All Things Tech

Back up your client’s files

techspert — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 08:08:15 +0000

I was doing some website maintenance for a client recently and because I had already worked on this client’s site previously, I already had some of his pages in my text editor. So I pulled up his web page and made the necessary mods. Then I clicked on the “Put” button and got a message about how the file on the server had changed and asked if I wanted to overwrite it. I was almost going to just click the button but decided to pull the file off the server first and rename it to use as a backup.

Well, after I uploaded the file, I received a very angry email from my client informing me that I was working on an out dated page and I need to fix it asap. So I grabbed the backup file of his page and renamed it back to the original name and uploaded it. This fixed the problem right away and I was very thankful that I had made a backup of the file from the server before I overwrote it.

It appears that someone else had made changes to this client’s web page since I did the original mods and therefore the version I had on my pc was out dated. So the moral of this story is: Unless you are exclusively working on a clients site, always pull the server version of the file into your text editor before you start making any changes. This will ensure you have any new mods that someone else may have done without you knowing.

So back up, back up, back up. It’s so important!!

Sometimes Old Technology is Better!

techspert — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 07:19:18 +0000

During one of my computer science classes in college. Our professor was discussing how new technology is replacing the old, and that things like tape are a thing of the past and have virtually been totally replaced by the much faster disc drives.

Then I remembered that the last company I worked for still used backup tapes to store all the company information. Each night someone would put a tape in the backup recorder before leaving for the evening. It would generally take about half the night for the tape to complete, which is of course much slower than a disc drive would be.

I started explaining to my professor that they used tapes because they are a safer backup media than a disc. My professor then pointed to an old tape she had brought in to show the class. She seemed very pleased to point out the piece of mangled tape hanging out the side of the cassette. I then told her that if she gave me the tape, I could take it home and cut off the damaged piece and splice it back together. I pointed out that only a very small portion of the data would be lost. I was also quick to point out that if a disc got badly scratched or broken, then the data loss would be far greater. By this time she had stopped smiling.

But please don’t get me wrong, I am the first to embrace the new technology. My point here is that sometimes, in certain circumstances, older and slower technology is better.

How To Hand Code Your First Webpage

techspert — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 20:03:07 +0000

The best way to learn how to create websites is to dive right in and get your hands dirty with code. Sure, there are a lot of do it yourself programs out there and a lot of (What you see is what you get or WYSIWYG for short) programs as well. But if you really want to learn this stuff properly, you have to know how to code.

I’m not entirely against using a program to assist you in coding and in fact, I usually use Adobe Dreamweaver to assist me. Other free programs like notepad++ (for windows) and textmate (for mac) are very helpful in assisting with coding. The best features of these advanced text editors, and the main reason why I use them, is that they use color coding for different parts of the code and they also alert you when there is an obvious error in your syntax. However, if you really want to code in plain text with no assistance whatsoever, you can always just use Microsoft Notepad.

The first thing you need to do is open your text editor and start typing the following code:

Start Code: (Do not type this line in your text editor)

My First Web Page

This is my very first web page, I coded this all by hand

End code. (Do not type this line in your text editor)

Now, save this file as “my_first_webpage” (without the quotes).
Note: Before you click save, be sure to make sure the file type is saved as an html or htm file. To do this, you first need to check something. Go into your folder settings in the control panel (start>control panel>folder options). Then select “view” and scroll down to the line that says “Hide extensions for known file types” and uncheck this box if it’s not already unchecked, click OK to save changes. Now go back to your text editor and in the box where the file name is, delete the “txt” extension at the end of the file name, and type “html” or “htm” at the end making sure not to remove the dot (between the extension you just typed and the file name). Finally, change the file type to “all” in the lower drop down box and after choosing where to save the file (and remembering where you saved it), click on “Save”.

Note: Some text editors will have “html” listed in the file type drop down menu, so all you need to do in this case is select it.

Now open up your folder or directory where you saved the file and just double click the file name. It should open up in a browser window and you should see the heading “My First Web Page” in the top right hand side of your screen. You should also see the text you wrote (This is my very first web page, I coded this all by hand) under the heading in smaller writing.

If you are seeing this, congratulations, you just created your first web page by hand coding.

If you don’t see this, you may have to right click on the file name and select open with > Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, or whichever browsers you have installed. Then you should see the above.

Explanation of code:
Doctype is declaring the type of documnt, in this case it’s an html5 document.
html lang is declaring which language the page is written in, in this case, English.
head, is the start tag for the header section. This is where important information goes to tell the browser to run this code first as it is most important.

meta chaset tells the browser which character encoding to use, in this case UTF-8 which is the latest encoding for most web pages.

title Is the title of your page. Whatever is in this tag, will appear in the very top of your browser window. It’s important that the title is relevant to the page content, because search engines, such as Google, use this information to find pages for the search words the user types into the search bar.

body is the main body of your web page, it will contain everything that is to be displayed to the user.

h1 stands for heading one and will produce a very large heading. Use h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 etc. for smaller headings. The larger the number, the smaller the text.

p stands for paragraph, and is used to separate blocks of text just as in a word document.

End of lesson 1.

Android Tablets, Which one to buy?

techspert — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 21:39:34 +0000

My son wants an android tablet for his birthday so I told him to start saving his pocket money. In the mean time, I have been researching android tablets to determine which one is most suitable for my son’s needs.

The main thing I am looking for in an android tablet, is connectivity. To be able to input and output data by as many means as possible. So, in light of that, I am leaning heavily towards the Toshiba Thrive 10.1in tablet. The Toshiba has full size HDMI, full size USB, mini USB, and a full size SD card slot.

Another critical feature I’m looking for in a tablet is USER REPLACEABLE BATTERY. The Toshiba Thrive comes with a removable back cover which gives the user access to all the inner workings and most importantly the battery.

All in all, this tablet is the best I’ve seen so far for connectability and usability.

Sorry Apple ipad, but you fail appallingly when it comes to all of the above. Do these people think the battery will last forever? I guess they want you to throw it away and buy a new one when the battery dies. And sorry ipad, but I want to be able to input and output data without being locked into your tiny, shackled world of itunes. The price is also ridiculously high, especially for such a non versatile device as this!

Plasma vs LCD

techspert — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 21:57:16 +0000

OK, here is the truth about plasma and LCD TVs. Plasma TVs are better than LCD TVs! There, I said it. Plasma TVs create the image by lights turning on and off, therefore they refresh at the speed of light. LCD TVs create the picture by energizing liquid crystals with different frequencies to make the different colors. It takes time for the liquid crystals to energize and there lies one of the problems with LCD TVs. The refresh rate can never be as fast as a Plasma TV.

Another reason that Plasma TVs are better than LCD TVs, is that in the case of plasma TVs, the pixels are turned off to create the color black, the blacks on plasma TVs are very black. One the other hand, because LCD TVs are either back lit or edge lit (meaning they have a constant light source which is on all the time) they create the color black by blocking the light. But because some light still shines through the pixels, it never looks as dark as a true black. It’s like putting a torch behind a black piece of paper, you will always get some light shining through.

One thing in defense of LCD TVs. The newer LCD TVs are now being produced with LED back or edge lighting as opposed to the standard fluorescent lighting (hence the LED/LCD label popping up in stores). A new system called “local dimming”, is now being used on high end, back lit LED/LCD TVs to create darker blacks. Local dimming localizes the back lighting so that the lights near a black portion of the screen are dimmed. This seems to help produce a darker image on scenes where there is a lot of black in a certain area of the screen, such as space scenes etc. However, I still believe plasma TVs have darker blacks, and a more natural looking picture.

So, in California (I’m not sure about other states), why do you see more LCD TVs in stores these days if plasma is better?

Now this is where it gets political. New nanny state regulations in CA say that TVs must comply with lower power consumption mandates. Because plasma TVs use more power than LCD TVs, the Californian government is forcing plasma TVs out of the market in favor of the lower power consuming LCD TVs. It’s as simple as that! By 2013, all big screen TVs must be consuming 50% less power than TVs produced before 2009. This is another case of big government sticking their nose into our lives and gradually taking away our freedoms one by one.

Shopping for a smart phone

techspert — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 02:41:47 +0000

I’ve been doing a lot of research on smart phones lately and would like to share with you some of the information I have gathered over the past couple of months.

OK, the first thing to consider is, which carrier do I choose and which operating system do I go for. Well, the carrier is easy to work out in my case, because I run my cell phone as cheaply as possible and therefore use a pay as you go setup.

Because I use a pay as you go system, I have to use a GSM (global system for mobile phones) based phone as opposed to a CDMA (code division multiple access) phone. You see, I have to be able to put a Sim card in the phone.

I simply refuse to get locked into a plan because the prices are way too high. When I can get unlimited everything for around $30 bucks a month, I will consider it.

Now for the operating system (os). Because I need to be able to put my own sim card into the phone, this rules out getting an iphone right away, so now I’m down to android, symbian, and windows. After researching all the pros and cons, I have decided on Android because that is the most popular and has the most apps available right now.

Just another point of interest about the iphone. Another reason why I won’t get one is that the battery cannot be replaced by the user. This is a huge minus for me because I usually like to have my phone for about 5 years, and the battery is likely to need replacing after about 2 years. If you’re running it on a contract it doesn’t matter as much, because the carrier will allow you to upgrade fairly cheaply by the time the battery runs out.

So, what brand will I choose? I have been tossing up between the htc amaze and the motorola atrix 2. However, one thing I really want in this phone is a great stills camera, and the htc amaze seems to have one of the best from what I’ve read. So I’ll most probably be getting the amaze.

I’m just waiting for the prices to come down a little more before I part with the cash. When I first decided that this is the phone I want, it was $599.00 on Amazon (for the unlocked version of course). Now the price is around $490.00. I’m waiting till it gets under the 400 dollar mark and then I’ll go for it.

I know I could get one through a carrier for around $200 but only if I get locked into a 2 year contract. At $60 to $80 dollars a month, it would only take 6 to 8 months to pay for it. I know I still have to pay for the usage through the pay as you go system, but at present, I am only topping up $25.00 every two months or so.

Please feel free to leave a comment.

Welcome to my tech talk

techspert — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 22:43:53 +0000

Hi everyone, and welcome to my tech talk. I love talking about all things electronic and technology in general. If it runs on electricity, I want to talk about it.