I will no longer be posting

I am sorry to inform you that The Web Tools Blog will no longer continue. For a number of reasons which I won't go into.

Thanks for reading,
Thomas

The Web Tools Blog Will be Back After this Short Break

I'm sorry to announce that I will not be posting for one week. After which I will start posting regularly.

I'm planning on making the move to wordpress, as well as some design changes.

I hope you join me when I start posting again.

Great Resource for Finding Web-based Apps

Apps Mania is a showcase for web applications. but it can be useful for finding great web apps.

Cousin to CSS Mania, Apps mania was started June 2007 and has been going strong since. It has about 400 subscribers as of this writing.

All the apps are nicely organized into categories such as social networking, blogging, mobile etc.

Check it out here.

Changes - Stick with me!

As some of you might have noticed I'm making some changes to the design, title and subject of this blog. Sorry to throw you around.

Please hang with me as I make some updates over the next week or so. When I'm finished it will be worth it.

If you have any ideas on how to make The Web Tools Blog better let me know. I will write a post with all the suggestion you give me and would be glad to link to your blog.

Thanks,
Thomas

Make a "What I'm Reading" Blogroll with Google Reader

With a click of the mouse you can add an a blog post to your own "What I'm reading" blogroll, here's how.

For this you need to be using Google Reader. Just log in and click the "settings" button then hit the "tabs" link. You should see a "your shared items" tag that's set at public. Go over and click the "add clip to site" link.

Click images for larger versions.




Once you install the code on your blog you can share stuff you like by hitting the "share" button in Google Reader.and it will be added to your "blogroll."

Here's an example:

Squidoo's new Project: ever.com

If you like Squidoo, you'll love The Ever Project.

The Ever Project lets you easily build a Squidoo lens (what's that?) with you current Squidoo account. The only real differences are that you can choose you own unique ever.com sub-domain, and there is a little different look.

You simple pick a superlative, then a keyword and your set. Example: best.stuff.ever.com. You then simply set up a Squidoo lens to put on that sub-domain.

To see an example go to best.webtools.ever.com that I mentioned yesterday.

Vote for Your Favorite Web Tools

Now there is a Squidoo lens where you can vote for your favorite social bookmarking site, blogging platform or just your overall favorite web tool. Made by me!

Check it out, vote, leave feedback or submit a tool to one of the lists. You can even subscribe to the RSS feed to keep track of updates.

An Introduction to Technorati

The best way to describe Technorati is a blog compiler. It collect information from blogs and compiles it to help you find things your interested in. Turns out, Technorati can also be a great tool for promoting your blog. Here are some ways you can use it to do that.

Getting started

First you need to create an account. If you already have one, good. You're set to go.

Watchlists

A watchlist is a simple way that you can track the buzz about anything on the web. They are very easy to setup and fun to use.

Tags

The next great thing about Technorati is that every blog post, blog, etc. is tagged. So you can easily move between similar posts/blogs.

Claim your blog

This is a little more complicated, but it's worth it. Once you claim you blog you can tag it and give it a description. This helps other Technorati users find your blog.

How to setup a Crazy Egg Heatmap for Your Blog or Website

A heatmap is an image that lets you see where people clicked on your site/blog. They can be very useful in test design or ad placement. Today I'm going to show you how to set one up with a web tool called Crazy Egg.

This tool cost from free to $99-a-month. The free account lets you track up to 5,000 visitors, on up to 4 different pages. That's all you need for now.

To get a feel for how the interface looks you can hit the "Demo" button.

Setting up a snapshot

Once you have sign up, log into you account and click the "add new page" button.

It will take you to the setup page where you will need to fill in information such as name of page, URL, length of test and description.

You will then need to add a bit of code to you site/blog. Unfortunately this is a javascript so if readers have that blocked you won't see them.

After you add the code you simply head back to the dashboard to see results. You can login every so often and hit the "view results" button for one of you pages to see the overview, list of clicked links, heatmap or confetti.

Sick of the Plain Old Google Interface? Have Some Fun Searching With Tafiti

Sometimes I feel just sick of the plain white Google interface. Don't get me wrong, I love Google and the white user interface can be refreshing. But day after day all I get is white. Not fun.

But I've found the answer! Tafiti is a great new beta search engine powered by Microsoft Live and Microsoft Silverlight.

Okay, so Microsoft live search doesn't rock, but Tafiti is definaty cool! Don't believe me? See for yourself!

Click the images to see larger versions.



That's the basic layout. Here are some more cool features.

You can go back through previous searches:


Or drag search results to the sidebar for later:




It even has this funky thing called tree view:



Dare I say it, this is search 3.0 Check it out!

How to Add Some Cool Web Tools to Your Blog or Site

Ever wanted to add a Page Rank checker or domain search to your blog, so your readers can use them? Now you can.

Today I stumbled onto a website called iWebTool. They have a large amount of simple web tools that you can use there on the site, or you can put the tools directly on your own blog or site.


They offer search engine ranking tools, HTML tools, domain tools and a bunch of Misc. tools.

If your looking for a great way to add some "pop" to your site or blog. Check iWebTool out!

Why You should Use More Than One Statistic Tools for Your Site

I use Google Analytics, MyBlogLog and SiteMeter. Sound crazy? Here's why you should to.

Today I was looking over and email report from Sitemeter. When I noticed that on the 26 of this month 80+ unique visitors had come to my site. I hadn't seen this on Google Analytics, so feeling a little puzzled I decided to look into it here's what I discovered:

I had submitted one of my posts to StumbleUpon, that's where the traffic came from, but I got different reports on all three statistical tools.

From Google Analytics I saw this:


It didn't even show StumbleUpon as a refferer.

From MyBlogLog I got this:


And From SiteMeter I got this:


Why did this happen?
Most SU users have Javascript blocked. Google Analytics uses javascript, but I pretty sure MyBlogLog and SiteMeter use it to. Do you guys know why? Let me know!

Anyway this just goes to show that it's not good to rely on just one site statistic tools. I'm not saying you need to use three, but it doesn't hurt.

StumbleUpon 101

StumbleUpon is a great social bookmarking tool, but are you using it as best you can? Here are some posts on other blogs that give tips and tricks on using SU.

Why StumbleUpon Sends More Traffic Than Digg - A great post on why SU drive so much traffic. - Problogger.net

How to Draw StumbleUpon Users Into Your Blog - Another Problogger post on SU.

Using StumbleUpon To Connect With People In Your Niche - A good post about connecting with like-minded people on SU. - Caroline Middlebrook

Building Your Blog With StumbleUpon - Another post on Problogger.net, but this one isn't by Darren, instead it's by Skellie @ skelliewag.org

Here are some more posts:
StumbleUpon Traffic Tip#1 - The Super Stumble

Easily Increase Site Traffic Using StumbleUpon.com

My take on StumbleUpon as a social bookmarking and research tool

Stumble Upon: A Cool Ethical Approach

Get Visitors to StumbleUpon Your Website

There are a lot of other great posts out there about SU, just run a Google Blog search for StumbleUpon and see!

Why not StumbleUpon this post, or check out my SU profile!

Google Page Rank

There's been a lot going on lately with the whole page rank thing. I made this animation to show you guys:

Keep your Social Bookmarking Easy

Do you have a StumbleUpon account, a Digg account, del.icio.us, Reddit etc.? If you use more than one of those, admit it, it can be hard to keep organized.

and There is a way that you can do two or more social bookmarking sites easily. I currently do SUDigg and del.icio.us. How do I stay sane?

With the AddThis browser button. To be honest with you, this isn't a web tool, but it's still cool.

All you have to do is setup and account, then install the browser plugin (IE and FF) or the bookmarklet.

Then on any page you want to bookmark, you simple hit the button and it takes you to a page with a list of social bookmarking sites. Just Click the one you want to bookmark it on.

This is really nice because you won't have a million toolbars piling up in you browser.

Enjoy! -Thomas

Google Trends for Bloggers

Google Trends may seem like a simple useless tool, but I think it's a great tool for bloggers.

Google Trends is a tool that lets you see what the top searches are. You can also put in any search terms any it shows you the popularity of that search as far back as 2004.

Those aren't the real gems of Google Trends though. The real cool part is that you can compare two or more search terms by separating them with commas.

For example I put in iPod, iPhone and here's what I got:
iPod iPhone

As you can see iPod has gotten a lot more searches that iPhone.

So how does this help bloggers? Well I tell you. Say you are writing a blog post about this cool iPod mod you found, but you weren't sure if you should title the post "Cool iPod Mod" or "Cool iPod Hack"

Just jump into Trends and put them both in. You would find that the keywords "iPod Hack" gets a lot more searches than "iPod Mod".

Enjoy!
-Thomas Flight

Need to create a Contact From or two? Wufoo!

Wufoo is a great tool that allows you to build any kind of contact form you want! A free account will get you three forms with pretty good customization. The interface is clean and fast. Overall a great tool.

Here's a example:

Powered by Wufoo

Survey Monkey: Make your own Survey in Minutes!

I kept hearing about a great tool called Survey Monkey, so I decided to check it out.

I found a free, easy to use, web tool that allows you to make a survey in very little time. You can have rating boxes, text boxes, drop-down menus and more. Want to make a long survey? Survey Monkey allows you to easily divide you survey into pages. You can also (slightly) customize the look.

Why not take my survey to help me make The Web Tools Blog better! Click here to take the survey.

The Web Tools Blog FAQ

This is a list of Frequently Asked Questions. So you can get an idea of what I'm trying to do on and with this blog.

Q. What is this blog about?
A. This blog is about web tools. It's here to help you find web tools, and show you how to better use them. I will have reviews on different web tools, tips and tricks and maybe so hacks.

Q. What is a "web tool"?
A. You may know them better as wed-based apps or web services. Pretty much a web tool is a tool that's on the Internet. In other words you don't have to download or install it.

A web tool can be any thing from Digg to Wordpress to Bloglines to Google.

Q. When do you post?
A. I post on every week day. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

Q. Can I copy you posts?
A. No you can't copy entire posts without permission. You can copy small portions ( a paragraph or to), but please give credit to me. My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Q. Can I use your blog's theme?
A. No. Although if you contact me we may be able to work something out.

Q. Can you link to my blog?
A. If you would like to trade links, let me know. I might be interested.

Q. What is Geek-More.com?
Geek-More is a website/Blog network that I'm currently developing. For more info please contact me.

If this hasn't answered you questions, please contact me, or comment below.

10 Reasons I use Gmail and Love it!

Here are the ten biggest reasons Gmail is great.

1. It's free! free is good. Sometimes free stuff tends to stink, but this is not the case with Gmail.

2. Lot's of space! 2GB and counting is no small potato's. Especially when you compare that to the measly 10MB that some paid services give.

3. Awesome search capabilities. This is great for finding that one message your really need.

4. Built in chatting features. You can chat with anyone else of has Gmail. Cool!

5. Great filter features, lets you organize messages nicely.

6. It automatically organizes your messages by conversations.

7. No ads in messages! There are some in the sidebar, but messages are ad free.

8. POP accounts. Don't like the web interface? Just setup a POP account and use Gmail in your favorite email program.

9. Fast and easy user interface (I hate slow and clunky).

10. Spam filter, I haven't got a spam yet. :)

I'd love to hear why you love Gmail in the comment section.

Del.icio.us Inside Out, Part 3

OK this post is going to wrap up my del.icio.us series. Today I'm going to talk about the del.icio.us user interface (UI). It is a little tricky to get the hang of so hope this post is of some help to you.

Now first of when you come to the del.icio.us home page, you see a couple of things.

• Hotlist
• Tags To watch
• Navigation
  

The hotlist is really just that, it's a list of the popular bookmarks right now. This list changes from day to day even hour to hour.

The tags to watch area is just a place with popular tags.

Finally the navigation along the top:

your bookmarks | your network | subscriptions | Links for you | post

These will take you to various area of your del.icio.us account.

One last thing I would like to mention. For some reason a lot of great feature where stuck in the "settings" area of the navigation. The features that are "hidden" here include; network badges, daily blog posts, tag lists, link list, Facebook integration and more!

I'd love to hear all your tips on how you use del.icio.us in the comment section!

More Web 2.0 Tools -Linked In Wednesday

Yazzie just posted a great list of links to web 2.0 tools. This is should be helpful for any webmaster or blogger.

This list is huge! The list contains tools for Images/graphics, CSS, Forms, fun and humor, RSS, site maps, meta tags, passwords, flash, favicons and a lot more!

Another Post to look at would be this one, a post much like the one above. Only It has screenshots of the tools.

P.S. I'm very busy right now, but I'll get back on the del.icio.us series soon! Thanks!

Del.icio.us Inside Out, Part 2

Now if you would like to start using del.icio.us you will need an account. It's just three easy steps, and it doesn't take much time.

If you are using FireFox you can install the del.icio.us buttons. I would recommend doing this. There are also options if you are using Internet Explorer, Safari or Opera.
And your done! Tomorrow I'll do a post on how to use and move around in and with del.icio.us.

Del.icio.us Inside Out, part 1

This is the first part of my series on del.icio.us.

del.icio.us is a social bookmarking network. Here is a quick list of what you can do with it:

1. Bookmark blogs/websites etc.
2. Bookmark stuff for other del.icio.us users.
3. See what others are bookmarking.
4. Keep private bookmarks that only you can see.
5. Delete, bundle and rename tags.
6. Subscribe to tags to see what others are bookmarking.
7. Network with other del.icio.us users.
8. Make a blogroll of you bookmarks. (My post on how to do this)
   
9. make tag lists/clouds for your blog or website.
10. Put a Creative Commons licence on your bookmarks.
11. Facebook integration.
12. Import/upload bookmarks
    

del.icio.us relies heavily on "tags" so you should know what a "tag" is. On the del.icio.us homepage it says:

A tag is simply a word you use to describe a bookmark. Unlike folders, you make up tags when you need them and you can use as many as you like. The result is a better way to organize your bookmarks and a great way to discover interesting things on the Web.

Inline comments on Blogger

For those of you who use Blogger I'm sure you have wanted in-line comments. Maybe you envy those nice Wordpress in-line comments. Here's the answer to your problem.

Amanda on Blogger Buster (my review post) is the one who discovered this great hack. You can read about it and how to use it here.

I was able to set it up with ease, and it's not to hard to customize if you know HTML.

Heard of any other great hacks? let me know!

-Thomas Flight

A Fun way to Catch Reader's Attention, Comics!

OK, so maybe that looks a little dumb, but did it get your attention?

You can easily make you own strip at StripGenerator.com.

If you're trying to get attention, try to make a strip that's relevant to your post topic.

Or you could slip in your blog's URL, pop it on your mySpace or something and have a free advertisement comic.

Don't over do it thought, you'll suffocate your readers.

Make Your Site or Profile look Web 2.0

Here are some great tools for generating Web 2.0 graphics. These can really spruce up a blog or website.

I found these tools on two posts I read Free Web 2.0 design tools for your blog and More than 100 Web 2.0 Online Generators. I chose my favorite out of the lists of tools in these posts. Here they are:

Stripegenerator.com
This is a really great tool. You can make stripes to fit just about any need. This tool will save you a lot of time in Photoshop. Very customizable.

Tabs Generator
This is Stripe Generator's cousin. It's also very customizable and easy to use. I you need some tabs, this is the place to go!

Logo Maker
This one is great for making reflection logos. You can also add a few symbols such as "beta" to your logo.

My Cool Button Maker
This one is nice of you want to make a round button. Only so customizable.

Quick Escape
This is a great tool! It's not web 2.0 really, but It rocks! Just add your raw HTML code, and it generates code that the browser can't read. In other words the browser doesn't read the code, so you can see the actual HTML in your browser.


Some more tools:
Roundedcornr
Easily make round corners.

Web 2.0 Badges
Make some neat round badges.

Stripedesigner.com
Another stripe designer.

OK This is the last post in the series Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips You can click the link to see a list of all posts in the series.

Want to know more about web tools and how you can use them to maximize your web life, you can subscribe to the RSS feed or by email.

Here's a Quick Time Saver, Form Auto Fill

Form auto fill is a tool that's built into some browsers and is in some browser toolbars. All you have to do is fill in common info about you (email address, name, etc.). Then when you come to a web form you hit a button and auto fill fills everything in for you!

Here how you can get it: Safari has it built right into the browser. To get auto fill for FireFox or Internet Explorer I would recommend Google's toolbar (my review). This has auto fill built into the toolbar.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Power Blogrolling with del.icio.us

In today's tip you will learn how to make a very efficiently blog roll using del.icio.us.

1. The first thing you are going to need is a del.icio.us account. You can sign up for one here.

2. Once your signed up and ready to go you might want to download the buttons for FireFox or IE, or you can the use bookmarklet buttons.

3. Now go to your account page on del.icio.us and click "settings" then click on "link rolls" below the "Blogging" heading.

4.Customize the settings. You can change the look a little, but the coolest thing is the box where you can filter the bookmarks that appear in your blog roll by tag. So you can have for example a tag called "blogroll" so that when you asign a bookmark to that tag it appears in your blog roll.

5. Add the code to your blog, and your done!

Now whenever you bookmark something with del.icio.us it will appear in your blog roll.

No more manually adding links to your blog roll!

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Using Squidoo, part 3

(If you haven't you might want to read parts one and two of the series) Now that you have your lens built you can start moving and customizing different modules.

I'm not going to how to customize each module, but I will list a few of the the modules there are and what they do. To edit any module in your lens, click edit while in the workshop. You definitely should experiment with different modules, see what works best for you!

Introduction module

The intro module give you a place to type an intro to your lens. This is the first thing people see on your lens. You can also add a picture.

Here are some modules that let you show your favorite name-brand products on your lens (money makers). There are more than this this is just to give you an idea of what's there.

ArtByUs Artist module

Barbecues.com

Beauty.com

Better home and Gardens store

eBay

Buy.com

Boaters World

Callway Golf and pre-own outlet

Camera World

Candle Bay

Cell phone shop

Amazon

Cafepress

The best thing to do is to go into the money makers tab (in the add module page) and click th category that suits you. There is a ton of them!

Here are some other module that stood out to me

Amazon Plexo

The same as the normal Amazon module only people can vote on which products they like best.

Gestbook

This lets people leave "comments" on you lens. There are some setting you can change to your liking.

Text/ Write module
Let you add text to your lens. Use this as much as you can , because while the other modules are great. You can forget to a the "meat" a good amount of text is the first step to making a awesome lens.

Link List
Pretty self explanatory

RSS module
Do you have a blog? Put your blog's feed URL in here to show the most recent headlines, or any blog for that matter
Google Blog search
This is a neat one. The latest on anything in the blogosphere

Plexo modules are like normal module except people can vote the items up and down, or even add there own. (you can choose how much people can do)

Alright that's a rap for the Squidoo mini series. I'd love to hear your Squidoo tips in the comments on this post. Have Fun!

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Using Squidoo, Part 2

If you don't know what Squidoo is read part one of the Squidoo series.

Today I'll walk you though the process of setting up a Lens. This is very easy but I'll give you some tips on the way.


1. First you are asked what you lens is about. Now note, this is not your lens' title. This is the main keyword for you lens. So choose carefully.

If you want to make a lens about iPod Nano 3rd generation. Put in "3rd Generation iPod nanos" not "ipod nanos". What you put here helps search engines pick-up your lens.


2. In step 2 you are asked what you want to do with your lens:

I want to get the word out about "_______" (easiest option)

I'm gonna sell "_______" stuff and earn $, for me or for charity (money maker!)

I want to make a list of my favorite things about "_____" (most popular)

I just want to do my own thing

You can just choose accordingly. Note: This doesn't change how your lens will look or what you can do with it, it just helps Squidoo give you initial modules.

3. In step three you pick your lens' title, URL, category and rating.

When you pick your title, remember to use keywords for search engines. Again something like "How to groom and feed small dogs" is better than "About dogs". So stick some keywords in the title, but not to many! Or you'll look like spam.

The same goes for you URL keep it as short as possible but still get some keywords in!

Category and rating a pretty self explanatory.

4. In step four you need to pick 4 more keywords for your lens. Choose wisely! Then you need to fill in the anti-spam code.

You have your lens!

Tommorow I'll post part 3 of the "Using Squidoo" series. I'll talk about customizing different modules and Building the "meat" of your lens.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Contests at Problogger.net

There are some great contests going on over a Problogger.net (most of them you don't need to be a blogger to enter). You might want to check them out here.

I've already won something!

-Thomas Flight

Using Squidoo, Part 1

Squidoo is a great tool that I started using just recently. It can be great for bloggers or just some one who wants to make a mini web page.

What is Squidoo?

Squidoo is a free tool that allows you to easily make a one page website (or as they call it, a "lens"). It's a very simple process and is a lot of fun.

The FAQ at Squidoo says:

What a lens is:

A lens is one person's view on a topic that matters to her. It's an easy-to-build, single web page that can point to blogs, favorite links, RSS feeds, Flickr photos, Google maps, your eBay auctions, CafePress designs, Amazon books or music, and oh so much more. That way, when someone is looking for recommended information, fast, your lens gets him started and sends him off in the right direction. Hooray for you!

Build one lens, build a hundred. It's fast, fun, and free. (And you could earn a royalty from each one--for you or for charity). What are you waiting for!

And why you should have one:

Great question! Here are just a few reasons to get you creative muses flowing:

• Share the knowledge: When you know a lot about something, it feels good to share. Help other people discover what you found out the hard way.

• Increase your profile: A popular lens gives credibility to the Lensmaster. A popular lens reinforces your role as an "everyday expert." And a popular lens makes you the go-to authority for those looking for help.

• Increase your traffic: Your lens points (if you want it to) to your blog and to your website. Lenses have huge credibility with search engines, so your lens can help your other sites rise to the top of Google searches.

• Earn a royalty for you, your organization, or your favorite charity. Think of the royalty as a bonus--and don't quit your dayjob yet! A single lens might not earn a lot, but if you imagine hundreds of lenses working to your favor, or fundraising for a charity, it can really start to add up.

Hooked? Here's how you can make your own lens!

Making your own Lens

After you pick a topic go to Squidoo.com and click the "Build your own" box. Go through the six steps (title, cash or charity, keywords etc.), and you have your lens!


Tomorrow I'll walk you step by-step through the process and give you some tips on how to make your Lens even better!

Here's a link to the lens I made about me.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

How to follow one train of thought on the web

Have you ever been looking for something on the Internet, and were distracted by a link or search result. Clicked that, and never found what you where first looking for.

Here's something you can do to keep on train of thought (And still check out all those neat things you see on the way).

Say I'm looking for info on "laptops", and I find a link to stuff about "building a better blog". I want to see the "building a better blog info", but that's not the info I'm looking for. Here's what you do:

Open the link in a new window/tab or bookmark it in your the specially made bookmarks folder called "things of interest" (or whatever you want). Then view it or open it after you found the info you are looking for. This way you skip that "I have a million topics being thrown at me at once!" feeling.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Other ways to find stuff on the web

When I say "other" I mean "other than search". Search is great! I use Google every day, but it can get boring.

Social Bookmarking is probably the biggest and most up-and-coming way of finding content on the web. Here are a few Social Bookmarking sites you might want to look at.

Social Bookmarking Networks

These are a great way to find stuff. Usually some one bookmarks stuff and then people vote it up or down. You can often find some great content at these sites. Here are a few:

StumbleUpon- This is a great bookmarking site that puts more emphasis on the "Social" part of Social Bookmarking. Also the front page is a little more random than some other Social Bookmarking sites.

Digg- I don't know to much about Digg. I haven't used it myself. But from what I here it's worth checking out.

Del.icio.us- This is more of a "bookmarking" site than a Social Bookmarking site. But they do offer some great tools.

Technorati- This site has a number of tools for bloggers, as well as a bunch of way to find content on the web.

Note: This is all from the readers point of view. Actually signing up and using the bookmarking features is another post.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Know Internet Slang, What lol and such mean

When you first enter the comment/chat section of the Internet it can be confusing. There are all kinds of different acronyms and abbreviations for phrases. When I first entered the Blogosphere I thought lol was a Hawaiian greeting.

Here a few you should know:

Acronym: What it means:

LOL Laughing out loud

TTYL Talk To You Later

JK Just Kidding

ROFL Rolling on the floor laughing

You can find a much more complete list here, and here. Don't try to memories the
things in these lists. Just sometimes knowing can bring a lot of clarification into
a chat conversation.

Also you should know that this :) is a sideways smiley. So are these :-) 8) :0 :] :} and so on.

More tips to maximize your web life.

Make Calls Free, Skype Today

Ever wanted to call your brother on his trip to Spain, for free? Well, now you can!

All you need is two computers with high-speed Internet (DSL, broadband, satellite...). You simply download Skype to you Linux, Windows or Mac. Setup an account and go.

Computer to computer calls are free. If you want you can buy credits and a "Skype in" number so people can call you from a phone and you can call them. This is cheap, but I've heard that the sound quality isn't so great.

If you have a web cam you can easily do video chat. Or you can text chat, send files or play chess (with the help of some additional add-ons).

Overall Skype is great. You can make call out of country for free (free is good). How can you get better than that?

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

HUGE changes for Blog Rush, maybe...

If you are a Blog Rush user you may have gotten an email promising Huge changes. But will they live up to their promises? Lets take a look.

The biggest thing that you notice in the email is 100% Manual blog review. They say they will check ever blog by hand and remove the blogs that go against policies. This sound great, if they carry out there plan.

Also Blog Rush "flavors" are now in use. There are more colors to choose from but you can't change the size.

They have introduced a feature that lets you filter out certian posts from your own blog so that they don't appearing in other peoples widgets.

They promise more categories, better reporting and bonus credits for low traffic blogs. Plus they say they will work very hard to improve Blog Rush. We, the bloggers, will see...

The email tool to save time!

Gmail Notifier, is the biggest time saver for me since bread. OK so bread wasn't a time saver, but anywaaay.

Even if you don't use Gmail you should use Gmail notifier. You can simply forward your emails to your free Gmail address.

You download the program that sits in your task bar and pops up ever time you get and email. It checks your email about every five minuets so it is very nice if you need your emails when you get them. The end result is that you don't have to check your email. It just tells you when you get one! Here's what you have to do:

1 Sign up for Gmail if you haven't already.

2. Download the Gmail notifier here. Or for Mac here.

3. Configure it to your liking. Note: if you are going to forward your current address to your Gmail address. Now would be the time to do so.

4. Enjoy the not having to check your email.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

How to make a link in plain English

Today I'm going to show you a very useful skill, how to make a web link. And I'm going to do it in plain English.

I would recommend checking out this page at w3schools.com. It lets you easily mess with the html code that makes links.

Here's an example of a standard link code:
<a href="www.example.com">Text to appear as link</a>
here's the output: Text to appear as link

Here's a illustration to help you understand the anatomy of a link:

More tips to maximize your web life.

Useful html tags that you should know

You don't have to be a webmaster to have to use HTML. It can be very handy at times to know a little how to make some text look italic or bold or even like code. Today I'll show you how to make a few simple tags.

Note: This is basic stuff so if you know any html you probably already know this.

The basic tag anatomy

I'm not going to give a huge course on html or anything ( for that go to w3schools.com ). Mostly all you need to know for now is that all html tags are surrounded by angle brackets "<" ">". And that a closing tag has a forward slash "/" after the the first bracket.

The bold (<b>) tag:

The bold tag will make you text look bold. Here's how you use it.

First you add the starting tag "<b>". Now you type the text you want bold. When you want the text to stop being bold you simply add this tag "</b>"

Example: <b> Text you want bold. </b>
Output: Text you want bold.

The italic (<i>)tag:

The italic tag uses the same form as the bold tag.

Example: <i> Text you want italic. </i>
Output: Text you want italic.

Other tags

There are many other tags that work the same way. Such as <code> </code> this gives you: text that look like code. and <Blockquote> </Blockquote> this gives you

text that looks like this.

So now that you know how to use tags, Where do you use them? Well there are plenty of good places to use this comments on blogs, post in your own blog and email are just a few examples. Have fun! What are your favorite tags to use? Let me know in a comment!

More tips to maximize your web life.

How to use RSS

Note: If you haven't read my post on what RSS is I would recommend doing so.

The first thing you need to do is find a feed reader (RSS reader). There are two kinds of feed readers.

Web based feed readers

First there are web based feed readers. These are web sites that work as feed readers. You usually just have to make an account and then you can start adding feeds by URL or you can search for different feeds depending on the reader you choose.

I prefer web readers as then I don't have to download the feeds to my computer (although this can be a bummer if you want to view feeds offline).

Here are some web based feed readers:

• Google Reader (this just came out of Google Labs
• Bloglines
  
• Newsgator online
• Of course there are a bunch more. You can Google "web based feed readers" to see a few.
  

Feed readers that live on your PC (or Mac, of course)

Second there are feed readers that are actual programs that you download. Some of them cost, some of them don't. These sometimes offer more features than web based readers. Here are a few to check out.

• Newsgator
• FeedDemon
• Again there's many more if you look around!

I also might be helpful to know that many web browsers have built in readers. the latest versions of Firefox, IE and Safari all have built in feed readers. These might be good for people who are just starting out with using RSS or only want to read a few feeds.

Once you have a feed reader you are pretty much set to go. For more info check the help area of the reader you choose.

More tips to maximize your web life.

BLOGRUSH. Somthing good just got better: Flavors

Some of you may have noticed the Blog Rush widget in my sidebar. Blog Rush has been through a lot of hype lately, bloggers have praised it and put it down. But I think it's a good thing.

I am getting visitors through the Blog Rush widget. And I have read many places that it does not go against the AdSense TOS. I don't see where Blog Rush could be doing any real harm.

And it just got better! We are no longer bound to a plain black widget. With the release of Blog Rush Flavors. This will be available in a few days. While it's not a super amount of customization. You can at least pick a color that matches your blog.

In an email Blog Rush sent out to their members they said

"* We're hard at work with many new
improvements on the way to help you
get more targeted traffic.

** We'll soon be adding a bonus credit
system that gives certain bonuses only to
our low traffic members since they need

the help the most!"

I hope they live up to their promises!

See how it works or sign up by visiting the Blog Rush website!

Note: all links in this post are referrals (I don't get paid though :)

About RSS and how it's changing the web.

RSS. You may have heard of it, maybe not. Either way, if you do any kind of serious blog of news reading (OK even if you only read 4 or so blogs) you should definitely use RSS.

This post is about what RSS is. Tomorrow I'll post about how to use it.

Here's how what some sites say RSS is.

Whatisrss.com says:
"RSS solves a problem for people who regularly use the web. It allows you to easily stay informed by retrieving the latest content from the sites you are interested in. You save time by not needing to visit each site individually. You ensure your privacy, by not needing to join each site's email newsletter. The number of sites offering RSS feeds is growing rapidly and includes big names like Yahoo News."

Feedburner.com says:
"Technology evolution in online publishing has made it really easy to not only publish regular updates to web-based content, but also keep track of a large number of your favorite Web sites or blogs, without having to remember to check each site manually or clutter your email Inbox. You can now streamline your online experience by subscribing to specific content feeds and aggregating this information in one place to be read when you're ready.

• Consumer Bottom Line: Subscribing to feeds makes it possible to review a large amount of online content in a very short time.
• Publisher Bottom Line: Feeds permit instant distribution of content and the ability to make it "subscribable."
• Advertiser Bottom Line: Advertising in feeds overcomes many of the shortcomings that traditional marketing channels encounter including spam filters, delayed distribution, search engine rankings and general “in-box” noise."

Here's a video about RSS and how to use it, "RSS in plain English."


VideoJug: RSS In Plain English

RSS stands for "really simple syndacation".

RSS is often called a feed or news feed.

The some of the standard icons for RSS looks like this:
You can see many examples of other feed icons in my sidebar. Click 'em to subscribe! >

More tips to maximize your web life.

Quick tip #2: Use support

This is another simple yet important tip. If you have a problem with something online (email, web hosting, etc.) and you've tried everything. Don't be afraid to contact support.

My favorite way to do this is by email. Yes, you have to wait a little longer than by phone, but you don't have to deal having to hold or wait while being transferred. One thing that helps is to provide as much info about the problem as you have.

If email doesn't get the answer don't be afraid to call support. Just make sure you have all the info you need in front of you when you call. Also make sure you set aside time before you call (don't call when you're in a hurry or have somewhere to go).

If you don't want to call (or the company doesn't provide phone support) make sure you check the support forums. You'll often find lots of information there.

More tips to maximize your web life.

Click... and Try!

Today I have just one quick tip for the series Maximizing your web life. Click!

"Click?!?!" you say. "What, how is that a tip?"

I'll tell you. (If you are a geek you probably know what I'm talking about already).If your not a geek and you've wondered how geek's learn so much about computers, it's because they click things. They try it out.

If you don't know what something does try it! But be careful you can get into trouble if your careless. (Like the time I didn't back-up my template when trying a hack a messed everything up!).

So there's today's quick tip. Go click something!

More tips to maximize your web life.

Use a Web Browser Toolbar

A toolbar for your browser can really beef up your web browsing. Many you can get for free, Here are some you might want to check out.

Google Toolbar:
Google has a very useful toolbar for Firefox and Internet Explorer. You can pick from a large selection of buttons that do various things. You also get tools such as AutoFill (A very useful web form auto filler), Google bookmarks, Google search, page rank and spell checker. Just to name a few. Here's a list of all the features.

Advanced Searchbar:
Advanced Searchbar boasts a whooping' amount of features. Here's the list they give:

100+ Search Engines [List] Pop-Up Blocker Auto Form Filler Auto Login Manager Adult Content Filter Add Custom Buttons Calendar Driving Directions Movie Showtimes Spelling Checker E-Mail Providers Finance Handy Calculator TV Listings Classifieds Horoscopes Health Sites 75+ Free Games Media Players (CD & DVD) MySpace Button

Many ISP's and other online search engines such as Yahoo and MSN have toolbars, but don't have as many features as Google Toolbar and Advanced Searchbar. These toolbars can increase your ease of using the web. One step closer to maximizing you web life!

More tips to maximize your web life.

Put bookmarks to important sites in your browser's toolbar.

If you don't have bookmarks in your browser's toolbar, you are missing out! This lets you put your favorite blogs or web sites just a click away. Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari all have this feature.

Here's what they looks like in Firefox:


To use them Internet Explorer simply click view - toolbars - links. Then move the favorites you want to appear in the toolbar to the links folder.

In Safari and Firefox they are usually in use by default.

Tip: If you keep the names of the bookmarks/favorites short you will be able to fit more in to the toolbar.

Using bookmark in a toolbar may seem just to take up space, but it will greatly improve how you move around the web!

More tips to maximize your web life.

Set your browsers homepage to something other than Google.com

Google.com gives you one thing, search. Many browsers have Google search built in. Today set your browser homepage to something you'll use more. Here are some ideas:

iGoogle
iGoogle lets you customize your Google start page however you want. You can choose from a pile of "widgets" giving you anything from news to feeds to games. Also you can create tabs that let you organize different pages of widgets.

Netvibes
Net vibes is like iGoogle with a twist. You can style your page with the templates they give you, add feeds. They also have "widgets" but not as many as iGoogle. Another neat feature is you can share your pages with other Netvibes users. Tabs let you organize pages however you want.

Your ISP's website
Many ISP's offer a homepage to use. My preference is not to use these as they are prone to use ads and often don't offer much customization.

A web page that you use a lot.
Consider making your feed reader your homepage (if you use a web-based reader). Or set blogger.com, wordpress.com or whatever blogging software you use. Also you can use any web page such as Google Blog search or Digg. The possibilities are endless!

More tips to maximize your web life.

Maximize your email with filters.

If you are greatly annoyed you by a cluttered inbox, this post is for you!

Today I'll show you how to keep your inbox clean. First by cleaning it out, then keeping it that way.

First take the time clean out your inbox. Read messages that need to be read, delete or archive ones that you've read.


Then set up filter to file different messages into different places. A filter simply searches each incoming message and decides what to do with it.

Note: Some email programs call filters by another name such as rules. Some programs may not have filters, but most should.

Where the filter feature is located on your email program varies from program to program. In Gmail it's beside the search feature and in the settings. In other programs a good place to check is the tools or setting area in your email program. If you can't find it check the help area.

Now once you found the filter feature. Set up a few to organize incoming mail. Setting up a filter is fairly strait forward once you get started. Again this depends on the program you use. Fiddle with the settings to your liking.

Your goal is to make at least three filters.

More tips to maximize your web life.

Maximize your Web life, 21 days of tips

Welcome to my series on maximizing your web life. In other words, helping you be faster, more efficient and better at what you do on the web. I'll do this series over 21 days with 21 post.

Look back here for a list of posts as I post them. I'll cover topics like RSS, email, bookmarks, free Internet calls, html and more.

Here's a list of the posts so far:

• Maximize your email with filters.
• Set your browsers homepage to something other than Google.com
• Put bookmarks to important sites in your browser's toolbar.
• Use a Web Browser Toolbar
• Click... and Try!
• About RSS and how it's changing the web.
• How to use RSS
• Useful html tags that you should know
• How to make a link in plain English
• The email tool to save time!
• Make Calls Free, Skype Today
• Know Internet Slang, What lol and such mean
• Other ways to find stuff on the web
• How to follow one train of thought on the web
• Using Squidoo, Part 1
• Using Squidoo, Part 2
• Using Squidoo, part 3
• Power Blogrolling with del.icio.us
• Here's a Quick Time Saver, Form Auto Fill
• Make Your Site or Profile look Web 2.0

Using Blogger Labels as Technorati Tags

Yesterday I work out a neat hack with Blogger labels. Only to find someone else had discovered it already. Anyway here it is.

1. Open Blogger and navigate to Template > Edit HTML.
2. Check the "Expand widget templates" box.
3. Find the following code:

<br/>
<span class='post-labels'>
      <b:if cond='data:post.labels'>
        <data:postLabelsLabel/>
        Read my posts about: <b:loop values='data:post.labels' var='label'>
          <a expr:href='data:label.name' rel='tag'><data:label.name
/></a><b:if cond='data:label.isLast != "true"'>,</b:if>
        </b:loop>
      </b:if>
    </span>.
       4. And below it add this:

          
<br/>
 
<span class='post-labels'>
      <b:if cond='data:post.labels'>
        <data:postLabelsLabel/>
      Technorati tags:  <b:loop values='data:post.labels' var='label'>
          <a expr:href='"http://technorati.com/tag/" + data:label.name' rel='tag'>
<data:label.name/></a><b:if cond='data:label.isLast != "true"'>,</b:if>
        </b:loop>
      </b:if>
    </span>

5. If you want to show only the Technorati tags and not the labels, replace the first code with the second.

6. Note: The Tags will be whatever you put in as labels. In other words the labels and tags will be the same.

Technorati Tags all day long!

Bloglines Beta an amazing User Interface!

I used Bloglines Beta version today. It has the most amazing user interface that I've seen in web based RSS readers. It has a very smooth, fast drag-and-drop interface. You can easily move feeds between folders.

There are a few new features. But some of the normal features are not yet in the beta version. Ounce the beta version is updated it will rock! I for one will be using it.

Another big update is the start page. You can select feeds to display on the main page. This is really nice, it gives you an at-a-glance of the blogs that are important to you.

I'll write an updates on Bloglines Beta update. So check back for more!

Correction, you can embed music with Myfabrik.com

I recently did a review on Myfabrik.com, In the review I said that music can not be embedded. But in fact, it can.

You can embed music with Myfabrik.

Sorry about that, Please except my apologies.

Thanks to the reader who brought thit to my attention.

Have fun embedding music!

Blogs to visit: Blogger Buster

Blogger Buster has a great amount of information on blogging with blogger. I have been helped many times by Amanda's blog. I used one of her templates to base my template from.

She has compiled many hack, tips, templates and more! If you use blogger.com you stop by Blogger Buster.

Have Fun!

Visit Blogger Buster

Tools for Bloggers: Myfabrik.com

Myfabrik is a powerful media storage tool. It allows you to upload 1GB of pictures, videos, music and documents. All for free. You get unlimited uploads per month. And integration with Flickr and Photobucket. File upload limit is 500MB.

Pictures:
You can get an embed code for any picture (includes instructions for Myspace, blogger etc.) You can embed in normal picture mode, slide show or filmstrip. Or you can just get the URL of the picture. Can be shared on your public page.

Video:
You can also embed video. But only gives you one embed type. Can be shared on your public page.

Music:
You can embed music. But it can be shared on your public page.

Documents:
You can upload documents of almost any type. You can't embed documents. But you can share them on your public page.

Public Page:
Everything you upload is private. But you can easily share things on your public page. Your public page allows some customization and multiple templates. Your public page is located at: www.myfabrik.com/username/public/beginning-of-email-address. People can download anything you put on your public page, but you can turn this off.

User Interface:
The UI is a little bit clunky and hard to work with. Some features are hard to find. It has drag-and-drop functionality which is a plus. The system can be a little slow at times, but nothing major. Overall it works nicely and quickly.

Visit Myfabrik

Blogs to visit: Problogger.net

Problogger.net is mainly about making money blogging. But even is you don't want to make money blogging, you should still check it out!

The author Darren Rowse has made a six digit income from blogging. Problogger tells you how to do just that.

Problogger has a heap of tips and trick. Darren covers topics such as Adsense, blog promotion, writing better posts, commenting and a very helpful series on blogging for beginners.

Overall whether you blog for money or just as a pastime Problogger is definitely worth checking out.

Problogger

Wordpress powered blogging platforms: Blogema.org

Of the three Wordpress powered blogging sites that I've reviewed, Blogema is the most powerful.

Pros:

• Drag-and-drop widget customization.
• 100+ themes many the same as Wordpress.com.
• Free to use.
• Free sub-domain.
• Site map generator.
  

Cons:

• No HTML editing.
• Can't use your own domain.
• No custom spam blocking.

Bottom line:

If you're going to use a Wordpress powered blogging site, use Blogema.org. It's definitely the most powerful of the three I've reviewed.

To view my test blog click here.

To view other reviews on Wordpress powered blogging sites click here.

Wordpress powered blogging platforms series

I've done some reviews on there Wordpress powered blogging platforms. Blogetery, Blogsome and Blogema.

Here's the reviews I've done so far:

Review on Blogetery.

Review on Blogsome.

Review on Blogema.

The series is finished. If you know of a Wordpress powered blogging platform you would like reviewed. Let me know! I'll do my best to help.

Wordpress powered blog platforms: Blogsome

Blogsome is a site that allows you to set up a free Wordpress blog.

Pros:

• It's free.
• Custom spam blocker.
• free sub-domain.

Cons:

• You can't use your own domain name.
• No HTML customizeation.
• Only a few themes
• No drag-and-drop sidebar customization.

Bottom line:
I don't no what to say. If you want a very basic free Wordpress blog, use Blogsome.com.

To view other reviews on Wordpress powered blogging sites click here.

Wordpress powered blog platforms: Blogetery

A whole host of Wordpress powered blogging platform have been springing up. This week I'll review three. Blogetery, Blogsome and Blogema.

Blogetery

Pros:

• It's free.
• You don't have to deal with the installation.
• 100+ themes.
• Customizable spam blocker.
• Free sub-domain.
  

Cons:

• You can't use your own domain.
• No HTML customization.
• No drag-and-drop sidebar widgets
  

Bottom line:

Really the only thing that's better than wordpress.com is that there are more themes. Is it worth loosing the features just so you have more choices of themes?

You can view the test blog here.

Note: If you have any questions about Blogetery features, I'd love to help! Leave me a comment on this post.

To view other reviews on Wordpress powered blogging sites click here.