Here are the sites. There is a certain amount of storage space you can use for free, and you can upgrade to a paid account if you really lilke it and you want to be able to transfer larger files.

http://www.mailbigfile.com/

http://www.dropboks.com/

Happy Web Developing!

I found a great site where you can build nice calendars and transfer them to your site very easily!

Here you go: http://www.calendarhub.com/

Happy Web Developing!

Ok let’s start with the Web Developer Tools.

These can be found by going to the Google search page, and clicking more and going into the Google Labs area.

Here are my three favorite areas to look at. Google Trends gives you a good idea of the most popular web sites and what the more popular web sites are going to be by giving you info on the most popular searches search engine-wide. Google Suggest can be used as a light key word research tool, it gives you helpful suggestions for key words to search under as you type your own search in the search bar. Google Page Creator can be used as an HTML editor, and prepares your pages for the Google search engine because that is what is actually creating the pages!

-Google Trends
-Google Suggest
-Page Creator

Here’s another fun Google thing; It actually shows you the “web” of the World Wide Web. You can use it for fun, and it also serves as a great tool to see linking on a site you are working on.

http://www.touchgraph.com/TGGoogleBrowser.html

Here’s a great place to get your gMap:  http://www.yourgmap.com/

AND finally the FUN:

Did you know that if you text 466453 (Google) from your phone and in the body of the text message put in a query for any number of things you will get a text message back with the answer?

It’s true! Just a few of the things you can get an answer for: Weather, Glossary, Sports, Maps and the list goes on! Check it out, I love this feature and most people I encounter have never heard of it!

Good knowledge of HTML and Java Scripts and how to integrate with your database is necessary, but it is very fast if you know these things!

Here’s the site:  http://www.webformfactory.com/

Happy Web Developing!

So, what’s a web designer to do? Download all the necessary browsers and check the site in all of them upon publishing and tweak and tweak and tweak until you get some reasonable results? Nope! Now there is a great tool you can use to take a snap shot of your site/page in many different browsers at once and look at them at a glance without having the hassle of doing this yourself!

http://browsershots.org/ is the site which does it. Simply go to the site and click, you have a snap shot of your site in many different browsers so you can tweak right away and get your site looking in top shape in more markets faster! Your international clients will LOVE that you can do this!

Happy web developing!

Some guru’s are emerging for the newest web marketing tool = VIDEO. And they are letting us in on the secrets of web video marketing.

AOL mobile application!AOL finally comes up with something new! My question is: Will we now be getting 100’s of CD’s in the mail with this application for the next 5 years?

For those who haven’t these are posting sites which can be seen/sent via SMS (text messaging), Instant Message and on the online message boards. You can subscribe to certain people’s accounts to receive all of their posts via text message if you want! It is the very latest in blogging, and is being called microblogging.

Now for the kicker: Google just bought Jaiku! What does this mean to you? Well, it could mean that a lot more websites and web-based programs such as these mini-blogs will be viewed on phones. And there is also talk of a Gphone from Google. If you have ever had to work on optimizing someone’s (or your own) website for Google you know how obsessed you can get, and how important it starts to seem that you get a good page rank. Now we might have to worry about if the site is optimized to be viewed on a mobile device!

Speaking of SEO, check out this article:

“10 reasons why I don’t care about Google Page Rank?” at DailySEOBlog

In other news:

If you ever send out mass marketing emails you might want to check out this article:

Best Practices for Bullet Proof Email Delivery

So, Let’s define the three types of publishing platform:

Editor:Probably the most common. Everyone has heard of these. They are the DreamWeaver’s and CoffeeCups of the world. They are HTML editors with lots of great tools to help you create a nice site. You see the HTML in one window and a MS Windows like display (which you manipulate just like Word or Power Point) in another. You can edit both the code and the display. You don’t necessarily need to know HTML but it helps a lot if you need something specific done and the editor isn’t helping you. You are completely free to edit the code and add anything you want to it (such as Java scripts, or Flash animations).

Site Builder:Also very common. Typically you get one of these when you buy your hosting/from your hosting company. It is an editor of sorts but not nearly as flexible as the Editor I spoke of above. You see just the display, and manipulate it like a Power Point slide. If you want to manipulate the code you have to figure out where the heck you can do that, and it is in a different place with most builders. Also, the builders don’t always let you mess around with the code that was “written” by the builder when you were editing it in the display. Great for someone just starting out, frustrating and inflexable for someone who knows a bit of HTML and is ready for more advanced stuff.

Content Management System:Can be the best tool for large or corporate sites or those with members needing to sign in. This is a program that writes the pages for you, and also let’s you edit all of the code. It however keeps track of your styles and statistics very well. Instead of editing each page individually you edit portions of it, while the management system keeps everything looking nice and uniform in the rest of the page. You fill out work sheets most of the time in order to create things in it. Don’t know how to put something in your shopping cart, no problem, fill out this work sheet and you are all set. Want to know who joined your site today, click here. It’s a very nice way of organizing and keeping track of a huge site while keeping every page looking nice and uniform and preserving your branding. It also integrates very easily with an Email Database and or Shoppingcart. The closest thing to a CMS that is fairly common is a blog; You fill out a kind of worksheet in order to post, click post, and then you can see that post up on the site.

So while you could say these are all the same thing, they are not. There are some pretty important differences that make a difference to your site, and what and how you can edit it. I hope it has been helpful. 

Have a great week!