Web Design, Flash Video Streaming, Application Development, SEO

CSS Layouts

2007-05-15T10:22:00.000-07:00

CSS page layout uses the Cascading Style Sheets format, rather than traditional HTML tables or frames, to organize the content on a web page. The basic building block of the CSS layout is the div tag—an HTML tag that in most cases acts as a container for text, images, and other page elements. When you create a CSS layout, you place div tags on the page, add content to them, and position them in various places. Unlike table cells, which are restricted to existing somewhere within the rows and columns of a table, div tags can appear anywhere on a web page. You can position div tags absolutely (by specifying x and y coordinates), or relatively (by specifying their distance from other page elements).

Creating CSS layouts from scratch can be difficult because there are so many ways to do it. You can create a simple two-column CSS layout by setting floats, margins, paddings, and other CSS properties in a nearly infinite number of combinations. Additionally, the problem of cross-browser rendering causes certain CSS layouts to display properly in some browsers, and display improperly in others. Dreamweaver makes it easy for you to build pages with CSS layouts by providing over 30 pre-designed layouts that work across different browsers.

Using the pre-designed CSS layouts that come with Dreamweaver is the easiest way to create a page with a CSS layout, but you can also create CSS layouts using Dreamweaver absolutely-positioned elements (AP elements). An AP element in Dreamweaver is an HTML page element—specifically, a div tag, or any other tag—that has an absolute position assigned to it. The limitation of Dreamweaver AP elements, however, is that since they are absolutely positioned, their positions never adjust on the page according to the size of the browser window.

If you are an advanced user, you can also insert div tags manually and apply CSS positioning styles to them to create page layouts.

CSS page Layout Tutorial Video

Requirements

To complete this tutorial you will need to download the following software and files:

Dreamweaver CS3 - 30 days trial download

About CSS page layout structure :

Before proceeding with this section, you should be familiar with basic CSS concepts.

Figure 1. A. Container div B. Sidebar div C. Main Content

<!--container div tag-->
<div id="container">
<!--sidebar div tag-->

<div id="sidebar">
<h3>Sidebar Content</h3>

<p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit.</p>
<p>Maecenas urna purus, fermentum id, molestie in, commodo  porttitor, felis.</p>

</div>

<!--mainContent div tag-->

<div id="mainContent">
<h1> Main Content </h1>
<p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Praesent aliquam,  justo convallis
luctus rutrum.</p>

<p>Phasellus tristique purus a augue condimentum adipiscing. Aenean  sagittis. Etiam leo pede,
rhoncus venenatis, tristique in, vulputate at, odio.</p>

<h2>H2 level heading </h2>
<p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Praesent aliquam,
justo convallis luctus rutrum, erat nulla fermentum diam, at nonummy quam  ante ac quam.</p>
</div>

</div>

In the above example, there is no “styling” attached to any of the div tags. Without CSS rules defined, each div tag and its contents fall into a default location on the page. However, if each div tag has a unique id (as in the above example), you can use the ids to create CSS rules that, when applied, change the style and positioning of the div tags. The following CSS rule, which can reside in the head of the document or in an external CSS file, creates styling rules for the first, or “container” div tag on the page:

#container {
width: 780px;
background: #FFFFFF;
margin: 0 auto;
border: 1px solid #000000;
text-align: left;
}

The #container rule styles the container div tag to have a width of 780 pixels, a white background, no margin (from the left side of the page), a solid, black, 1 pixel border, and text that is aligned left. The results of applying the rule to the container div tag are as follows:

Figure 2. Container div tag, 780 pixels, no margin

A. Text aligned left B. White background C. 1-pixel solid black border

The next CSS rule creates styling rules for the sidebar div tag:

#sidebar {
float: left;
width: 200px;
background: #EBEBEB;
padding: 15px 10px 15px 20px;
}

The #sidebar rule styles the sidebar div tag to have a width of 200 pixels, a gray background, a top and bottom padding of 15 pixels, a right padding of 10 pixels, and a left padding of 20 pixels. Additionally, the rule positions the sidebar div tag with float: left—a property that pushes the sidebar div tag to the left side of the container div tag. The results of applying the rule to the sidebar div tag are as follows:

Figure 3. Sidebar div, float left

A. Width 200 pixels B. Top and bottom padding, 15 pixels

Last, the CSS rule for the main container div tag finishes the layout:

#mainContent {
margin: 0 0 0 250px;
padding: 0 20px 20px 20px;
}

The #mainContent rule styles the main content div with a left margin of 250 pixels, which means that it places 250 pixels of space between the left side of the container div, and the left side of the main content div. Additionally, the rule provides for 20 pixels of spacing on the right, bottom, and left sides of the main content div. The results of applying the rule to the mainContent div are as follows:

Figure 4. Main Content div, left margin of 250 pixels

A. 20 pixels left padding B. 20 pixels right padding C. 20 pixels bottom padding

The complete code looks as follows

Note: The above example code is a simplified version of the code that creates the two-column fixed left sidebar layout when you create a new document using the predesigned layouts that come with Dreamweaver.

Create a page with a CSS layout using DREAMWEAVER

When creating a new page in Dreamweaver, you can create one that already contains a CSS layout. Dreamweaver comes with over 30 different CSS layouts that you can choose from. Additionally, you can create your own CSS layouts and add them to the configuration folder so that they appear as layout choices in the New Document dialog box.

Dreamweaver CSS layouts render correctly in the following browsers: Firefox (Windows and Macintosh) 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0; Internet Explorer (Windows) 5.5, 6.0, 7.0; Opera (Windows and Macintosh) 8.0, 9.0; and Safari 2.0.

Select File > New.
In the New Document dialog box, select the Blank Page category. (It’s the default selection.)
For Page Type, select the kind of page you want to create. Note: You must select an HTML page type for the layout. For example, you can select HTML, ColdFusion®, JSP, and so on. You cannot create an ActionScript™, CSS, Library Item, JavaScript, XML, XSLT, or ColdFusion Component page with a CSS layout. Page types in the Other category of the New Document dialog box are also restricted from including CSS page layouts.
For Layout, select the CSS layout you want to use. You can choose from over 30 different layouts. The Preview window shows the layout and gives a brief description of the selected layout.
The pre-designed Dreamweaver CSS layouts provide the following types of columns:

Fixed Column width is specified in pixels. The column does not resize based on the size of the browser or the site visitor’s text settings. (Non recommended)
Elastic Column width is specified in a unit of measurement (ems) relative to the size of the text. The design adapts if the site visitor changes the text settings, but does not change based on the size of the browser window. (Yahoo.com Layout)
Liquid Column width is specified as a percentage of the site visitor’s browser width. The design adapts if the site visitor makes the browser wider or narrower, but does not change based on the site visitor’s text settings. (Accessible layouts)
Hybrid Columns are a combination of any of the previous three options. For example, the two-column hybrid, right sidebar layout has a main column that scales to the size of the browser, and an elastic column on the right that scales to the size of the site visitor’s text settings.

5. Select a document type from the DocType pop‑up menu.

6. Select a location for the layout’s CSS from the Layout CSS in pop‑up menu.

Add To Head Adds CSS for the layout to the head of the page you’re creating.
Create New File Adds CSS for the layout to a new external CSS stylesheet and attaches the new stylesheet to the page you’re creating.
Link To Existing File Lets you specify an existing CSS file that already contains the CSS rules needed for the layout. This option is particularly useful when you want to use the same CSS layout (the CSS rules for which are contained in a single file) across multiple documents.

7. Do one of the following:

If you selected Add to Head from the Layout CSS in pop‑up menu (the default option), click Create.
If you selected Create New File from the Layout CSS pop‑up menu, click Create, and then specify a name for the new external file in the Save Style Sheet File As dialog box.
If you selected Link to Existing File from the Layout CSS in pop‑up menu, add the external file to the Attach CSS file text box by clicking the Add Style Sheet icon, completing the Attach External Style Sheet dialog box, and clicking OK. When you’re finished, click Create in the New Document dialog box.Note: When you select the Link to Existing File option, the file you specify must already have the rules for the CSS file contained within it.

Note: Internet Explorer conditional comments (CCs), which help work around IE rendering issues, remain embedded in the head of the new CSS layout document, even if you select New External File or Existing External File as the location for your layout CSS.(Optional) You can also attach CSS style sheets to your new page (unrelated to the CSS layout) when you create the page. To do this, click the Attach Style Sheet icon above the Attach CSS file pane and select a CSS style sheet.

Add custom CSS layouts to the list of choices

Create an HTML page that contains the CSS layout you’d like to add to the list of choices in the New Document dialog box. The CSS for the layout must reside in the head of the HTML page.
TIP: To make your custom CSS layout consistent with the other layouts that come with Dreamweaver, you should save your HTML file with the .htm extension.
Add the HTML page to the Adobe Dreamweaver CS3\Configuration\BuiltIn\Layouts folder.
(Optional) Add a preview image of your layout (for example a .gif or .png file) to the Adobe Dreamweaver CS3\Configuration\BuiltIn\Layouts folder. The default images that come with Dreamweaver are 227 pixels wide x 193 pixels high PNG files. TIP: Give your preview image the same file name as your HTML file so that you can easily keep track of it. For example, if your HTML file is called myCustomLayout.htm, call your preview image myCustomLayout.png.
(Optional) Create a notes file for your custom layout by opening the Adobe Dreamweaver CS3\Configuration\BuiltIn\Layouts\_notes folder, copying and pasting any of the existing notes files in the same folder, and renaming the copy for your custom layout. For example, you could copy the oneColElsCtr.htm.mno file, and rename it myCustomLayout.htm.mno.

(Optional) After you’ve created a notes file for your custom layout, you can open the file and specify the layout name, description, and preview image.

Flash Video can be Progressive or Streamed

2007-05-13T01:57:00.000-07:00

Social Network Video Publishing

What Is Flash Video ?

Flash Video (FLV) is a proprietary file format used to deliver Videos over the world wide web using Adobe Flash Player (Macromedia Flash Player). Prominent users of the Flash Video format are the social networks like YouTube, Myspace, Google Video, Yahoo! Video and a few more.

Technology behind Flash Video Files

Commonly Flash Video files contain video bit streams which are a variant of the H.263 video standard, under the name of Sorenson Spark. Flash Player 8.0 and 9.0 support the playback of On2 TrueMotion VP6 video bit streams. On2 VP6 Video Compression codec can provide a higher visual quality than Sorenson Spark, especially when using lower bit rates. On the other hand it is computationally more complex and therefore will not run as well on certain older server systems. on2 Flix Engine (compression technology) requires Redhat Linux Enterprise Version 4.0 to be upgraded to PHP Developer version.

Flash Video files can be published in two ways :

PROGRESSIVE DOWNLOAD via HTTP (supported by Flash Player 7 and later versions). This method uses Action Script to include an externally hosted Flash Video file client-side for playback. Progressive download has several Advantages, including buffering, use of generic HTTP servers, and the ability to reuse a single SWF player for multiple Flash Video sources.

Flash Player 8 includes support for random access within video files using the partial download functionality of HTTP, sometimes referred to as streaming.

Disadvantage : However, unlike streaming using RTMP, HTTP "streaming" does not support real-time broadcasting.

Streaming via HTTP requires a custom player and the injection of specific Flash Video metadata containing the exact starting position in bytes and timecode of each keyframe. Using this specific information, a custom Flash Video player can request any part of the Flash Video file starting at a specified keyframe. For example, Google Video supports progressive download and can seek to any part of the video before buffering is complete, whereas YouTube cannot. The server-side part of this "HTTP pseudo-streaming" method can be implemented, for example in PHP or as an Apache HTTPD module.

Streamingvia RTMP to the Flash Player using the Adobe Flash Media Server 2.0 is the most recognized and implemented by sites like Youtube. An alternative which promises the same quality is the open source Red5 server. However its still not an established server and we are not sure about its performance as none of the recognized social networks have used them.

Conclusion : Social Network Video Publishing requires three components :

Compression Video Codec that generates FLV file format : on2 Flix Engine is generally the unanimous choice. Single client license costs 3,800 US$. Demo version is also available.
Custom Flash Video player (you can embed your logo and brand it). Your developer can make this for you or you can order here.
Streaming Videos require Flash Media Server 2.0. Singe client license costs 4,500 US$.

If you are looking to have Progressive Downloads then Flash Media Server (iii) is not necessary. The server-side part "HTTP pseudo-streaming" method can be implemented, in PHP or as an Apache HTTPD module.

If you are looking to build a social network with video streaming and convinced to go forward immediately, then you can contact us.

Search engine friendly URL and navigation

2007-05-01T14:17:00.000-07:00

A search engine friendly URL doesn't contain a question mark followed by a list of variables and their values. A search engine friendly URL is short and contains the keywords describing the page's content best, separated by hyphens. This does not only help with rankings, it helps visitors and especially bookmarkers too.

However, it's not always possible to avoid query strings. All the major search engines have learned to crawl dynamic pages, but there are limits:

· Search engine spiders dislike long and ugly URLs. They get indexed from very popular sites, but dealing with small web sites spiders usually don't bother fetching the page.

· Links from dynamic pages seem to count less than links from static pages when it comes to ranking based on link popularity. Also, some crawlers don't follow links from dynamic pages more than one level deep.

· To reduce server loads, search engine spiders crawl dynamic content slower than static pages. On large sites, it's pretty common that a huge amount of dynamic pages buried in the 3rd linking level and below never get indexed.

· Most search engine crawlers ignore URLs with session IDs and similar stuff in the query string, to prevent the spiders from fetching the same content over and over in infinite loops. Search engine robots do not provide referrers and they do not accept cookies, thus every request gets a new session ID assigned. Each variant of a query string creates a new unique URL.

· Keywords in variables and their values are pretty useless for ranking purposes, if they count at all. If you find a page identified by the search term in its query string on the SERPs, in most cases the search term is present as visible or even invisible text too, or it was used as anchor text of inbound links.

· There are still search engine crawlers out there which refuses dynamic links.

Thumb Rules On search engine friendly URL's:

· Keep them short. Less variables gain more visibility.

· Keep your variable names short, but do not use 'ID' or composites of entities and 'ID'.

· Hide user tracking from search engine crawlers in all URLs appearing in (internal) links. That's tolerated cloaking, because it helps search engines. Ensure to output useful default values when a page gets requested without a session ID and the client does not accept cookies.

· Keep the values short. If you can, go for integers. Don't use UUIDs/GUIDs and similar randomly generated stuff in query strings if you want the page indexed by search engines. Exception: in forms enabling users to update your database use GUIDs/UUIDs only, because integers encourage users to play with them in the address bar, which leads to unwanted updates and other nasty effects.

Consider providing static looking URLs, for example on Apache use mod_rewrite to translate static URLs to script URLs + query string. Ensure your server does not send a redirect response (302/301) then. Or, on insert of tuples in a 'pages' database table, you can store persistent files for each dynamic URL, calling a script on request.

For example a static URL like http://www.yourDomain.com/nutrition/vitamins-minerals-milk-4711.htm can include a script parsing the file name to extract the parameter(s) necessary to call the output script. In this example the keywords were extracted from the page's title and the pageID '4711' makes the URL unique within the domain's namespace.

The ideal internal link looks like

keyword-phrase

Search Engines Inside Stories

2007-05-01T13:56:00.000-07:00

Recap:

Let's recap the basic methods of steering and supporting search engine crawling and ranking:

# Provide unique content. A lot of unique content. Add fresh content frequently.
# Acquire valuable inbound links from related pages on foreign servers, regardless of their search engine ranking. Actively acquire deep inbound links to content pages, but accept home page links. Do not run massive link campaigns if your site is rather new. Let the amount of relevant inbound links grow smoothly and steadily to avoid red-flagging.
# Put in carefully selected outbound links to on-topic authority pages on each content page. Ask for reciprocal links, but do not dump your links if the other site does not link back.
# Implement a surfer friendly, themed navigation. Go for text links to support deep crawling. Provide each page at least one internal link from a static page, for example from a site map page.
# Encourage other sites to make use of your RSS feeds and alike. To protect the uniqueness of your site's content, do not put text snippets from your site into feeds or submitted articles. Write short summaries instead and use a different wording.
# Use search engine friendly, short but keyword rich URLs. Hide user tracking from search engine crawlers.
# Log each crawler visit and keep these data forever. Develop smart reports querying your logs and study them frequently. Use these logs to improve your internal linking.
# Make use of the robots exclusion protocol to keep spiders away from internal areas. Do not try to hide your CSS files from robots.
# Make use of the robots META tag to ensure that only one version of each page on your server gets indexed. When it comes to pages carrying partial content of other pages, make your decision based on common sense, not on any SEO bible.
# Use rel="nofollow" in your links, when you cannot vote for the linked page (user submitted content in guestbooks, blogs ...).
# Make use of Google SiteMaps as a 'robots inclusion protocol'.
# Do not cheat the search engines.

Robots.txt
------------

http://www.yourdomain.com/robots.txt behaves like any other PHP script. Your file system's directory structure has nothing to do with your linking structure, that is your site's hierarchy. However, you can store scripts delivering content which is not subject of public access in directories protected by robots.txt. To prevent this content from all unwanted views, add user/password protection.

User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /*affid=
Disallow: /*sessionID=
Disallow: /*visitorID=
Disallow: /*.aspx$
User-agent: Googlebot-Image
Disallow: /*.gif$

"*" matches any sequence of characters, "$" indicates the end of a name.

The first example would disallow all dynamic URLs were the variable 'affid' (affiliate ID) is part of the query string. The second and third example disallow URLs containing a session ID or a visitor ID. The fourth example excludes .aspx page scripts without a query string from crawling. The fifth example tells Google's image crawler to fetch all image formats except .gif files. Because not all Web robots understand this syntax, it makes sound sense to put in a URL Specific Control: the Robots META Tag.

INDEX|NOINDEX - Tells the SE spider whether the page may be indexed or not
FOLLOW|NOFOLLOW - Tells the SE crawler whether it may follow links provided on the page or not
ALL|NONE - ALL = INDEX, FOLLOW (default), NONE = NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW
NOODP - tells search engines not to use page titles and descriptions from the ODP on their SERPs.
NOYDIR - tells Yahoo! search not to use page titles and descriptions from the Yahoo! directory on the SERPs.
NOARCHIVE - Google specific1, used to prevent archiving
NOSNIPPET - Google specific, prevents Google from displaying text snippets for your page on its SERPs

Difference between Organic SEO and PPC

2007-04-30T14:51:00.000-07:00

It doesn’t matter how great your website is if you don’t get visitors. This is where Organic (Natural) Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Pay per Click (PPC) becomes so important, as they drive traffic to your website. What are SEO and PPC and how exactly do they help your business?

Search Engine Optimisation and PPC: Conceptual Differences

The most important thing to remember is that Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and PPC are complementary strategies. There is no conflict between using the two techniques, and both will be more successful if used together as opposed to using just one or the other in isolation.

The most obvious difference is the price tag that comes with these two techniques. You are paying for the clicks that PPC sends your way, whereas the clicks from Search Engine Optimisation are free. Getting to the top of the Search Engine Optimisation tree for your most lucrative search keywords requires extreme hard work. Getting to the top of the PPC for identical search terms requires financial potential (just how much is dependent on the competition for that particular search term) and work. Both PPC and Organic Search Engine Optimisation require hard work researching keywords so that you know which search terms to buy (for PPC) and which terms to optimise for (SEO). Different creatives per search term or group (PPC) and different tags for each page of your site (SEO) both need to be written to entice customers. Natural Search Engine Optimisation has the added complication that the title tags need to be written with the search engines in mind as well.

PPC can be characterised as INSTANT traffic to a site. If you’re willing to pay the price of the clicks, and your bid is on the higher side you can choose search terms in the major Pay per Click engines. Providing your search term has enough traffic, and your creative is tight and enticing, you should notice a bump in traffic.

Search Engine Optimisation is a slower process. You are unlikely to see major changes to your traffic in the early stages, as so much of Search Engine Optimisation is to do with the structure and environment of your site.

However, the effects of Search Engine Optimisation are long term thus making it far cheaper than PPC. With PPC, the moment you stop your payments the traffic dries up entirely. Search Engine Optimisation on the other hand will continue to bring in traffic even if you stop SEO work on the site, although you will need to ensure that your SEO campaign keeps abreast of changes in the search engine algorithms.

Search Engine Optimisation and Pay per Click go hand in hand and you have to implement a combined strategy to achieve best results. That is why you should hire a search engine optimisation company who has done successful campaigns. SEO India is our recommended SEO company who brings results. Try them.

Step 3: Host Your Own Web Site or Work with a Web Hosting Service?

2007-04-27T01:20:00.000-07:00

The Web site you build must be stored on a computer that has a reliable, secure connection to the Internet. Hosting a Web site means providing the technical resources (the computer hardware and operating system, the networking equipment, the Internet connection, etc.) needed to make your Web site available to your customers. You can either host your own Web site or hire a Web hosting company, such as thePlanet, Interland, Rackspace to host your site. There are advantages and disadvantages to both.

Hosting Your Own Site Advantages: You are in complete control. You have unlimited flexibility: you choose your own hardware, operating system, database, and other tools. You do not have to learn another company's Web hosting procedures. You will not pay additional charges for hard disc storage space or bandwidth usage.

Disadvantages: Purchasing and maintaining computer hardware and software can be expensive. Obtaining a reliable, fast connection to the Internet can be very expensive. You will need a high degree of technical knowledge, and if you have any problems, you're on your own.

Working with a Web Hosting Service
Advantages: Reliable and secure computer hardware with a fast connection to the Internet. Low start-up costs and relatively inexpensive monthly fees. You can get your Web site online much faster. Technical support is often free or available at a nominal charge. Purchase only the services you need and add more as your business grows.

Disadvantages: You are limited to the software and hardware options the hosting service offers. Monthly fees may vary depending on how many customers visit your Web site. Not all hosting services are created equal: it takes some research to find a reputable company that will be a trusted advisor and help you grow your business.

Build the Web Site Yourself or Hire a Web Designer and Developer?

2007-04-27T01:23:00.000-07:00

Should you design your site or engage a Web designer and developer?

The decision boils down to a few factors:

Does your Web hosting service offer any tools and templates to help you? If so, you may be able to quickly create a Web site with little or no technical knowledge, and at no additional cost. Also, there are many free scripts available that enable you to add features to your Web site, such as a traffic counter or a customer feedback form, with very little technical knowledge.

If no templates are available, the next best do-it-yourself option is using WYSIWYG HTML/Web site software like FrontPage. These tools enable you to design a Web site with very little technical knowledge, and many include templates.

If you do not have templates or WYSIWIG software available, do you have the necessary skills in-house to design your Web site? To do the job yourself, you will need graphic design skills, the ability to create graphics, HTML and JavaScript programming skills, some knowledge of information organization, and a general familiarity with Internet technology and software. If you don't have these skills, are you willing to take the time to obtain them?

What is your Web site budget? Hiring a designer and programming company will probably cost more than doing it yourself. Indian Web designers typically charge from $10-$15 per hour. Before you hire a designer, make sure you have a clear idea of what you want your site to look like and how you want customers to navigate it.

Do you have some skills but lack others? If so, control your costs by hiring a designer or developer to do only the work that you cannot.

Register a Domain Name

2007-04-27T01:14:00.000-07:00

A domain name is your business's identity on the world wide web; it will be used as part of your company's e-mail address and its Web site address (URL). For instance, if your domain name is dassnagar.com, then your e-mail address might be me@dassnagar.com, and your Web site URL would be www.dassnagar.com.

It is important that your domain name be less than 20 charecters, descriptive, and easily memorable. For instance, Dassnagar's domain name is dassnagar.com. If you can't be descriptive, then be short and memorable. When dassnagar obtained its domain name, it had many choices: DassnagarInfosystems.com, DISWebDesign.com, but they chose the simplest name: dassnagar.com

Also note that www.dassnagar.com and www.dassnagar.co.in are two entirely different domain names. If you own one and a competitor owns another, then your customers may mistakenly go to the wrong site. To avoid this problem, consider registering several domain names. Example dassnagar registered all names with spelling mistakes like dasnagar.com and disindia.com.

The best place to register domain is Network Solutions, Enom and Directi. Godaddy is the worst.

Type of Website

2007-04-27T00:50:00.000-07:00

Step 1: Decide on the Type of Web Site You Need

The type of Web site you need depends on the nature of your business and the goals you have for the site.

A brochure Web site is the easiest to build (www.rotamech.com is a good example). These sites also called static site or HTML sites combine the roles of online brochure, and enquiry generation by having contact form. Brochure sites are used primarily by start-up business of all types, restaurants and other small businesses that need to promote their message online so that customers can know about them. Brochure sites usually have basic information about the business's products or services, location, and the hours it's open. They make heavy use of photographs and marketing copy to entice potential customers to visit. Optimising Static Websites are also easier as search engines prefer static pages.

If you need to frequently update your web pages and do not have HTML knowledge, then you should go for an Updateable Website. These sites are powered by Content Management solution that enables you to add/edit and delete content using an online panel protected by Password. Overall it gives you the flexibility to update your site without engaging a designer and you can do at your convenience.

If want to sell your company's products directly to customers, you will need am Ecommerce Web site that revolves around a product database (online catalog) (www.teamoods.com is a good example). Each product in the product catalog contains a thorough description, photograph and product reviews. Catalog sites need CMS that manages the catalog and a shopping cart, with shipping calculator and credit card payment integration. Ecommerce sites can be made as cheaply as 1,000 USD using FREE Open source frameworks like osCommerce, Comercus but eventually such sites do not attain search engine rankings nor gives your customer to expose his credit card to a site that is made from free source codes. Freelance firms mostly rely on existing open source products which they can skin and sell at flat rates and short timelines. Freelance firms are ideal for those Customers who are shopping for the cheapest offers available.

Many businesses publish or distribute newsletters, articles, bulletins, reports, editorial opinions, educational materials, cartoons, music, animations, and other information (www.teamoods.com is a good example). These sites are usually heavy with text and graphics and are often designed to resemble an enterprise image.

Once you choose the general type of site you want, you need to decide what features you will offer. The choices are almost unlimited, but some of the most popular additional features are: membership, video broadcasting, blogs, message boards, news bulletins, stories, free file storage space, slide shows, personal home page and automated customer service.

Before deciding the type of Web site you need, look at your competitor's sites and position your site accordingly.

Building a SEO-Friendly Website

2007-04-27T00:17:00.000-07:00

1. Choosing a domain name

Domain Name in Internet is the identity of your business. Selecting the right domain name for your website is important for your future success. Not only does the domain name need to be logically themed to your business and be fairly easy to remember, but your choice of domains can have an effect on your placement within search engines.

Keyword Importance

The actual domain name of your website may be included as one of the factors considered by the large search engines in determining whether your web site is relevant for a specific keyword. As a result, including the most-searched keyword for your business in the domain name itself can increase your sites relevance in search result pages (SERPs). The SEO India Keyword Suggestion Tool is a great resource for figuring out which keywords are the most important for your business, and thereby can be considered as an important part of your domain name.

There are of course many examples of seemingly irrelevant domain names that perform exceptionally well on search engines. The domain name of Google is a perfect example. Search engines use complex algorithms to determine a websites relevance, so remember that this is just one of many factors.

Alphabetically Speaking
The value of creating a great brand exceeds the advantage of being the first on alphabetical lists with a nonsensical domain name.

Think Branding
Building a great brand should be a primary goal of most online businesses. The almighty Brand is among the companys core assets. Since a strong presence on the Internet is becoming more and more important for even traditional businesses, the right company name and URL choice can be vital to your businesss success. Choose a name which is easy to remember, easy to pronounce, and does not infringe on existing trademarks.

The goal of corporate branding was eloquently summarized by Marketing Sherpa:

We are building a religion
We are making a brand
Were the only ones to turn to
When your castles turn to sand

An easy-to-remember domain name is a valuable tool for your business promotion and recognition.

Including hyphens in a domain name has its pros and

ROR Sitemap Generator

2005-09-03T01:28:00.000-07:00

ROR Sitemap Generator - Create Sitemap for Google

This free tool will crawl your website and generate a ROR Sitemap with up to 1,000 URLs for ALL search engines, not just Google.

ROR is a rapidly growing XML format for describing any object on a website (sitemaps, products, services, menus, images, reviews, contact info, business info, etc), so any search engines can better understand its content.

Note:To make your ROR Sitemap automatically readable by all search engines, choose the "ror/rss" format.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) 101 : Basic Optimization Techniques

2005-12-04T23:03:00.000-08:00

It is hard to believe the all too short northern summer is almost over. In less than two weeks, kids will be going back to school and commercial webmasters will be gearing up for the autumn and winter sales seasons. This is as good a time as any, perhaps better than most, to cover SEO 101, the basic techniques that form the foundation to an advanced SEO or SEM campaign. For the purposes of brevity this piece starts with a few assumptions. The first assumption is a single, small business site is being worked on. The second assumption is that the site in question is written using a fairly standard mark-up language such as HTML or PHP. The last assumption is that some form of keyword research and determination has already taken place and the webmaster is confident in the selection of keyword targets.

Believe it or not, basic SEO is all about common sense and simplicity. The purpose of search engine optimization is to make a website as search engine friendly as possible. It's really not that difficult. Basic SEO doesn't require specialized knowledge of algorithms, programming and taxonomy but it does require a basic understanding of how search engines work. There are two aspects of search engines to consider before jumping in. The first is how spiders work. The second is how search engines figure out what documents relate to which keywords and phrases.

In the simplest terms, search engines collect data about a unique website by sending an electronic spider to visit the site and copy its content which is stored in the search engine's database. Generally known as 'bots', these spiders are designed to follow links from one document to the next. As they copy and assimilate content from one document, they record links and send other bots to make copies of content on those linked documents. This process continues ad infinitum. By sending out spiders and collecting information 24/7, the major search engines have established databases that measure their size in the tens of billions. Every day, both Yahoo and Google claim to spider as much data as is contained in the US Library of Congress (approx. 150 million items).

Knowing the spiders and how they read information on a site is the technical end of basic SEO. Spiders are designed to read site content like you and I read a newspaper. Starting in the top left hand corner, a spider will read site content line by line from left to right. If columns are used (as they are in most sites), spiders will follow the left hand column to its conclusion before moving to central and right hand columns. If a spider encounters a link it can follow, it will record that link and send another bot to copy and record data found on the document the link leads to. The spider will proceed through the site until it records everything it can possible find there.

As spiders follow links and record everything in their paths, one can safely assume that if a link to a site exists, a spider will find that site. Webmasters and SEOs no longer need to manually or electronically submit their sites to the major search engines. The search spiders are perfectly capable of finding them on their own, provided a link to that site exists somewhere on the web. Google and Yahoo both have an uncanny ability to judge the topic or theme of documents they are examining, and use that ability to judge the topical relationship of documents that are linked together. The most valuable incoming links (and the only ones worth perusing), come from sites that share topical themes.

Once a search spider finds your site, helping it get around is the first priority. One of the most important basic SEO tips is to provide clear paths for spiders to follow from "point A" to "point Z" in your website. This is best accomplished by providing easy to follow text links directed to the most important pages in the site at the bottom of each document. One of these text links should lead to a text-based sitemap, which lists and provides a text link to every document in the site. The sitemap can be the most basic page in the site as its purpose is more to direct spiders than help lost site visitors, though designers should keep site visitors in mind when creating the sitemap. Here is an example of the basic sitemap used on the StepForth site. Google also accepts more advanced, XML based sitemaps, providing a wealth of information on their Sitemap FAQ page.

Allowing spiders free access to the entire website is not always desirable. Good SEOs should also know how to tell spiders that some site content is off limits and should not be added to their database using robots.txt files. Last week, Mike Banks Valentine of Website101 wrote a good overview on how to write and use robots.txt files in his article, Search Engine Spiders Lost Without Guidance - Post This Sign!.

Offering spiders access to the areas of the site one wants them to access is half the battle. The other half is found in the site content. Search engines are supposed to provide their users with lists of documents that relate to user entered keyword phrases or queries. Search engines need to determine which of billions of documents is relevant to a small number of specific words. In order to do this, the search engine needs to know your site relates to those words.

There are four basic areas, or elements, a search engine looks at when examining a document. After the URL of a site, the first information a search spider records is the title of the site. Next, it examines the Description Meta tag. Both of these elements are found in the section of the source code.

Titles should be written using the strongest keyword targets as the foundation. StepForth's primary keyword target is Search Engine Placement. A glance at our index page shows that phrase is used as the first three words in our site title. Some titles are written using two or three basic two-keyword phrases. A key to writing a good title is to remember that human readers will see the title as the reference link on the search engine results page. Don't overload your title with keyword phrases. Concentrate on the strongest keywords that best describe the topic of the document content.

The Description Meta tag is also fairly important. Search engines tend to use it to gather information on the topic or theme of the document. A well written Description is phrased in two or three complete sentences with the strongest keyword phrases woven early into each sentence. As with the title tag, some search engines will display the Description on the search results pages, generally using it in whole or in part to provide the text that appears under the reference link. Some search engines place minor weight in the Keywords Meta tag however, it is not advisable to spend a lot of time worrying about the keywords tag. After reading information found in the section of the source code, spiders continue on to examine site content. It is wise to remember that spiders read the same way we do, left to right and following columns.

Good content is the most important aspect of search engine optimization. The easiest and most basic rule of the trade is that search engine spiders can be relied upon to read basic body text 100% of the time. By providing a search engine spider with basic text content, SEOs offer the engines information in the easiest format for them to read. While some search engines can strip text and link content from Flash files, nothing beats basic body text when it comes to providing information to the spiders. Very good SEOs can almost always find a way to work basic body text into a site without compromising the designer's intended look, feel and functionality.

The content itself should be thematically focused. In other words, keep it simple. Some documents cover multiple topics on each page, which is confusing for spiders and SEOs alike. The basic SEO rule here is if you need to express more than one topic on a page, you need more pages. Fortunately, creating new pages with unique topic-focused content is one of the most basic SEO techniques, making a site simpler for both live-users and electronic spiders. An important caveat is to avoid duplicate content and the temptation to construct doorway pages specifically designed for search placements.

When writing document content, try to use the strongest keyword targets early in the copy. For example, a site selling the ubiquitous Blue Widget might use the following as a lead-sentence; "Blue Widgets by Widget and Co. are the strongest construction widgets available and are the trusted widget of leading builders and contractors."

The primary target is obviously construction applications for the blue widget. By placing the keyword phrases "blue widgets", "construction widgets" and "trusted widget" along side other keywords such as the singular words, "strongest", "trusted" and "builders" and "contractors", the sentence is crafted to help the search engine see a relationship between these words. Subsequent sentences would also have keywords and phrases weaved into them. One thing to keep in mind when writing basic SEO copy is that unnecessary repetition of keywords is often considered spam by search engines. Another thing to remember is that ultimately, the written copy is meant to be read by human eyes as well as search spiders. Each page or document in the site should have its own unique content.

The last on-site element a spider examines when reading the site (and later relating the content to user queries), is the anchor text used in internal links. Using relevant keyword phrases in the anchor text is a basic SEO technique aimed at solidifying the search engine's perception of the relationship between documents and the words used to phrase the link. A good example is found on towards the bottom of pages in the StepForth site. Note the use of the words "placement services", "seo results", "SEO Faq" and the topic of the internal pages these links point to.

In a nutshell, that's pretty much it to the basics of clean, search engine friendly SEO. The foundation of nearly every successful SEO campaign is simplicity. The goal is to make a site easy to find, easy to follow, and easy to read for search spiders and live-visitors, with well written topical content and a fair number of relevant incoming links. While basic SEO can be time consuming in the early stages, the results are almost always worth it and set the stage for more advanced future work.

About The Author : Jim Hedger is a writer, speaker and search engine marketing expert based in Victoria BC. Jim writes and edits full-time for StepForth and is also an editor for the Internet Search Engine Database. He has worked as an SEO for over 5 years and welcomes the opportunity to share his experience through interviews, articles and speaking engagements. He can be reached at jimhedger@stepforth.com.

Full List of Free Blog Directories

2006-09-06T06:41:00.000-07:00

I thought it would be a nice start to post a great list of blog directories arranged in PR. Please enjoy!

http://www.blogwise.com/ PR8
http://www.bloglines.com/ PR8
http://www.technorati.com/ PR8
http://www.feedster.com/ PR8
http://www.syndic8.com/ PR8
http://boingboing.net/ PR8

http://www.weblogalot.com/ PR7
http://blogcritics.org/ PR7
http://blogdex.net/ PR7
http://www.globeofblogs.com/ PR7
http://www.bloggernity.com/ PR7
http://www.blogrankings.com/ PR7
http://www.globeofblogs.com/ PR7
http://www.blogdex.net/ PR7
http://www.blogstreet.com/ PR7
http://www.blogmatrix.com/ PR7
http://www.lsblogs.com/ PR7
http://www.pubsub.com/ PR7
http://www.2rss.com/ PR7
http://www.bloguniverse.com/ PR7
http://blogcatalog.com/ PR7
http://www.blogsearchengine.com/ PR7
http://www.blogflux.com/ PR7
http://www.blogdigger.com/ PR7
http://www.yourwebloghere.com/ - PR7
http://portal.eatonweb.com/ PR7

http://dir.yahoo.com/Computers_and_I...s/Directories/ PR6
http://www.top100bloggers.com/ PR6
http://www.fastbuzz.com/ PR6
http://www.blogrunner.com/ PR6
http://www.shas3.com Pr6
http://bulkfeeds.net/ PR6
http://www.blogsbywomen.org/ - PR6
http://findingblog.com/ PR6
http://www.search4rss.com/ PR6
http://www.blizg.com/ PR6
http://www.blurtit.com/ PR6
http://www.bloogz.com/ PR6
http://www.blogaudit.com/ PR6
http://www.blogexplosion.com/ PR6

http://www.google.com/Top/Computers/...s/Directories/ PR5
http://www.bloggeries.com/ PR5
http://www.bloglisting.net/ PR5
http://www.search4blogs.com/ PR5
http://www.bloghop.com/search.htm PR5
http://www.blogcode.com/ PR5
http://www.sarthak.net/blogz/ PR5
http://www.readablog.com/ - PR5
http://www.localfeeds.com/ PR5
http://www.blogtopsites.com/ PR5

http://www.bloggerspoint.com PR4

http://blog.announce.googlepages.com/ PR3
http://www.bloggerhq.net/ PR3

http://www.blogguru.biz/ PR0
http://www.blogvision.com/ PR0
http://www.boogieplay.com/ PR0
http://www.waypath.com/ PR0
http://www.blogs-collection.com/ PR0

Regional
http://www.blogscanada.ca/directory/
http://www.weblogverzeichnis.de/
http://www.rss-verzeichnis.de/
http://www.blogbot.de/
http://www.blogg.de/
http://weblogcheckup.de/carmina/
http://www.izigo.nl/
http://aggregator.weblogs.co.uk/
http://www.weblogabout.com/
http://www.plazoo.com/
http://www.misohoni.com/bba/

I would be great if you could help me extend the list and make it a real "full list".

For Blog Directory owners: Please kindly comment on this thread to get your site listed!

Enjoy Blogging!

List of Free Article Directories

2006-09-06T02:23:00.000-07:00

Here is the list of Free Article Directories I have (I arranged them according to Page Rank) :

PR6
http://www.articlebiz.com/
http://www.articlecity.com/
http://www.easyarticles.com/
http://www.ezinearticles.com/
http://www.goarticles.com/

PR5
http://www.anyarticles.com/
http://www.articlealley.com/
http://www.articlemotron.com/
http://www.articlesexpress.com/
http://www.articleson.com/
http://www.bigarticles.com/
http://www.earticlesonline.com/
http://www.ezinefinder.com/
http://www.iarticlebeach.com/
http://www.isnare.com/

PR4
http://www.freearticlesubmit.com/
http://www.activeauthors.com/
http://www.amazines.com/
http://www.answer-site.com/
http://www.articlebeam.com/
http://www.articlebin.com/
http://www.articlebar.com/
http://www.articlecube.com/
http://www.articledepot.co.uk/
http://www.articlefever.com/
http://www.articlefusion.com/
http://www.articlehub.com/
http://www.articleintelligence.com/
http://www.articlekarma.com/
http://www.articlemap.com/
http://www.articlemarketer.com/
http://www.articlerich.com/
http://www.articles4free.com/
http://www.articlesbeyondbetter.com/
http://www.articlesoup.com/
http://www.articlesphere.com/
http://www.articles-submit.com/
http://www.articlewarehouse.com/
http://www.content-articles.com/
http://www.contentdesk.com/
http://www.contentmasterworld.com/
http://www.ezinecrow.com/
http://www.free-articles-zone.com/
http://www.freecontentzone.com/
http://freeinternetarticles.com/
http://www.freewebsitearticles.com/
http://www.freezine-articles.com/
http://www.goarticles.net/
http://www.infonexus.org/
http://www.premierdirectory.org/articles/index.html

PR3
http://www.101articles.com/
http://www.wisearticles.com/
http://www.acearticles.com/
http://www.acmearticles.com/
http://www.addarticle-submitfree.com/
http://www.ababba.com/
http://www.activearticles.com/
http://www.articleaccess.com/
http://www.articleavenue.com/
http://www.articleboutique.com/ - nice collection of articles but no submission.
http://www.article-blogs.info/
http://www.articlebliss.com/
http://www.articleblender.com/
http://www.articleboy.com/
http://www.articlebunch.com/
http://www.articlecapital.com/
http://www.articlecircuit.com/
http://www.articlecrazy.com/
http://www.article-database.com/
http://www.articledestination.com/
http://www.article-domain.com/
http://www.articlefair.com/
http://www.articlefarm.com/
http://www.articlefocus.com/
http://www.articlegarden.com/
http://www.articlegroup.com/
http://www.articlehopper.com/
http://www.articlelookup.com/
http://www.articlemailbox.com/
http://www.articleonlinedirectory.com/
http://www.articlepot.com/
http://www.articlerampage.com/
http://www.articles365.com/
http://www.articles24.com/
http://www.articles4reprint.com/
http://www.articles-4-free.com/
http://www.articlesandauthors.com/
http://www.articlesbase.com
http://www.articleselections.com/
http://www.articles-galore.com/
http://www.articleshelf.com/
http://www.articles-hub.com/
http://www.articles-keyword-rich.com/
http://www.articleskingdom.com/
http://www.articlesmagazine.com/
http://www.articlesnetwork.com/
http://www.articlestack.com/
http://www.articlestash.com/
http://www.bigarticledirectory.com/
http://www.cajun101.com/
http://www.content-corral.com/
http://www.contentfueled.com/
http://www.content-edge.com/
http://www.everydayarticles.com/
http://www.ezinearticles.biz/
http://www.ezine-writer.com.au/
http://www.ezineplug.com/
http://www.findandpostarticles.com/
http://www.free-articles-search.com/
http://www.freebie-articles.com/
http://www.free-content-resource.com/
http://www.freezinesite.com/
http://www.getyourarticles.com/
http://www.geminipublishing.com/
http://ireprint.info/
http://www.superarchives.com/

PR2
http://www.1articleworld.com/
http://www.ablearticles.co.uk/
http://www.allaboutarticles.org/
http://www.articlebag.com/
http://www.articlecorral.com/
http://www.articledaddy.com/
http://www.articlefeeder.com/
http://www.articleforyou.com/
http://www.articleinterchange.com/
http://www.articlejoe.com/
http://www.articlelocker.com/
http://www.articlemax.com/
http://www.articlepeak.com/
http://www.articleportal.com/
http://www.articleprobe.com/
http://www.articlerocket.com/
http://www.articlesearchnet.com/
http://www.articlesindex.com/
http://www.articlesnet.co.uk/
http://www.articlesnatch.com/
http://www.articlesonline.org/
http://www.articlesrightnow.com/
http://www.authorcontent.com/
http://www.bestarticlecity.com/
http://www.goodinfohome.com/

PR1
http://www.a1-articledirectory.com/
http://www.articlefrenzy.com/
http://www.articlejunction.com/
http://www.article-monster.com/
http://www.articleoptimizer.com/
http://www.articlepipeline.com/
http://www.eclipse-articles.com/
http://www.fetcharticles.com/
http://www.free-article-directory.com/

PR0
http://www.articlesalley.com/
http://www.article-store.com/
http://www.contentarticles.com/
http://www.dezinersplace.com/
http://www.freearticlehq.com/
http://www.hotarticles.net/
http://www.internetmagnet.com/
http://www.outblogger.com/articles

Anyone have free article directory, can please reply here.

If you want to copy this list and post it on the internet as is, you are required by copyright to note the source and to give a link back to this page.

CSS2 and Internet Explorer 7

2006-10-02T23:23:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, Microsoft has announced that it will be releasing Internet Explorer 7.0 this summer to those who are on the XP operating system in a project code named “Rincon”. The move is reportedly being done to improve the security of the IE browser. However, with browsers such as Firefox gaining market share, many people speculate that the new Internet Explorer will come with more than just security enhancements. Features such as tabbed browsing, built in anti-spyware, and RSS aggregating are all features that appear to be coming with the Rincon project.

The real question, however, for any website owner and developer is whether Microsoft will create a browser that interprets CSS2 in a standard way. Currently Microsoft does not support all of CSS2’s functionalities and also adds some functionalities that CSS2 never initially supported. The result is nothing more than a major headache for those developing a website (SEO Herald) that is accessible to all people, regardless of the browser they are using.

So will Microsoft finally adhere to the official CSS2 specifications? Don’t bet on it. A look at Microsoft’s history and their current position in the market place seems to point to the idea that they will continue to buck the open source development trend and try to mold the marketplace according to their vision.

Microsoft Views Incompatibility as a Competitive Advantage

Most website developers develop a website for Internet Explorer first, and for the secondary browsers second. The reason for this is obvious. If you have a website that works in Firefox, but appears broken in Internet Explorer, the site appears broken to over 90% of its visitors. On the flip side, if the site works fine in Internet Explorer, but not in Firefox, only a small percentage of your website visitors are inconvenienced.

Microsoft, being the vast market share holder in the browser market, can influence the behavior of website owners and web surfers. Because not every site is optimized for browsers such as Firefox, web surfers who try to make the transition to Firefox will find themselves on familiar sites that appear broken to them in Firefox, but not Internet Explorer because Internet Explorer does not follow a standard set of rules that any browser can comply with. The result is that these surfers who try to make the transition over to Firefox will go back to the more familiar Internet Explorer.

Keep the Advantage, Eliminate the Disadvantages

There are a few reasons for people making the switch from Internet Explorer to Firefox. There is the obvious group of people that truly believe Microsoft is evil, so they will do anything to avoid a Microsoft product no matter how much it inconveniences them. Microsoft is not worried about these people so much because they will always represent a small group of people. What Microsoft does need to worry about is the real advantages of making the switch to Firefox.

Security
Security is probably the top reason people make the switch to Firefox. Now that most people have been introduced to spyware, awareness of PC security is becoming a bigger issue. Any person who does a little research will quickly realize that most spyware programs focus on the vulnerabilities of Internet Explorer, since that is what most surfers use. Making the switch to Firefox not only gives surfers new security features that are not available with Internet Explorer, but they also remove themselves from the target of spyware creators.

Since security is the one of the biggest reasons people leave Internet Explorer, the people at Microsoft have decided to make security a major priority. And, in the interest of giving credit where credit is due, they should be commended for finally looking to improve the security of their browser . Who knows how many countless computers were infected with spyware programs due to the vulnerabilities Internet Explorer presented.

Features
Firefox also offers unique features that users cannot get with Internet Explorer. Features such as tabbed browsing, RSS Aggregation, and others have proven to be more than just nice ideas or some programmer’s pet hobby. Unfortunately for Firefox, they have proved to be the market testing for Microsoft, without Microsoft having to spend any money on development. Look for Microsoft to continue to copy the successful features of Firefox in the future, and ignore those features that are not successful.

Back to CSS2

What is CSS2 really? CSS2 is nothing more than a set of recommendations for controlling layout and design of websites put forth by the World Wide Web Consortium. The W3C’s goal for their recommendations is to avoid market fragmentation on the Internet, thus creating a more uniform and more enjoyable surfing experience for web users. Ironically enough, Microsoft and the W3C have the same goal, although Microsoft would like to have uniformity on the web as a result of everyone using Internet Explorer.

As long as Microsoft is able to hold onto its market share through segmenting the market, they will do so. They will have this ability as long as they have an overwhelming majority of the market share. Unfortunately for those who make their living designing and developing websites, there are only two hopeful outcomes to make life easier: either Microsoft loses enough market share that they decide to adopt the W3C’s recommendations, or Microsoft successfully eliminates all browser competitors and is the only option for web surfers. Until one of these two options occurs, expect Microsoft to continue to interpret the web as they see fit, and in a way that will keep users on Microsoft products.

About This Author :
Mark Daoust is the owner of Site-Reference.com. Discuss this article further at http://forums.site-reference.com/

Collection of FREE Stock Photography Websites

2006-09-11T01:12:00.000-07:00

I just decided to publish this list of Free Stock Photography Websites. Please keep in mind that each one of them has a different term of use.

http://www.sxc.hu/
http://www.morguefile.com/
http://www.imageafter.com/
http://www.freephotosbank.com/
http://openphoto.net/
http://www.bigfoto.com/
http://www.usda.gov/oc/photo/opclibra.htm
http://nix.nasa.gov/
http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/
http://www.nps.gov/yell/press/images/
http://earth.jsc.nasa.gov/sseop/efs/
http://www.fws.gov/pictures/
http://images.fws.gov/
http://www.picturestation.net/start/
http://geekphilosopher.com/MainPage/photos.htm
http://www.freeimages.co.uk/
http://www.pixelperfectdigital.com/index.php
http://www.freefoto.com/index.jsp
http://davidniblack.com/imagebase/
http://www.cepolina.com/freephoto/
http://amazingtextures.com/textures/index.php
http://www.texturewarehouse.com/gallery/index.php
http://pdphoto.org/
http://imageblowout.com/xoops/
http://www.piotrpix.info/
http://mandragora.ex.lv/resources.htm
http://www.fotogenika.net/modifica/igallery.asp
http://www.mayang.com/textures/
http://www.freephotostation.com/
http://cromavista.ricardomartin.info/
http://www.afflict.net/
http://www.creativity103.com/
http://www.pyed.net/eye/
http://aarinfreephoto.com/
http://www.stockvault.net/
http://www.designpacks.com/
http://www.unprofound.com/
http://www.fourbees.com/fourbees/phoelm.asp
http://www.insectimages.org/
http://www.freemediagoo.com/
http://www.freemediagoo.com/
http://www.adigitaldreamer.com/freestock/freestockphotos.htm
http://freestockphotos.com/
http://www.freewebpics.de/
http://www.lightmatter.net/gallery/
http://majesticimagery.com/
http://www.tripalbum.net/
http://www.demmy.nl/fotostock_0001.html
http://www.twicepix.net/imgdatabase/
http://www.aboutpixel.de/
http://www.woophy.com/
http://www.pixelquelle.de/
http://www.litetek.net/backgrounds/
http://pix.halal.dk/
http://tofz.org/
http://www.fontplay.com/freephotos/
http://orangetrash.d2.hu/index2.html
http://www.artfavor.com/types.php?type=12
http://www.imagetemple.com/
http://www.logodesignweb.com/stockphoto/
http://www.fotodatenbank.com/
http://www.bajstock.com/
http://www.pixelbag.de/
http://www.nwyhstockimages.com/default.aspx
http://photo.itc.nps.gov/storage/images/
http://www.deviantart.com/
http://www.photocase.com/Default.asp
http://www.gimp-savvy.com/PHOTO-ARCHIVE/index.html
http://www.corbis.com/

If you want to copy this list and post it on the internet as is, you are required by copyright to note the source and to give a link back to this page.

Future of Commerce is Online

2006-11-10T23:48:00.000-08:00

Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft Corp. sees good Indian presence in IPTV.

The World Wide Web is growing at a scorching pace with the number of applications, websites and users growing daily. However, a lot needs to be done since most transactions are still not digital.

“Most of the transactions are still in analogue mode, and there is a lot more work to be done. The magic of the Internet will increase when all transactions become digital. This will result in a spurt in e-commerce,” said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, while delivering his keynote address at IndiMIX ‘06 — Microsoft India’s event for Web designers and developers — here today.

IndiMIX ‘06 focused on popularising technologies for the next-generation Web. The event was attended by over 40,000 Web designers, developers and decision-makers.
“Customers are demanding more interactive and responsive experiences that take full advantage of the capabilities of the Web as well as the multitude of digital touch points that consumers use every day, ranging from the Web to the personal computer to the mobile phone. We at Microsoft are committed to innovating in this area,” said Ballmer.

Search is the entry point for many people on the Web. It is also the entry point for corporate intranets, and it will continue to be one of the most sought-after applications on the Web.

With the media moving into an interactive zone, digital advertising would emerge with multiple touch points like Web, video, mobile and gaming consoles, he said.

Dot.net technology is also emerging while Windows is becoming one of the most-used platforms in the world. Rich servers, rich in data and applications, are now serving rich clients (a computer that provides information to other computers on a network is called server, while the recipient computer is a client).

Ballmer pointed out that Microsoft was close to introducing major innovations in Windows XP (Special edition 2) and would launch enhanced functions in Windows Vista. On the gaming and music front, he said the Xbox line worldwide had grown into an online community.

“Microsoft will ship a path-breaking new product very soon, by the second part of next year,” he said. However, he did not elaborate further.

The future of television viewing, too, will change, with the emergence of Internet protocol television. India would have a good presence in the segment, while television viewing would depend on content and users’ needs, he said.

With blockbuster launches (software and hardware), emergence of increased business opportunities, new user experience and new forms of entertainment, there was an incredible year ahead for India, he added.

Later, Microsoft India and its partners showcased a range of Web solutions developed on its platform at the event that included a Rich Media Search for bharatmatrimony.com, an application aimed at enabling first-time non-computer savvy users to search for brides or bride grooms easily; a user interface from Satyam for customers to register with the system and apply for loans, view loan status, as well as an office application and interface for loan officers to approve or reject a loan and view status of loans; and a mobile phone solution from MSN that delivers a near real-time experience to mobile phone consumers with content like cricket, other match scores, news and entertainment through mobile RSS feeds from MSN India.

Ways to Better Search Engine Rankings

2007-02-14T21:53:00.000-08:00

Understanding exactly what it takes to attain a top ranking page (or pages) can sometimes seem like a somewhat difficult task. Regardless of your experience in search engine promotion, we've all, at one time or another, sat in front of the computer frustrated and ready to call it quits.

Sound familiar? It should. It's actually fairly normal. That is why I have put together a list of the top 10 things you can do to help assure that you will find your site's pages sitting proudly at the top of the results.

With all that being said, let's jump right in ok?

1. Do your keyword research. Yes, I know this is harped on constantly (heck I do a lot of harping myself), but it is the single most important aspect of search engine optimization. If you don't know how your targeted visitors search for your product or service, then you are shooting in the dark. Don't just assume you know how they are going to try and find you. Use a service like WordTracker.com to develop a good and comprehensive list of keywords. Visit your competition and look at the terms they use in the keywords tag and throughout their pages. Spend a good bit of time on this because it will payoff big down the road. Once you have your list, rank the phrases in order of importance starting with your most important keyword phrase.

2. Now that you have your keywords list. It is time to start getting the text for your pages ready. When doing so, you will want each of your pages to focus on one of the keyword phrases from your list. Your homepage should focus on your most important phrase and each subsequent subpage should focus on another keyword phrase. Ideally, you should never focus on more than one or two keyword phrases per page. Trying to focus on more than this will dilute the theme of the page and could have a negative effect on your rankings. You will here a lot of talk about keyword density. While this is important, don't spend every waking hour trying to hit the perfect density. With so many other things such as link popularity, themes, etc. being taken into account, hitting the exact density is becoming less and less important. A good rule of thumb is to shoot for a density between 3% and 5%.

3. Now let's talk title tags. The title tag is one of the most important elements of your page. The engines put more weight on the title tag than any other single element of your page. Your title tag should ALWAYS contain the keyword phrase you have chosen to target for that page. Keep the tag short, no more than about 6 words generally, but make it appealing. The goal here is make the title appealing to visitors but also short enough that you don't take away from the importance of your keyword phrase.

4. Try to keep your pages as simple as possible. Things such as frames, excessive javascript, flash, too many graphics or image maps can have a negative affect on your search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is that the simpler the page, the better it will generally rank. Even tables, when used too much can break up the flow of the text on a page and hurt your chances at a top ranking.

5. Good solid content is always important. While you will occasionally see top ranking sites with very little content, you will have a much better time getting and keeping a top ranking with good content. This not only gives the engines more to index, but it gives your visitors something to read and absorb.

6. Think big. What does this mean? Quite simply, it means that a site of 30 or more pages has, at least, 6 times the chances to get a top ranking as a site of 5 pages. The more pages your site has with good, solid, quality content, the more keyword phrases you can target and the more chances you have of attaining a top ranking.

7. Create a good system of internal linking. You should be able to get to just about any page on your site within no more than 3 clicks. Consider creating a site map with links to all of the pages within your site. This will assist the engines in properly indexing your site. When creating your internal links try to use the actual keyword phrase that you will be targeting on the page you are linking to as the link text. Many engines look at the visible text of a hyperlink as a description of the target page. If the visible text matches the focus of that page, it will help to give that page a boost in the rankings.

8. Work hard to build your sites external link popularity. This can be a long and arduous task, but it is crucial to your success. All of the top engines use link popularity quite heavily when ranking sites. It is important to note that it is not only the quantity of links that is important but also the quality of those links. One link from a site such as Yahoo is worth as much or more than 100 links from unknown sites. Also remember, it is also important that you link to other sites. When linking to other sites, or attempting to get them to link to you, always shoot for sites that are of a similar theme as your site.

9. Monitor your rankings in the search engines and make adjustments accordingly. This is best accomplished through a program like WebPosition Gold, Top Dog, or other similar programs. If you see your position starting to slide, look at the sites that have overtaken you and see if you can determine a pattern. This will tell you what you need to do to regain your position. Always check your internet security lavels .

10. Whew! We've covered a lot. Now that your at this step keep at it. If you don't get a top ranking right off the bat don't get discouraged. Heck, how did your first attempt at an omelette turn out? Give yourself some time to get accustomed to this new field. Keep tracking your progress, analyzing the competition, and making adjustments, and in no time at all, you will find yourself sitting comfortably on that elusive first page.

Good Luck and Happy Optimizing!

Thanks to John Buchanan (author of the book The Insider's Guide to Dominating The Search Engines, and publisher of "The Search Engine Bulletin", a FREE monthly newsletter. Visit his site for more information or to sign up for his newsletter).

Tips for Building Niche Websites

2007-04-04T00:43:00.000-07:00

The best variation is to jewel a activity area. You could rehearse leader from your friends, media, books, sneaking pages, or from top affiliate programs. Once found that, the next important thing is to market the website so as to attract a good traffic to the website everyday. In fact, this is the difficult most part in building a niche website. This article discusses few tips that could effectively help one to market his/her niche websites.

1) Write articles further propose to divergent avowed directories. This is an striking depiction to push traffic to your websites. But, ensure that the articles have a link back to your website.

2) Participate actively spell contradistinctive discussion forums command your niche. Find few proper further common forums in the web and register for an account. Observe the activities in the forums for few days to get a feel of it and then have a go at it by answering few questions, all the while subtly promoting your website.

3) Use blogs to your advantage. Publishing your blog with RSS feeds besides updating present ofttimes entrust sequentially augmenting the visibility of your website.

4) Link exchanges culpability unraveling a website's page ranking. Hence tie to particular well-timed also feverish quality websites in your niche. However, it must be kept in mind that linking to low ranked websites could be counterproductive.

5) Posting comments notoriety other blogs repercussion your trade is further a desired rubric to improve the visibility of your website. But, while doing so, never attempt anything unethical like abusing a particular entry or making hostile criticisms.

6) Another dynamic mode to push your nine-to-five website is due to habitual accentuate releases, on something news worthy that is happening in your portal. Designing an affiliate program and recruiting hard working affiliates in exchange of a share of your profits is also a decent idea you can try out. Finally, if you are prepared to shell out few bucks, consider pay per click advertising - like MSN AdCenter and Google ad words - banner advertising or buying paid links to high PR websites.

7) All these aspects could up the reputation of your stint website. But what incitement incarnate serves if the website does not constitution string the first few search results in a search engine? Therefore, some serious SEO while designing the website is also important. Sans SEO, it is next to impossible to remain visible in the web.

Thanks to Peter F., marketer of India Web Design Directory

Web 2.0 for Designers

2006-09-07T01:11:00.000-07:00

In Web 1.0, a small number of writers created Web pages for a large number of readers. As a result, people could get information by going directly to the source: Adobe.com for graphic design issues, Microsoft.com for Windows issues, and CNN.com for news. Over time, however, more and more people started writing content in addition to reading it. This had an interesting effect - suddenly there was too much information to keep up with! We did not have enough time for everyone who wanted our attention and visiting all sites with relevant content simply wasn't possible. As personal publishing caught on and went mainstream, it became apparent that the Web 1.0 paradigm had to change.

Enter Web 2.0, a vision of the Web in which information is broken up into "microcontent" units that can be distributed over dozens of domains. The Web of documents has morphed into a Web of data. We are no longer just looking to the same old sources for information. Now we're looking to a new set of tools to aggregate and remix microcontent in new and useful ways.

These tools, the interfaces of Web 2.0, will become the frontier of design innovation.

The evidence is already here with RSS aggregators, search engines, portals, APIs (application programming interfaces, which provide hooks to data) and Web services (where data can be accessed via XML-RPC, SOAP and other technologies). Google Maps (in beta) provides the same functionality as similar competing services but features a far superior interface. Flickr's interface is one of the most intuitive and beloved around. Del.icio.us offers personal and social functionality, and reaches far beyond its own site. Interfaces like these are changing the way we store, access, and share information. It matters very little what domain content comes from.

Web 2.0 has often been described as "the Web as platform," and if we think about the Web as a platform for interacting with content, we begin to see how it impacts design. Imagine a bunch of stores of content provided by different parties—companies, individuals, governments—upon which we could build interfaces that combine the information in ways no single domain ever could. For example, Amazon.com makes its database of content accessible to the outside world. Anyone can design an interface to replace Amazon's that better suits specific needs (see Amazon Light). The power of this is that content can be personalized or remixed with other data to create much more useful tools.

There are six trends that characterize Web 2.0 for designers. In this introductory article we'll summarize each of those trends and give brief examples. In upcoming articles we'll explore each trend in more detail.

Writing Semantic Markup: Transition to XML
One of the biggest steps in realizing Web 2.0 is the transition to semantic markup, or markup that accurately describes the content it's applied to. The most popular markup languages, HTML and XHTML, are used primarily for display purposes, with tags to which designers can apply styles via CSS.

These markup languages are not semantically dead, however. Designers can describe content, but only to the extent that it fits within the (X)HTML tag set. For example, designers can mark up content as headers, paragraphs, list items, citations, and definition lists using the tags, respectively. For some simple documents, these tags are adequate to describe content effectively. For most documents, however, there is no way to accurately describe the content with the (X)HTML tags we have available. In Web 2.0, this description is not only possible, but also critical.

Though HTML and XHTML give us only a glimpse of what it means, there is one technology demonstrating clearly the power of semantic markup. RSS is an XML format for syndicating content. It is an easy way for sites to tell people when there is new content available. So, instead of browsing to your favorite site over and over again to see if something is new, you can simply subscribe to its RSS feed by typing the RSS URI into a feed aggregator. The aggregator will periodically poll the site, notify you if something is new, and deliver that content. It's a real timesaver.

Providing Web Services: Moving Away From Place
During the early years of the Web, before content had semantic meaning, sites were developed as a collection of "pages." Sites in the 1990s were usually either brochure-ware (static HTML pages with insipid content) or they were interactive in a flashy, animated, JavaScript kind of way. In that era, a common method of promoting sites was to market them as “places”—the Web as a virtual world complete with online shopping malls and portals.

In the late 90s and especially the first few years of the 21st century, the advent of XML technologies and Web services began to change how sites were designed. XML technologies enabled content to be shareable and transformable between different systems, and Web services provided hooks into the innards of sites. Instead of visual design being the interface to content, Web services have become programmatic interfaces to that same content. This is truly powerful. Anyone can build an interface to content on any domain if the developers there provide a Web services API.

Two great examples of the shift away from place to services on the Web are Amazon.com and eBay, both of which provide an immense amount of commercial data in the form of Web services, accessible to any developer who wants it. An interesting interface built using eBay's Web services is Andale, a site that tracks sales and prices to give auction sellers a better idea of what items are hot and how much they’ve been selling for.

Remixing Content: About When and What, not Who or Why
Associated Press CEO Tom Curley made an important and far-reaching keynote speech to the Online News Association Conference on Nov. 12, 2004. In it he said;, "… content will be more important than its container in this next phase [of the Web]… Killer apps, such as search, RSS and video-capture software such as TiVo—to name just a few—have begun to unlock content from any vessel we try to put it in."

Curley was specifically addressing journalists and the media industry, but this insight applies equally to the design profession. Web design during Web 1.0 was all about building compelling places (or sites) on the Web. But content can no longer be contained in a single place—at least not without going against the nature of the social Web and locking up your content in a secure site.

Web design in Web 2.0 is about building event-driven experiences, rather than sites. And it's no coincidence that RSS is one of the key building blocks. RSS feeds enable people to subscribe to your content and read it in an aggregator any time, sans extraneous design.

Searches can also be mixed with RSS to let people subscribe to content via topic and tag RSS feeds (from PubSub or Feedster, for example). These so-called "future searches" not only let people mix content from various sources, but end up being yet another way for users to bypass a site’s visual design.

Because content flows across the Web in RSS feeds and can be remixed along the way, Web designers must now think beyond sites and figure out how to brand the content itself.

Emergent Navigation and Relevance: Users are in Control
As a result of the remixing aspects of Web 2.0, most content will be first encountered away from the domain in which it lies. Thus, much of the navigation that is used to reach a specific item might be far removed from the navigation specifically designed for it. This “distributed” navigation might come in the form of a feed reader, a link on a blog, a search engine, or some other content aggregator.

One of the side effects of this is that the sources of and pathways to useful information will continually change, and users won't necessarily know where to go to find it. Fortunately, content aggregators have a built-in answer for this—they can track what people are doing. By recording what pieces of microcontent are most often visited, aggregators can use past user behavior to predict what users will find most relevant in the future. This is very apparent in Daypop, Del.icio.us, and Blogdex feeds. What people have found relevant in the past is likely to be useful in the future.

With relevance decided within these third-party interfaces, users might even be able to read content without ever visiting the domain it comes from. Navigation schemes, as we know them, will be used less. The most traveled navigation paths will emerge from user behavior instead of being "designed" specifically for it.

Adding Metadata Over Time: Communities Building Social Information
One feature of Web 1.0 that seemed to change everything about publishing was the ability to make changes to the primary publication at any time. There are no "editions" or “printings” on the Web like there are in the print world. There is simply the site and its current state. We are used to this paradigm now, and an optimist can hope that Web content will only get better with time: metadata will be added, descriptions will get deeper, topics more clear, and references more comprehensive.

What we see happening in Web 2.0 is a step beyond this, to where users are adding their own metadata. On Flickr and Del.icio.us, any user can attach tags to digital media items (files, bookmarks, images). The tagging aspect of these services isn’t the most interesting part of them, though. What is most interesting are the trends we see when we put together everyone’s tags.

Let's say, for example, that we tag a bookmark "Web2.0" in Del.icio.us. We can then access del.icio.us/tag/Web2.0 to see what items others have tagged similarly, and discover valuable content that we may not have known existed. A search engine searches metadata applied by designers, but Del.icio.us leverages metadata applied by folks who don’t necessarily fit that mold.

Shift to Programming: Separation of Structure and Style
In Web 1.0, there were two stages to visual Web design. In the early years, designers used tricks like animated GIFs and table hacks in clever, interesting and horrible ways. In the last few years, CSS came into fashion to help separate style from structure, with styling information defined in an external CSS file. Even so, the focus was still on visual design—it was the primary way to distinguish content and garner attention.

Enter the Web 2.0 world, which is not defined as much by place and is less about visual style. XML is the currency of choice in Web 2.0, so words and semantics are more important than presentation and layout. Content moves around and is accessible by programmatic means. In a very real sense, we’re now designing more for machines than for people. This may sound like we’re in the Matrix, but in the words of Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos, "Web 2.0… is about making the Internet useful for computers."

What does this mean for Web designers? It means designers have to start thinking about how to brand content as well as sites. It means designers have to get comfortable with Web services and think beyond presentation of place to APIs and syndication. In short, it means designers need to become more like programmers. Web 2.0 is a world of thin front ends and powerful back ends, to paraphrase Bezos.

Summary
The effects of Web 2.0 are far-reaching. Like all paradigm shifts, it affects the people who use it socially, culturally, and even politically. One of the most affected groups is the designers and developers who will be building it—not just because their technical skills will change, but also because they’ll need to treat content as part of a unified whole, an ecosystem if you will, and not just an island.

To summarize, these are what we see as the six main themes covering design in the Web 2.0 world:

Writing semantic markup (transition to XML)
Providing Web services (moving away from place)
Remixing content (about when and what, not who or why)
Emergent navigation and relevance (users are in control)
Adding metadata over time (communities building social information)
Shift to programming (separation of structure and style)

Our purpose in this column is to analyze those themes and figure out what Web 2.0 means for designers. We'll explore the new technologies that are making it happen, take a closer look at the new interfaces that demonstrate its power, and ponder the social effects it has on the people who use it.

As we move along, we hope that designers who may be wary of the promises of new technology help us focus on the practical aspects of this one, the subtle but real changes that Web 2.0 is having (and will have) on design.