Total Pageviews

August 21, 2012

Prevent your Blogger Blog from Redirecting to Country-Specific URLs

 
 

Sent to you by rak77 via Google Reader:

 
 


Google, as most would know, redirects Blogger blogs to country-specific domains. For instance, if you open example.blogspot.com in your browser, you might be redirected to example.blogspot.in if you are located in India or to example.blogspot.com.au if you access the same blog from Australia.

The main reason why Google implemented country-specific redirection is selective censorship – they can now easily block a blog, or a particular page on a blog, in one country but still serve it in other regions.

blogger countries

Blogger and Country-Specific Domains

My traffic logs suggest that country-specific redirection in Blogger is now live in at least 15 countries. Here's a complete list:

India [blogspot.in], Australia [blogspot.com.au], UK [blogspot.co.uk], Japan [blogspot.jp], New Zealand [blogspot.co.nz], Canada [blogspot.ca], Germany [blogspot.de], Italy [blogspot.it], France [blogspot.fr], Sweden [blogspot.se], Spain [blogspot.com.es], Portugal [blogspot.pt], Brazil [blogspot.com.br], Argentina [blogspot.com.ar], Mexico [blogspot.mx]

Prevent Blogger from Redirecting to Country-Specific Domains

This country based URL redirection does mean some negative consequences to your Blogger blog. For example:

  1. The social stats – like Facebook Likes, Google +1s and Tweet counts – for your blog stories may be diluted as the URLs for the same story become different from different visitors.
  2. You will have a similar problem if you are using an external commenting platform like Disqus or Facebook Comments.
  3. Also, if canonicalization isn't implemented properly, it may cost you some Google juice as external websites may link to your country-specific pages.

If you are not happy with the idea of Blogger redirecting your blog to a different URL, you can add the following piece of code to your Blogger template and it will always serve the .com address to your visitors irrespective of their geographic location.

Go to your blog inside the Blogger Dashboard and choose Template. Then click the "Edit HTML" button followed by "Proceed." Next, copy-paste the following code into the template after the <head> tag.

<script type="text/javascript">  var blog = document.location.hostname;  var slug = document.location.pathname;  var ctld = blog.substr(blog.lastIndexOf("."));  if (ctld != ".com") {  var ncr = "http://" + blog.substr(0, blog.indexOf("."));  ncr += ".blogspot.com/ncr" + slug;  window.location.replace(ncr);  }  </script>

Click the Save Template button and now your Blogger Blog will always serve with the blogspot.com URL.

This simple script parses the domain name (document.location.hostname) of your blog page and if it includes a country-specific URL (like blogspot.in), it will force-redirect the visitor to the blogspot.com address using the /ncr switch.

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Digital Inspiration @labnolThis story, Prevent your Blogger Blog from Redirecting to Country-Specific URLs, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 22/03/2012 under Blogger, Internet.

Related posts:

  1. Prevent OpenDNS From Redirecting Google Searches – Fix for Firefox & IE Address Bar
  2. Backup Your Blogger Blog in a Click
  3. Find Images from a Specific Country with Google
  4. One Can Leave His Blog URL in Blogger Comments Even With OpenID
  5. Okay, Here's Why Google is Redirecting your Blogger Blogs


 
 

Things you can do from here:

 
 
By - No comments:

Save your Gmail Messages in Google Docs

 
 

Sent to you by rak77 via Google Reader:

 
 


You can save your Gmail messages in Google Docs and then edit them like any other document. The other use case is that once a Gmail message is available inside Google Docs, you can easily export that email as a PDF file or as a Word document while retaining the original formatting and without requiring an external PDF writer.

send gmail to google docs

To integrated Google Docs with Gmail, go to the Labs page and enable the "Create a Document" gadget. Save the changes and return to your Gmail Inbox.

Next, open any of your existing email messages and you should see a "Create a Document" link under the More box as shown in the screenshot above. This will export the current message as a new document in Google Docs – the rich text formatting is preserved but if the message includes any file attachments, Google Docs will ignore them.

One more thing. The Google Docs app for Android allows offline access to your documents so once you have saved your most important Gmail messages in Google Docs, they can be accessed on your phone without a data connection as well.

Thank you J.D. Biersdorfer for the tip.

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Digital Inspiration @labnolThis story, Save your Gmail Messages in Google Docs, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 30/03/2012 under GMail, Google Docs, Internet.

Related posts:

  1. Read any Web Document Directly in Google Docs – Similar to Gmail
  2. Save Web Pages to Google Docs
  3. Create a Mail Merge with Gmail and Google Docs
  4. Convert Your Emails into Google Documents without Gmail
  5. Add Links to Google Docs Documents in your Gmail Messages


 
 

Things you can do from here:

 
 
By - No comments:

How to Find the Sender’s Location in Gmail

 
 

Sent to you by rak77 via Google Reader:

 
 


When John sends an email message to Elizabeth, the IP address of the sender (John's computer) is included in the header of the outgoing email message. The receiver (Elizabeth) can then perform a simple geo-lookup against that IP address to find the approximate geographic location of the message sender.

Both Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail include IP addresses in outgoing message headers but if John is sending an email address using Gmail, or Gmail for Google Apps, his IP address won't be included in the message.

IP addresses can be considered sensitive information. As such, Gmail may hide sender IP address information from outgoing mail headers in some circumstances.

If the IP address of John is not available, because he is sending email using Gmail, how can Elizabeth determine John's geographic location? There two options:

Option A: Gmail may include the IP Address

senders ip address in gmail

Gmail doesn't include the IP address of the sender when the sender is using Gmail's web interface to send email. However if he or she is using a desktop client (like Microsoft Outlook) or a mobile device to send that email, the IP address is often included in the outgoing message.

Open the message in Gmail, click on More –> Show Original and search for the line "Received: from " – it may have the IP address of the sender that you can map to a physical location with the help of Wolfram Alpha.

Option B: Find the Sender's Time Zone

When the IP address is not available, you can determine the sender's very-approximate location from the time-zone of the originating computer. Go your Gmail Labs page and enable the "Sender Time Zone" feature.

Now open any message in Gmail and click on the down arrow that says "Show details". The message will display the the current time in the sender's time zone as shown in the following screenshot.

senders time zone in gmail

Next you can use this timezone map to determine countries where the current time is the same as the time displayed in the Gmail message. Obviously this not the most foolproof method as two different countries can be in the same time zone but when the IP address is not available in Gmail, this is the closest you can get.

On a related note, the time zone of your outgoing Gmail messages is determined from your computer's time zone. If you would like your Gmail messages to show a different time zone, just go to your computer's data and time settings and change the time zone.

More ideas: Find the Person Behind an Email Address

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Digital Inspiration @labnolThis story, How to Find the Sender's Location in Gmail, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 03/04/2012 under GMail, Internet.

Related posts:

  1. Get Gmail Messages Delivered on Multiple Computers via POP
  2. Gmail Adds Read Receipts in Google Apps Business
  3. Add Your Current Location to Gmail Signatures Automatically
  4. A Gmail Filter to Find your Most Important Emails
  5. Create a Safe Senders List in Gmail Similar to Outlook


 
 

Things you can do from here:

 
 
By - No comments:

Take a Virtual Tour of The White House

 
 

Sent to you by rak77 via Google Reader:

 
 


whitehouse virtual tour

If you are curious to know what it is like inside the residence of the world's most powerful person, take a tour from the comfort of your couch.

Search for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC on Google Maps and drag the street view icon on the White House building. Or maybe you can use this direct link. Once inside the building, you can use the arrow keys to walk through the various public rooms and halls of the White House or click the level numbers (1 or 2) to switch to a different floor level.

You may also want to visit the official White House website – whitehouse.gov – to learn about the history of the various rooms and to explore sections of the building that aren't covered in the Street View project.

And here's a behind-the-scenes video that shows how Google photographed the various public room to create these virtual tours.

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Digital Inspiration @labnolThis story, Take a Virtual Tour of The White House, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 03/04/2012 under Google Maps, Internet.

Related posts:

  1. Google Maps 360°Camera for Shooting Street View Pictures
  2. Use Evernote to Plan your New House
  3. Take a 3D Virtual Tour of Disneyland via Google Earth
  4. [Picture] The Google Street View Car
  5. Stop the Google Camera Van From Clicking a Picture of Your House


 
 

Things you can do from here:

 
 
By - No comments:

How to Create Web Content that Works

 
 

Sent to you by rak77 via Google Reader:

 
 


Good Content is Liked and Shared

Writing for the web is no different than writing for print except for the fact that your online readers are constantly distracted and most won't read your content word by word. Here are some tips to help you create more web-friendly content that your online audience is more likely to read and share on the social web. These notes were initially part of a presentation that I delivered at the India Social summit.

Create Good and Effective Web Content

  1. The web is like a battleground where you are continuously fighting against so many factors to grab the attention of the reader. He has unread messages in Gmail, someone pinged him on Facebook – there are so many distractions that it will be hard to hold his attention. If your content is short, precise and well-presented, he will appreciate it.
  2. People on the web have short attention spans – they'll read the headline of your story and probably the first few lines and then zoom off. Thus you should use the inverted pyramid approach to catch their attention – put the most important parts of the story at the top that can be seen without using the scroll bar.
  3. The headline is almost as important as the story because it will be visible in search engines, RSS readers, email newsletters and social shares. Good headlines are like short summaries of the article but free of jargon – the reader should be able to guess what the article is all about just from the headline itself. Here are some good headlines.
  4. Eye-tracking studies suggest that people don't read web pages, they scan pages in an F-Pattern. Thus you need to present content in such a fashion that important parts don't go unnoticed. Add a table of content if you have a long article. Use headings and sub-headings (like h2, h3, etc.), add captions to images, use italics or bold text to emphasize important points and put interesting information in pull quotes. Use short paragraphs and each paragraph should convey exactly one idea.
  5. When you are writing on the web, you are writing for a global audience and therefore you should avoid using jargon or complex language in your content. Make no assumptions – you know what NSFW stands for but not everyone does so spell out the acronyms. Use humor and slangs with care as what's considered funny in your culture may not be so in other countries. Also use the Readability Test to know if people who are less fluent in English can easily grasp your writing style.
  6. Sometimes you have to use numbers in your content that can be difficult to visualize. For instance, the US spent anywhere between $4-$6 billion fighting the war in Iraq. How big is that number? If you can add another number to the same story saying the US spent X amount on medical research or that Y amount is enough to feed million people, your readers will be able to connect better with your story. Apple didn't stress the number of pixels in the new iPad, they said it has more pixels that your HDTV.
  7. When you are writing about a product, a service or maybe a restaurant where you had dinner last night, try to put yourself in the shoes of the reader and think what additional questions they may have related to that topic. Your content should answer all of them. Your aim should be create a page that is the best resource on the web for that topic. Use Five Ws, a proven journalistic technique, to get the complete story on a subject.
  8. Make sure that all information in your content is accurate and comes from trusted sources. If you are using facts in your content – like the average age of an African elephant is 70 years – you should cite credible sources to support that fact.
  9. If you have an idea for a story, don't publish it right away – think over it for a day or two, edit and the final product will almost always be better than your initial draft. Darren Rowse calls it the idea marinating process.
  10. When you are writing on a not-so-unique topic that dozens of other sites have covered in the past, analyze what others have missed or how you can make existing content better. For instance, you can include fresh data, you can include quotes from experts, you can create videos around the topic, you can present information in an alternate form – like a chart, a presentation or even as an ebook.
  11. Spend some time reviving your old content. Sometimes your content doesn't get the attention it deserves and it just sits there in the archives gathering dust. You can use Google Analytics to learn about stories that didn't click with your readers, analyze the missing pieces, think how you can make the content better, and push it again. If you include "factual" content on your site – like which is the most popular social site – this kind of data needs to be updated regularly because that what your readers will like.
  12. The content that you create must be readable across difference devices and platforms that your audience are on. Often times we create content that looks good on the desktop but that quality is lost as soon as we switch to a different device – say a mobile phone. That's a missed opportunity. If you have embedded YouTube videos in your content, make sure you offer an alternative thumbnail that links to the YouTube video for environments that don't support Flash or HTML5.
  13. Users will consume your content in different forms. Some will save your stories to InstaPaper for reading later, some will print your articles as PDFs while others may send your stories to their Kindle. It is important that your content looks good when it is saved across different mediums. Do not ignore the print stylesheet because if you create good content, some people will print it on paper.
  14. The first image and the thumbnail image of your story, or the image that your have specified inside the OpenGraph tags, should be clear, high-quality and predictable. That's because these images will appear when your stories are shared on social networks like Pinterest, Tumblr, Facebook and even Google Plus. You may have a  great headline but if the attached image thumbnail isn't great, the story can sometimes go unnoticed.
  15. The other reason to have good images in your content is that they "pause" a reader when he or she is scanning your content. Use an image format depending upon the content of the image – for instance, images that have text are best served as PNG files. Avoid using stock images on your content especially the ones that are very common. Use the Similar Images option is Google Images to determine how popular a "stock image" is and if it returns too many results, don't use that image.
  16. Do not ignore video. It does take some effort to produce videos but it will be well worth the effort. YouTube is the world's second largest search engine and if your produce video content, you have an opportunity to show up there. Also, Google is no longer a collection of 10 blue links but a mixture of images and videos. Good videos have great audio. Shoot and record at 720p (1280×720). Apply to become a YouTube partner and that will help you add custom thumbnail images to your videos. Keep you video length short, really short because it is difficult to hold a user's attention for more than a few minutes.
  17. SEO is no rocket science. This starter guide [PDF] from Google covers nearly everything that you need to do to make your good content more search friendly. Use good headlines, the content should be scannable, use good-quality images with captions, have an easy to navigate site structure and use Sitemaps to help search bots discover your content. Here's more useful SEO advice from Google.
  18. You should know how people are consuming and sharing your content. The new social analytics feature of Google Analytics can help track most of the social activity happening on your site and, accordingly, you can put the right social sharing buttons around your content.
  19. You may think that Page Views are the best indicator to determine the success of content but that may not be the case. A reader lands on your page from Facebook, scans it for a second, doesn't find anything interesting and leaves. This activity registers as a pageview in Google Analytics but the visitor didn't find anything useful. The metric that gives a better idea of user behavior is "average time spent on a page" – if they are just coming and leaving, there's definitely something wrong with the page content or there's a mismatch between your headlines and the story.
  20. You might think that the web has an infinite appetite for content and the more you feed it, the better. That's not the case though. It takes effort, time and lot of thinking to produce good and useful content and that will clearly not happen if the goal is to publish as many words as possible in a day.

Recommended reading:

The Facebook Like illustration is courtesy Charis Tsevis.

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Digital Inspiration @labnolThis story, How to Create Web Content that Works, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 04/04/2012 under Blogging, Internet.

Related posts:

  1. The Success of Web Video Depends on Quality and Content
  2. What to Do When Your Web Content is Stolen
  3. Monetizing Non-Content Web Pages with AdSense Ads Can Be Hard
  4. Create Evergreen Content
  5. Create a Digital Magazine with your favorite Web Content


 
 

Things you can do from here:

 
 
By - No comments:
Subscribe to: Comments (Atom)

h