A Good Comment That Makes My Day!

“Hi Gnocchi – I hope all is well and you’re keeping busy.

I just had to let you know that our new website is pulling in some much better leads than our old websites. We recently closed a nice sized client in Cambridge who needs a lot of projects done and ongoing support – they will be one of our larger clients.

A different company in our neighbourhood has been on our mailing list for a few months. Last week they checked out our website and downloaded a report. This morning they contacted us for a meeting.

A few minutes ago we were contacted through the website by the Ontario Real Estate Association!!!! Ontario!

Who knows if we can be of service to them – their requirements may be too much for us to handle but we are ecstatic at even being called – it means the website impressed them!

Thank you thank you for helping us step up our web image!

Best
S. and J.”

A comment like this one is precisely the reason why a web designer like me keep going on designing websites with love – meaning, from scratch, very clean codes and beautiful layouts.

Thanks for making my day!

Live video (from mobile phone to Qik)

Quickbooks problem: “QuickBooks was unable to back up company file”

Problem:

I have Quickbooks Pro 2008 installed in Windows XP. I try to save a backup of my company file on local disk, and got the error message: “QuickBooks was unable to back up company file” again and again. I’m frustrated. Please, how to solve it?

Solution:

Here’s a solution: do a Windows Update.

I have Quickbooks Pro 2008 installed in Windows XP, and I got this backup problem from time to time. I read in a forum somewhere that doing a Windows Update will solve the problem.

Open Internet Explorer browser, go to Tools/ Windows Update. Try to install all the updates available (click on Custom, not Express). After installing all the updates for windows, go back to Internet Explorer and do the same steps again to make sure that everything is up to date.

Usually after I do all these updates, Quickbooks’ backup problem is gone!

It goes back from time to time, and everytime I just need to do a Windows Update again to solve it.

Hope it helps.

HTML ASCII Reference

The ASCII character-set is used to send information between computers on the Internet.

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The ASCII Character Set

ASCII stands for the “American Standard Code for Information Interchange”.  It was designed in the early 60’s, as a standard character-set for computers and hardware devices like teleprinters and tapedrives.

ASCII is a 7-bit character set containing 128 characters.

It contains the numbers from 0-9, the uppercase and lowercase English letters from A to Z, and some special characters.

The character-sets used in modern computers, HTML, and Internet are all based on ASCII.

The following table lists the 128 ASCII characters and their equivalent HTML entity codes.

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ASCII Printable Characters

ASCII Character	HTML Entity Code	Description
		space
!	!	exclamation mark
“	"	quotation mark
#	#	number sign
$	$	dollar sign
%	%	percent sign
&	&	ampersand
‘	'	apostrophe
(	(	left parenthesis
)	)	right parenthesis
*	*	asterisk
+	+	plus sign
,	,	comma
-	-	hyphen
.	.	period
/	/	slash
0	0	digit 0
1	1	digit 1
2	2	digit 2
3	3	digit 3
4	4	digit 4
5	5	digit 5
6	6	digit 6
7	7	digit 7
8	8	digit 8
9	9	digit 9
:	:	colon
;	;	semicolon
<	<	less-than
=	=	equals-to
>	>	greater-than
?	?	question mark
@	@	at sign
A	A	uppercase A
B	B	uppercase B
C	C	uppercase C
D	D	uppercase D
E	E	uppercase E
F	F	uppercase F
G	G	uppercase G
H	H	uppercase H
I	I	uppercase I
J	J	uppercase J
K	K	uppercase K
L	L	uppercase L
M	M	uppercase M
N	N	uppercase N
O	O	uppercase O
P	P	uppercase P
Q	Q	uppercase Q
R	R	uppercase R
S	S	uppercase S
T	T	uppercase T
U	U	uppercase U
V	V	uppercase V
W	W	uppercase W
X	X	uppercase X
Y	Y	uppercase Y
Z	Z	uppercase Z
[	[	left square bracket
\	\	backslash
]	]	right square bracket
^	^	caret
_	_	underscore
`	`	grave accent
a	a	lowercase a
b	b	lowercase b
c	c	lowercase c
d	d	lowercase d
e	e	lowercase e
f	f	lowercase f
g	g	lowercase g
h	h	lowercase h
i	i	lowercase i
j	j	lowercase j
k	k	lowercase k
l	l	lowercase l
m	m	lowercase m
n	n	lowercase n
o	o	lowercase o
p	p	lowercase p
q	q	lowercase q
r	r	lowercase r
s	s	lowercase s
t	t	lowercase t
u	u	lowercase u
v	v	lowercase v
w	w	lowercase w
x	x	lowercase x
y	y	lowercase y
z	z	lowercase z
{	{	left curly brace
|	|	vertical bar
}	}	right curly brace
~	~	tilde

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ASCII Device Control Characters

The ASCII device control characters were originally designed to control hardware devices.

Control characters have nothing to do inside an HTML document.

ASCII Character	HTML Entity Code	Description
NUL		null character
SOH		start of header
STX		start of text
ETX		end of text
EOT		end of transmission
ENQ		enquiry
ACK		acknowledge
BEL		bell (ring)
BS		backspace
HT		horizontal tab
LF		line feed
VT		vertical tab
FF		form feed
CR		carriage return
SO		shift out
SI		shift in
DLE		data link escape
DC1		device control 1
DC2		device control 2
DC3		device control 3
DC4		device control 4
NAK		negative acknowledge
SYN		synchronize
ETB		end transmission block
CAN		cancel
EM		end of medium
SUB		substitute
ESC		escape
FS		file separator
GS		group separator
RS		record separator
US		unit separator
DEL		delete (rubout)

From source: http://www.w3schools.com/tags/ref_entities.asp

Reserved Characters in HTML (HTML ISO-8859-1 Reference)

Some characters are reserved in HTML and XHTML. For example, you cannot use the greater than or less than signs within your text because the browser could mistake them for markup.

HTML and XHTML processors must support the five special characters listed in the table below:

Character	Entity Number	Entity Name	Description
“	“	"	quotation mark
‘	‘	' (does not work in IE)	apostrophe
&	&	&	ampersand
<	<	&lt;	less-than
>	>	&gt;	greater-than

Note: Entity names are case sensitive!

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ISO 8859-1 Symbols

Character	Entity Number	Entity Name	Description
		 	non-breaking space
¡	¡	¡	inverted exclamation mark
¢	¢	¢	cent
£	£	£	pound
¤	¤	¤	currency
¥	¥	¥	yen
¦	¦	¦	broken vertical bar
§	§	§	section
¨	¨	¨	spacing diaeresis
©	©	©	copyright
ª	ª	ª	feminine ordinal indicator
«	«	«	angle quotation mark (left)
¬	¬	¬	negation
	­	­	soft hyphen
®	®	®	registered trademark
¯	¯	¯	spacing macron
°	°	°	degree
±	±	±	plus-or-minus
²	²	²	superscript 2
³	³	³	superscript 3
´	´	´	spacing acute
µ	µ	µ	micro
¶	¶	¶	paragraph
·	·	·	middle dot
¸	¸	¸	spacing cedilla
¹	¹	¹	superscript 1
º	º	º	masculine ordinal indicator
»	»	»	angle quotation mark (right)
¼	¼	¼	fraction 1/4
½	½	½	fraction 1/2
¾	¾	¾	fraction 3/4
¿	¿	¿	inverted question mark
×	×	×	multiplication
÷	÷	÷	division

ISO 8859-1 Characters

Character	Entity Number	Entity Name	Description
À	À	À	capital a, grave accent
Á	Á	Á	capital a, acute accent
Â	Â	Â	capital a, circumflex accent
Ã	Ã	Ã	capital a, tilde
Ä	Ä	Ä	capital a, umlaut mark
Å	Å	Å	capital a, ring
Æ	Æ	Æ	capital ae
Ç	Ç	Ç	capital c, cedilla
È	È	È	capital e, grave accent
É	É	É	capital e, acute accent
Ê	Ê	Ê	capital e, circumflex accent
Ë	Ë	Ë	capital e, umlaut mark
Ì	Ì	Ì	capital i, grave accent
Í	Í	Í	capital i, acute accent
Î	Î	Î	capital i, circumflex accent
Ï	Ï	Ï	capital i, umlaut mark
Ð	Ð	Ð	capital eth, Icelandic
Ñ	Ñ	Ñ	capital n, tilde
Ò	Ò	Ò	capital o, grave accent
Ó	Ó	Ó	capital o, acute accent
Ô	Ô	Ô	capital o, circumflex accent
Õ	Õ	Õ	capital o, tilde
Ö	Ö	Ö	capital o, umlaut mark
Ø	Ø	Ø	capital o, slash
Ù	Ù	Ù	capital u, grave accent
Ú	Ú	Ú	capital u, acute accent
Û	Û	Û	capital u, circumflex accent
Ü	Ü	Ü	capital u, umlaut mark
Ý	Ý	Ý	capital y, acute accent
Þ	Þ	Þ	capital THORN, Icelandic
ß	ß	ß	small sharp s, German
à	à	à	small a, grave accent
á	á	á	small a, acute accent
â	â	â	small a, circumflex accent
ã	ã	ã	small a, tilde
ä	ä	ä	small a, umlaut mark
å	å	å	small a, ring
æ	æ	æ	small ae
ç	ç	ç	small c, cedilla
è	è	è	small e, grave accent
é	é	é	small e, acute accent
ê	ê	ê	small e, circumflex accent
ë	ë	ë	small e, umlaut mark
ì	ì	ì	small i, grave accent
í	í	í	small i, acute accent
î	î	î	small i, circumflex accent
ï	ï	ï	small i, umlaut mark
ð	ð	ð	small eth, Icelandic
ñ	ñ	ñ	small n, tilde
ò	ò	ò	small o, grave accent
ó	ó	ó	small o, acute accent
ô	ô	ô	small o, circumflex accent
õ	õ	õ	small o, tilde
ö	ö	ö	small o, umlaut mark
ø	ø	ø	small o, slash
ù	ù	ù	small u, grave accent
ú	ú	ú	small u, acute accent
û	û	û	small u, circumflex accent
ü	ü	ü	small u, umlaut mark
ý	ý	ý	small y, acute accent
þ	þ	þ	small thorn, Icelandic
ÿ	ÿ	ÿ	small y, umlaut mark

ISO-8859-1

ISO-8859-1 is the default character set in most browsers.

The first 128 characters of ISO-8859-1 is the original ASCII character-set (the numbers from 0-9, the uppercase and lowercase English alphabet, and some special characters).

The higher part of ISO-8859-1 (codes from 160-255) contains the characters used in Western European countries and some commonly used special characters.

Entities are used to implement reserved characters or to express characters that cannot easily be entered with the keyboard.

From source: http://www.w3schools.com/tags/ref_entities.asp

Dreamweaver: How to lock editable region in child template?

Question:

I have a template, Template_Parent, with 2 editable regions; say Region 1 and Region 2. I then make a nested template, Template_Child and I want the pages that will be made from this template to be able ONLY Region 1. How do I edit region2 in the Template_Child and then lock it so the pages made from it cannot edit Region 2?

Answer:
In Template_Child, change this code:


<!-- InstanceBeginEditable name="Region 2" -->blah blah<!-- InstanceEndEditable -->


to this code:

<!-- InstanceBeginEditable name="Region 2" -->@@("")@@blah blah<!-- InstanceEndEditable -->

Original question and answer posted at http://www.highdots.com/forums/macromedia-dreamweaver/how-lock-editable-region-child-127162.html

Fixed size pop-up window

Pop up window, using target=”_blank”:

<a href=”image.jpg” target=”_blank”><img src=”image_thumb.jpg”></a>

Fixed size pop up window (not resizable, and no scrollbars), using onclick=”window.open()

<a href=”image.jpg” onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=400, height=600, left=300, top=100′); return false;”><img src=”image_thumb.jpg”></a>

Fixed size pop up window, resizable with scrollbars, using onclick=”window.open()

<a href=”image.jpg” onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=400, height=600, left=300, top=100, scrollbars, resizable‘); return false;”><img src=”image_thumb.jpg”></a>

CSS layout: replace tables with lists.

1. Example 1: use list to create navigation bar.
   

   #nav { margin: 0 auto; width: 100%; height: 60px; background-color:#a2d39c; } #nav ul { margin:0 auto; width: 1000px; overflow:hidden; } #nav li { float: left; display: block; list-style:none; } #nav a { text-decoration:none; }

2. Example 1: use list to create columns and rows.
   

   #div_cols_rows { margin:0 auto; width: 1000px; } #div_cols_rows ul { width: 960px; overflow:hidden; } #div_cols_rows li { width: 200px; float:left; display: block; list-style:none; }

Meta Tag Generator

The use of meta tags in web pages are often required by search engines as a source of information to help them to decide how to list and rank your website. Meta Tags are not always required, but as a rule of thumb, it makes more sense to take advantage of them than to leave them out.

It is a simple process to add Meta Tags to web pages. Use the free Meta Tag Generator.

Example:

<head>

<title>"Nicholas, you are ridiculous!" by Olena Kassian</title>

<meta name="description" content="“Nicholas, you are ridiculous!” is a wonderful children's picture book about the ridiculous antics of a Japanese Shiba Inu puppy, illustrated by internationally recognized artist Olena Kassian. Follow Nicholas, the Shiba Inu puppy, on a day's romp! Nicholas is a rascal based on Olena Kassian's own Shiba Inu, absurd, mischievous,and utterly charming.">

<meta name="keywords" content="Olena Kassian, children's picture book, Japanese, Shiba Inu, puppy, Nicholas you are ridiculous, dog story, yoga dogs, yoga dogs illustrated, yoga dog cards">

<meta name="copyright" content="Design and Coding Copyright ©2009 My Graphic Friend. All rights reserved.">

<meta name="author" content="My Graphic Friend">

<meta name="email" content="gnocchi@mygraphicfriend.com">

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />

<meta name="Distribution" content="Global">

<meta name="Rating" content="General">

<meta name="Robots" content="INDEX,FOLLOW">

<meta name="Revisit-after" content="1 Day">

</head>

1. Page Title

The Page Title is probably THE most important attribute for search engine rankings. The Page Title should contain a coherent description of the page, and should contain words that are located within the page content.

2. Description Meta Tag

The Description Meta Tag should contain a coherent description of the page, and should contain words that are located within the page content.

3. Keywords Meta Tag

For best results, select 12 of the most popular and relevant keywords to that particular page, ideally keyword phrases of 2 to 3 words, separated by a comma. Ensure that the keywords you use are located in the title, description and content of the page. If they are not, DO NOT add extra words, otherwise the theme of your page will be watered down. The ordering also plays a role, make sure you order the keywords in order of importance. The 1st being the most important. Use the Trellian keyword research and search term suggestion tool, it is crucial in identifying what search terms to use.

3. Copyright Meta Tag

The Copyright Meta Tag is used to indicate that your information is copy righted.

(i.e. Design and Coding Copyright ©2009 My Graphic Friend. All rights reserved.)

4. Author Meta Tag

The Author Meta Tag is used to insert a name of the webmaster or company.

5. Email Meta Tag

The email us used to display the relevant contact address.

6. Language Meta Tag

The Language Meta Tag is utilized by regional search engines.

7. Character Set Meta Tag

The Charset Meta Tag is used to tell the browser which character set to use.

8. Distribution Meta Tag

The Distribution Meta Tag is used to tell search engines whether the page is global or locally oriented.

9. Rating Meta Tag

The Rating Meta Tag is used to set an audience content rating.

10. Robots Meta Tag

The Robots Meta Tag is used to tell search engines whether to index and/or crawl a page or not.

11. Revisit Meta Tag

The Revisit Meta Tag is used to tell search engines when to come back next.

12. Expires Meta Tag

The Expires Meta Tag is used to tell search engines when when the page and content is no longer valid.

Solution originally posted at http://www.addme.com/meta.htm

HTML <!DOCTYPE> Declaration

HTML <!DOCTYPE> Declaration

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Example An HTML document with a doctype of XHTML 1.0 Transitional: <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd”> <html> <head> <title>Title of the document</title> </head> <body> The content of the document…… </body> </html>

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Definition and Usage

The doctype declaration should be the very first thing in an HTML document, before the <html> tag.

The doctype declaration is not an HTML tag; it is an instruction to the web browser about what version of the markup language the page is written in.

The doctype declaration refers to a Document Type Definition (DTD). The DTD specifies the rules for the markup language, so that the browsers can render the content correctly.

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Doctypes Available in the W3C Recommendations

HTML 4.01 Strict

This DTD contains all HTML elements and attributes, but does not include presentational or deprecated elements (like font). Framesets are not allowed.

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd”>

HTML 4.01 Transitional

This DTD contains all HTML elements and attributes, including presentational and deprecated elements (like font). Framesets are not allowed.

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd”>

HTML 4.01 Frameset

This DTD is equal to HTML 4.01 Transitional, but allows the use of frameset content.

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Frameset//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/frameset.dtd”>

XHTML 1.0 Strict

This DTD contains all HTML elements and attributes, but does not include presentational or deprecated elements (like font). Framesets are not allowed. The markup must also be written as well-formed XML.

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd”>

XHTML 1.0 Transitional

This DTD contains all HTML elements and attributes, including presentational and deprecated elements (like font). Framesets are not allowed. The markup must also be written as well-formed XML.

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd”>

XHTML 1.0 Frameset

This DTD is equal to XHTML 1.0 Transitional, but allows the use of frameset content.

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Frameset//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-frameset.dtd”>

XHTML 1.1

This DTD is equal to XHTML 1.0 Strict, but allows you to add modules (for example to provide ruby support for East-Asian languages).

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/DTD/xhtml11.dtd”>

Content originally posted at http://www.w3schools.com/tags/tag_DOCTYPE.asp

Problem with search engines, and the <meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,nofollow” /> tag case.

Question:
We have a WordPress site. When I search the keywords, the site can be seen on small datacenters but not the main datacenter. So, we suspected that there’s something wrong with our site. When I do a command search (site:sitename), all the page have the same metas (title, description, keywords) eventhough I use the All-in-one SEO Pack Plug-in. 

I did a view source and found this: 
<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,nofollow” /> 
but when I checked the header.php file, there’s no code similar on this one. I deactivated the All-in-one SEO Pack Plug-in but it still the same. 

Answer:
Sometimes a big problem is caused by a small mistake. I had this problem too, and for a few weeks my site has completely fallen off Google and other search engines’ results. The mistake was very easy to fix however, it’s just the matter of setting the visibility of your blog.

In your WordPress blog’s admin panel, go to:
Settings –> Privacy –> Change Blog Visibility to “I would like my blog to be visible to everyone, including search engines (like Google, Sphere, Technorati) and archivers”

This will remove the meta tag from the source code.

Solution originally posted by cphadley on Sep 10th 2008 at http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=882978