BinaryWolf

Cool Tools - The Beast

January 11, 2005 | In hardware | No Comments

The Beast is the most powerful flashlight SureFire has ever produced for civilian sale. Utilizing a xenon-fill high-intensity discharge (HID) arc lamp, it puts out 2000 lumens of blinding white light � 120 times the light output of a typical two D-cell alkaline flashlight.

Only 85 Beasts are being offered for sale to private citizens. No kidding, at $2900.00 a pop, I don’t imagine they are flying out the door.

What Bloggers Can Learn From Journalists

January 10, 2005 | In blogging | No Comments

Blogging can be not only influential, but also great fun. As Wonkette.com’s Ana Marie Cox has said, “It’s all chocolate cake and no potatoes.”

Of course, as blogging has grown up — from exclusively the domain of hobbyists typing for the world from their spare bedrooms to the addition of top-flight bloggers making careers of it and bringing in professional salaries — the diet has become a bit more balanced, at least for some.

Bloggers need to eat their vegetables, too, if they expect to grow up and win the respect of larger audiences and survive the rigors of long-term publishing…

…bloggers could learn a thing or two from traditional journalists.

Let us count the ways.

Six Apart buys Live Journal

January 7, 2005 | In blogging | No Comments Six Apart (Movable Type) buys Live Journal.

Q. What is LiveJournal?
A. LiveJournal is an online community organized around personal journals. LiveJournal is run by Danga, a Portland, Oregon-based company founded by Brad Fitzpatrick in 1999. The company has helped fuel the rapid growth of weblogging by offering consumers both free and paid subscriptions to its easy to use personal publishing blogging tool, built on open source software. Every week, over 860,000 users update their blogs. LiveJournal’s users are predominately in their teens and twenties, younger than users of Six Apart’s other products.

Q. Why did Six Apart acquire LiveJournal?
A. We think LiveJournal is a great community and a great company founded and run by a really talented team that is just as fanatical about blogging and online communication as we are. They have done an amazing job growing and supporting their online community and we think there is a lot we can learn from each other.

Search the Compact Oxford English Dictionary

January 7, 2005 | In search engines | No Comments The Compact Oxford English Dictionary of Current English contains 145,000 words, phrases, and definitions. Merriam-Webster Online is another choice for “looking up” words. Try your local library’s Web page as well. Your library card might be the key to unlocking many excellent free online reference resources.

Search Engine Submission Tips

January 6, 2005 | In search engines | No Comments

This section of Search Engine Watch is primarily for webmasters, site owners and web marketers. It covers search engine submission, placement and marketing issues. It explains how search engines find and rank web pages, with an emphasis on what webmasters can do to improve their search engine rankings by properly submitting, using better page design, HTML meta tags, and other tips.

Essentials of Search Engine Submission
1. Intro To Search Engine Submission
2. Your Search Engine Submission Budget
3. Submitting To Directories: Yahoo & The Open Directory
4. Submitting To Crawlers: Google, Yahoo, Ask/Teoma & Microsoft’s MSN
5. Submitting Via Paid Listings: Overture & Google AdWords

Optimizing for Crawlers
1. Intro to Search Engine Optimization
2. How Search Engines Work
3. How Search Engines Rank Web Pages
4. Search Engine Placement Tips
5. How To Use HTML Meta Tags

Nvu Open Source Web Authoring System

January 5, 2005 | In software | No Comments Nvu is designed for Linux desktop, however a Windows version is available. Currently in beta and backed by Linspire.

Nvu (pronounced N-view, for a “new view”) is a complete Web Authoring System that combines web file management and easy-to-use WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) web page editing. Nvu is designed to be extremely easy to use, making it ideal for non-technical computer users who want to create an attractive, professional-looking web site without needing to know HTML or web coding.

Microsoft�s Worst Nightmare

January 4, 2005 | In search engines | No Comments 19-year-old Blake Ross helped to create Firefox at age 17.

Mozilla was already trying to develop an open-source alternative browser to Microsoft�s Explorer, which many analysts felt had grown clumsy and outdated. Mr Ross and his friend David Hyatt began working on a small, user-focused browser. What began as an experimental side-project turned into Firefox.

Firefox
# Open source, non-profit software allows programmers to add applications and utilities � hundreds available free
# Can block pop-up adverts
# PC, Mac and Linux versions
# Tabbed viewing to switch easily between sites in same window
# Very fast rendering

Safari
# Apple�s browser for Macs, blocks pop-ups and allows tabbed viewing
# Many free add-ons available, such as customisable skins

Opera
# Tabbed browsing and pop-up blocking
# Customisable skins
# Mac, PC and Linux versions available

Internet Explorer
# Used by 90 per cent of internet users
# Riddled with security holes. Most web viruses exploit weaknesses in IE
# PC and Mac versions