People associated with online journalism and professional blog writing will relate to this. While experienced ones may have already found a way out, many beginners might not even be aware of the hindrances that affect their online productivity. They start putting exhaustive efforts to better their figures but hardly do they know what’s causing the real trouble. Based on my personal experiences, here are 5 major things that bring your enthusiasm, and hence productivity, down.

1) Social Media

Yes. Paradoxical, but yes. You sit in front of your computer, prepping yourself for some real work, but you keep your Twitter client and Facebook running in background. Yes, you are following some awesome people on Twitter and hope to receive the last minute update so that you can tweak your work (let’s say a blogpost) accordingly. But this affects the quality of your work bigtime. Anything that you do requires ‘focus’. And the lack of it causes mediocre quality work which leads to bad productivity. As simple as that. Close these applications and use them later to promote your stuff.

2) Analysis

“Too much analysis leads to paralysis”. I have seen people analysing (or simply checking out) their Google PR, Alexa rankings, number of incoming links to their blog, their adsense earnings, analytics, Twitter mentions, ‘Likes’ and comments on their FB fanpage almost a dozen times in a day. While it’s a great ego booster to see those graphs go up and down, it seriously affects your work. I have a rule of thumb – analyse anything and everything only in the last half an hour of your day, just before packing up.

3) Keeping an eye on competitors…all the time!

See, it’s a human nature to consider only those people as your competitors who are slightly ahead of you in the game. Always. Once you surpass them, your subconscious mind removes them from the list to add new competitors. So at any given time, you feel like you are behind someone else. Now, in a way it’s a good thing that keeps you motivated. But keeping a close eye on their progress all the time makes you feel less confident about yourself. You try to follow their exact footsteps and become less creative. Here you need to give importance to your intuition about what you want to achieve and how you will achieve it. Only then, your productivity will show some rise.

4) Choosing the wrong time

No, it’s not about working at the most suitable time of the day when you feel energetic and enthusiastic. It’s about being smart. It’s about analysing the rush of internet users at different times. Often, people do not study the internet properly and then crib about not getting enough exposure. If you are publishing something online, make sure you do that in the peak hours when the traffic is huge. Your content is more likely to be picked up then. Publishing something important at 3AM or on weekends will obviously get unnoticed. Try to spread your best works on weekdays, just before noon. Avoid Saturday evenings at all costs. Keep in mind that even if you work hard for the whole day, but it doesn’t get noticed, your productivity still remains zero.

5) More than necessary sources of information

It is quite obvious that people tend to stuff in as many news and information feeds in their feed-readers trying to get the most of it. But before you can even realise, you would have made an information hodgepodge. You try to extract relevant information from it and before you make any sense out of it, you feel exhausted and frustrated. Your productivity suffers. I tend to analyse my feeds every month or so and keep those blog feeds which provide a particular information at the earliest. The rest with almost the same story, I remove them.

So these are the hindrances to productivity that I experienced and my views to tackle them. What hindrances do you face? Share your thoughts

HTML5 will sooner or later replace flash. This is quite evident from the latest upward trend in the popularity of HTML5 and the fact that most of the web browsers are not supporting HTML5 multimedia. Even popular video hosting sites have shown their positive support to HTML5 video formats and hence it’s inevitable for webmasters to consider HTML5 as a very strong option while integrating audio and video on websites and blogs.

To make your task a breeze, here are some very good HTML5 video players that can be integrated onto a website or a blog that can not even play HTML5 audio/video files but also traditional formats.

While you check-out the players below, do subscribe to our feeds and join us on  Facebook and  Twitter.

1) Video JS: Video JS is by far my favorite HTML5 player so putting it on top of the list. It is a Javascript based video player that fully utilizes the power of HTML5 in latest web-browsers like Firefox 4, Chrome 5 and Opera 10.60

2) JW Player: The close second is the JW Player. What I really like about JW Player is that it gives comparatively more personalization options. So there is hardly a chance that the player won’t go well with your blog/website’s theme.

3) Kaltura: An open-source video solution that works on all major browsers and yes, it even works on Internet Explorer. It is a skinnable and can be a decent HTML5 video player.

4) OSM Player: Open Standard media player is a jQuery based HTML5 video player that’s versatile and can play even the traditional video formats. It can additionally deliver videos from YouTube and Vimeo.

5) Video for everybody: Most simplest of them all. This isn’t actually a video player but merely a piece of code that your browser (HTML5 compatible browser, ofcourse) understands and fires up the native player to play the content. You need to embed your video under a <video> element, like so:

<video height="360" width="640" src="LINK TO THE HTML5 VIDEO FILE" controls="controls">Your browser doesn’t support HTML5 video.</video>

I am sure there might be many more options available optimised for different platforms like WordPress, Joomla, etc. If you know of any or have developed a player of your own, do mention it in the comments.

No matter how insightful your content is, if your site fails to make a good impression on the visitor, you are going to have a hard time building up the reader base. This is where CSS comes in. Long gone are the days when CSS was used to provide a basic layout of the site. Now it’s all about creativity and usability. With CSS you can make or break a site irrespective of its content. I have collected an extensive list of CSS resources which I hope you’ll find useful.

1) CSS Tutorials

2) CSSTutorial.net

3) EchoEcho’s CSS Tutorials

4) WestCiv.com

5) HTMLDog.com

6) MaxDesign’s CSS Layouts

7) Subcide.com’s CSS Layouts

Noupe – 40 best CSS practices

9) KillerSites.com

10) CSS Portal

11) UTTexas – Learn CSS

12) WebChicklet – Learning CSS

13) CSS Play

14) LearnThat

15) RichinStyle.com

16) CSS Basics

17) CSSDog.com

18) CSS3.com

19) NetTuts+ CSS Tutorials

20) Web Design From Scratch – CSS

21) FriendlyBit – Beginner’s guide to CSS

22) CSS Property Index

23) CSS3 Previews

24) W3Avenue.com – CSS Techniques

25) CSS Shorthand Guide

26) CameronMoll – Beginner’s guide to CSS

27) CommunityMX.com – good CSS coding habits

28) AddedBytes.com – CSS Cheat Sheet

29) DZone.com – Core CSS

30) SmashingMagazine – Powerful CSS techniques for effective coding

31) CSS StyleGuides for better code readability

32) LeslieFranke.com – CSS Cheat Sheet

33) Carsonified.com – Creating Sexy Stylesheets

34) DesignReviver.com – CSS Training Principles

35) CSS Beauty

36) CSS Vault Resouces

37) CSS Quick Reference Guide

38) BlogHerald.com – CSS Tips and Tricks

39) CatsWhoCode.com – Techniques for cross browser CSS coding

40) EddieWelker.com – CSS Shorthand CheatSheet (PDF)

41) BarelyFitz.com – Learning CSS Positioning

42) CatsWhoCode.com – Learn how to make CSS Buttons

43) Line25.com – Gettings started with CSS

44) CSSGlobe.com – CSS Tips

45) SixRevisions.com – CSS Techniques and examples

For more resources, stay connected with us.  Subscribe to our posts.

 Follow us on Twitter and join our  Facebook community too.

Let me start off by saying that there was a time when websites were made for desktops and laptops. Hours and hours of web designing followed by weeks of debugging to make it look presentable on 1024×768 resolution on Internet Explorer. Fast forward to 2010 and this whole perception becomes null and void. We have already reached a point in time when even hand held devices have reached a point of saturation.

While your site may look awesome on a desktop, it might not even load on a mobile phone. With increasing availability of smart phones, it has now become inevitable to build a mobile version of your site. Looking at a broader picture, people will eventually leave desktops and laptops and completely turn to hand-held devices for their daily internet appetite. And this will happen very very soon.

Recently Opera claimed to have 100 million users out of which 50% are mobile. The Internet Telecommunication Union forecasted long ago that the mobile internet users will reach over 1.7 billion by 2013. With the advent of devices like iPhone, iPad and technologies like 3G, this target seems ridiculously easy. Some more mobile internet usage data here.

I am using Woopra as my site analytics software for about a year now. It gives detailed information about your visitors. One such information is the screen resolution of the visitors. I have noticed that the visitors with smaller screen resolutions (mostly 480×320) have constantly increased in the past 6 months. This urged me to have a separate mobile version of my site – http://m.techexplorer.in.

In this scenario, you simply can’t ignore the mobile platform while designing sites. Making a mobile version of a site is just as important for a normal site owner as it is for corporate big daddies. And to simplify your task, there are many options available. There are services like Mobify, Mofuse, MobilePress, etc. and WordPress plugins like WPhone, WordPress Mobile Pack, WPTouch to make a mobile version of your site. And the best part is, most of these services are free. Why not use them?

When you use these services, they will automatically redirect your visitors to your trimmed down mobile version of your site. This will make your site load faster on their mobile devices and will eventually make them happy. Great browsing experience is one of the critical factors on mobile phones. Fancy banners and other multimedia magic is of second priority here. Also, this will make a good professional impression on your visitors.

I have always believed that when it comes to visitors browsing your site using mobile devices, they just need vital information and are more interested in the content rather than the eye-candy. When Godzilla visited NYC in 1998, Dr. Nick Tatopoulos said, “Give him what he wants, and he’ll come to you.” This stands true for your visitors too. Provide them with the information that want and they will become your loyal returning visitors.

What are your views on mobilizing your site? How much important it is to you to have a separate low-bandwidth version of your site? Do share in the comments!

Security of your blog and thereby your hard work is extremely important. Like all web 2.0 systems, WordPress too is susceptible to attacks. I guess you already know how much important it is to have a robust security for your online content. Here is a quick tutorial to secure your WordPress blog in less than 5 minutes.

First, get a FTP client like FileZilla and configure it with your WordPress blog.

Changing Permissions

This is the most primitive yet effective solution. Once you have setup your blog with the FTP client, you now have to change the permissions of certain folders in it. If you are using FileZilla, you can do this by just right clicking the folder and selecting ‘File Attributes’

Now you need to put in some numeric value (shown by an arrow in the above picture) for the different folders.

Using empty HTML to hide plugins

Make an empty HTML file, call it ‘index.html’ and place it in wp-content/plugins folder. This will prevent listing of plug-ins you are using on your blog.

Using Login Lockdown & WP Security Scan plugins

Download and install Login Lockdown plugin. This will lock your administrator login for a definite amount of time after a predefined number of failed login attempts. Simple yet highly effective.

Also, download and install WP Security Scan plugin. This plugin will scan for any security loop holes in your wordpress installation and will help you rectify them.

Strong password with these characteristics

Finally choose your WordPress administrator password wisely. Make sure you includes ALL of the below parameters:

» 8 characters long.

» Must include a combination of uppercase and lowercase characters.

» Must include special characters (!, @, #, $, %).

» Must include a number.

» Must not be dictionary word.

» Must not include information related to you. For eg. your birth date, your car number, your middle name, etc.

So these are some quick security measures to ensure a considerable amount of protection. If you too have come across a nice security tip for WordPress blogs, do share here.

If you are a website/blog owner then you must already be knowing the benefits of a faster loading webpage. Well, if at all you were taking this aspect lightly then I must tell you that Google has now decided to penalize heavy and slow websites/blogs by pushing them down in search results. Here I am listing 5 cool websites that’ll help you know how fast (or slow) your website is. Many factors affect the speed of a website like images, flash content, embedded videos, CSS (stylesheets) and even your HTML structure. It’s better to know what might be slowing down your site before search engines like Google penalize you.

WebPageTest.org

WebPageTest.org is one of the best website speed analyzers. It provides results of many sites simultaneously in two different ways – The number format and the visual format. Personally, I liked the number format because it takes in various configuration options to provide accurate results.

Web Page Analyzer

This tool is good in a way that it provides extensive statistical figures related to your websites performance and speed. Very detailed analysis is done on each and every element that is present on your webpage. Very useful for serious webmasters.

iWebTools – Web Speed Test

The speed tool at iWebTools is little less analytical but gives a really quick overview of your webpage. It can simultaneously display webpage speeds of up to 10 pages.

Self SEO – Website Speed Checker

Apart from showing the normal load times of a webpage, Self SEO’s webpage speed checker also displays Average Speed per KB. This has everything to do with the latency and the number of HTTP requests to the server. Very useful data to figure out whether or not your server is fast enough.

Website Goodies – Speed Test

Pretty simple but fast. Instantly provides the page load time and and the page size. However, it excludes the images and embedded content which might not just be something you want. Still, give it a try.

Here are some of the tools that tests your website’s speed and loading time. Hope you find them useful. For more interesting articles, keep visiting TechExplorer,in. You can also subscribe to us. 

How to know feed count of your competitors’ blogs? How to compare number of feed subscribers of two blogs?

The answer the above questions is – Very easy. As a blogger, such questions are rather natural. In order to have some sort of representation of growth (or the lack of it ) of your and your competitors’ blogs, the feed count or the number of subscribers might be considered as a substantial measure.

The web-app called Feed Compare v1.0 lets you know and compare feed count (number of subscribers) of blogs. There is no mystery and no extra magic. Just enter the ‘Feed Name’ or easier still, the entire Feedburner Feed URL of the blog and click ‘Compare’.

    The results are pretty darn accurate. It gives results for the maximum range up to 2 years which is not quite that bad for a free service. One more advantage of Feed Compare I can think of is that you can easily spot blogs who bluff about their feed counts by displaying fake subscriber counts on their blogs. 

So go to Feed Compare v1.0, compare feeds of blogs and while you’re at it, subscribe to TechExplorer.in too.

Spelling check is one of the most boring yet important task in publishing. Online publishers and blog writers will agree that no matter how much care you take while writing a post, you are not 100% sure that your content is error free. And what’s worse is that you are simply unaware of your silly mistakes. Here’s something that can help online publishers to spot spelling errors on their websites and blogs.

Spellr.us is a web-based app that detects site-wide spelling errors within a minute. You just need to feed in your website’s / blog’s URL and it takes care of the rest.

The app lists out errors in three categories: likely, unlikely and possible. And the best part is, as I mentioned above, Spellr.us checks the entire website / blog for errors.

Enough said, I know you are looking for the link

Check Spellr.us now

Blogging is amazing when it is unrestricted and hassle-free. And to make blogging a smooth experience, there are many desktop blog-publishing applications available but most of them are ‘typical’ softwares that you need to install. Some might require you to download a suite in order to get a simple blog-publishing application. Here is something for those who love blogging on Blogger and hate installing a blog-publishing software – Blogger Buddy.

Blogger Buddy is a Windows Vista/Windows 7 Gadget that lets you create new posts and publish them to your Blogger blog. It also lets you preview the content before you publish.

Although a mere 120kb download, this small utility has full fledged text editor where you’ll find everything you need.

Features of Blogger Buddy:

» Unlike a typical blog publishing software, Blogger Buddy is a Windows Vista/Windows 7 Gadget.

» Just 120KB download size and low on resources.

» Rich text editor.

» Post previews are available before publishing to Blogger blog.

So, if you are a Blogger user out there, I would recommend you to use thisgadget for posting to your blog just because it is too hassle-free and has a footprint of an ant.

Download Blogger Buddy / 120kb

Enjoyed this blogging tip? There’s more. Grab feeds to get more blogging tips.

I am sure this will excite the hell out of you especially if you are a beginner and have just started a blog or a website. There are a lot of statistical analysis tools for websites available out there that does pretty much the same job so I am not going to discuss the charts here. I want to show you how you can get ‘real-time’ notification when somebody views your blog or website right on your desktop. Something like this:

To set it up, you’ll need ‘Woopra’ client (available for Windows, Linux and Mac). Here is the step-by-step procedure involved.

1) Go to Woopra.com and signup for free. Provide required information about your website/blog on the site.

2) Download Woopra client and login using your credentials. The details of the website you submitted at the site will get displayed within the application itself.

You will find charts and figures which might very well interest you but here we’ll just discuss how to setup real time notification when somebody visits your website. So once you are done looking at the charts, proceed along.

3) In the left pane, click ‘Notifications’ option.

4) In the right pane, click ‘Create a new Event Notification’ button.

5) In the window that appears, first enter an appropriate label to the notification you are about to create. Click ‘Next’.

Note: You will find loads of options you can set a notification for. As far as this tutorial goes, we won’t be needing them.

6) Click ‘Next’ a couple of times till you get the ‘Edit Notification’s look and feel’ option as shown below.

7) Here, set ‘Country Flag’ as the Notification’s Icon and write a ‘custom notification message’ below. Use ‘Tags’ for extra information like page URL, page title, etc. in the notification.

Finally, click ‘Apply Notification’ and wait for someone to visit your site. When your website is viewed, you will get a notification like this:

Once you click the notification you will be able to see the stats of visitor and based upon such information, you can know which part of the information or which posts interests your audience. The best part is, you get all the information real-time.

If you enjoyed your read, grab feeds.