By admin on April 20, 2010
I was once tasked with creating a Kiosk for a company I am working at. It was decided to use a Web based design for the kiosk. MS IE 8 was used in Kiosk mode to lock the user to the Web site. A WAMP (Windows, Apache, MySQL, PHP) server was used to provide the site at localhost. JQuery was used within the Web site. One of the issues was the slider navigation, which was almost impossible to use.
So, with jQuery’s help, a couple of buttons were created. Home and Contact buttons were placed on the left and Up and Down slider buttons were placed on the left. scrollTo() was used to position the window relative to the current position. That allowed the Up and Down buttons to function. The Windows scroll() was then watched for action so that the buttons could be repositioned after the scroll action. It was amazingly simple with jQuery.
<div id="scrollers_home" style="position: absolute; z-index: 8888; left: 0; top: 10px;">
<a href="/"><img src="/images/scrollers_home.gif" alt="Home" width="100" height="99" border="0" id="relative-position-home"></a>
</div>
<div id="scrollers_contact" style="position: absolute; z-index: 8888; left: 0; top: 120px;">
<a href="/contact.php"><img src="/images/scrollers_contact.gif" alt="Home" width="100" height="99" border="0" id="relative-position-contact"></a>
</div>
<div id="scrollers_up" style="position: absolute; z-index: 8888; right: 0; top: 10px;">
<img src="/images/scrollers_up.gif" alt="Up" width="100" height="99" border="0" id="relative-position-up">
</div>
<div id="scrollers_down" style="position: absolute; z-index: 8888; right: 0; top: 120px;">
<img src="/images/scrollers_down.gif" alt="Down" width="100" height="99" border="0" id="relative-position-down">
</div>
<script type="text/javascript">
$('#relative-position-down').click(function() {
$.scrollTo( '+=440px', 300, { axis:'y' } );
});
$('#relative-position-up').click(function() {
$.scrollTo( '-=440px', 300, { axis:'y' } );
});
$(window).scroll(function() {
$("#scrollers_home").css("top", ($(window).scrollTop()+10) + "px");
});
$(window).scroll(function() {
$("#scrollers_contact").css("top", ($(window).scrollTop()+120) + "px");
});
$(window).scroll(function() {
$("#scrollers_up").css("top", ($(window).scrollTop()+10) + "px");
});
$(window).scroll(function() {
$("#scrollers_down").css("top", ($(window).scrollTop()+120) + "px");
});
</script>
Posted in jQuery |
By admin on April 14, 2010
People are always worried about their retirement, but what about their funeral plans? What about their parents funeral? Who’s going to have the money to pay for that? Funeral planning is now being taken very seriously. It’s a confusing financial world out there for many of us and funerals are not the exception. Funerals can not only be depressing, but the financial aspects can overload an already fragile mind. Luckily there are web sites out there that can help. I’ve had the chance to read some of the article on FuneralResources.com, and I must say that Chris Hill knows this business. I highly recommend his Web site.
Posted in Uncategorized |
By admin on April 13, 2010
WordPress isn’t the best content management system (CMS) to use for a company Web site. In fact, there are many reasons why you should not use WordPress. My Dad taught me a long time ago that you need to use the right tool for the job. A Web site is one of those cases.
“…you can use a flat head screwdriver for a philips head screw…it’ll work… but eventually it will strip the screw”
I’ve seen many small companies start out by using WordPress. The simple ease of use is usually enough to convince many small company Presidents, CEO’s and other OO’s they many have onboard. WordPress is simple to install and provides a basic CMS with all kinds of plugins. Unfortunately, there are several downsides to using WordPress for a company Web site.
Post or Page?
Not soon after you start messing with a fully designed WordPress site your bound to get the difference between a post and a page confused. WordPress handles these two differently. Pages are supposed to be part of your main site content, where as posts are general part of your blog section – which is really what WordPress is all about. But, why does a company need posts or a blog? Doesn’t a company have different kinds of pages; such as: content, products, press, updates, newsletters, etc?
A WordPress Site looks like a Blog
“it looks like a WordPress site”, I’ve heard many times before. There’s nothing worse than having your company image associated with a common blogging Web site tool. It doesn’t show anywhere near the right level of professionalism. A company Web site needs to be professional, well thought out and clear. Building your Web site from a blog program is not professional, in my opinion. A WordPress site usually displays content in a scattered approach; with tags, archives and categories grouping posts together. A company Web site needs to have a hierarchical design that flows well between levels & pages.
Targeted by Hackers and Spammers
It’s a known fact, that by using WordPress, you are opening up the possibility that your site may become vulnerable to hacker attempts. WordPress has in the past experienced several exploits which hackers have used to post malicious code onto Web sites which spread viruses onto visitor’s computers. Spammers are also a constant issue as they target WordPress sites with all kinds of spam.
SEO / Google Ranking Reasons
While you may be able to obtain fairly good search engine results using WordPress SEO Plugins, you probably should not overlook the possibility that Google may at any time change it’s stance on blogging sites. In fact, it may already be part of it’s 200+ ranking factors. Perhaps the word “blog”, just in itself, could penalize your pages. Of course this probably sounds a bit extreme, but as the Google Florida Update has shown in the past, Google can change its algorithm pretty drastically at times.
Ok, I’m done ranting. Flame away.
Posted in Google, SEO, Software, Word Press |
By admin on April 13, 2010
Everyone is talking about the new Google algorithm factor: Web site speed.
Some people are rushing to optimize graphics and even buy a faster server. This is absolutely hilarious to me. It’s really no big deal; or at least, it shouldn’t be. In fact, it will probably never effect your site SERPS – at all. Matt Cutts, one of the top SEO Gurus at Google, states on his blog that it is a minor factor one of over 200 factors that you should be considering.
Matt Cutts Blog Article
“fewer than 1% of search queries will change as a result of incorporating site speed into our ranking. That means that even fewer search results are affected, since the average search query is returning 10 or so search results on each page.”… “Compared to those signals, site speed will carry much less weight.”
Your Web site should already be optimized for speed.
If you’re Web site isn’t responding very well before this Google news/update, then shame on you for not doing something about it any sooner! Remember, Google is not the authority to all things Web related, even though it may seem like it. In practical Web “best practice” terms, you should have already had your Web site optimized as best as possible. You should have already compressed your JPG graphics files and optimized your GIFs/PNGs. You should have already considered compressing your CSS an JavaScript files (I’m guilty here). If your Web site is not optimized then your visitors, regardless of how they are finding your site (direct, search engine or referral), are likely to “bounce” back from it. You want to give your visitors the best visiting experience possible. It’s been my opinion for some time now that you’ve got about 2-3 seconds to load a page “fully” for your visitor and another 2-3 seconds to allow them to scan your content; that’s it. If your site doesn’t load fast enough, they will click that back button. If you don’t show them a reason to stay and read your content, they will click that back button. So, what Google is doing is actual a good thing for it’s search engine results by removing or penalizing sites that have poor speed. In the end, it will save you time.
What about the speed on busy shared hosting servers?
The big question that comes to mind is, “Will this factor effect SERPS for Web sites that are hosted on busy shared servers?” This could become an issue for some sites. I’ve seen from some GoDaddy experiences (not limited) that some share hosting servers are hosting too many sites at once. During peak hours, the response from the server can stretch to 15-20 seconds to return the HTML/XHTML portion of the page. This speed issue is not limited to GoDaddy servers. It highly depends on the server hardware and process loads on the server.
How can I measure my site’s speed?
The way that I’ve tested site speed in the past is to use Mozilla’s Firefox Browser with the Firebug Plugin (Web Development Evolved). The Firebug plugin is a great tool for Web developers, but it also has network analysis tools. When loading a site’s page you can clearly see the time connecting to the server, time waiting for the server and the time sending/receiving data. It can give valuable insight into what is causing a Web page to load slowly.
Firebug Plugin
Posted in Google, SEO | Tagged Google, SEO |
By admin on March 24, 2010
Orlando Landscaping businesses are popping up all over the place during the past year. I believe part of this is due to the economy and how a downturn in the construction business has forced so many hard workers to look for work in other fields (literally). But, can you really trust landscapers that don’t know the business? Don’t risk it. Roedell’s Landscaping has been in the landscaping business for as long as I can remember. I can personally vouch for their honesty and integrity. They have done some incredible work around my home and I recommend them to anyone looking for a quality landscaping company in the central florida area.
Posted in Friends and Family, Portfolio |
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