To Do or Not To Do
Was surfing around the Internet when I should have been working and came across this. For some reason, it struck me as something I wanted to do. I have linked where I got it from and left the link from that site to where they got it from. Good neighbors, and all that.
Re-robbed from ellybabes – I just highlighted what I’ve done in BLUE, I probably want to do all the other ones that don’t involve hospitals or being attacked 
ellybabes said: Robbed from K8 the GR8 – all the things I’ve done are BLUE, all those I want to do are in RED.
1. Started my own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. I have played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than I can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sung a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched lightning at sea
14. Taught myself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown my own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitchhiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb (and fed it too)
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse (was still in grade school)
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of my ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught myself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke in public
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had my portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris (Seen in person on the ground)
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma.
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check/cheque
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job (Laid off, technically J )
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had my picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Ridden an elephant
And, as number 101, had a new post inspire a new Category, instead of the other way around. My new "Time Waster" category now has a post.
A Question of Greatness
Ok, the title is overstated, but I’m tired of writing boring titles to get better search results.
Today, I have questions rattling around in my brain, some of which are more important than others, some of which could change the way do things or handle my workflow, and some of which are nothing more than minor concerns that an inquiring mind wants to know about.
- Is it really worthwhile / doable / smart to use WordPress to manage a normal "static" website? The truth is that static websites generally aren’t really all that static, but they do have a more set structure, unlike a blog. Often, the changes and tweaks made to a page are relatively minor and it seems like overkill to fire up Dreamweaver CS4 just to add a link to a freelance writing samples page, for example. On the other hand, I get more flexibility and understand more of what is going on from a non-WordPress angle. (My HTML / XHTML / CSS is stronger than my PHP / mySQL.)
- Why can’t I find a non-complicated way to make lists on a website with explanation text? Take the list you are looking at. Ideally, there would be a number followed by the question. Then, underneath that there would be this explanatory text instead of having to rely on the bold to separate the question from the text. I know it can be done, but it’s just so much effort to click all the buttons to make it happen or keep all of the <ol> <ul> <li> code straight.
- Is Technorati (or any others) really that important? Unfortunately, the worlds of web design, search engines, SEO, and social networking are all dominated by techie types. That means that when it comes to things like Technorati, Digg, Twitter, or whatever, the volume tends to be disproportionately loud. Is getting indexed, listed, or whatever on these sites worth the time and effort? Or, more specifically…
- Is It Better To Add Technorati Specific Tags to Posts, or Will WordPress’ Ping Take Care of It? Considering that I have no real interest in trying to force my way to the top of Technorati or any other site by any means other than writing good stuff, do I get any benefit from taking the extra time to "tag" my posts with Technorati tags?
- Do All Those Incoming Yahoo Glue Links Count for Anything? My incoming links for some of my sites are filled with links that come from Yahoo Glue. Do I get anything out of those?
- What If Google Knows What It Is Doing? Pretty much all SEO techniques both on-page SEO tactics, and off-site SEO linking, assume that Google needs a lot of help getting its index and search rankings results right. In other words, that Google isn’t a very good search engine. That doesn’t seem right does it? I mean, it’s the #1 Search Engine in the world for a reason. Microsoft has tried 3 times to create something that even comes close and couldn’t. Does it really make sense then that Google’s search results are so delicate that they can be heavily influenced by something as simple as changing a few HTML tags?
- If Google Knows What It Is Doing, Then Why Do So Many Search Results Suck? As a corollary to the above, why are some search results so terrible? Is it that Google’s famed reliance on incoming links, or links pointing to a webpage or website, makes it too vulnerable to being conned into ranking lesser sites above better ones? This seems especially true when it comes to authoritative websites. Consider this search for california school rankings
The obvious authoritative source is the actual rankings published by California. In fact, both of the sites that rank higher are nothing more than interfaces tacked onto the data provided by the third link. A search for california school ratings produces a similar result except that the #4 result becomes the #2 result.
There are much worse examples, this is just the one I came up with off the top of my head for a quick blog post. Fortunately, the other sites listed above the official one aren’t scam sites or obvious web spam. They are both trying to milk free publicly available information to show advertising and get people to sign up (get email addresses) and perhaps even pay for "premium" information.
The fact that the official California API results ranks so high, however, is a testament to Question #3. Look at the Academic Performance Index (API) page from the California Department of Education, and you will see a website that has no redeemable SEO qualities whatsoever – in the traditional sense, at least. And, yet, there it is at #3.
Like most "official" websites, they have better things to do than keyword research, emailing other websites to beg for links, and so on. On more competitive keywords, this is often much worse, with scam sites or obvious web spam ranking above the official resources.
The worst examples are often those where the higher ranking sites offer biased or otherwise slanted information, while the official, unbiased, sites rank much lower. This is because of a combination of using every SEO trick in the book, and then the fact that like minded supporters will link to the websites that promote their point of view, rather than the straight factual websites which might include information that they don’t like.
Search your favorite, financial, political, governmental, or judicial topic to find examples.
Back to Work
Ok, I’ve spent too much time writing this today already. Off to make money freelance writing. Don’t worry, I’ll be back later.
News From Microsoft
So far this morning, I’ve stumbled across some updates from Microsoft that impact me or some of the freelance articles I’m writing (or scheduled to write).
First, Microsoft is no longer accepting beta participants for its Security Essentials program. Security Essentials is a multi-dimensional securities application, but for the average home user, it is a free virus scanner with free virus definition updates. While there are other utilities like this out there, this one would presumably come with technical support from Microsoft which could make it a viable option for businesses. No word on how this would, or would not, impact the other major security vendors out there.
Next, I found out that Dell is offering the same kind of migration assistance and upgrade tools as pretty much every other first-tier PC manufacturer, but for some reason, they get a pretty extensive and flowery write-up in the Windows Blog. Wonder if there is a marketing deal there, or if Microsoft is just showing some love, or if the Windows team is handing out a little payback for what appears to be some pretty hefty testing work done by Dell during the Windows 7 beta and Windows 7 RC periods.
And lastly, the same Windows Blog apparently is reading my thoughts while I’m laying in bed. Last night I was going through what the differences are between XP Mode and Med-V , other than that Med-V only is available to business clients with Software Assurance licenses or other enterprise licensing. Looks like I can use this post as the jumping off point for a nice freelance computer article.
This isn’t news, but I was using Internet Explorer a bit this morning and was thinking that it would be really great if I could customize this page that opens whenever you open a new tab in IE 8. Not that I can change what page appears when you open a new tab, I know I can do that, but rather that I could change / add to what links are information are displayed on this page:
I’ll haven’t done much with IE 8 other than upgrade to it so that I have the least insecure Internet browser Microsoft makes, so with a little digging, maybe I’ll find that I can do exactly what I want.
Cheers.
Firefox 3.5 vs. Chrome 2 Why Firefox Wins For This User
I do a lot of reading online. Some of it is for my freelance writing business, other times, it is research for my own projects like my saving and investing advice website, and other times, it just shows up in my RSS Feeds which I never used to read, but now read all the time because I like reading them on my phone (via Google Reader on Windows Mobile). Plus, I’m a reformed IT professional, and you can take the techie out of the computer world, buy you can’t take the computer world out of the techie.
Anyway, a lot of sites and feeds I read are starting to trickle out articles about why people are switching from Firefox to Google Chrome as their primary browser.
When I read the reasons why these people think that Chrome is better than Firefox, I realize that they don’t use their browsers like I do. They may think they are power-users, but until you’ve done 24 Google searches (still open in their tabs in case you still haven’t found what you need), opened 100+ sites, twenty or so online PDF files, clicked every one of the reference links at the bottom of eight or nine Wikipedia articles (Wikipedia is a good way to find sources, Wikipedia is not a good source for professional writers.) read through page 188 of a 533 page SEC public comments posting in order to find out just where the regulatory agency stands on what type of disclaimer is required in an investment related corporate email, all while still messing around on Facebook, Twitter, and Hulu, you don’t know what a power browser is.
Ironically, you don’t even have to push the browsers to advanced capabilities to see that Firefox is better than Google Chrome (at least for now.)
Why Firefox Is Better Than Chrome For Main Browser
When you are done running tests and calculating that Chrome loads a Javascript page in 1.834 seconds while Firefox takes 2.122 seconds, the choice comes down not to speed, but usability and functionality. There are several critical features that are missing in Google Chrome, either intentionally, or someone just hasn’t gotten around to it yet.
I’m not talking about playful little plug-ins and things like moon-phase calendars or digital clocks or skins. I’m talking about things that interrupt my workflow so dramatically, that it causes me to sit stunned for a few seconds while I try and figure out what the best way to proceed is. Do I work around it in Chrome, or do I wait forever for Firefox to load and copy and past the link over there?
Here are the Top Reasons Firefox is Better Than Chrome As a Default Browser
- File Handling – I don’t care if Chrome’s built-in download manager is better or not. Sometimes I don’t want to download the file (or technically, I want to download it in the background instead). PDF files come to mind. There are hundreds of PDF files that are linked to out there. In Firefox, it opens Foxit Reader and loads the file. I can scan it and decide whether to read it, save it, or get rid of it and move on. In Chrome, it downloads it, puts a button at the bottom of the screen and waits for me to decide what to do with it. That’s after it asked me where to save it. I had to create a temporary directory just so I have a place to put all of those little files that I have to fully download and store in Chrome, just so I can access it. I also get no choice to Open, Run, or anything else. You can’t get through 40 PDF files on a website by doing it this way.
- Google Updater – Yeah, I know, they finally pulled their head out and started doing it in a way that makes sense, but I spent so many months killing, deleting, closing, and stopping Google Update from starting automatically with Windows, that I don’t even know how to go back to letting it run. By the way, even if it doesn’t run all the time it still runs every single hour and doesn’t bother checking with you to see if now is a good time to update. If you are pushing a tight deadline and trying to download, proof, and re-upload some big files, too bad. Google Update will be wasting your bandwidth (and number of connections) downloading the upgrade from version 2.1.03.2 to 2.1.03.3, because we all know that is more important.
- No Print Preview – Seriously, how hard is this to code? There is nothing quite like printing out what you think will be 2 pages only to get 14 pages thanks to all the extra stuff that prints funny. I also hate that one extra line that prints on a new page. I never print without preview first, and Chrome doesn’t have one.
- Plug-ins – No Zotero, no default browser. The same people that used to say plug-ins were one of the main reasons Firefox was so much better than Internet Explorer, now say they don’t need them. Not me. Some of my plug-ins are optional, but plenty of my add-ons are not optional.
- Bookmark Tags – No tag support for bookmarks? I long ago passed the point where folders were sufficient to find my bookmarks efficiently, this is a deal killer.
Notice that I didn’t say anything about Ad-block Plus or NoScript or other Firefox add-ons that make browsing less annoying. If those are your main reasons for using Firefox, then by all means, switch over to Chrome. But, until I have usable bookmarks, usable printing, usable file handling, and my can’t-live-without-them add-ons, Chrome will be my secondary browser.
Chrome Is Faster
Don’t get me wrong. Chrome is faster, way, way, faster. The quicker start-up time alone is worth the extra resources I use up having another browser. When I need to check something out quickly, Chrome is my go to browser. But, when I’m settling in to get some real work done, it’s worth the wait to start up Firefox.
