GuestPost Archives - Page 7 of 12

5 Great Websites to Help You Inform Your Design

When you are attempting to create a unique and creative website design, you can always use some extra inspiration or tips to help you come up with fresh new design or code snippets no matter how advanced your web design skills may be. The techniques that go along with designing web pages are constantly changing and improving therefore it is important that you are always in the know when it comes to the latest methods and newest forms of coding that you can use in order to make your website or the site or a clients’ site, stand out and get noticed.

Many web designers turn to online resources when they are busy strategizing and trying to find new things to add to their design process. Listed below are our five favorite design and coding websites – full of tips, tricks and other helpful resources that will allow you to create a website exactly how you imagined.

1. Alistapart.com

Alistapart.com has plenty to offer web designers and coding experts. Hundreds of helpful articles are listed by category and neatly organized so that you can find the information that you need when you need it. Some of the resources that can be found on this website include nearly 300 articles about coding as well as over a hundred on the topics of Culture, Design, User Science and Process. The A List Apart Magazine explores the most innovative ways to design and develop unique web content. It also focuses on the best practices that web designers have to go by and concentrates on the importance of web standards. The source code on the ALA website may be protected by copyright, however designers and coders who visit the website are allowed to use the code for free if they wish since it is available to everyone.

2. WebDesignerWall.com

This web design blog or ‘wall’ is full of brand new website design ideas for you to check out. It also contains a wide range of design and coding tutorials as well as information on all the latest web trends so that your website will have a design that is always up to date. The Web Designer Wall is very easy to navigate and features hundreds of helpful articles all in one convenient location. The articles featured on this website are based on topics that are about everything from creating CSS social media buttons to add to your site to fun giveaways that you can take part in. The creator of Web Designer Wall is a Toronto based web designer and illustrator that has years of experience creating stock icons, CSS websites and WordPress Themes. Some of the suggested offline reading material that Web Designer Wall has been featured in includes Web Designer magazine and .Net magazine.

3. Netmagazine.com

Where can you find the most professional and opinionated web design and coding related articles on the Internet? Look no further than Netmagazine.com. This well organized and up to date website is full of helpful articles that are on the cutting edge of everything that has to do with website design. Get access to the best tutorials and all the latest news about new developments in coding when you visit .net magazine’s website. This website is unlike all the other web development blogs and sites out there because it features more opinionated topics while still giving you access to the some of the most technologically advanced advice out there. You can also find the same helpful information offline by picking up the latest issue of the .net magazine.

4. Smashingmagazine.com

This website features a wide range of website design and coding topics with links broken down into sub-topics for more convenience. This site can provide you with CSS, HTML and JavaScript coding tutorials as well as all of the essentials that you will need to design your own WordPress theme, information on UX Design and a special Community area where you can share your opinion, discuss new web designs with others and spark creativity. As far as reading material goes, The Smashing magazine recommends that you pick up Redesign the Web, The third in the Smashing Book series that goes over how the Web has changed over the past few years and how it has completely renovated the world of web design.

5. Elated.com

Known for being one of the largest archives on the web when it comes to help with design and coding, Elated.com has been helping designers create high quality websites since 1997. It features a long list of articles on practically every topic you can think of along with innovative web templates, a large collection of stock images, Photoshop information, and a community forum where you can discuss all of the latest web design ideas with others. Learn more on Elated.com about how to get started with your own unique web design as well as gain more knowledge on how to fine tune your high tech site with a few helpful tweaks that will make your webpage better than it ever was before. If you are looking for one of the most trusted web design websites out there that can offer serious technical information as well as fun and creative template designs, Elated.com is the place for you.

Guest Author: Kimberly Clark is a Content Strategist who enjoys helping clients navigate through web design Louisville and beyond. From planning to ongoing content strategies, she has a deep understanding of the tools of the trade like social media and SEO. Kimberly is also a data fiend and uses it to develop unique, original and interesting web content that keeps visitors engaged and interacting. She works at: www.VIAStudio.com.

5 Ways We Can All Prepare For the Evolving Digital Future

Mobile Device Evolution by Adam Selwood

Google recently debuted “Project Glass,” their new augmented reality glasses that allow wearers the space-age capability to access information, video, and more in literally the blink of an eye. Project Glass is just the latest proof that technology is evolving at a relentless pace—and if you want to succeed, you’ve got to keep up. We’ve compiled five of the most important facets of preparing for a digital future below.

Educate yourself. Education is the name of the game when it comes to understanding and capitalizing on the digital future. There’s an IT school to suit every style of learning and level of skill, with online courses that offer valuable insight to computer newbies and savvy tech-experts alike. You’re just a few clicks away from finding a class that’ll keep you in the loop and ensure your continuing relevance in the digital marketplace.

Evaluate your digital needs. It’s tempting to get in line for every new gadget on the market, but too many devices can be distracting, not helpful. Evaluate the offerings of a new product before you pounce, and make sure it aligns with your needs; if you rely on practical features like GPS and email access, then a tablet designed specifically for movie streaming is just excess baggage.

Stay current. IT Degree aside, you can stay informed simply by perusing everyday headlines. Tech advancements are always in the news, and following trends in the current market can illuminate tech direction for the future. Set your smartphone to send you auto-updates and stay on top of the latest in the digital evolution.

Upgrade. Still lugging around a phone or laptop that looks and functions like an antique? Step into the light and upgrade to a product that can service your information, entertainment and business needs while streamlining your daily life.

Embrace change. The digital future is here, and you’d better get on board if you want to succeed. There’s no better time than the present to embrace the increased efficiency, reach, and control that technological advances can bring your life.

Guest Author: Philip J Reed, on behalf of Westwood College.

10 Invaluable WordPress Tools

If you want to make using WordPress an easier process, or just want to make the most out of what WordPress has to offer, check out these ten tools.

1. Bundlelytic

Bundlelyti

The great thing about this content package is that it is more than just beneficial for WordPress bloggers. It is also a charity package, which gives 100% of their proceeds to emergency programs through UNICEF. It comes with access to nine different services: Site5 Web Hosting, The Hello Bar, Themify, Pippity WP Plugin, Mad Mimi, CodeGuard, Sendible, OrganicThemes ‘Bold Theme’ and Themes Kingdom (5 different themes). Some of these, such as the themes, are one time purchases that give you full use rights. As for the services, they are between three and six month plans. In all, this is a $630 value package for $59, and all to help UNICEF. Definitely worth getting.

2. WPBeginner

WPBeginner

When you first go onto this site you might be a little confused. The format is a fantastic clone of the WP dashboard, complete with matching side icons. In itself, it is the perfect guide for the WP beginner. It goes through every element of the website, giving you a total tutorial to use. They also have a list of useful WordPress books you can read if you want to learn even more.

3. Guest Blog Checklist

Guest Blog Checklist

As a blog owner, you are responsible for the content that is posted on your site. The biggest issue with this comes with guest bloggers. While you can easily control the genre or topics they write on, it is harder to handle format. Most writers will try to follow by the general layout used on other posts, or follow your instructions, they can often forget something. Which leads to more work for you in edit. That is why having a checklist for guest post formatting is a great idea. You can make your own, or use this one by the great Ann Smarty. Download and customize it.

4. 7 Tips For WP

7 Tips For WP

Copyblogger is a very informative site, and they aim to provide simple posts with plenty of advice for the average blog owner. In this edition, they give you seven tips on how to make WP work for you. It includes tricks for your sidebar, navigation advice and more.

5. Creating A WP Template

Creating A WP Template (Video)

WordPress has a large selection of templates for you to use. Most of them are free, and some of them cost between $15 and $200. All of them are customizable and easily adapted for your needs. However, you might want something entirely your own. In that case, you will have to create one. Luckily, this isn’t as difficult as creating other coding, such as traditional graphic design. This video will show you how to make a template for WP, step by step.

6. Designing For WP

Designing For WP (Video)

If you want more information on design for WordPress, this series is a good place to start. They have a few videos explaining the finer points of the topic, starting from the Starkers theme rather than a default. In all, the video series runs about two hours and fifteen minutes.

7. Putting Custom Headers In WP (Video)

Sometimes you love a theme, but you hate the header that it generates. Which is fine, because it is very simple to create your own header. On this video it will break it down for you, showing exactly how to make a header that will fit your blog. You will be ready in a manner of minutes.

8. Modifying WP Themes

Modifying WP Themes (Video)

The most confusing part of customizing a blog for more WorPress users is modifying an existing theme. It doesn’t take that much to learn what you are doing. Each part is in a different area of the coding box. This video breaks it down for you and shows you how to make changes.

9. ScribeFire

ScribeFire

ScribeFire is a great plugin tool for Firefox, Chrome, Safari or Opera. It allows users to turn their browser into a full blog updater. Create new posts, edit old ones, work on SEO and more through the plugin itself. But best of all is that it allows you to work on all of your blogs in one place.

10. Broken Link Checker

Broken Link Checker

An official tool from WP, this allows you to check for any broken links in your posts. This makes it really easy to keep track of them, and to be alerted to any problems in the future.

Conclusion

If you want to make WordPress really work for you, then these ten tools can help. From getting advice on how to create a better blog to learning how to properly code your theme, they have everything you need to get things started.

Guest Author Jessy is the tech blogger for VIP Reality blog. Vip Reality is a Dallas real estate company preaching a high-quality approach to online marketing. All images courtesy Jessy.

Copyright Symbols You Need to Know

When you are planning on using or creating content for the web, it is important that you have a basic understanding of copyright law. That doesn’t mean you have to take a legal course on the subject. You just have to be aware of the fundamentals that make it less likely that you get into trouble.

Here are a few things you need to know: the different between a copyright and Creative Commons and how to assert or recognize each.

Symbol # 1

Any time the © symbol is present, the content is owned and cannot be used for commercial or sharing purposes without proper permission and credit. If you fail to meet this criteria, the content counts as being plagiarized. This could lead to lawsuits, fines and other consequences, depending on the context in which it was used.

Symbol # 2

While a © stands for a copyright, there is also a ™ for trademark and ® for a registered trademark. They are made with ( c ), ( tm ) and ( r ) in Windows, minus the spaces.

Symbol # 3

Creative Commons has its own symbols. These include attribution, derivatives, share-alike and noncommercial or commercial use. Each one signifies that an image can be used if the specified requirements, set by the creator, are met. Content that is in the public domain does not require any special rules to be listed or followed for use. For attribution, you must provide a credit with the content and link or source. Derivative and share-alike both refer to the presentation of similar or edited content based on the original. Commercial or noncommercial will tell you whether you can use it for a profitable venture. The creator may also have some special requirements to meet, such as telling them you have used the image, and where.

Symbol # 4

Any creative work is automatically copyrighted in the United States under the amended Copyright Act of 1988, as long as the work is created after March 1, 1989. If the work was created prior to that date, the creator or owner must have applied for copyright protection under the new law. This is why so much content prior to that date is within the public domain, as the copyright originally in place expired or it was never placed according to the amended law.

Bonus: One Tip

It is your responsibility as a creative owner of anything you create to place a copyright symbol upon the work when sharing it. This includes online, where it is easy to steal another’s work. Some websites made for sharing will automatically list it as copyrighted to you to protect themselves from liability. But you should always check, in case your work is plagiarized and you have to show the court that the user was aware of your ownership.

Conclusion

Copyright can be a complicated issue. But as long as you take steps to remember the basics you will be able to protect yourself from the most obvious risks, especially online, where it has become so easy to both have your work stolen and catch instances where it has occurred.

Guest Author Tom Chu is the SEO manager at PsPrint, an company specializing in online printing. PsPrint offers an array of free tools, for example it lets you make your own business cards online.

Image Credits: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

The Complete Set of Social Media Plugins for WordPress

WordPress is the most popular blogging, CMS and general website platform in the world, and for good reason! WordPress offers its users absolute ease of use with its simple and intuitive yet robust and powerful interface, giving everyone from light bloggers to network admins the ability to manage their websites with ease.

While WordPress has a slew of appealing features built right into its main open source package, one of the most highly regarded aspects of this CMS is its extendability with plugins. No matter what need you are trying to fill or what result you’re wanting to achieve, it is very likely that a plugin or two exist to make it happen with only a few clicks.

The line between blogging and social media is blurring more and more each day, making it increasingly necessary to integrate one within the other. If you’re looking to give your WordPress blog a boost via social media, plugins are the way to go and we’ve got some of the very best lined up for you right here!

General Social Sharing Plugins

Sociable

A simple, yet robust, social media sharing plugin and widget for WordPress, Sociable is a long-trusted social media solution for WordPress websites. With the option to choose from more than 100 social network platforms, buttons for each with automatically generated “share” links can be added to posts, pages or both with a click of a button, showing above or below the content as you choose.

Similar to Sociable in its functionality, ShareThis sports two main differences. The first of those differences is the manner in which ShareThis displays social media sharing links within your blog, offering a flyout menu instead of a string of button icons; when on-screen real estate is a concern, ShareThis is the best option. The second and perhaps more intriguing difference is the inclusion of tracking reports, allowing you to see at a glance how often your content is shared, and by who.

Network-Specific Social Sharing Plugins

TweetMeme

Used on more than 100,000 websites, including such giants as Wired.com and the official Time Magazine site, TweetMeme for WordPress has been the standard in WordPress/Twitter integration for more than four years. Including a simple “Tweet This” button in a spot of your choosing within your content, TweetMeme also offers a live count of clicks, letting both you and your visitors know just how popular your blog post is in the Twitterverse.

Google+1

Google+ may not match some of its competitors in terms of sheer size but its popular parent company and useful features have helped it to become by far the fastest growing social network leading into and through the first part of 2012. The Google+1 WordPress plugin does exactly what its title suggests, inserting a simple “+1” icon for your users to click in order to share your content with their Google+ circles.

Deep Integration Plugins

WP Social Toolbar

A beautiful and highly configurable complete social media solution for your WordPress website is the aptly named Social Toolbar. Placing a detailed but unobtrusive toolbar at the bottom of each page of your site, Social Toolbar for WordPress gives your users the ability to share anything, anywhere, with the click of a button. With options to configure your accounts, what you want included and every bit of color, this plugin can easily be adapted to any WordPress website with ease.

Social Metrics

When all is said and done, improving your blog’s position with social media sites depends on knowing and understanding your current performance: enter the Social Metrics WordPress plugin. Compatible with Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, LinkedIn and Google+, this plugin tracks and displays your site’s social media performance statistics and gives them back to you in an intuitive way to help you to understand what you’re doing right and where you can improve.

Guest Author Tom Chu is the SEO manager at PsPrint and PsPrint Blog. When he’s not sitting behind a computer, Tom likes watching sci-fi movies and Japanese cartoons, hitting the golf course and playing with his four dogs. You can connect with Tom via LinkedIn at LinkedIn.

iPhone 4S- How Does Siri Work?

It’s Monday morning and you get up from the bed to get ready to office. You wonder would it rain or not. You pick up your iPhone 4S, click on the microphone tab and ask the question-

‘Siri, Will I need an umbrella today?’

‘The weather is Sunny today in Sydney. Hence no need for the umbrella.’ Comes the prompt reply.

Welcome to the world of voice recognition and artificial intelligence. With the new iPhone 4S, the world of mobile phones has transformed how we use our electronic devices and has provided us with better productivity and convenience.

The Siri application has taken the world by storm by performing certain basic activities like taking notes, sending email, scheduling appointment and many more just by following voice commands. It is better than other speech recognition software we have encountered till now as instead of functioning on pre-determined words, Siri actually tries to understand what you speak and perform tasks accordingly. This leads to an important question- How does Siri work?

When a voice input is provided to Siri, a chain of algorithm is followed which tries to understand what the command means and accordingly produce the output. The following processes occur when you give a command to Siri-

How Does Siri Work?

Your sound is channeled through the noise cancelling microphone of the iPhone and is encoded into digital format and stored temporarily.
The digital data is then transferred via internet connection through your ISP to the Siri server located in cloud which is loaded with pre determined AI algorithms to understand the data and provide suitable feedback to your phone.
Further, the digital data in your iPhone is analyzed locally by a built in recognizer (which communicates with the server) installed in your phone which tries to determine whether the command can be resolved locally (by creating contacts, schedules etc.) or it must connect to the internet for command execution. (For more sophisticated commands like weather report, sending an email etc.)
The server compares the data with various statistical algorithms already provided and tries to understand the data based on the letters and order of the letters to come up with a solution for the command (voice command). Meanwhile the local recognizer in the phone also tries to compare the data with a shorter version of the statistical algorithm and comes up with a solution. Based on the highest probability between the two solutions, a go ahead signal is given to the corresponding channel.
The response is then passed through a language model which then tries to compare it with a list of probable interpretations to further ensure accuracy of the response. Then the phone will produce a voice feedback to insure that the command was properly understood. If the program is convinced with the results, then it will execute the task corresponding to what it understood.

For instance if it understands that you want to make an appointment with a certain contact, Jack, it will go ahead and ask the question ‘Do you want to make an appointment with Jack?’ to ensure that it properly understood your command.

If it receives a yes or a similar response to the question, (which will also be scrutinized in the same manner) then it will go ahead and create a new entry in the appointment folder with the appropriate note linking with the contact Jack.

The beauty of the program is that the whole process takes less than 3 seconds and can provide with instant feedback and solutions for your queries. Hence Siri can be regarded as a good start in field of Artificial intelligence and although it may not be perfect for now and make lot of mistakes, with further improvement in R&D, the future will be ruled by AI.

Guest author Divya Rawat is a mother and a self confessed SEO and tech-enthusiast. She works as a Writer @ iNetZeal (which offers variety of services including content wrting–click here to read more about their content writing service.)

Secure your Server-Side Scripting

There is no web server existing within our society that proves fail proof. Web servers are often targeted in organizations because of the sensitive information they contain. Securing a web server proves as momentous as securing web or website applications and the networks surrounding them. If you have a secure web application that is paired with an unsecured web server or if this is reciprocated, your business will remain a substantial risk.

Securing web servers can prove frustrating and tedious along with requiring expertise, but it is not an impossible task. Ensuring the company web servers are secured will save your company from various headaches and data breaches in the future. No matter the operating system you have or web server software you are using, an out of the box configuration is always unstable. Companies should implement necessary tasks to increase the security of their web servers.

The following is a list of steps that should be taken to protect business web servers:

1. Remote access

Server administrators should always log onto local web servers. If remote access is warranted, you must ensure that the remote connection is properly secured. This is achieved by tunneling and following encryption protocols. It never hurts to use security tokens and other sign-on equipment. Do not use public computers or networks when you are accessing business servers remotely. This means that when you are enjoying a cup of java in the cafÈ, do not try logging onto business servers.

2. Remove services that are unnecessary

Default configurations and operating system installations are never safe. In standard default installations, network services that will not be used in web server configurations are installed. Some great examples of this are printer server services, RAS and registry services. When your operating system has an abundance of services running on it, this leaves open more ports, thus leaving more ìbackdoorsî for hackers to take advantage of. Disable and turn off all unnecessary services and this will ensure the next time you boot up your server, they will not start automatically. This task will also provide that extra boost to your serverís performance with freeing up hardware resources.

3. Server-side scripting and web application content

Web applications and or website scripts and files should always be on separate partitions and not that of your operating system, system files or logs. Hackers can easily gain access to the web root directory and exploit vulnerabilities.

4. Separate testing/development and production environment

It proves faster and easier for developers to develop new versions of web applications on production servers. It also proves standard that testing and development of these applications are performed directly on the production servers. Because these types of web applications are in early development stages, they usually have different vulnerabilities, cannot handle exceptions properly and they lack input validation. These applications can easily be exploited and found by hackers with using ordinary, free tools found on the Internet.

To deal with this issue, developers have begun to develop internal applications that allow access to the databases, web servers and other resources. The applications typically do not have any restrictions because they are merely testing applications that normally are only accessed by developers. If testing and development is not performed on a production server, they can easily be found by hackers which can help them gain access to the production server.

Testing and development of web applications should be performed on remote servers from the Internet and should never connect to or use real life databases and information.

5. Installment of security patches

Just because your web server contains fully-patched software does not assure its security. Ensure that you pay close attention to updating the operating system, and software running on it. Any hacker will admit that one of the easiest ways to take advantage of operating systems is through unpatched software and servers.

6. Audit and monitor the server

Logs should always be stored in a segregated section in web servers. Network services logs, database server logs, operating system logs and website access logs should be monitored regularly. If you see suspicious activity occurring on the server, the action should immediately be investigated to see what exactly is going on.

7. Privileges and permissions

Network and file services play a vital part in the security of web servers. If a web server becomes compromised through network service software, hackers can use the account where the network service is running from to carry out their evil deeds. It proves necessary to assign privileges warranted for network services to run. It is necessary to backend databases and information.

8. Use scanners

Scanners prove to be practical tools that aid in automating and easing the process of web application and web server security. Scanners that include port scanners can enable port scans on the web server hosting web applications being scanned. Scanners will initiate various security checks in reviewing network services and open ports that are running on your web server.
Remove software extensions and unused modules

Default Apache installations contain various predefined modules that are enabled. Ensure that you turn off these modules to prevent attacks to these modules. This also applies to Internet Information Services (Microsoftís web server). By default, IIS is configured to serve various large application types such as ASP. NET, ASP and more. The application list extensions should only contain the extensions the web applications or website are using. Each application extension should be restricted to using HTTP verbs only, whenever possible.

User accounts

Any default user account creating when an operation system is installed should be immediately disabled afterwards. It proves necessary to examine the long list of softwareís that have been installed on the server. This software should be checked regularly and frequently. The admin account should be renamed and should not be used; the same applies to the root user on a Linux/ Unix install. Any admin accessing the server should have their own user account with privileges. It is also highly recommended not to share your user account information with anyone.

Conclusion

In our modern era, tips and information on software and operating systems can easily be found on the Internet. It proves useful to stay informed while educating yourself about new tools and malicious attacks. One easy way to accomplish this task is by reading security-type magazines, forums, newsletters or other types of communities. Knowledge is power and the more you learn, the more you will be able to protect the security of server-side scripting.

Guest author Alfred Richards an experienced web designer and has profound knowledge of web hosting and web marketing, to know more visit his site VPN service.