My Computer Back in Service

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The other day, I asked everyone What Do YOU Want to Know? Brooke from Snippets n Blurbs asked a couple of questions (I hope I answered the first one in comments Brooke).

The question, which is the subject of this post was:

“This might not be what you want posted here - but I think that people need to know more about SEO - the general stuff. Why it is important, some of the costs associated, not all web designers offer that…etc.”

In order to answer these questions within a question, I will break it down a little bit.

1. SEO is an acronym for Search Engine Optimization. In other words, it is how people can best find your site when using Google, Yahoo, MSN or any of the other Search Engines by typing in certain search terms or “Keywords”.
2. Cost is not an object. It is free if you think you know how people will try to find the services, articles or products you offer. A suggestion I would make is to try to find your site on SE’s by using different terms to see what you get. Again, it’s free.
3. The unasked question is How to go about it. This is where the Meta Tags come in. They are located in the “head” php in the presentation portion of your template.

Most templates will include a Meta Description which is derived from your “tagline”. An example of this would be:

<meta name=”description” content=”<?php bloginfo(’description’); ?>” />
  <meta name=”author” content=”Joe Hauckes  / My Computer Back in Service - http://mcbsconsulting.com” />
(you can add your own description in place of the bloginfo, but don’t make it too long)

The other is the Meta Keyword which is where you put words and phrases you think people will use to find you. Another example from MCBS:

<meta name=”keyword”
content=”help,DSL,Setup,php,online,offline,adapt,programs,install,hardware,software,
computer,consulting,internet,” />

Probably the most important is not within tags, but using the right “Keywords” within your content. If you write good content with a good mix of what you want people to find, they will come.

Just remember, none of this happens overnight, it takes time.

This may seem a little early in the process, since the Blog has only existed for a little over a month, but I wanted to ask you for your Questions.

I can write anything about what I know regarding fixes, programs, shortcuts etc. But, even though these solutions are proven to work, I am only guessing at what may be useful to YOU. So, what I would like to do is open a dialogue with you and find out what you have questions about.

Do you want information about:

• Online Problems?
• Offline Solutions?
• Anti-virus/malware programs?
• How to’s on installation of plugins/add-ons?
• Adjusting/Adapting Webpage or Blogging platforms?
• Hardware problems with your PC?

This is NOT a sales pitch. This is to try to provide you with information that will help you solve some of the problems you incur in your day to day use of your computer. And it may possibly help others who are running into the same situations.

Ask Away!

If you Blog, you know that most of the time spent writing a post is online. If you are on a dedicated server with one of the High Speed Providers it is usually not a problem.

But if you still use Dial-up (why would you?) or need to post using Wi-Fi it can get expensive pretty quickly. Sometimes you just don’t have access to the internet for whatever reason, but still want to get an article ready for when you regain internet access.

What to do?

I personally, just started using Windows Live Writer. It seems to fit the bill for most times when I am not online but need to get something written. (This post is written on Live Writer.)

What it does:

• It is compatible with Blogging Services like WordPress, Blogger, TypePad and Movable Type and most other platforms.
• It uses WYSIWYG so you can see what your Article will look like before it is published.
• You can insert pictures, tables, videos, hyperlinks, just about anything you can do on your blog online. It even spell checks as you’re typing.
• Best of all once you are satisfied and can get online, you can publish it directly, save as a draft online or save as  a draft and continue editing online.
• You can even set categories and a date to pre-publish a post (al least using WordPress I don’t know about the others).

What is Doesn’t:

• If you have a recurring series of posts that the lead paragraph/ending are always the same, you Can Not save it as a local draft and reuse it. It will automatically pick up whatever the end published document contains.
• For some reason, when you publish a post containing pictures or .jpg .gif .jpeg .png or similar, it will automatically add it to the default upload as a new pic. If you delete it from the upload file, you will lose the picture or whatever graphic you added to a previous post.

All in all, Windows Live Writer is a very effective and powerful publishing tool for writing Blog Posts when you aren’t online.

If you have been here before, you may notice a little change in the Sidebar. In the top section for Newest Blog Posts there has been links to recent posts, but it was just the Titles. Nothing to let readers know what the posts were about other than a few words.

I have tried various ways to enhance the description but have always fallen short of what I wanted to give readers as a preview. Using a combination of 2 different plugins, I still could only come up with one excerpt for the newest post, but had to rely on the old fashioned Title for the rest of the current posts.

I finally found a plugin, SimplePie Plugin for WordPress, through the recommendation of a friend and thought I may as well try it because no combination of plugins would give me what I wanted.

It works really well, but they make it a little more complicated to get the download(s) than is necessary. When you get to the landing page, you download their .zip file, but it is only one of 2 that you need to run the php. You have to go to the “download” in the top navigation bar and download another .zip file separately in order for the plugin to work.

After unzipping both files (separately and in different folders) the one for the actual php file (simplepie_wordpress.php) is easy enough to find and upload from the 1.2.1 folder. The other file you need is the library of information to allow the whole thing to function. The file (simplepie.inc) in the 1.0.1 folder is a little more difficult to find because it is mixed in with a lot of files you don’t need for anything (unless you like to read). Once you find the .INC file, it is also easy to upload.

Then you have to create an empty folder, cache, to use as a holding place for the current information (new posts).

If they put everything you need in one download, it would be a lot simpler to install.

Once you get through the ordeal of this process, the rest is easy.

After you upload the 2 files and create the cache folder in your wp/plugin folder, activate the plugin on your WordPress Blog.

Go to the section you would like the excerpts to show and place the following code:

<?php echo SimplePieWP(’http://example.com/feed.xml’, ‘items: 5, shortdesc: 200, showdate: j M Y’); ?>

You can adjust the “items”, “shortdesc” if you would like you can even remove the date.

The output will default to an Ordered List (numbered). If your want to change it to an unordered list, you need to be comfortable with changing the Plugin php. Don’t attempt it if you don’t know what you are doing, you might break it.

I was asked by a few readers on my Working at Home on the Internet Blog about the procedure for putting a Drop Down Menu in the Sidebar for the Categories. It seems I’m not the only one who has too many categories and not enough room to show them all.

It is a fairly simple bit of code to add a Drop Down Menu…

• Go to your Sidebar php
• Locate the code <?php get_categories (); ?> or <?php wp_list_cats (); ?>
• Replace that code with the following:
   <h2>Categories</h2> 
   <ul class=”sellLi”>
   <form action=”<?php bloginfo(’url’); ?>” method=”get”>
     <?php wp_dropdown_categories(’show_count=1&hierarchical=1&orderby=name’); ?><br />
     <input type=”submit” name=”submit” value=”View” />
     </form>
   </ul>
• Save your Sidebar php
• Done

If you are using Widgets, you may need to get a plugin by Otto that allows the use of php code within a Widget! Go to his post Fun with Widgets and look for the execphp.zip file.

Download it, unzip it, upload it to your server wp-plugins file and you will be able to use the above php code in the Widgets and you will have the same DropDown Menu you see in my Sidebar on the WAHI Blog.