Archive | December, 2007

Portable Links with TrayURL

TrayURL - Tiny Bookmark ManagerTired of not having your bookmarks when you move to a new machine, or go visit your friends, relatives of people you don’t really like but they have a nice PC that you love to play with? Wouldn’t it be nice to fit all your bookmarks on a USB thumb drive so that you could take them with you no matter where you go?

TrayURL is a tiny program that will get that job done for you.

Totally portable, this application is simple to master and will not take long to learn at all. Here are some of the features of TrayURL I am sure you will love:

  • 100% “Portable”. Does not depend on any system files (ie. DLLs, OCXs, etc) nor does it reply on the system registry. Everything is in the program directory.
  • Compatible with Windows 95/98/98SE/ME/NT/2K/XP/Vista.
  • Runs with most browsers and your USB flash drive.
  • Runs from the system tray for convenient access.
  • Support for web site logins and passwords with handy “Paster” utility.
  • Import and export utilities.
  • Multi-user support with multiple configuration files.
  • Up to 50 categories.
  • Up to 80 bookmarks per category.

On the negative side, some people have complained about not having an import option which does kind of suck. I would use this more as a way to carry around important bookmarks I need to have on hand – and not every bookmark from my browser. If you got a new thumb drive for Christmas and your looking for something to use it for, this program should be a must have.

Carry TrayURL around like you would your wallet or car keys, and never be without your favorite bookmarks.

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Hot in Web Dev for this Week

I’ve done weekly link lists on Firefox Facts for some time now, so I thought I’d give it a shot here as well – but with more web dev and hosting related talk.

Have an interesting link to share or pass my way? Leave a comment or drop me an e-mail at mitch@mitchkeeler.com and I’ll be more than happy to share it with the masses.

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Poor Man’s Pigs in a Blanket

Working freelance or as a “contracted worker” means you don’t have much time for 7 course meals. Heck, you hardly have time for meals at all as a mater of fact. You always have that next client, deadline or project to work on. With that in mind I thought I would share with you one of my favorite recipes for a quick and easy snack.

Vienna SausagesPlease go gather this from the kitchen:

  • 1 Can of Vienna Sausages (Armor is the best!)
  • 3 slices of bread (regular ol’ white bread, don’t get fancy!)
  • 1 bowl (don’t eat the bowl, please…)

Step 1: Drain the water from the Vienna Sausages, and then dump them into the bowl.

Step 2: Stack the 3 slices of bread, one on top of the other and rip them in half by your bare hands. This should give you 6 rectangle pieces of bread.

Step 3: Eat the first Vienna Sausage now. If you don’t, you’ll end up with an odd amount later on.

Step 4: Last step in this recipe is to wrap each Vienna sausage in a piece of bread (don’t be afraid to squeeze the final result to make it stick well). Then eat as you wrap. You now know what keeps me going from my day to day job a Lunarpages, to producing a web hosting podcast and more.

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Feed Suggestions from A to C?

Always having talked about being a big fan of others work more so than my own, I wanted to spend some time plugging those who deserve to be plugged. When looking around to for source to plug from my feed subscription list looked like a good place to start.

Asa Dotzler – Known as the community coordinator for several Mozilla projects, Asa is a guy that we can all relate to. Love Firefox or hate it, I would suggest you subscribe either way. You are always bound to find something of interest here.

Worthy Example Post: IE8

bLaugh – The un-official comic of the blogosphere has gotten a little less busy in the past few months, but there is still plenty of awesome comics if your are a tech or Internet fan. One of the few Online comics I actually subscribe to, just wish there were more updates.

Worthy Example Post: Huge Software Sale

Blog on a Stick – This blog belongs to one of the best Firefox theme designers out there today, TwisterMC. Past covering some of his Firefox theme updates, he does talk about plenty of interesting tech and Web related content.

Worthy Example Post: iPox Remix

Chris Pirillo – How could you not have much geeky love for Chris Pirillo? I still have to thank my time over at Lockergnome to much of the success I have now in my professional life. I’ve been a fan of Chris’s ever since the TechTV days and it was awesome to work with him on a few projects here and there.

Worthy Example Post: Thank You, Thank YouNote: Ok, example post only included because my name was in there. :)

Clickfire – If you consider yourself a webmaster, which I know many of you do – subscribe to Clickfire. From web dev ideas to web hosting help, they have a lot of content well worth diving into. Emory Rowland has done a great job at producing grade A content for 10 years now.

Worthy Example Post: How to Lose a SEO Contest

As I work my way down my feeds I subscribe to I am sure more suggestions and praise will be coming along the way. A list, B list or no list at all – I don’t care where your blogging from as long as I can get something out of the experience.

Checkout the Entire Feed Suggestion Series!

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Don’t be Afraid to Write About Nothing

Back when I lost my first web hosting job and I decided I would rather take a track down the road of freelance writing, I went around from web site to web site trying to find a place to work. I quickly realized though after talking with three or four places I wanted to write for that without example articles and stories it would be really hard to show them exactly what I could do.

I know it might sound silly, but if you are a writer without a published work to your name you might need to create a few before you become a hired hand at your favorite blogging spot. Personally I wrote up several different types of articles covering the areas I knew the most about. Then I linked them up on my personal site (which also doubles as my resume) and was ready to give looking for a freelance writing job another chance.

The second time around I was welcomed with much warmer arms of amazement and didn’t have any proverbial doors shut on my nose.

Each time I got a gig’ I added whatever I wrote for them to my resume links, so others could see my work there too. Fast forwarding to where we are now I have written so many articles, posts, podcasts and more there is no way I could fit them all on one list. Just don’t forget that when your first starting out with the online writing game that you have to have examples of your work, the best you have to offer, if you want to make your name from behind your keyboard.

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Merry Christmas from Mitchelaneous

Here’s hoping that each and every one of you out there have a very Merry Christmas (or insert other just as merry other holiday here). It has been a most excellent holiday season from here – as I am enjoying a break from my usual job – a little mini vacation to help me recharge the ol’ batteries.

If your looking for a present.. geez, I am afraid I don’t have much. How about adding a couple of new web sites to your RSS feed reader of choice? If you like what you see here I am sure you will love FirefoxFacts.com (RSS Feed) and WebHostingShow.com (RSS Feed). Thanks for reading Mitchelaneous through out the year – and hopefully many more great things will come by the time I make this same post next year.

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Undelete Your Lost Files with Restoration

RestorationNeeding a good piece of freeware to undelete your mistakingly deleted files? We have all done it. You hit delete, you remember you needed something off of that hard drive or memory card and bang your head against the desk in frustration because it is all your fault.

Restoration looks to be the answer to your problems. It is an easy to use, straight forward and tiny un-deleter that will recover your lost files, or will at least give it a try. Restoration works with FAT and NTFS as well as digital cameras cards.

Of course the biggest tip I could give you for this type of situation would be to make sure you don’t write to the hard drive or card that you are wishing to recover files from. If you do you are risking writing over the space that you are trying to recover.

The major positives about this program is it is easy to use and doesn’t take a degree to master. All you have to do is point it in the direction of the hard drive or memory card you wish to look into and hit one single button.  It will also run on Windows 98/ME/2000/XP and Vista.

On the negative side, I wish there was an easier way to restore files from it once you find them on the card. Currently you have to do it file by file, saving each file you restore to a new location.

All in all, Restoration is a great free product that does the job when it comes to recovering deleted files.

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Ultimate List of Free Image Hosts

42 Free Photo HostsLooking for a for a free place to upload a few of your pictures? There is no shortage of places online, I can promise you that for sure. Over the past few weeks I’ve been gathering my own list up, checking it twice and have found for you 42 of the best photo or graphic hosts out there today.

I know that some people don’t like to register to get this type of service so the only requirement that I had for this list would be that you can upload without registering – with the exception of Flickr, Zooomr, Photobucket and some of the known and trusted photo hosting resources.

Here is the list of free photo or graphic hosts:

  1. Flickr – 20 MB monthly upload limit / unlimited bandwidth
  2. Zooomr – 100 MB monthly upload limit / unlimited bandwidth
  3. Visadig – Max file size 1.6MB / unlimited bandwidth
  4. Photobucket – 1 GB disk space / 25 GB monthly bandwidth
  5. Image Vimage – Max file size 2 MB / bandwidth unknown
  6. TinyPic – Unlimited photo hosting and bandwidth
  7. PutPix – 2 GB of space / 10 GB bandwidth / 2 MB file size limits
  8. ImageShock.eu – no limits mentioned / cool bonus tools included
  9. IMGSpot – max file size 650 KB / bandwidth not mentioned
  10. ImageShack – max file size of 1.5 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  11. Supload – unlimited disk space and bandwidth
  12. PicHostOnline -max file size of 1.5 MB / hosted for 60 days
  13. UploadJPEG.com – max file size of 1.5 MB / bandwidth unknown
  14. ImageVenue – max file size of 3 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  15. Keep My File – max file size of 2.5 MB / bandwidth unknown
  16. ImageTitan – max file size 1536 KB / unlimited bandwidth
  17. ImageRush.com – max file size 50 MB / hosted 60 days
  18. Pikkisays unlimited file size and bandwidth
  19. PixHosting.info – max file size 10 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  20. ImagesFly.com – max file size 5 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  21. PostImage – max file size 4 Mb / unlimited bandwidth
  22. IMGBolt.com – max file size 1 MB / 1 GB bandwidth (1,000 max views)
  23. Slibe – unknown all around, very strange service
  24. Picshome – max file size 300 MB / bandwidth unknown
  25. ImagePile – max file size 5 MB / bandwidth unknown
  26. Uploadem – max file size 15 MB / bandwidth unknown
  27. ShareURPic.com -max file size 10 MB / hosted 90 days (or longer)
  28. YourUpload.com – max file size 50 MB / bandwidth unknown
  29. Upload and GO! – max file size 1 MB / bandwidth unknown
  30. Pictiger – max file size 1 MB / bandwidth unknown
  31. FreeImageHost -max file size 3 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  32. ImageBam – max file size 3 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  33. 2and2.net – max file size 3 MB /bandwidth unknown
  34. Picfu – no limits mentioned on web site
  35. Image Hosting Site – max file size 2 MB / bandwidth unknown
  36. Pic-Spot.com – no limits mentioned on web site
  37. 10pix.com – max file size 1.5 MB / bandwidth unknown
  38. Imagefilez.com -max file size 3 MB / bandwidth unknown
  39. DigitalUploader – max file size 256 KB / bandwidth unknown
  40. ImageCabin -max file size 25 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  41. WeImage – max file sie 2 MB / unlimited bandwidth
  42. xs.to – no real rules & limits defined on uploads

Have a perfect one for number 43? Don’t be shy! Drop in a comment or leave me an e-mail and let me know about it.  Need more?  Check out my other reviews of free web hosts.

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Audio Guides to a Better Web Hosting You!

Time to add to my list of web hosting audio guides, right from the Web Hosting Show. Just uploaded my latest special edition for all to enjoy:

+ Handy Guide to Domain Names – Episode 134

Here is a little more information about this episode of the best hosting podcast out there today if I do say so myself (and I just did!):

Need help picking the best domain name? Do you want some assistance finding the domain name register that is right for you? Have you considered the privacy concerns you might be giving up by getting that .com of you very own? I want to tackle domain names from head to toe to give people a guide to the confusing world of domain name registrations.

Go check out the show notes for the visual version, and for the audio version download the mp3 from WebHostingShow.com.

Past Audio Guides to the Web Hosting World

There are many subjects that take a little longer to explain and are confusing to most inside of the web hosting industry. Here are a few of the other special “guide” episodes I have produced. Continue Reading →

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CamStudio – Easy Desktop Recording

CamStudioLooking for the perfect way to roll out a few tutorials here and there?

I have looked everywhere at every single product. For the best tools for the cheapest price my personal best find award would go to CamStudio. It is free and gets the job done.

The interface is simple enough for you to master within a few minutes and the number of different projects you could do with this are almost endless.

Personally, I wanted something to do a few quick captures so I could do a few more video tutorials – showing things from my desktop.

Here are a few more details from the developer:

CamStudio is able to record all screen and audio activity on your computer and create industry-standard AVI video files and using its built-in SWF Producer can turn those AVIs into lean, mean, bandwidth-friendly Streaming Flash videos (SWFs)

CamStudio did not let me down. There are a handful of advanced features too – but they really were not needed for what I wanted to do. As long as I can send that avi into a video editing program or upload it to a place like YouTube I am good to go.

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