Morning to Night - Bing Bing

What's Bing? For me it's something like a bird tweets "bing bing" or a child makes noise for for "bing bing" or something similar to Crazy Frog singing "bing bing bing bing prrrrrrrrrrrrrr..........".

As usual, looked at my Google Reader in the morning. Found Digital Inspiration blogged about Bing, a advance search engine (they prefer to call it as a decision engine), which which Microsoft will start a big battle with Google, the default choice for a search engine. Earlier Microsoft tried to be on the battle field with MSN Search, Live Search (Nothing was live there, better to call it as dead search!), and did not left any mark. But after seeing the video of Bing, I hope it may leave some mark on the search engine market. At first I did not take this seriously, I saw the related videos later at night.

I subscribe to MyToday News. MyToday is a free SMS subscription service which sends you free SMS on News, Cricket (news, scores), Bollywood news, etc. For News service, they send 2 SMS per day, one in the morning (delivers around 10 AM) and other in the evening (delivers around 5 PM). Generally one SMS includes 2 (rarely 3) News headlines and one advertisement at the bottom. But at headline number 2, it was "MS's 'Bing' to take on Google search"! Is it a headline or Ad? No, it's not as an Ad, it was like a headline. Then I started to think that, Bing is going to live today (29th May). I think Microsoft has paid a good money to MyToday to advertise like that!

Then I searched "Bing" (of course) on Google. And found first 2 results pointing to bing.im, the Mobile IM software. And 3rd result links to bing.com. Clicked on that result and found "Bing and decide, Coming Soon....". Then I <a href to decisionengine.com and but could not able to see the video (Silverlight is not installed on that system and Flash videos are disabled by proxy). So tried to satisfy myself by reading their letter on that web site. I noticed, Digital Inspiration comes on the top result of the search as compared to other popular blog, also above another link of Microsoft. Good! I think as a MVP, he got the news first and blogged.

After the evening people retweeted that Bing stands for “But It’s Not Google.” - TechCruch, I tweeted, If #bing stands for "But it's not Google", what does #kumo stand for?

Anyway, let's wait for Bing to start it's decision engine and now sing with me "Bing, Bing, Bing..... Bingo!"

Compare Laptops and get the Best Deal @ ConsumerMate.com

When I used to want to buy a laptop or help any friend to buy a laptop, what I was doing is going to dell.co.in (as my first preference is Dell), then search for some hp or Compaq laptops, and some other good brands like Acer etc. Then write all the specifications, price, etc. on a paper or fill in a spread sheet. Then time to compare on the paper or spread sheet. Again, search for any user review or comments. Too much difficult and takes a lot of time. Time is money, why should not we save this time and spend this money on the laptop?

After these difficult days, I found ConsumerMate.com. It's quite cool. I setup my budget, the other requirements and it listed out all the laptops available on market and all the information are provided at a managed manner, more better than what I used to on paper or spread sheet. This also includes the products rated by Digit Test Center (Digit is the most popular technology magazine of India). And when there are some hot deals, why will anyone want to miss them? For example, BenQ has announced that the new Joybook Lite U101 will be sold in India at an introductory price of Rs. 24500. The best thing is that you can know about the street price of every model, so no more bargain, to get at right price.

However ConsumerMate.com is limited to Laptop now, soon it's coming with other products. Waiting for that day.

Providing Information in Your Business

These days, I want to send one parcel to US, so I wanted to know the estimated time and cost for the shipping. Some of the parcel services came into my mind, UPS, FedEx, DHL, TNT etc. I am looking for a cheaper solution, but can't go with India Post, because of complexity of custom process, however this option seems to be the cheapest option.

First I tried to estimate at UPS, and the results I got is unbelievable. It shows less price (INR 2xxx) for the best service they have, which is even less than the cheapest solution from them. When I clicked there to see in detail, it says the actual price (INR 6xxx). Wherever I mentioned INR here, is INR in actual, but the website shows it as USD. If someone thinks about USD 6,265.88 to send a parcel of 7lbs (3.5 Kg, approx), the lips only utters 'WTF?'.

Now it's time to check FedEx. However, I found it's easy to estimate, but there is only one option, one plan.

Now I moved to DHL. Whereas the global website looks good, the India website does not look good and it's full of broken links and many things which does not work. Having a website with good looking yellow color, bad looking design and no information which you need, is what DHL India website.

At last I checked at TNT. Very easy to navigate to get the estimate for shipping. And the price is even low as compared to other services. So now thinking to choose TNT to ship. Let's see what happens next?

So if you are some business and have a website, the website is for providing information about your business, not to have it on your business card only. Some business have a domain name, which they primarily use for email id, and just put something to fill the website for domain. It's important to provide useful information about your business, which need to be easily accessible. Easily accessible means the the user can easily get what they need, a better navigation, easy to understand layout. Accessible also means, that search engines find it easy to index, so that your website come in the top results when anyone searches the information which your business provides. And why do anyone shy to say what she says? And when you have some competitors, then it becomes more important to provide the perfect information easily and win your customer.

Which service do you like and suggest? Do you have any bad or good experience with shipping something?

image credit

Theft on the web and Brand awareness

Recently I found The Markup Dude changed his portfolio design. Then I came to know that someone (a front-end developer from 2006) stolen the design and put it on his portfolio. This worried Deb (the dude) and he changes his portfolio design. See this image for the original and copycat.



Deb tried to put that design off from that site. So he emailed that guy and some of his clients about this theft. And it worked! That guy changed his portfolio design. So it became a winning story for Deb.

Now come to the second part - the brand awareness. Your design is popular, this means you have the potential for a brand. A in case of Deb, his design is already featured in many css and design showsites (I coin showsites = showcases + websites). That guy who copied it must have got this from any of those showsites. This implies that the design is good and popular. When I think about markupdue.com, that particular design comes into my mind and when I think about The Mobile Store, that red color poly-bag comes into my mind.

There are few blogs who provide their theme for free download, so that admirers of that blog design can use this on their blogs (wordpress or blogger). This helps them to build their brand. Anyways, the design of your website affects your brand in a big way. So what do you think about the "Worry of Deb on design theft"? Does anyone can share the brand value or add more importance to the it by coping the design? Anywhere on the web you will see any bird, do you think about twitter? And what comes to your mind, when you see a whale (of course failed!)?

Copyright and HTML

Now I am going to explain how copyright is related with HTML.

If you write the following code in html:
Code:

<a href="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3475/3362464113_c8a721e308.jpg">Copyrighted photo</a>

Preview
Copyrighted photo

The above code is not infringement of copyright of the owner.

Just make a little modification to the above html code. Replace a by img, replace href, also remove the text in between the html tags. For XHTML validation, you can remove the img inside the closing tag and replace the code &rt;< by a blank space or white space. (You can even just delete it). Now the code becomes:
Code:

<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3475/3362464113_c8a721e308.jpg"/>

Preview
Please excuse me; I can't show you the preview here, it may infringement of copyright of the owner. However you can try it yourself :P

Well, now using the above code can be a infringement of copyright of the owner.

Don't spend time on the bug someone already fixed

Bug, a integrate part of development. If you have developed some application, then there may be some bug. If you are unable to find a bug, that does not mean that the code is 100% perfect. And we learn many things from the bug. In my case, if I unable to find at least two bugs from my code, then I think there is something seriously wrong (Still I am a good coder ;) ). Some bugs easily fixed and some take more time to fix. If you have a good experience, then there may be a chance that you can fix the bug easily, you may be come across it before. Think, if you seeing the bug for the first time and you have no clue about the reason and the solution? You may end with wasting a lot of your valuable time.

Their goal:

No human should work on an error that has already been solved.

I am talking about an interesting platform, bug.gd. It's am Error Search and Collaboration tool, which helps you search for errors that other people have encountered. And the logic is quite simple, but great: why should you spend time on the error, if someone already fixed it? Using this is also quite simple. Just type something about your error and you will find a list of errors matching with your keywords. And you can get the solution there. They will you your email id (optional), so that you can create a profile for you and track all your error, fixes etc. In 48 hours, they will ask you, how you solved this problem.

It not only searches in its own database, but also searches in Microsoft, Apple, RedHat support sites and Linux forums. With addition to searching for your error, you can also download some tools for your browser,

• bug.gd Firefox Extension
• bug.gd Firefox Search Bar
• bug.gd IE7 Search Bar
• Python Library

Also you can create a free error database for your company at ErrorHelp.com.

And the registration is very easy, just give an email id and your profile is created. Everything is good, but only thing I am thinking about, why it's not asking me any password while log in!

Rs 700 investment worths Rs 1.5 Lacs

I got one online tool Stimator some days back, which estimates the value of your website. In curiosity I checked Love Orkut value there. Then it showed me some value just above to $3000 (approximately 1.5 lacs in INR) [now it shows $411 - market crashed down :( ].

Well let me tell you about Love Orkut, I started it in the early 2008. Registered domain name for Rs 295 and opted for a free hosting at xtreemhost. Selected a free template for the design from Open Source Web Design and started coding (in PHP and MySQL) for the website. Collected scraps, testimonials from my old collection and searched some good photos from Flickr, Loving Hugs, Photo Bucket etc. to add the most popular section, Photo Scraps. I have not counted the time spent on it. If I could have a track of this, then I could tell you better, if I am in profit or in loss. I added many things to this, which does not cost anyone: love, passion, knowledge, experience etc. It took time for me to earn money from this site, but I got increase in it's visibility. The number of page loads, unique visitors, direct visitors and returning visitors increasing day by day (Still I can manage this in free hosting).

In last one year the money I able to make is just above INR 10,000. I spend another 400 rupees for renewing the domain name. In this way I invested Rs 700. Let me justify its value for INR 1.5 Lac. If you deposit INR 1.5 Lac in Post Office Monthly Income Scheme (8% interest rate per yer, calculated and credited each month and goes for 6 years, after maturity pays 15% bonus with the face deposit), you can earn INR 1000 each month. I am earning more than that (not for doing anything, what I do for this site is not for today, for future) each month! In this way it worth INR 1.5 lac.

Till when I can run and earn from it:

• When Orkut will be shut down or banned (in India, I got most of the visitors from India)
• When people stop using Orkut
• When people will be get bored with the old contents
• When I will not renew the domain name
• And some unknown reason

And then I will lost all of 1.5 lac or more, which never happens when you invest money in other places. So this is my 700 Bucks story. If you have any idea to execute (don't worry, if it's a small one), please execute and you will be happy and successful in future. Let me know, if you need any kind of help.

Where is IST (GMT + 05.5)

I was filling a form in a website and found the drop down list for timezone has listed all timezones which differs from GMT by a multiple of an hour. So many timezones which differs by a multiple of an hour plus 30 minutes are out of the list, and IST (GMT + 05.5) is out of the list. So how can I feel it? One thing I am thinking, the developer who developed that form is unaware of all timezones, or thinks every timezone only differs by a multiple of an hour? Or it may be an error while coding which makes those timezones out?

Google Said Sorry

Before an hour the world saw Google saying the WWW is infected and can harm your computer. At that time, I was browsing Google Webmasters Tool and I redirected to a page, in the domain name sorry.google.com and it said me query looks like from a virus or a spyware. Here is the image. I think this error message is somehow related to the Google Search Issue.

HTML and CSS Reference in Mozilla Firefox - FireScope

Suppose you are designing a web page and stuck some where and then you need to refer a good resource: it may be a good book or any good reference on the web. Think, if you can get it in your browser (Mozilla Firefox - Browser boleto Firefox). It is possible now by FireScope. FireScope is a Firefox addon which works together with FireBug and provides reference material for HTML and CSS. This tool FireScope is developed by SitePoint, which provides high quality books and reference materials on web development. SitePoint also provides good reference materials for free at SitePoint Reference
Thanks Shayne Tilley.

Get FireFox here:

High Quality Free Web Reference - New SitePoint Reference

SitePoint, the popular resource for web related knowledge and skill has release their newly designed Reference site. Their you can get high quality reference for HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Now web development and learning will be more easier.
Thanks Shayne Tilley

Where are my Tweets - Bug of Twitter

Sometimes twitter shows 0 updates in the home page. And again clicking on home link, it shows actual number of updates. I noticed it twice in these days.

No commercilization of YouTube video

As Google updates the TOS of YouTube, I removed all the ad blocks from Oriya Video Songs. So now there is no commercialization of YouTube videos, but Oriya video lovers can watch those videos. However there is a search box (uses Adsense for Search) and it displays ad on a separate page, where there is no YouTube videos embedded. This is legal and becomes only source of revenue from this.

Thanks Amit for this info.

Hordit Beta Program is Now Open

What is Hordit?

Hordit is a online service where you can save all of your valuable items in one place. You don't need a separate bookmarking site, photo site, and RSS feed reader. And I (also those guys at hordit) don't know of any service that allows you to also save documents, PDFs, notes, and more. To know more about it please visit: faq.

Now they decided to open the beta program and allow Hordit users to invite new members
to store and share with them! So they are sending beta codes to theirs users, so that their users can distribute them with their friends and colleagues. I also got some beta codes. If you want a hordit account, then please visit hordit.com and click the blue signup button.

Here are the codes:

YQE930
HQX801
QXQ187
RHU665
QEE916
ETC109
JVV313
UXS802
KKY140
MLB800

Update: Now no need of these beta codes. Anyone can register without these code.

And as an extra incentive, they give a free Hordit t-shirt to the first 50 people to get 5 new users to sign up!
As an extra incentive, the top 15 recruiters between now and December 19th will earn a fashionable Hordit t-shirt!

Thanks Shubh

How to See Solutions in experts-exchange.com for Free

Experts Exchange provides very nice solutions to many questions regarding coding. But when you come to this site (also if you come from Google) you can see the question and answers like this:

All comments and solutions are available to Premium Service Members only. Sign-up to view the solution to this question.

Already a member? Login to view this solution.

After this you can see all the categories listed. At this point people left this site, as they think this is the end (footer) of this page. But all the answers are below that. This is the reason why this site is indexed in Google.

Google Labs SMS Channels Shortens Your Message

Google Labs SMS Channels gives a free service to send SMS to a network, it may be a friends group or group of a people subscribed to a channel. I found that it uses some logic to shorten the contents of message to keep it within 150 characters (When it gets contents from a feed, then there are chances of length of more than one characters). To give you as much content as possible, they replace the content with short codes. As for example, to is replaced by 2, your is replaced by ur, for is replaced by 4, etc.

One interested replacement I found with it is, it once removed slashes (/) from a URL in the message. The url http://is.gd/4P47 was http:is.gd4P47 in the SMS.

Subscribe this blog in SMS (Free)

IMO.in links to wrong permalink

IMO.in (in my opinion... india), is a web site where you can find some updated posts around the world. These entries added to this website by registered users. But the entries are linking to different post of my blog. As for example Spam Filter in Orkut post links to SMS Me - Absolutely FREE SMS !!! post.

MeGlobe : Chat in Your Own Language Always

MeGlobe is a free chat service, where you can chat in your own language (not every language works here) and the person with whom you will chat can see your message in their own language. Now it supports English, Français, Español, Italiano, Português, Deutsch, 日本語, Русский, Nederlands, Ελληνικά, 한국어, العربية, Svenska, 简体中文 and 繁體中文.

Roadside Romeo - Game and Widget

Roadside Romeo introduced widgets to update about the movie. This features widgets (you can also say OpenSocial applications) for myspace, facebook, myyearbook, vista, yahoo,google, live, netvibes, hi5, freewebs, xanga, friendster, tagged, blackplanet, blogger, univision, typepad, livejournal, wordpress, hoverspot, multiply, econs, pageflakes, webwag, orkut, vox, piczo, perfspot and squidoo. And embed code and email service is also available for this widget.

Roadside Romeo is also introduced a game, is very addictive. I played for sometime and moved up to second level. Have fun.

AlphaInventions - An Innovative Idea - Updated Blogs in Real time

When I was checking statistics of one of my WordPress blog, I found a referrer AlphaInventions.com. Curiously, I checked what is this and found something innovative. This is a website where you can see recently updated blogs around the blogosphere in real time. Generally this type of sites shows feeds. But this shows the site there itself. To understand this website you need to visit this site.

This site need little makeover and some improvement in everything it has. It eats your band width a lot, this is the main disadvantage of this website. But I respect the innovative idea behind this.