Computer and Web Articles

QUESTION: I’m not really sure how to get the most out of my LinkedIn account. Any suggestions?
- Lynn, Breckenridge

ANSWER: Well, it depends on what, exactly, you’re trying to achieve by having a LinkedIn account in the first place. Though I’m not aware of your goals, I can still point you in the direction of a great slideshow. (Tip: It’s easier to download it and view it on your computer than it is to try and zoom in and read its content in the little slideshow viewer on the website; you’ll need to create a free account to do this, though.)

Here’s the link: http://tinyurl.com/yh7jobv.

I use these two shortcuts just about every single day of my life. They help me move about the web quickly and efficiently, and I thought you might like to use them, too.

Shortcut #1: To the Next Site in the Blink of an Eye
Ctrl + L. Holding down the Ctrl key and then tapping the L key jumps my cursor up into and highlights the text in the address bar.  This allows me to immediately start typing the address of the next site I want to visit. No need to click in the address bar, no need to highlight the current URL with my cursor, no need to hit the Delete or Backspace keys to clear that text out. I just hit Ctrl + L, type the address of the next site I want to visit, hit Enter, and I’m at the next site in the blink of an eye.

Shortcut #2: Start Your Search with Lightning Speed
Ctrl + K. Like many web users, I have a Google search box in my browser’s toolbar so that I can conduct Google searches from whatever page I’m looking at; I don’t need to go to www.google.com every time I’d like to search the web. As I search many, many times a day, I find it wonderfully convenient to hold down the Ctrl key and then tap the K key to get my cursor sitting in the search box – no mouse necessary!

Your friend is sitting across the table from you, chatting away about the amazing new dish she made using kohlrabi last week. You smile and nod your head knowingly while you think, “Now wait a second, I know I’ve heard of kohlrabi before, but what in the world does it look like??”

Upon returning home you sit down at your computer, fire up Google, type “kohlrabi” into the search box, and hit the “Google Search” button. You click the first result and are taken to a webpage that has a description and one photo of the root vegetable.

You hit your back button. You click search result #2 and see another photo of the vegetable, then click the back button again to return to your search results once more. You’re starting to remember what the veggie looks like, but can’t remember if it comes in different colors or what it looks like when baked or fried. So you keep laboriously clicking through the results on the page, hoping one of the sites listed will have a variety of photos for you to look at.

Okay, stop. There’s a much better way to look for a variety of kohlrabi photos.

Let’s start over. Go back to www.Google.com. Now, in the upper left-hand corner, click the “Images” link. Done? Good work. Now back to business as usual – go ahead and type “kohlrabi” into the search box, then hit the “Search Images” button that’s appeared.

Boom. There you have it. Thousands upon thousands of photos of kohlrabi, lined up nice and neat for your viewing pleasure.

And so: whenever you want to look at images and photos of something in particular, using Google Images instead of Google’s standard search is the way to go. Have fun!

Over the course of the past few weeks I’ve found myself reminded of the fact that many people still find the concept of downloading to be mysterious and confusing. And so I dove deep into my article archives and found this June 2003 write up on downloads that’s just as accurate and helpful as ever. Enjoy…

——————————————–

Today’s delightful discussion delves into downloading. Alright. So it’s not really a discussion; it’s more along the lines of me talking about it and you just reading about it but hey, I was feeling the need to start this article off with an alliterative bang.

“Downloading” is one of those terms you hear quite often but may not feel quite sure what it means. I mean, you kind of know. Sort of. But not exactly. Allow me to clear the clutter and clarify the confusion.

To download is “to transfer (data or programs) from a server or host computer to one’s own computer (or device)”. Blah blah blah, glazed eyes, technical babble, that definition didn’t do anything for you, right?

Well, since most of our download experiences deal with the Internet, I suggest you just think of downloading like this: Pulling something cool off of the Internet and saving it onto your computer. That’s it! For general purposes it’s much easier to think about it that way.

Okay, so you understand what downloading is. “Why should I care about it?!” you cry. “Because,” I respond, “there are lots of really neat things sitting out there on the Internet just waiting to be downloaded. And many of them are free!” Your eyes just got wider when I said free. I saw it.

When you pull something off the Internet and put it onto your computer, you usually need to save it in a specific location. Some people like to save downloads to their desktops, others like to save downloads into their “My Documents” folder. This way, once your downloads are transferred onto your computer, you can open them up and use them. After all, it would kind of defeat the purpose of downloading something if you couldn’t find the spot on your computer to where that something was downloaded.

“Alright,” you say hesitantly, “but then what does ‘uploading’ mean? Is it any different?” Why I’m so very glad you asked! Uploading is, not surprisingly, the exact opposite of downloading. It’s when someone takes something from their computer and pushes it up onto the Internet. Webmasters create websites on their computers and when they’re done, they upload the website to the Internet. Unless you’re editing a website or are a filesharing maniac, you most likely don’t upload things on a regular basis. That’s why we focused on downloading today.

And there you have it; you’re now an expert on downloading.  Keep up the good work.

I’ve always wished there was a way to sort my search results by date–a key factor that has always helped me determine relevancy within search results. So it’s now time to celebrate, as Google recently implemented functionality that allows people to filter search results by … time!

Give it a try.

Next time you conduct a Google search and find yourself reviewing the results page, click the Show options link (the one with the little plus sign in front of it) below the search box.

More filtering options will instantly appear on the left-hand side of your screen – and you’ll note there is now an entire category allowing you to filter your results by time. Cool!

Here’s a riddle.

What do the following three things have in common:

1. Eleven year olds who took a website elective class in middle school
2. Grandmas who read a book on website building
3. Computer technicians who have followed a few step-by-step build-your-own-site tutorials online.

Answer: They all have their own websites, are promoting themselves as professional web designers, and will be doing their best to persuade you that they should be the ones building your company website.

Don’t roll your eyes—and for heaven’s sake, don’t think that of course you would be able to easily tell the difference between a web professional and someone just posing at one. I argue that differentiating between the two groups isn’t so simple. Let’s take a look at a few examples to see what I mean, shall we?

Case Study #1: My partner and I are achingly aware of two Colorado web companies selling themselves as Search Engine Optimization and Marketing experts. Problem is, neither one of the companies shows up in the search engine themselves. Ouch. We also happen to know that one of the companies has in fact, never once worked on a search engine marketing project before. Ever. Yet they have a very professional, well-designed site that clearly states—right on the homepage—“Specializing in Search Engine Optimization”. Based on the professional design of the site, one could easily assume that this company is trustworthy and professional; from there it would be easy to take the next step and hire them for a search engine optimization project. It would likely be a very bad move.

Case Study #2: We recently had a potential client ask us why our web design work was more expensive than Competitor Y’s. We asked the potential client to tell us how they felt about the fact the design for Competitor Y’s very own website was, in fact, purchased from a completely different web design company. Yes, you read that correctly. Competitor Y didn’t design their own website. The potential client realized that a company not using what it was selling might have a very good reason for selling its products for cheap.

Case Study #3: Imagine my horror upon finding a New York web design agency’s website in which the entire About, Process, and FAQ pages had been copied and pasted–word-for-word-for-word–directly from my company’s website. Now imagine potential customers arriving at their website, reading that text – and thinking “Wow, these guys seem great! I think they’ll be a good match for our needs.” Unfortunately, these potential customers would be looking to hire plagiarizers unable to craft content for their very own website. The kicker? Their homepage touted that they were an “honest, ethical company you could trust”. Awesome.

So How Does One Sort Through the Riffraff?

It would make things so much less stressful if the process of choosing a web design/development company was as simple as comparing apples to apples. Unfortunately, it’s more akin to comparing apples to vanilla mint cookies dipped in fudge. Or something close to that. You need to be able to prevent yourself from teaming up with a company that talks the talk … but actually walks a little bit funny.
So let’s think about this. You wouldn’t hire a personal trainer who weighed 450 pounds and ate 2 boxes of cream puffs during your first consultation, would you? So then why in the world would you work with a web design company that didn’t create the design for its own site? Or hire a gal promoting her search engine expertise . . . yet can’t seem to rank in the search engines herself?
Please don’t get me wrong. I really do believe that many of these web companies truly feel they are experts and can do everything they purport. What you need to remember, though—unfortunate and labor-intensive as it may sound—is that it really is up to you to determine if these companies can do all they say they can and whether or not they’ll be a good match for your specific needs.

In the end, all you need to remember is this: Do your due diligence and engage in a bit of research before you hire any web company. They all say they can do a myriad of amazing things. Don’t take their word for it, though; power up your good friend Google and find out if they really can.

Continuing to hone your Google searching skills over time can only improve your web surfing and researching experiences. The fact that few people ever become true Google Search Masters shouldn’t stop us from trying our best to improve our web searching skills.

And so today (and in many future articles as well) I’ll share Google-searching tips with you in hopes that, together, we can find the exact information we’re looking for more quickly and with less effort than ever before.

For today, let’s start off with two easy-to-remember, virtually-effortless tips.

Tip #1: Don’t waste time or energy trying to enter your search with “correct” capitalization. In fact, don’t waste time with capital letters at all. There is zero benefit to using capital letters in your searches as they don’t matter or alter your search results one bit.

Tip #2: Rein in those lengthy searches! It’s not made clear on Google’s homepage or in its search bar, but Google does have a 32-word search maximum. (Can you believe that prior to January 2005 it actually had a TEN word maximum??)

(Note: This tip assumes you use a mouse with a scroll wheel on top!)

To engage in speedier web surfing when using Internet Explorer or Firefox, hold down one of your keyboard’s SHIFT keys while you use your mouse’s scroll wheel to zoooooom forward or backward through the pages you’ve viewed.

Last week we reviewed a basic definition of social bookmarking. Now that the information has had a bit of time to sink in, I’d like to share a few additional resources that might help you feel more comfortable with the concept and, perhaps, even encourage you to get involved with it yourself.

First, here’s a fantastic 3 minute video that gives a visual, plain English explanation of social bookmarking: http://tinyurl.com/28qhop.

Next, here’s a handy PDF you can print out and read next time you’re standing in line somewhere and want to expand your knowledge on the basics of social bookmarking: http://tinyurl.com/6ouzpr.

And lastly, here’s a starting point where you can try out social bookmarking for yourself: http://delicious.com. Delicious is one of the main social bookmarking sites on the web, and it’s totally free. I’d recommend first taking a super quick peek at the site’s About page upon which you’ll find a short list of the three main things you can do with Delicious. Then, when you’re ready to dive in, just click the green “Join Now” box in the upper right hand corner of the site to get started.

Have fun!