Bob

July 27, 2009 / Bob / Tech / Leave a Comment

New Google Wave Will Change How We Email, Collaborate, Blog And Share Documents

I recently watched a Google presentation video about a completely new technology/platform that Google Labs have been working on called Wave. From what I saw this will change how we use email how we communicate and how we collaborate.

First up is the email application, and I use email here as a very loose term. Email will no longer be the email that we know. Instead it will be a complete communication tool. As you type your message to the recipient of your choice, if you so choose, the recipient will be able to watch you type in real time. Now stop and think about that. I didn’t say that once you hit the enter or send button the recipient will see your message, I said as you type the recipient will see your message as you type in real time. Now of course this is dependent on both parties being signed in and online simultaneously. However if one person is online and the other is not then as soon as the recipient signs in they see the message (Wave) and any additions or revisions that the sender may have made.

To take it a step further you will be able to add more people to the conversation simply by dragging them into the conversation window. Once the 3rd or 4th person gets dragged into the Wave (that’s what it’s going to be known as , The Wave) then that person or persons will see the entire conversation beginning to the present. But to take it even further anyone coming into the conversation will be able to literally replay the conversation from the beginning so that they get the whole message in context. Another really cool feature is the ability to respond to a comment or sentence within the message. So in other words lets say that within the message somewhere in the 3rd paragraph is a reference that you would like to respond to. You can enter a response directly below that line as opposed to the end of the full conversation and again the message will be see immediately or upon signing in.

Adding images is also innovative. If you were to drag images into the Wave then anyone who is online that is part of the Wave will see them immediately. The thumbnails will actually pop into the Wave before the images are even rendered on the screen that they were entered on. All in all pretty awesome. You can also extract the images or for that matter portions of the conversation to share with others without sharing the entire Wave.

This next feature blew me away. If you decide to you can share the Wave or parts of the Wave on a blog something akin to Google Maps API. The difference here is that if if someone makes a comment on the Wave that was embedded into the blog, it will also go directly to the Wave that is going on within the application and conversely one can respond to the comment from within the Wave and have the comment be published on the blog. You can also then continue the conversation within the Wave client or the blog or both. All of these features will also be available on an iPhones app and the Android all working together in real time.

There is a lot more that I can write about but I fear I may lose you or get boring. So why don’t you go ahead and watch the Google You Tube video directly below this post for the rest of the story. I hope that you have enjoyed this and found it to be informative. If you did please leave a comment and let me know what you think of this new upcoming Wave.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQ[/youtube]

June 29, 2009 / Bob / Online Marketing / Leave a Comment

An Introduction To Internet Marketing

There are many reasons why people fail at internet marketing and internet business in general. For the most part everyone starts out with a broad goal and idea and starts doing research to see what it is that they have to do or learn to make it happen. The problems begin as soon as they do their first search on Google for “Internet business opportunities” or “Internet marketing”. They are immediately assaulted by thousands of results that for the most part are useless. There are so many scams and get rich quick schemes that are so well introduced that it’s no wonder that people get sucked in. The sales copy for these websites is excellent. They use some very talented copy writers to get this accomplished and spare no expense at making their ‘Business model” look like the right one that the uninitiated almost don’t stand a chance and fall prey to these great looking opportunities.

Not all is lost and not everything is a scam

Fortunately there are plenty of legitimate opportunities and courses that will get you going in the right direction. Before diving in to a business I would recommend that you look around and find the legitimate course programs and think about taking one. But also you have to think about and decide how you want to make money.

One very popular model of business is niche blogging or niche marketing. While they are similar they are not the same. In niche blogging you create a blog, preferably a self hosted WordPress blog, and you “blog” about a particular subject or “niche”. You might choose dieting or dog grooming or even sports card collecting. You then begin to write articles about your subject of choice and begin the process of driving traffic to your blog. Depending on your writing skills and how much time you put into it but it can take 6 months to a year for your blog to become popular. You make money a couple of different ways. You can sell an eBook on the subject that either you wrote or bought PLR rights to. PLR is short for private label rights and these rights give you the ability to republish it under your own name. You can also use Google Adsense to have Google post ads on your blog and get paid when people click on those ads. Of course in either case you have to have a good amount of traffic coming in.

Niche marketing is a bit different in that you publish a site sometimes referred to as a mini-site, due to the fact that you just publish one page as the sales page and write a compelling sales copy (Page) to sell your product. A lot of people that do that use pay per click advertising to drive traffic and use services like PayDotCom.com to find others to sell their product and pay them a commission. One good example of this is MyResellSoftware a site that sells software to people who would like to start a business selling software.

Selling Software As A Business

The nice thing about MyResellSoftware is that they give you everything you need to get up and running in no time. You can literally have a site published with about 1 to 2 hours of work (depending on your skill level) and all you really have to do is insert your information like PayPal account and email address and your name. But the rest of the site is 100% finished and ready. The presentation of the software is first rate and the sites, especially the ones that come with source code and full resell and plr rights are excellent. The sales pages for the individual articles are written by a professional copy writer so once you get traffic the sales should start coming in.

There are other sites that I have seen that sell a “business in a box” concept but few do it as well and as complete as MyResellSoftware. While some of the others I’ve seen I have liked they sell PLR eBooks which are a dime a dozen and therefore much harder to market well and make a good profit. Of course if you can write your own eBook, a quality eBook at that, then you can also make some good money by selling the eBook either for the niche it was written or as a PLR title.

In my next article I will discuss other forms of internet business including PPC Marketing which can bring you tremendous riches but which can also leave you broke and destitute if your not careful. I’ll also discuss some courses that I am currently reviewing. I got my hands on a few popular ones and let you know how they stack up. In the meantime do your research carefully and don’t go with the first offer that comes along.

April 2, 2009 / Bob / Joomla!, Tech / 1 Comment

New WordPress For Joomla Extension Version 2.7.1. Is it Worth The Upgrade?

A little while ago I did a review of the WordPress for Joomla extension that gave you new and almost infinite possibilities with Joomla that you didn’t have before. Now ‘corePHP’ has released and updated version of WordPress for Joomla in the flavor of WordPress 2.7.1 and as good as the original version was, this new version is that much better. The new version of WordPress for Joomla extension now includes permalink capabilities, four sidebars, the WP-Cumulus plugin and a few more useful plugins that will allow readers to share your posts with many social media websites.

First though let’s start with the easy installation and configuration of this extension. ‘corePHP’ has two different versions of the .zip file for download. The reason is that WordPress for Joomla extension is a fairly large file size and some servers may time-out when trying to install since it will take longer than 30 seconds which is the usual default server setting for uploading PHP files. So the second option is to install part of the extension through the Joomla installer and upload the rest of the files through FTP, either way the installation is very easy and fast.

For those of you who may never have seen the Joomla admin panel the screenshot on the left shows the Joomla installer and the process of which you would install any Joomla extension including the WordPress for Joomla extension. I must say that Raphael Corral, the developer at ‘corePHP’ who is responsible for this extension, did an incredible job with this extension. I can’t think of anything else on the market that even comes close to what WordPress for Joomla does for Content Management Systems and Internet publishing platforms. To try to put it into perspective, this would be like taking Mac’s OS X and re-writing it and building it into Windows Vista so that they become one (Please don’t bombard me with VMware comments because that’s not what I mean). That would be an incredibly powerful operating system that would have unlimited potential. Well the WordPress for Joomla extension in essence does that with Joomla and WordPress.

The screenshot on the left is a screenshot of the WordPress for Joomla extension. As you can see it looks exactly like a standalone version of WordPress and if you were blindfolded and put in front of a keyboard and screen you would never know that you were in fact working with the extension and not WordPress. You might ask at this point, “Why would I use this extension if I could use WordPress and get the same result?”. Well the thing is that you could now build your site any way that you want. There are many people who now attempt to use WordPress as a Content Management System with mixed results. So lets say that you have a product or service that you want to promote or sell but at the same time you want to have the ability to have a blog because you want to be able to add posts on a regular basis to attract readers and give more value and enhance your site and your products. A static website invariably is a lot harder to promote and get good Google rankings than a site with regularly added content that changes on a regular basis. Google does give points for sites that add content on a regular basis, not to mention the benefits that you would gain by showing your authority on the product or service that you would like to sell. Now on the flip side of that if you wanted a blog, you can now build a blog like no other. Joomla has a built-in blogger-API plugin that when activated will allow you to submit your Joomla built blog to various blog lists including Technorati and DMOZ (The open directory project) and it will be “seen” as a blog.

Getting back to the extension, it really is a breeze to work with. Whether you have ever used WordPress or not it’s the easiest publishing platform to work with. All you do is click on the left side menu selection for “Add new post”, write it and click on publish and your done. It really is that easy, of course you have the ability to add mages or other media and you can format the text pretty much any way that you would like.

Currently these are the plugins available for the WordPress for Joomla extension:

Akismet
All-In-One SEO Pack
GD Star Rating
Lightbox 2
Report Comments
Sermon Browser
ShareThis
Sociable
Subscribe To Comments
Subscribe 2
TineyMCE Advanced Text Editor
Wikipedia Autolink
WP Cumulus
WordPress.com Stats

While the list may not be extensive these are some core plugins that the vast majority of WordPress users use on their blogs. I also know first hand that many more plugins are being worked on by ‘corePHP’ and of course the community should start contributing to the efforts shortly. Generally speaking the plugins have to be coded to work correctly with this extension, however there are some plugins that will work without changing a line of code. Nextgen Gallery for example works fine in it’s original state. So you do have to try if there is a certain plugin that you like to use. If however it does not work you can always ask the team to make a specific plugin available. On the ‘corePHP’ site there is a section for customers to add their requests and ideas.

All of the same upgrades that were made to WordPress 2.7.1 (Stand alone version) are also part of this extension and the full compliment of WordPress feature are available in this extension:

Natively works on Joomla! 1.5, install it as any other extension
Dynamic Pages
Pages –Allows you to manage non-bloggable content, such as an About page
WordPress Links – (Blogroll).
WordPress Themes – There are thousands of themes out on the web ready to be used with WordPress. ‘corePHP’ also offers the ability to make you a custom theme to match your website. Note: Most themes will need some edits to work inside of Joomla!
Cross-blog communication tools – WordPress fully supports both the Trackback and Pingback
Comments – Visitors can leave comments on individual posts and through Trackbacks and Pingbacks.
Spam protection —WordPress comes with very robu
st tools such as an integrated blackli
st and open proxy checker to manage and eliminate comment spam on your blog.
Full Joomla! 1.5 user integration – WordPress will sync the WordPress user every time he loads the component to make sure all of the users information is accurate. All of WordPress roles are fully functional within Joomla! 1.5
Password Protected Posts – Give individual posts a password to hide them from the public.
Easy Installation and upgrades – Every time a new update comes out just uninstall it from Joomla’s administrator panel, and install the new version, your database, media, plug-ins and themes will still be there.
XML-RPC interface – WordPress currently supports an extended version of the Blogger API, MetaWeblog API, and finally the MovableType API.
User Roles – You can have different user types, users that can only post drafts, but cannot publish them.
ASCII to correct XHTML – WordPress will transform pain ASCII into correct XHTML entities.
Ping away – WordPress supports pinging Ping-O-Matic, which means maximum exposure for your blog to search engines.
iPhone – Joomla! supports the iPhone app for WordPress. This app allows you to create, publish, draft, and password protect your posts. It takes pictures and much more in the upcoming releases.
Post via Email – If you don’t have an iPhone, you can send an email to a predefined email address and WordPress will automatically post it to your blog.

‘corePHP’ has added a few features of our own:

Add / Remove blog title
Add / Remove sidebar
Different options for CSS style sheets
Enable / Disable automatic role syncing with Joomla!
Show / Hide Author name in posts.

You have to admit this is an impressive list of features for any product but to now have the ability to join Joomla and WordPress into one platform is a feather in ‘corePHP’s cap. I for one am one of their biggest fans and I’m also looking forward to testing out the new ‘corePHP’ WordPress-MU for Joomla extension. Yes that’s right they now release WordPress-MU and that just opens up all new doors and possibilities and I’ll be publishing my findings shortly. In the meantime have fun with this incredible plugin and start imagining the things that you could create with this extension and Joomla.

February 11, 2009 / Bob / PC Software / Leave a Comment

Opensource Software Is More Important Than People Realize

If you’ve spent any lengthy amount of time on the Internet, you’ve probably heard of open source software but might not have fully understood what it is and why it even exists. This article will describe this recent phenomenon and describe some of its benefits for the software using community.

In a nutshell, open source software is software made by everyone – for everyone. The hopes behind its development is that through its open access, it will evolve into something that represents the true desires of computer users. Through a wide network of user involvement, the software in question is enhanced and debugged without costs or administrative politics.

Traditionally, software is developed behind closed doors. A team of professional coders build it but the community at large isn’t part of its conception. It’s costly to produce and as you can probably guess, that cost is passed on to the end user: the consumer. Open source software on the other hand is free. Free to download, free to install, free to use, free to modify, and free to share.

Started over twenty years ago, it’s a phenomenon that is gaining in both popularity and exposure. In its first conception, open source gave birth to the World Wide Web as we know it today. The Internet as a whole is the result of free permission to access the web, use the web, contribute to the web, and share the web with others. But it certainly hasn’t stopped there. In the not too distant past, Netscape converted its once commercial version of its Navigator web browser to open source. And today, open source is venturing into the commercial realm as well.

At first thought, the idea of open source may sound just plain crazy to those who earn a living from software development. But the facts point to a different prediction. Open source software puts companies in a terrific position to re-brand and re-position themselves in a market that they may have not been able to reach before. In the business world, open source is all about image and when consumers witness corporations contributing (instead of selling) to the buying public, they gain big favor in the eyes of their users (plus tremendous opportunities to sell other items).

Inviting the public inside a product’s development builds community and trust. It also sets the platform for increased reliability. Fans of open source programs are adamant about reliable software and highly criticize commercialized versions for being buggy and error-prone. Avid fans even proclaim commercialism is the cause of shoddy software.

Another benefit that open source brings to light is the speed at which its products are developed, enhanced, supported and distributed. This is because the people who regularly contribute to an open source product do so for unmotivated reasons (other than perhaps to feed the ego.) They’re highly talented, they’re available, and they care. Bringing money into any project can almost mean instant death. It can kill motivation, desire, and a true willingness to create a good product. In a commercial setting, participants work for a paycheck rather than for the product. And this is what puts open source projects far ahead of its monetized competition.

As a software user, this means you can contribute to an open source project as well, and help to develop it into a product that reflects your direct preferences. You aren’t “stuck” using open source software the way you would be stuck using an expensive word processor or database. You have the same access to open source software as its programmers have and in essence, you are your own customer!

Perhaps at this point you’re wondering where you can get in on this wonderful opportunity. There are plenty of open source opportunities sprinkled across the Internet and they can be easily found though any search engine. Google “open source project” and you’ll be sure to find more resources than you can shake a stick at!

February 11, 2009 / Bob / Audio / Leave a Comment

Just A Quick Word About The Give Aways

Listen to my sgort message about the give aways that I’ll be doing

[audio:Contest.mp3]

February 1, 2009 / Bob / Tech / 1 Comment

Webcam Max A Great New Utility For Your Webcam

I just recently came across Webcam Max a new utility for your webcam needs. At first when I saw this I thought that it was just a gimmicky software application to use for just having some fun when chatting to you friends over an instant massaging program, however it’s more than that it’s a tool to use with the online service ustream.com.

This is one cool application and I actually prefer to call it a tool because of all of the things that you can do with it. First of all lets start with the installation which was a breeze. Very simple, no odd configurations or questions. Just click install and the installer does the rest. Once installed all you have to do is set Webcam Max as the default capture utility for your webcam and off you go. Webcam Max has somewhere in the area of 2000 special effects that you can use in your cam image. Everything from a waving country flag in the corner to a cartoon superman body imposed on the screen with your face in the right place. Pretty cool stuff, but it doesn’t stop there. As I said before it is a tool. You can use this seamlessly with the online TV streaming site ustream.com. When broadcasting live online you can use Webcam Max to show your desktop as apposed to the live picture of yourself or whatever your streaming. That in itself is worth the money for this application especially if you plan on doing any kind of online tutorials or even live classes. You also have the ability to show images from any folder on your PC, so if you have a Office presentation that you need to share you can do that too. You can play videos and share a color pallet if you wanted to. You can also zoom in for super close-ups and of course you can record all of this. It makes it super easy to upload and share your videos with online services like You Tube. Oh yeah and you can even use a PinP feature.

Some other things you can do is apply various special effects like different mirror effects, multiple grids (Tile the live stream), you can use an embossing filter, fire shadows and many many others. As I said before you can use over 2000 special effects to enhance and make your broadcast more interesting. Also as I said earlier you can use this application with any IM application, everything from AIM to ICQ to Skype and everything in between.

The pricing for all of this is very extremely reasonable and I have to repeat myself here by saying that it is loaded with features. I really think this is the most feature rich program of this type. I have not seen anything else that even comes close and at a starting price of $19.99 it is a bargain. So don’t wait just go on over to Webcam Max and download the trial version (which does have a watermark and limited effects) and check it out for your self.

January 27, 2009 / Bob / Videos / 1 Comment

President Barack Obama On You Tube

President Obama is the first president to appear on You Tube by design. The new president can change the way future presidents communicate with the people. By leveraging a site like You Tube he is also creating an image of being closer to the people and almost as being part of the people. So it looks like The White House and the President of The United States of America have gone public in a way that has never been done before. Personally I think this could be a very exciting beginning to the new form of government that we have been promised for years upon years, lets see where this takes us.

January 26, 2009 / Bob / Site Optimization / Leave a Comment

Analytics Are One of The Cornerstones of Smart Marketing

What is one of the most important aspects of hosting your own website? Tracking your website traffic of course. How else would you determine which of your web pages are more popular than others and what sources refer the most visitors? Not only do trackers tell you how many hits you get on your site, they also give you information such as IP address and location. This can be useful when advertising.

There are several types of trackers depending on the type of website you have and how experienced you are. The most difficult and outdated form of tracking is through Apache access_log. It is not user friendly at all. This is only accessible to those hosting a website through an Apache server. Tracking is accessed through the access_log file and is a text format of each request made from the server for your site. In order to access the file you have to contact your web host provider so they can guide you to the location of the file. Once you access this file you will find the file in ELF format or Executable and Linkable Format. You will be able to track the IP address of the visitor, date and time the person visited your site, what information the visitor requested, the HTTP status code and user agent.

Next on the list of outdated trackers is Site Meter. It is more user friendly however has been around for years and is still a little old school for my taste. This is available for free and is simple to use. You just insert the JavaScript code into your site and it tracks your visitors. This not only gives you all the information that Apache access_log does, it also gives you the physical location of your visitor.

Now on to the more current trackers. Google Analytics is a wonderful tool for combining advertising with tracking. You still get your basic statistics but your also using AdWords for advertising. AdWords gives you the ability to narrow your advertising to a certain region or location. Then when people visit your website from your own ad on Google, you can get the same information as the other trackers and find out if your advertising is working. Are you targeting the audience you hoped for? Is your ad attracting visitors? There is a lot you can do with GA.

Want to know how many people are subscribing to your RSS feed? FeedBurner is your best bet. However, this is not the only fabulous function of FeedBurner. It also tracks the number of hits on your website and includes tools to set up a subscribed email list. Webmasters used to pay for these services but are now available for free!

So take your pick and start tracking. Steer clear of hit counters. They do not give you any information other than how many people are visiting your site. Stick with one of the few suggestions above. You will see just how successful your site is, or isn’t, in no time!

January 21, 2009 / Bob / Site Optimization, Tech / Leave a Comment

Web CEO is a full-range Search Engine Optimization Software Package

Web CEO is a full-range search engine optimization software package that works. I have seen the results of this software myself and I must say that they were quite impressive. I’m doing this short review because this is one sponsor I believe in. I normally take advertisements for SEO and claims of incredible results with a grain od salt. This software is different. First of all you do have to do some work and help optimize your site. The software makes it a much more pleasant experience though to me this kind of work is mundane. However if you like to get your hands dirty I highly recommend that you give this a try. First of all it’s free and your not obligated to get anything. I was impressed with it’s ease of use and excellent tutorials on the accompanying website and I think you will to.

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Some of the important tools you will find
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January 20, 2009 / Bob / Ubuntu / 3 Comments

20 Reason Why I Switched To Linux

This past July I was reading a copy of PC World magazine, specifically an article about “20 features that Windows should have”. As I read the description of these 20 features I realized that all of them were available on either a Mac, Linux or Unix based computers. The thing that really surprised me was the fact that these features were available on either Linux or Unix. My impression of those two operating systems was that A. You had to be a programmer or database administrator to understand or use them, and B. that you would be working with a computer that had a boring black screen, something like the old DOS system that I learned on. I really did not know anything about Linux or Unix as it turned out. I always new that Mac’s were GUI driven(Graphical User Interface) and a pleasure to look at. I also knew that they were stable solid computers and expensive. Who wants to spend two or three thousand dollars on a computer that you don’t even know if your going to like using? Lets face it, we are all creatures of habit and change is difficult for most people. Put a three thousand dollar price tag on it and I can pretty much guarantee a change is not forthcoming. But I was intrigued enough by the fact that Linux and Unix had these 20 features, that I decided to do some research and look into Linux to see what it was all about. First here is a list of the 20 features discussed in the article:

Seven of these were Mac only, 2 were Linux/Unix only and the rest were shared by all three. The article also went on to mention that Microsoft charges extra for some features in the guise of bundling them into Windows Vista. So in order to get all of the features that Windows offers you have to shell out $277.00 (Amazon) for full version of Vista, and if you need Microsoft Office you have shell out a whopping $549.00. That’s $826 for the privilege of getting Microsoft’s Ultimate computing package. Or you could find a package deal somewhere and for about $1500-$2000 you could get a computer with your software. You might as well, your more than halfway there. Or you could get it all for free(sans computer)!
As I started researching Linux I learned that there were many different Linux distributions available for download. I am not going to go into detail on all of them here, instead I will focus on Ubuntu since that is the one that I decided to try and ultimately installed to my hard drive.
First I have to explain about “Open Source” software, and what it means to you as a user and why you should care. Open source software is developed under the GPL (General Public License). Basically what it means is this A. You can use it, copy it, give it to friends and generally make it available to anyone who wants it and B. You can modify it (If you have the capabilities) add to it and change it and redistribute it, as long as you release it under the GPL. For a more detailed description please read this page.
One of the reasons that we should care about open software is quite simple. Open source software gives us choices, thousands of choices and because programmers, users and developers can modify it, we as users get a better product in the end. Companies like Microsoft cannot even come close to the type of testing and re-testing that open source software gets. While it is true that MS will release beta (test) versions of their software, it cannot compare to the thousands of people who try and test open source software on a continual basis, it is impossible, regardless of how big MS is. And I must say this about open source developers. These people are very proud and extremely committed to their projects. Hence you get software that is relatively bug free extremely functional and easy to use.
Ubuntu is much more than just an operating system. It is an all encompassing suite of software designed to allow the user to do anything he or she needs or wants to do on a computer. From surfing the internet to creating documents to storing and categorizing your photos to creating presentations to chatting on line to downloading music to watching videos to… well, you get the idea. But it is still much more than that. There are over 20,000 software titles available at your fingertips. Just look it up, and click to install it. There is too much to list here, but I will tell you the most amazing thing about it. It is FREE. Yes free as in no cost, no catches, no kidding.
The next best thing is that you can try it before installing it to your hard drive. You can download the Live CD here, burn it to a blank cd, insert it into your cd-rom drive, and boot from the cd. You might have to change the boot order in your Bios. To do this look for a line on the screen during bootup that says something like “Press [Key] to enter setup” or “Press [Key] to change boot order”. On most new computers the default boot order is already set to the CD-Rom drive as the first boot device. And presto, you have a fully functional operating system that you could take for a test drive. You can use your computer exactly as if you installed Ubuntu to your hard drive. Of course it will not run as fast as it would once installed to your drive, but it is fully functional. You can even install software using the Synaptic Package Handler that is located under the System menu at the top of the scree. Don’t worry though, once you reboot anything you might install will be automatically removed and your computer will be in the same exact state as it was before.
If you don’t have any software to burn an ISO image you can download this burner if you like. (Faq and instructions for Infrarecorder)
I highly recommend that you install it to your hard drive and have a dual boot configuration. The Ubuntu installer is outstanding and it will automatically install a bootloader that will give you the choice of running Windows or Ubuntu.