me to review the Gaim and Trillian IM (Instant Messaging) clients. Both are pretty cool, are skinnable, and support a number of other clients including MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, and several others. So it’s easy to consolidate all of your IM accounts.

But I figure why use any of them when there are VoIP clients that can handle text, audio and sometimes video. One cool example is Sightspeed, a competitor to Skype and Gizmo Project. All three are both IM clients and VoIP clients. Thus, if you have a microphone and headset, you can make free VoIP audio calls to anyone running the same software.

In fact, Gizmo Project allows you to also contact people on specific other VoIP soft client networks. Unfortunately, Skype isn’t one of them, as they do not have an open interface.

On the other hand, if you want free video VoIP calling, free video email, and video conference calls with up to three other people, Sightspeed is the way to go. (Skype now has video enabled, but it requires a plugin, and their website does not make much effort to promote the video features.)

I’ve got ALL of the above-mentioned IM and VoIP clients on my laptop, and my fave at the moment has to be Sightspeed. While the free version does not let you do video conferencing, the paid plan is only US$4.95/m or $44.95/yr, which also gives you unlimited 60 second video mail stored for an unlimited time. The free plan gives you unlimited 30 second video mail store for 30 days.

Besides regular VoIP audio chats, you can do VoIP video calling, send video mail to one or more people - even if they are not Sightspeed members - or publish videos to a weblog. The latter two options are done by recording a new video message with your webcam and uploading it (free) to Sightspeed servers. If you are sending video mail, your recipient(s) will get an email with the appropriate URL link. If you want to publish the video for a weblog, Sightspeed will generate a URL link, which you can include in your blog.

Now if that’s not enough for you, anyone who is not a Sightspeed member can still have a video/ audio VoIP chat with you. Both the free and paid plans give you a free web page, where a plugin (IE 6+ only) lets them have a video chat with you.

I tried a cheapo USB “snake” webcam (< $100) on both Skype and Sightspeed and only Sightspeed picked up the signal. Neither seems to be able to receive video from my Palm Treo 650 - though I may have something on it configured incorrectly. (Skype provides a shortlist of Skype-certified webcams on their website.)

The interesting thing is that my laptop RAM is only 512 Mb and the webcam doesn’t function too well on it in other video capture applications (such as Snagit screen capture software). But the camera actually functions well enough in Sightspeed, even with my RAM usage maxed out. Still, I’d recommend either a gigabyte of RAM or dual processors, or both. (I have both on my desktop, and the videocam functions much better over there, but I kept that computer offline, so I haven’t tested it with Sightspeed.)

To put Sightspeed to the test, I called up their friendly Support Guy in audio mode first. I jokingly said that I looked really scruffy, not having shaved in days, and I wanted to see but didn’t want him to see me. He laughed and told me how to change my camera settings. I then called him back in video mode and it worked like a charm. However, I haven’t tested it in the other direction, where I’d be able to see the caller and they couldn’t see me.

I also recorded and uploaded a video mail and emailed it to myself. Very simple process. The email just contains a link, not the actual video. That’s true for blog use as well. I haven’t figured out if I can embed the video on blog, to make it viewable from there instead of having to go to the Sightspeed website.

I’m going to love this software, and you just might too. Now if I can only get my relatives across the world an Internet connection, I can see and hear them at the same time. The drawback is that Sightspeed does not currently allow you to communicate with other audio or video IM clients, so you may have to install several software packages like I have.

Sightspeed is available for Win 2000/ XP and for Mac OSX 10.3.9 and up.

If you are an IT guy who knows all about PCs, this article is not for you. This is for those people who find it hard to choose one computer over another while they are computer shopping. I will be focusing mainly on the configuration and I will keep the brands for a later article. Also, this is for PCs ONLY. I am not a Mac guy. Read my profile if you have any questions regarding my credentials.

This article will address both desktops and notebooks but the examples that are dealt in the article are mainly desktops. I am just going to scan the software surface and when I say software, I mean windows and not any other OS.

Whether you go to a store like best buy or an online store like Dell, you are bound to bump into something that looks like this :

SPECIFICATIONS

Operating System: Microsoft? Windows? XP Media Center Edition 2005 (Update Rollup 2) w/ XP Media Center Backup
Application Software: Microsoft? Office Small Business Edition 2003 (Basic + PowerPoint & Publisher) w/ Microsoft? Home Collection
Processor: Intel? Pentium? Extreme Edition 955 with Hyperthreading Technology (3.46GHz, 1066MHz FSB 2×2M cache)
Chipset: Intel? 975X Chipset with DDR2 Support
Memory: 2048MB PC5300 Dual-Channel DDR2 667MHz SDRAM (2-1024MB modules)
Hard Drive: 500GB Serial ATA II/300 7200RPM w/Raid 0 (2-250GB Hard Drives - Striping)
Floppy Drive: 9-in-1 media card reader
Optical Drive: 16x Double-Layer Multi-Format DVD Writer (DVD?/R?RW/CD-R/RW) and 16x/48x DVD-ROM drive
Extended Service Plan Including Limited Warranty: Desktop Value Plus Service Plan — 3 year parts/labor/on-site/3 year toll technical support
Case: 7-Bay Tower Case
Controller: Integrated Serial ATA Controller
Expansion Slots: (2) PCI Expansion Slots (Filled), (1) PCI-E x1 Expansion Slot (available). (1) PCI-E x16 Expansion Slot (available)
External Ports: (6) USB 2.0 (2 in front and 4 in back), (3) IEEE 1394 Firewire (2 in front and 1 in back), (1) Serial, (2) PS/2, (1) RJ-45 Integrated LAN, (1) VGA, (1) Microphone, front audio ports
Certification: Energy Star Compliant
Monitors: FPD2185W 21? Black Widescreen High-Definition LCD Analog/Digital Performance Flat Panel Display with 4 Powered USB Ports (Includes height-adjustable stand)
Video: NVIDIA? GeForce 6600 with 128MB, DVI, VGA & TV-Out
Keyboard and Mouse: Elite Multimedia Keyboard and Soft-touch USB Optical Wheel Mouse (no mouse pad included)
Speakers: 2-piece speaker solution
Internet Service Provider: Six months America Online? Internet access
Part Number: 1008697
Additional Software: Adobe? Acrobat Reader? 7.0 and Google Toolbar
Network: Integrated Intel? 10/100/1000 (Gigabit) Ethernet
Security Software: McAfee? Internet Security Suite with VirusScan, Personal Firewall Plus, SpamKiller & Privacy Service, 36-months
Desktop Technology: Intel? Viiv? Technology
PCI Multimedia Card 1: Sound Blaster Audigy 4 Sound Card
Standard Software: Napster Trial Subscription

ADDITIONAL TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Processor:
Intel? Pentium? Extreme Edition 955 with Hyperthreading Technology (3.46GHz, 1066MHz FSB 2×2M cache)
Chipset :
Intel? 975X Chipset with DDR2 Support
ICH7DH w/ RAID 0,1,5 Support
XD (eXecute Disable) bit
EM64T (64-bit support) support
EIST (Intel? Speed Step) support
HT (HyperThreading) support
VT (Virtualization) support (Requires additional software support)
Dual Core support
400 watt, dual voltage power supply
16.5?(H) x 8.0?(W) x 17.5?(D)
38 lbs (without packaging) Varies with options
I/O Ports:
1 9-pin serial connector
1 15-hole VGA connector
1 RJ45 network connector
2 PS/2 (keyboard and mouse) 6-pin mini-DIN connectors
6 version 2.0 USB ports (4-front/2-rear)
3 6-pin IEEE 1394 ports (2 front/1 rear)
Audio-Five 1/8? mini-jacks for 7.1 surround sound
- Front left/right (green)
- Rear left/right (black)
- Surround left/right (blue)
- Center/sub (orange)
- Microphone (red)
S/PDIF (Sony/Philips Digital Interface)
Two front-panel 1/8? audio mini-jacks Audio
- Headphone (green)
- Microphone (red)

Thats a long confusing list which could drive most people insane. From that big list, 70% of the items are not extremely critical for computing needs. The items that matter the most are 1. processor 2. hard disk 3. RAM and 4. motherboard. Along with this there are many other smaller features that makes a perfect computer to possess. I will be briefly scanning them as well.

Processor

There are two major players in the market. Intel and AMD. Intel is widely known and highly popular while AMD’s base is growing constantly. I am not gonna delve into details of the processor technology, all I going to share is that Intel used the CISC technology and AMD used/uses RISC. But now, Intel is using RISC to do the CISC. So, in a way Intel has discarded their initial technology to follow the technology that AMD implemented. No more engineering stuff, sorry.

When you look for a processor, there are two major components that are crucial. The clock speed and the cache memory(L1 and L2). Try to choose a processor that has a higher clock speed. Higher the clock, faster the computer. Secondly the cache, its just like clock speed in speed and importance. Higher the cache, faster the computer. There is another feature that is becoming popular, the number of bits. A 64 bit computer can do the job faster than a 32 bit computer. A good analogy would be if you are building a house, 64 people would build it faster compared to 32 people. There is more data transfer between the computer and processor with a higher bit processor.

In the above example, - “Processor: Intel? Pentium? Extreme Edition 955 with Hyperthreading Technology (3.46GHz, 1066MHz FSB 2?2M cache)”. Its an intel processor, which is good. Hyper threading technology is a good one to have. 3.46GHz is fast, I will talk about the Frontside bus under the motherboard section. It has 2 caches that are 2MB each which is extremely fast. Just know that the caches will act as an intermediate memory. Let me give you another example. If you buy a computer with 6GHz and 1MB cache, it is the same as buying a 3GHz processor with 2MB cache. Intel Centrino has lower clock speed but a higher cache memory which makes up for the slower clock speed.

Comparing Intel and AMD, the performance is almost the same. For a regular consumer, it works the same way. But, AMD gets the bait as it is cheaper than Intel. How many intel ads have you seen in the past month? How many AMD ads? All the ad costs are piled upon their products and hence Intel is so much more expensive compared to AMD. There are reports that AMD is closing in on Intel.

Hard Disk

My first computer had 256MB hard disk and I was so excited when I got a 1.2GB hard disk. These days, we have broken all barriers and we are dealing with hundreds of GBs. It is a common knowledge that the higher the hard drive space, the better it is. I agree 100% on that. There is not much you could with the brand of the hard drive you could buy if you buying it in a store like best buy. But, if you happen to have a choice of choosing the hard disk, I would recommend Western Digital, Seagate and Maxtor. In my experience, I have found these three extremely trustworthy. It is important that we have a good hard drive as the data that we store is priceless. Hard disk is one thing that we shouldn’t compromise on if we had a choice. Even if a hard disk costs you $20 more, think all the data you would be storing in the future.

This is from my personal experience. Dell used other branded hard drives and we used to have so many cases of broken hard drives and people losing sleep over the lost data. Losing data is not a pretty picture. All these said, I am not saying that the hard drives that I recommended wouldn’t crash. The probability of these hard drives crashing is much smaller than the others.

I almost forgot to mention about the speed of the hard drive. It is good to have a faster hard drive. But, for daily operations, most of the process is stored in the RAM and processor cache; there is a bleak chance that you might be able to observe a slower hard drive with a faster one, unless you are a person who transfers a lot of data back and forth.

RAM

We have gone through many different kinds of RAMs in the past few years. If I go into the technologies, I could write another long article on it within no time. But I will just say that as in hard drive and processor, higher the RAM memory, faster the computer.

There are two variables in a RAM. The RAM size and the channel bandwidth. You would want to have both these on the higher end. Both are critical for the overall speed of your computer. The RAM size affects the amount of data that could be stored on a computer while the channel bandwidth is responsible for the rate of flow of data stored in the RAM and to the RAM.

There is not much to choose from in RAM brands. All the RAMs are equally good and bad. I wouldn’t press on a single brand for a RAM. I would just go for a cheaper one.

Motherboard

Apart from the processor, this is the most important part of a computer. This defines all the features that a computer might possess. There are awfully lot of things that a motherboard can integrate but I am going to scan the important ones.

First of all, a motherboard should have a higher FSB. It is the bandwidth with which the data can flow through. Higher the FSB, faster the computer.

A motherboard typically has USB ports, firewire, integrated video card, integrated sound card, integrated modem, and other different ports. It is good for a computer to have as many USB ports. Most accessories are USB driven. But this is not critical as you can always bank on purchasing a USB hub which could do the trick. A firewire port is not as widely used but its existance on your computer is important. A good video card enhances your windows GUI. Look for a video card that has a higher non shared memory. Usually, video cards that are integrated on the motherboard share the RAM memory. Also, make sure that your motherboard has an AGP slot which could give you the choice of adding your own video card instead of the one on the motherboard. A good soundcard would be a plus. I have no clue how many people still use a phone modem. I don’t. It isn’t something I would look for in a computer. But it doesn’t if there is one already sitting on my computer. PCI slots are important as well. Most motherboards have at least 3 PCI slots which should be good.

Windows is the most common OS you can get in a store. It comes in two different versions, home and professional. For any home user, home would be more than handy. Professional is for people who would like to use their computer for remote desktop and other networking features. If somebody tries to sell you a media center PC, say no. Not worth it. Many bugs. I am awaiting Vista which could change the things around in the computerdom.

I have tried to share some of the things that I felt are critical in choosing a computer. If you have any questions regarding choosing a computer, feel free to comment and I will get back to you…

Each day I receive e-mail through all my various sites from other site owners offering to exchange links. Most approach me in the wrong manner and I can tell they have no idea about the proper way to run an effective linking program. See, in a true linking program, it isn’t just about you - it should be about both sites involved in the process.

So many of these notices are not from complimentary sites in topic or design–some are actually direct competitors making me wonder why they would think I would link to them. Why would they want to link to me considering my site is of so much better quality and has much more valuable information? Because they are hiding their link pages from site visitors; so their site visitors never actually find out about my site. Right there is a big red flag! If you cannot make your link directory easily visible and available to your site visitors, you don’t have the proper modus operandi.

Many of these sites have absolutely nothing even remotely similar to the site of mine that they have e-mailed. So there is no synergy. If they state they have already linked to my site, which is what you want to do when building a valuable link directory–not a link farm–the majority of these requests are immediately responded to asking their link to my site be removed. I know I do not want to have one of my sites “in bed” with another site that can have a detrimental effect on either my rankings or the juried resources I offer my visitors.

Here are some basic tips you need to keep in mind and integrate in your linking efforts based in the reality of having an effective and ethical approach. If you cannot take the time to put these issues in play, don’t waste your or the other site owner’s time.

Stay Away From and Do Not Create Link Farms: “Link Farm” is a term used to describe groups of links that have nothing in common other than the sites involved have all agreed to link to each other for the sole purpose of improving their organic search engine listings. Quality of content, design or site focus is not a consideration that is a requirement to participate. When you create a link directory on your site, you want to have set of guidelines that will be required for sites to be added to your link directory. Only quality links, relational or complimentary to your site’s focus that you know will benefit your site visitors should be considered. Just as you want to see those requesting links from you have done the same.

Links Need to Make Sense for Both Sites: On my Lake County, Illinois site, LakeOnline.com, I only exchange links with non-commercial community groups and organizations located within Lake County, Illinois. This makes sense as that is the focus of my site and it benefits the groups within that category to have a link from such a popular site that has proven longevity. It is a win-win for both sides. My site visitors then have links available to them of other Lake County, Illinois resources and the sites that link to LakeOnline.com are linking to a quality Lake County, Illinois resource.

If the site linking to you has no direct relationship to yours in topic or is a poor quality site–don’t exchange links. Just having links for the sake of doing so doesn’t benefit either site–or your site visitors. So don’t consider mass e-mailing for links without taking the time of thoroughly reviewing the value of each site you send a request to. Think in terms of the fact that the links off your site need to compliment and add to the overall value for your site visitors.

Consider Google’s PageRank: PageRank is not the end-all-be-all! Please don’t live or die by PageRank. (From what I’ve read as of late Google is way behind in updating their PageRank anyway.) However, when it comes to linking, it can be a useful tool you can use to guide you. Before you begin requesting links, you want to ensure that you at least have a PageRank for your top page for a start. Not having a PageRank is an indication of a newer Web site or a site that is not considered to have quality valuable content–that is when PageRank is working properly. Just like everything online, Google’s PageRank glitches on occasion too. That is why I stress you use it as a guide not your bible.

PageRank is accomplished by having a valuable resource site that others feel is worthy of linking to. One way links to your site are more valuable for ranking than reciprocal links are any day. If you are all sales pitch with very little content, PageRank is difficult to attain. Always check a site’s PageRank to determine if it has been determined to have any value. Without a PageRank, linking for the sake of linking is moot. Sites with higher PageRank are given more relevancy, as are the sites they in turn link to.

Organize and Categorize Your Directory of Links: Some crawlers have been known to ignore pages with more than 50 or so links. This is because tons of unorganized links on a page indicate “link farm” and do not indicate any sort of value or relational substance to the site in question. Categorize your links and create a new page when necessary for new topics. When a specific topic starts approaching 50, create a subcategory or an additional page. The goal here is to make your link area easy to use and navigate. In my opinion, even 50 links is too much to scroll through. I tend to stick around 25–at most.

You want to do everything you can to avoid the perception of linking purely to manipulate your rankings. When I receive requests from sites with over 50 links and their link directory is not categorized, I generally do not respond. I know they are creating a link farm which will offer no benefit to me and may have even have a detrimental effect on my natural listings.

Have a Plan Before You Request Links: After you have reviewed the sites you would like to exchange links with, (Never spam for link exchanges!) here are some tips to keep in mind before you e-mail them with your request.

1. Create a brief but concise e-mail that includes specific instructions on how they can link back to you. You want to make sure that your requested return link text, if at all possible, includes a couple of your main keywords in the link. Also be sure to not provide the same link text for every request. You want to have a diversity of keyword rich link text pointing to your site to benefit your rankings.

2. Be sure to mention why your site and the one you are contacting are complimentary and why a reciprocal link will benefit both sides. If you cannot make this analogy, you probably should not be requesting a link in the first place.

3. Have the other site’s link already in place on your site before you e-mail your request and let them know exactly where that is. Be sure if you said their link is in place that it is or you loose credibility and look as though you are not sincere in your offer.

4. Include a comment of exactly where on their site or in what category of their link directory that you would like to see your link. This lets the other side know that you’ve reviewed their site and see the reciprocal value and are not just spamming for links.

Your Link Directory is Easy to Find: Hiding your link directory deep within your site or not obviously linking to your link directory is a sure sign that you are gathering links for all the wrong reasons. Search engines have a way of determining link relevancy based on topic, popularity and as well as other evolving factors. If you are hiding your link directory this is a big clue that is probably has no value to your site visitors or why would you be hiding it? If you cannot have obvious navigation to your link directory, you know that you are not offering value and need to rethink your strategy.

One of the other benefits of exchanging links is the hope that those who visit the other site, will find yours by following the link to your site. If their link directory is hidden, folks cannot find you which prevents you from garnering this potential additional traffic. If you receive a request to exchange links and see that the other site has their link directory buried where their site visitors will have difficulty finding it, I would decline the request as they are not offering me anything. Work only with site owners who understand what linking is all about and have a link directory that is well organized and easily found on their site.

Spammy Link Requests: You’ve probably received those yourself. Some marketer asking if you are interested in exchanging links with a site they are unwilling to identify until you show interest. What is that!? If exchanging links makes sense there should be no reason to hide the identity of any site. This is an indication the site most likely has no page rank, is not related to yours, or is creating a link farm. Use these e-mail as an example of what you don’t want to do. Hit the Delete button.

Link exchanges serve two purposes. The first being they add value to both sites and offer visibility to an entire new set of site visitors who may not have known the other site even exists to search for it. The secondary reason is that search engines have a ranking algorithm that is built upon evaluating incoming and out going links to your site.

If you do not want to deal with the link exchange process all you have to do is have a high quality, content rich site and the links will happen without you having to make a single request. Create a site worth linking to and the links will come.

The online marketing arena is murky with quick tips and strategies to optimize your site for the best free search engine rankings. Without participating in “sponsor” advertising or PPC (Pay Per Click) programs, it is a fact that search engine optimization can enhance your “natural” or “organic” listings. But within reason and only when done within the rules.

Unfortunately, there are a plethora of unethical search engine marketers that do not hesitate to take your money by making impossible promises based on little to no actual experience in doing so even for their own sites. If you’ve read my previous article The Ten Commandments of Search Engines, you’ll then have a good grasp of what is involved.

When approached either by spam or on the phone with the following pitches, know them to be untrue or misleading at best! Companies that offer you these “solutions” do not really know what they are doing. Well, that is a subjective statement, they either think they know what they are doing, or know for a fact they are bending the rules in an effort to bypass standard practices. One thing is clear, they are banking on your lack of knowledge to get into your pocket book!

1. Change/Update your Meta Keyword Tags: If only it were that easy! I have seen those who have been conned into paying high fees to have some designer update their Meta Keyword tags because this will produce better listings. List whatever you want within that tag and you’ll get found when searched for. Baloney! The fact is the majority of search engines completely ignore or put little to no value on the Meta Keyword tag.

2. Creating Doorway Pages or Mini Sites: Yikes! This is considered spamming the search engines and will get your site dropped and banned completely. Any page that is not a linked to part of your site and is created with duplicate content for the sole purpose of manipulating search engine listings is a disaster waiting to happen. The same site or info on a different domain name to garner duplicate listings is simply spamming the search engines. They all have rules against this and don’t take kindly to folks who use these tactics. Anyone offering you this solution is surely not playing by the rules or worthy of your hard earned dollars.

3. Guaranteeing Positions: Experienced and ethical marketers can and should certainly show you how they approach the process and what results have been achieved in the past. However, if they are true pros running an legitimate shop, they will never promise or guarantee future results - either is position or for length of time. Those who make these promises are mostly likely not playing by the rules and spamming the search engines with a multitude of doorway pages or redirected cloak pages - both of which are big no-nos!

None of us have any idea what search engine algorithms will be tomorrow let alone a week or a month from now. Guaranteed positions can only be promised by participating in Pay Per Click programs and purchasing your positions. In particular for new sites, plan on 7-8 months before you see the fruit of your labor for organic listings on Google.

4. Instant Link Popularity & Results: Anyone who has been online even for a short amount of time has found out that the word instant does not apply to most things online. If the word “instant” is used in particular when it comes to a link program you know the company making the offer is using under the table trickery to temporarily boost your listings. They do this by using expired domains or adding you to link farms on their servers that link all their clients together. The downside is eventually this catches up with your site and has the opposite effect on

Link programs are only successful when done properly. A key factor in any successful link directory creation is that all the sites have something in common in topic or site focus that benefits the site visitors to each site. This takes time and consistency to build (just like anything that produces results online). When it comes to links, a site owner’s search engine ranking desires need to take a back seat to offering site visitors quality resources.

5. Your Site Is Just Fine the Way It Is: I’ve seen this train of thought from both site owners whose ego is invested because they created their own site (or don’t want to pay to have it done right) and from unethical marketers willing to take advantage of that train of thought to make some bucks. Don’t believe that pitch for a moment!

I have yet to run into a site when contacted for advice that I cannot optimize for better organic listings. Heck, I can probably find issues with some of my own sites where I could optimize further if I so desired. If optimization was not considered during the development stage and the copy writing stage of your site - you having catching up to do.

This includes having complimentary navigation that is not only consistent throughout your site for your site visitors, but ensuring your navigation is “crawler friendly” so you have the best chance for your entire site to get listings. This requires planning way in advance of any bit of code or copy being created.

For those who have read other articles of mine, you’ll find the same reoccurring theme. There are no quick fixes or short cuts. Your site is a business and it has to be given the same amount of dedication and planning that any off-line business venture would require. And, online is nothing if it isn’t about marketing! You have to spend your time and invest your budget in the appropriate areas to make things happen - or they won’t and you end up throwing good money after bad all in an effort to save time or money.

This means following the rules and implementing proven strategies that are the core of all successful Web sites. Because there are far too many companies out there that willing take advantage of the hungry uniformed site owners with the desire for “quick, cheap and easy” - you are now armed with the facts. One of the most popular acronyms used online in the early days, applies here: TANSTAAFL: There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch!

Avoid working with anyone who portrays the above as your path to better listings. Let them know you know better and then spend your time and money to work on growing a site that is the best it can be about your products or services. Have a plan and do things the right way and the traffic will come.

Whatever i type here, i assume that you have changed to that directory (if necessary) using “cd {path}” (w/o dowble quotes and brackets) command and u should always be logged in as root using “su -” (w/o double quotes) command.

There might be other ways to execute these files, but i have used these and found these only when i searched for the same over the net.

Also always read the README file, if provided with the package.

1) .sh (Script) files

Simply click on them to execute them, works sometimes.
or
Open Terminal
type ./scriptname.sh
or
Open Terminal
chmod -x scriptname.sh
sh ./scriptname.sh

2) .py (python) Files

Open Terminal
type python filename.py

3)Java Files

Open Terminal
type ./filename

4)tar.gz Files (Archives)

Simply extract them with an Extractor by clicking on them (as in windows)
or
Open Terminal
type tar xvzf file.tgzNote: To extract to some other folder, change over to that folder and then type
tar xvzf {path}.tgz
path of the file w/o brackets

5) Making an Install File from the package u downloaded

Extract the contents
Open Terminal
Type: ./configure
then: make
then: make install

6) .rpm Files

Right Click on them, and then selct Install with Yast
Note: Choosing Install Software never worked for me..

That should be enough!!

SANTA CLARA, Calif.–As you might expect from a vice president of product marketing, Facebook’s Chamath Palihapitiya can deliver a convincing sales pitch.

His sell: Facebook is the next-generation platform of the Internet that can turn any ambitious entrepreneur (with the right application) into an overnight success. He rattled off the stats to back up the argument.

The average development time, he said, for an entrepreneur to build a Facebook application is between two and 15 weeks, according to a self-reported survey of its developer community. The average number of employees to make those applications: between one and five people. And about 33 percent of Facebook application makers reported profits of up to $500,000 a month. Finally, at least one-quarter of the applications running on Facebook have 100,000 active daily users.

“The barrier to entry is lower than it’s ever been,” Palihapitiya said to an audience here Saturday at the TieCon conference. “When you build something social, you get immediately rewarded with distribution. You will allow your user base to be your marketers.”

Palihapitiya, a former venture capitalist at the Mayfield Fund and one-time head of AOL’s instant messaging application, knew his audience. TieCon is a two-day conference cut out for technology entrepreneurs; and it attracted as many as 4,000 attendees. But some attendees said that at times, the talk was too wonky (with terms like “social stack”) and heavy on PowerPoint. At least one attendee said that the speech was a “good sell.”

“We view ourselves as a technology company at our core. We’re the cable company creating the pipes, and what they carry is social information and engagement information about people.”

–Chamath Palihapitiya, VP of product marketing, Facebook

Luring more developers to Facebook is essential for the company’s plans to become, as Palihapitiya said, the network operator of the Internet.

“We view ourselves as a technology company at our core. We’re the cable company creating the pipes, and what they carry is social information and engagement information about people,” he said.

“That plumbing should exist around the Internet, and then what happens is that people can create truly social experiences on the Web. As long as we can build the plumbing for this, we view that as a success.”

For example, he talked about and illustrated (via PowerPoint) the so-called social stack, or the elements to create social experiences on the Web. Those include wide distribution on the Internet and being able to securely port your personal identity anywhere online. He said that Facebook is helping people manage their identity with privacy settings. And the company is opening distribution for developers so that their applications will be judged by merit.

“The rules of distribution are changing fundamentally. When you’re an entrepreneur all you need is one person to like it, one person to be an advocate of it, and then their friends find out and engage in that.”

What does Facebook gain from becoming the Internet’s cable company? Palihapitiya didn’t exactly say, but it hinges on all that social data captured about individuals and their friends. He said that developers make money, largely through advertising, without tax from Facebook. And he said Facebook will probably come up with its own products that developers can use to make money, presumably referring to an advertising platform.

Last year, the company backed up its commitment to developers when it introduced the Facebook Fund (or fbFund), which grants up to $250,000 to promising entrepreneurs without asking for equity. (Facebook worked in partnership with Accel and the Founders Fund to launch this initiative.) He said that Facebook has already funded a New York-based Indian couple that is working on a social application for people who are planning to get married and want the help of friends.

In a Nike-esque call to entrepreneurs, he added: “We want you to be empowered to do it.”

These are some unix tips that might be helpful someday down the road. Feel free to contribute more unix tips by commenting on this article.

Becoming yourself from someone else’s login
su <yourID> will retain the previous person’s environment, a good way to go from your ID to root
su - <yourID> (note the dash) will read all your dot files and land you in your home, just like a real login

Core files
I assume hardly anyone looks at core files, but they are generated more often than we like and can be HUGE! On the top of your .cshrc add: limit coredumpsize 0k Remove any other lines that specify similar stuff. If there is a really hairy software problem, I will ask you to edit this line and deliver the ressulting core file to me, but it hasn’t happened yet.

You can also create a crontab for yourself to do some regular housekeeping for you:
On SUN:
setenv EDITOR vi
crontab -e
lands you in vi with your crontab file loaded, if one exists; get into append or insert mode and type:
# remove all my core files daily
05 23 * * * find ~ -name core -exec rm -f {} \;
Exit vi the usual way. This searches your home area for core files at 11:05 pm everyday and removes all of them.
On SGI: create a file with the above lines, then type: crontab This second method works on SUNs also.

Disk space
If there is not much space on your machine and you wonder why (and you know that you are not directly the culprit!): Check the /var partition for large files. (You may need to be root.) du -k /var (SunOS 4.1.x does not know the option -k!) It should be obvious in which directory very large files are hiding. Some machines have a /var/crash area that holds dumps from crashes. If research computing hasn’t requested them from you for inspection, these may go. Also, large LOG files may be truncated to conserve space. If you had any trouble recently check with me or someone knowledgeable before you remove any log info. If these files are large, there may be a good reason for it!

Cut and paste text files by columns
How many times have you wanted to edit those results files columnwise? Here’s a generic UNIX way: (startcol and endcol refer to character columns, including whitespace. Tab counts as 1.)
cut -cstartcol-endcol file {>receiving file} paste sourcefile1 sourcefile2 {>final file}
I like to preview and fine-tune my commands by looking at the result on standard out (the shell window) and then redirecting output to a (temporary) file when things look right. Those feeling really adventurous can combine things into a single command line…

File compression
Probably everyone is using compress to conserve disk space and/or net bandwidth. While compress has its merits, mainly that its efficient and available on nearly all UNIXes, it has NO consistency checks. And there are even more efficient tools today: Under /tsri/gnu/sun4/bin you’ll find gzip. Gzip and its companions gunzip, gzcat, gzmore, gzgrep (and so on) will work with files compressed with gzip, compress, pack and zip (the UNIX variant of PKZIP, perhaps it can handle PC files?). I have used gzip successfully for the last two years and SGI now ships it as part of their systems. That should speak for itself. Gzip compressed files end with .gz. To get at gzip, edit your .cshrc:

set path = ( /tsri/gnu/sun4/bin $path )
setenv MANPATH $MANPATH:/tsri/gnu/man
setenv GZIP “<whatever>” (check gzip -h for available options)

On SGIs do nothing. gzip is already in your path.

Gzip can work through directory trees: gzip -r -9 <some dir> will compress every file it find starting from downwards. The -9 switch specifies best compression at the expense of speed. Great for archiving.

For very efficient compression of some directory and its contents:
tar cvf - dir | gzip -9 > dir.tar.gz

To uncompress: gzcat dir.tar.gz | tar xvf -

Renaming a group of files
Suppose you have a group of files, named file_jan.1, file_jan.2, file_jan.3, etc. and you want to rename them to something like experiment_1_jan.txt, experiment_2_jan.txt, experiment_2_jan.txt, etc.

Use a script like this:

#!/bin/csh -f
foreach x ( file_jan.* )
mv $x experiment_$x:e_jan.txt
end