PC running a little slow?
Windows Maintenance
Clean out the files you don't need.
1. From your Desktop
Click on My Computer
Right-click your C: drive
Select Properties
Click Disk Cleanup Button
Make sure the Temporary Files
and Recycle Bin checkboxes
are checked
Click OK
Clean up Internet Explorer
1. From the Start Menu Select Settings Control Panel Internet Options Click Delete Files button Click Clear History
You might run a little slower at first but after you visit your regular pages and the fresh pages are cached your speed will increase.
Defragment
Defragment when you have some free time. It will take a while.Select Start Programs Accessories System Tools Disk Defragmenter Select your C: drive Click Start.
PC running a little slow?
Windows NT Maintenance
Defrag for Windows NT
Free up Disk Space
On the File menu
Click Properties
Tools Tab
Click Defragment Now and follow
instructions on the screen.
Shortcuts to your C: drive
c:\Program Files\Internet Explorerc:\windows\defrag.exe
What else can we do to speed up our PC? Comments? Suggestions?
| SPOOKY SCARY FUN |
Blogs we are reading today
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Halloween
We are preparing for Halloween. We take a polariod photo of each trick-or-treater and toss it in their bag while they are picking the candy. Some neighbors have their pictures displayed for each year.
How do we estimate how much film? The first year we ran out at 100 polaroids. The next year it was 160 polaroids. It's fun for us and many parents come to the door with the kids to get a family shot.
Some teens come back twice to get photos with boyfriends or a group of their friends. It is so fun. And, the candy is good too!
We are excited and working on the background for the pics this year.Prizes
We'll also have cellophane and ribbon wrapped toys for best costume, most original, best boy, best girl, and more. We make it up as we go along, just picking whoever it is we think might really like to win a prize. Everyone loves children.Trick or Treat
Cheap Web Tricks
Glow Filter Treat
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Copy and paste (or type) this code in your blog or web page:
<TABLE STYLE="filter:glow(color=orange)"> <TR><TD> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE SPOOKY SCARY FUN </TD></TR> </TABLE>
Shadow Filter Treat
HALLOWEENAre you spooked yet? The shadow filter looks a lot like the glow filter. And, it's just as easy to code. |
Copy and paste (or type) this into your blog or Web page.
<TABLE STYLE="filter:shadow(color=gray)"> <TR><TD> <big> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE </big> You don't have to use big text </TD></TR> </TABLE>
What does this code say?
Extras that you don't need to know
- TABLE says we are using a table for our layout.
- COLOR="gray" says use the color gray for the shadow.
- TR and TD say that we are starting a new row and a new column.
- BIG says make the text that follows big.
- </BIG>says close the big text.
- /TD and /TR say to end the table column and the row.
- The /TABLE says end our table
FROM THE ARCHIVES
Shadows
No Graphics Needed
The CSS shadow filter is a powerful way to add punch to a page without graphics. It's also a fun filter to play with.| Shadow |
How did they do that?
Copy and paste (or type) this code in your Blog or Web page
<table width="200" style="filter:SHADOW">
<t><td>
<span
style="font-family: Arial Black;
font-size:32px;
color: red;">
YOUR TEXT GOES HERE
</span>
</td></tr></table>
Humor
Grillboy had a response from a spammer that will make anyone laugh, even us, and we don't have a sense of humor.Cultural Literacy
Top 10 Gaining Queries
Week Ending Oct. 21, 2002
1. sniper not surprising
2. the ring what ring?
3. bob crane
4. halloween costume ideas like who needs an idea? Or, go call Martha.
5. world series tickets We've moved on to basketball already. Go Kings! Yes, we have season tickets for awesome seats! First game is tonight.
6. bmx xxx I dunno
7. peter kay should we know this one? So out of touch here.
8. southwest airlines flew southwest last week. They rock. Happy staff.
9. pumpkin carving we still just punch out a couple of eyes, a nose, and a mouth
10. ulrika jonsson uh, we are losing it again
Icon Cheat Sheet
We need a cheat sheet to the icons we made. You are welcome to use them.Linksites 32x32 Icons
Blanks
Tiny1.gif - Tiny10.gif
Tiny11.gif - Tiny20.gif
Tiny21.gif - Tiny30.gif
As we suspected, we are missing a few here.
50x50 Icons
Seasonal Images
Tip for Today
Make sure that you include the HEIGHT and WIDTH for every image on your page. If you forget (like we do) the page will not be displayed until the browser finishes the download.Regular GIF Button (size: 88x31)
Free Banner or Button maker
Do you know about a good button maker?
Can you help?
Life in the IT Trenches
It's Monday.In the IT world that can mean a lot. Most changes are done over the weekend. I personally make changes on a Tuesday. That way I see the problems right away and can back out quickly if needed.
so you want my job, eh?
From home I am testing a secure Internet Web application I wrote in ColdFusion. They (the Internet group of kids) decided to migrate the Internet server and upgrade to a newer version of ColdFusion server at the same time.so you want my job, eh?
Nothing went right. The Internet group refuses to roll back since it did indeed work for two customers.so you want my job, eh?
In the networking and application development world one always has a backout plan.The Internet kids say this fiasco can't be backed out.
my boss, the genius
Unfortunately there is no support. My boss doesn't have a clue what it is that I do. Not that he should. Everyone in our group is specialized and I'm the only Internet application developer. I don't even know if he is in the office this week or last week. Most of us are invisible.my boss, the genius
The job is not so difficult, the politics are.Overheard: Shut her up.
Link Banner 88 x 31
Maggie has redesigned her site and is looking for a good 88 x 31 link banner maker.Standard Sizes
The good news is that standard sizes for link and advertising banners are getting smaller. Most are going to 88 x 31 pixels. Why 88 x 31? We don't know. The free banner generators that we know about don't work well with the 88 x 31 size.
Where are the new banner generators?
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We're back from Palm Springs and ready to rock and roll.
Blogs we are reading
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Technical difficulties...
Play sounds
Q: Hi ya, Meg. I have what is probably a dumb question for ya. Is there an easy code to use for wav file?note: we have never had a dumb question asked ever. We may be a day ahead of you sometimes but that's about it.
A: Yes, it is easy to play background .wav file sounds.
Playing a .WAV File Here is the copy and paste code -
<EMBED SRC="deja_vu.wav""hidden="true"> <BGSOUND SRC="deja_vu.wav" loop="0" >We have another post that give a little more info Play Sound.
Where to find sounds?
Try SoundAmerica.Dotted Box
How did you make that dotted box?
Copy and paste (or type) this inline CSS style code in your blog or Web page.
<div style="width:200px;text-align:left; padding:5px;background-color:lawngreen; border:2px dotted black;font-size:11px;"> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE </div>
"bloggers can be F*beep*ing attention-starved playground bullies with a keyboard?"
You think? Like my blog is my fist? The keyboard is my weapon.
Halloween Colored Box
"A bad review is even less important than whether it is raining in Patagonia. "
-- Iris Murdoch
Copy and paste (or type) this code in your blog or Web page for a Halloween box.
<div style="width:150px;text-align:left; padding:10px; background-color: #FF6600; border:1px solid black;font-size:10px;"> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE </div>The layout for this popular South Korean Portal is particularly interesting.
Visit VeryBigDesign for a visual treat.
Simple File Download
How do I let visitors download files from my site?It's easy if it is a file that the browser will not try to execute or display. For example, you want your visitor to be able to download a style sheet. Make the download clickable with the HREF tag.
Click to Download our style sheetCopy and paste (or type) this HTML in your blog or Web page.
<a href="style1.css">Click to Download our style sheet</a>
Nobel Prize
Official Web Site of The Nobel Foundation The Nobel Prize Winners for 2002. Includes pictures and even games. No advertising. No pop-ups or pop-unders.
Blogs we are reading
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Quirky Programmers
Only you will hear the sound of one hand clapping...
Seeing a reference to "the sound of one hand clapping" today made me think of some quirky things we programmers do. Here's some of mine.
- When an application greets me with "only you will hear the sound of one hand clapping" it is a reminder that the system has detected either through Novell or from the logon used that it is behaving for me, not for the end-user.
- If a piece of code says "Merry Christmas" in the comments it signals me that I don't have a clue why the following code required a work-around solution.
- If the address is "1234 Disk Drive" or "6789 Sesame Street" it means I am working with a test database
- Joe Customer is well represented in test data, Joe Sixpack never is.
- When an application suddenly displays a small window that says "It's 6PM, do you know where you parked?", it's a personal reminder to go home. It displays only for my logon.
- In one application if your first name is Dave you will hear Hal from 2002 Space Odyssey and he addresses you as Dave. Can't believe I'm fessing up to that one. Most folks keep the volume off at work anyway. Sorry Dave. It was some midnight fun.
- In Web applications the nav bar that is available only to my logon is always coded using the color #FFFFCC (light yellow).
Slide Show
Fade Applet or JavaScript Slide Show
Easy Instructions
The fading image you see here is done with the old Fade Applet
The JavaScript slideshow looks identical so you can compare and select either one for use on your site.
In the IT trenches...
Steaming. We (they) are moving one of my secure ColdFusion applications to a new Internet server this weekend, thank you very much for the warning guys. I can't get a new SSL certificate this fast and don't have a clue if it is possible to just move the certificate.so you want my job, eh?
Two high priority projects, emails, customer problems, and now this leaves me with time only to blog.I blog to keep from screaming
And if that wasn't enough they will be upgrading the ColdFusion server at the same time. Hey, I had plans for the weekend. Sis is flying in from Florida today.so you want my job, eh?
They instructed all to move everything to a migration server today and they will move it from there over the weekend. Right. Wakeup and smell the coffee guys. The database is updated all day every day by external customers. You can't just move it in action.I see stupid people
Sneak out for a smoke and chill. The elevator is a good place for screaming.And I know this post is boring. I'll delete it later. Just fuming still and blowing off steam.
Just saving my place. This looks like a potential daily read grillboy
Cultural Literacy
Or Cheap Tricks?
It's cultural literacy for us.
Here are Google's Top 10 Gaining Queries for the Week Ending Oct. 14, 2002. We have learned a lot about what people are looking for in Web sites, and have learned about what is going on in the world. The list is often mysterious, especially since we don't do TV or know much about the music scene. This week most of the list makes sense.
1. bali - a tragedy we all shared.
2. sniper - he's still out there.
3. chicago marathon - uh, I have to look this one up.
4. eldred supreme court - I should know. Eldred Copyright
5. nobel prize - Jimmy Carter we know. Here's the rest Nobel Prize 2002
6. petri gerdt - don't have a clue. Oh, another terrorist.. About Petri Gerdt
7. christopher columbus - yes, that was a holiday for us. A holiday they need to undo or delete.
8. imre kertesz - don't have a clue, gotta look it up. Imre Kertesz Auschwitz survivor Imre Kertesz of Hungary wins the Nobel Prize in literature.
9. queen - something is going on that I don't know about
10. audrey mestre - again, don't have a clue. Was she the diver who recently died trying to break a diving record?And, sometimes it is embarrassing to not know why something is in the top ten. But, we share our ignorance and look up all of them. We try to provide good links. Hey, the first time I searched for Eminem it was enlightening. This guy can do things with lyrics that reach in and pull your heart out. It's rap, right? No, I've never heard the music. Don't have to. The lyrics alone were impressive.
So, no we don't do it for "hits" as someone implied, and no offense taken here. Hits from accidental tourists are a minus, a waste of time for the searcher of information. Our Mandarin Music link at the top of our site is the "get out of this site quick" link. Visitors come here searching for Mandarin music, lyrics, and downloads. We found the best site we could to provide a good link.
Is this kind of post a waste of space and your time? Want us to stick to the copy and paste code? Comments please...
"I once cried because I had no shoes until I met a man that had no class."
- George SessumOverheard at Unfamous Quotes, a place where you can add your original quote. So far, George is knocking our socks off. He can tell it like it is. Whoa.
Alexa
Have you ever used Alexa? It ranks sites so you can tell how "popular" a site is, presumably so that you know whether a site is worthy of your visit.mostly meaningless
It's mostly meaningless since it ranks based on how many Alexa users surf a particular site.where's the fun part?
Avg. Review:
We are a 5-star site! Of course our average is based on the ranking of one kind person so we get to keep the 5-star average.
Rank your favorite site today on Alexa.
Note: Some of you, like blogspot sites, will not see your page ranking. You will see the ranking of the high-level domain.
Let the day begin.
Killer applications?
"The problem with broadband is there simply aren't any good killer applications," said Nalebuff
Computerworld"Sometimes you just have to throw your hands up in the air and say, 'He was dead when I got here'."
Ready for a good Googlefight?
- George Sessum
FROM THE ARCHIVESReturn of the Favicon
Oh, this is so cool! Another free icon maker site Favicon.co.uk has taken up where the old guys left off. If you bookmark our site you see
next to the bookmark.
Want your own Favicon? So what masterpiece can you create with your logo? Take it for a spin. It will take you about 10 - 15 minutes of total mindless fun to do this and it lasts forever...Make your own Favicon Now
Columbus Day
Today is a holiday for us, the civil servants of the State of California. It's not easy being a servant.
FROM THE ARCHIVESTables for Dummies
As requested, here is the "For Dummies" table template code.
SURGERY
for
Dummies
Copy and paste (or type) this code into your Web page or Blog.<table width="100" cellpadding="10" cellspacing="10" border="3" bordercolor="black" bgcolor="yellow"> <tr><td bgcolor="black"> <span style="color: yellow;"> <big> SURGERY<br><br> for <br><br> Dummies<br> </big> </span> </td> </tr> </table>Fill in your own title.
"I tend to always choose the most difficult ways, the hardest solutions... as if that somehow will make it more worth the trouble. Strange..."
Blogs we are reading
Karina In my head
More CSS Style Fun
Summary of cool effects in CSS
It takes just a tad bit more than plain HTML.Play with
SPAN.
Hover Color
Hover it yellow.
Color the text
This is lawngreen. You can use any of the named colors.
Color the background
A yellow background.
Space text
And, here we are using 7 pixels between each letter.
Space lines
Here we say space it 140% of normal. You actually see the effect better if there are multiple lines. This one comes in handy.
Lose the underline on a link
Your link will not have an underline.
Qoöl
PixelCharmer has a good referral script that looks like it might be fun to test drive.
Just take a quick peek at these Really Cool Links . No it is not your usual link list, it's a visual thing.
Anita Rowland has a script on her site that would be fun to play with. Go there and look on the left nav bar.
Blogs we are reading
IP Address
What does a site know about you, the visitor? Fred writes this morning asking if a guest book slammer can be identified.it depends...
We'll go to his site, look at the tools used for the guest book and first see if the IP address is being tracked. If it is, then it is possible to identify the annoying visitor. If the visitor
Note: The IP address is just like the street address for your home. The address for your PC looks something like thisis sophisticated orhas a dynamic IP Address then it will be more difficult. The search begins.169.3.169.9IP Address Banning
We can see that Fred is using Bravenet that allows IP Banning of a specific IP (example:138.222.555.65) or a group of IPs. We can't find where it tracks the IP.Can you help?
We can't find where the IP is tracked in the Bravenet guest book. Can you help Fred?
"The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents."
YACSS is closed for a while so we are trying out the HaloScan commenting. Fred is looking for something like this. Any other suggestions?
Nathaniel Borenstein



Microsoft Hell?
Computerworld reports this morning that Microsoft is no longer Google's No. 1 Vision Of 'Hell'. Typing the phrase "go to hell" into the Google search engine no longer gives Microsoft's home page as the first result.
Halloween Box
Halloween Colored Box: Put your click-or-treat items in a nice orange box. Ugh, that sounds so Martha Stewart.
Copy and paste (or type) this code in your blog or Web page for a Halloween box.<div style="width:200px;text-align:left; padding:10px;background-color: #FF9700; border:1px solid black;font-size:12px;"> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE </div>
Gary Turner has this Unfamous Quotes thing going in his blog this morning where you can contribute a quote, by you, the unfamous. Everyone is doing it, even
Farrago is talking about the
unfamous quotations. This is your chance to be "unfamous".
Visit The Homeless Guy for a reality check. Lundy, who likes the link to the Free UK Favicon icon generator, left two site names we will visit today - Scrapbook and Mosaic Tile Design.
Overheard: "Your blog is like a car wreck, but more interesting"
FROM THE ARCHIVESGrouping Images
Have you ever tried to put a group of images together? Some tools like Adobe will automatically gallery your images. But using HTML gives you more control over how your images are displayed.





Hey, where's the cool part?
Check out the article Grouping Images for step-by-step help in creating thumbnail visual trickery. Each thumbnail expands. Use your art or photography to create a simple live collage."It's total chaos. There's no communication, so no one knows what anyone else is doing," says
Michelle Goodrich, an IT specialistin Sacramento, Calif." Computerworld, End of Job Loyalty? article by Sharon WatsonBusted. The photo was removed to protect the innocent. That was the beginning of the end of her career.
Blogs and Tags we are browsing today...
Daniel who is redesigning perfection.
LauraInterior designer with classy site.
Maggie has a lot to say
RageBoy who posts stuff, mindless stuff
Zeldman has some new content.
Gary Turner Who says something even when he doesn't have anything to say.
BostonBluEyes who finds cool stuff and always has something to say.
Ariel Pay it Forward a day in the life
InnerBalance nice layout
dgsblog quiet lately
in my head daily life and more...
j-mo who survived hurricane Lili
Bladed by Cisco�
We aren't renewing CiscoBlade.com. Not because of the legal stuff with American.Com , but because it was never a good domain name. It was a late-night buy for pocket change. The game is over. Nobody won. We had a few good laughs. The Cisco that bladed us can dedicate their legal staff to real work now, a slimmer and trimmer Cisco. Blade on. We intended no harm, it was naive innocent fun.Let it Glow
It's Saturday, why aren't you outside playing? That was an unintended cool effect. Here's the code to copy and paste.
<TABLE border="1" width="200" STYLE="filter:glow(color=yellow)"> <TR><TD width="190"> It's Saturday, why aren't you outside playing? </TD> </TR> </TABLE>
Fresh Free Mandrake
MANDRAKE LINUX 9.0 is now available for download.
Welcome guests from Mystically Purple
Hint: The code will work if you put it all on one line. We put it on separate lines for demonstation. Either way usually works.If it doesn't work on the first try make sure your blogging tool didn't insert stray line break
<br>tags. You may not be able to see the line breaks. Use the delete key to make sure each tag is on one line.
Steal these Graphics
Free icons
Those little 32 X 32 standard sized icons you see around are free at Zeldman.comHere are a few that we borrowed.
We had so much fun with the Zeldman icons that we made some of our own.
Domain Name and Hosting
Painful Process: Transferring to a new host...
Today we are setting up a new site, using GoDaddy for hosting, while the domain name is registered at TotalNic.net. The transfer isn't going well. It has been a long frustrating day and we still aren't ready to rock and roll.
the easy way...
Register Your Domain/Hosting with One Company
Advice: If you can register your domain name and hosting service at the same time, using one company, it will save you a lot of grief. We set up a site recently at GoDaddy and it was simple and painless. We don't recommend any particular hosting service.
Hmmm...
Listen to Kelly Clarkson
American Idol Kelly Clarkson's "A Moment Like This"" is front page news at Webmonkey. So are they searching for material or are they affiliated with Lycos? Is this an advertisement? Just watching to see where sites get their content. This one was interesting.
Duh. It's an advertisement.notepad
Mel is another awesome site made entirely in Notepad.
Qoöl
Is your programmer out playing? "...web design and CSS are irresistible toys "
Dorothea
How can I make a box?
CSS Boxes: For Dummies, Beginners, and Masters
First, let's have fun and box the hyperlinked icons for the blogs we are reading today. We'll use some Halloween colors.
It's all done with the
DIVtag with someborder styleadded. Let's start with simple boxes.Copy and Paste Code
Box Example 1
This is a simple box.Copy and paste (or type) this code in your Blog or Web page.
<div style="border: solid 1pt #669933; width:100px; background:white; padding:10pt" align="left"> This is a simple box. </div>
We used the color #669933 for the border, a solid 1pt border, and white background.
Box Example 2
Psst, the article Borders, borders, borders is about CSS boxes. A box has 4 borders. Get it?
Copy and paste (or type) this code in your Blog or Web page.
<div style="border: dotted 1pt #FF3333; width:260px; background:#FFFFFF; padding:10pt" align="left"> <p> Psst, the article <a href="borders.html"> Borders, borders, borders</a> is about CSS boxes. A box has 4 borders. Get it? </p> </div>
Box Example 3
YOUR TEXT GOES HERECopy and paste (or type) this code in your blog or HTML page.
<div style="width:200px;text-align:left; padding:5px;background-color:yellow; border:1px dotted black;font-size:12px;"> YOUR TEXT GOES HERE </div>
We like using CSS inline style because it's free. No graphics to load.
Any copy-and-paste code that we post can usually be put on a single line.
Overheard at Confessions: This document almost validates as 4.01 Transitional and CSS.
Web site loading too fast?
Add some images (bigger than 10,000 bytes each) and a JavaScript counter that runs at another site. That should slow it down a bit. If it's still running too fast just add an Applet. That usually works for us.
Colin AKA
ran with the "for dummies" code and enhanced it. He's the man with ideas.BostonBluEyes Hurricane Lili
Stay safe Jen and let us know when Hurricane Lili passes.
