Debra D's Blog

Occasionally I check the Google Trends page, to see what’s the hot news of the day (or hour). If you’re stuck for a blog idea, or dinner conversation topic, you might get some inspiration there.

It’s not too surprising, but today’s hot topic is the iPad, in a variety of spellings.

You can also see the hot searches, which are usually quite different than the hot topics. Today is the 24th anniversary of the Challenger explosion, so it makes sense that people are searching for information on that topic. But amaryllis flowers?

Website Trends

At the bottom of the Google Trends page, there’s a link to Trends for Websites. That takes you to a page that shows trends for Wikipedia.org. You can put your website in the search box, to see the overall trends, or focus on a specific page on your site.

You’ll see information similar to the data in Google Analytics, such as unique visitors and visitor regions. Here’s the visitor trend for the first part of last year on the Contextures site.

Check Similar Sites

When you view your site trends, you’ll see a list of other sites that people visited. You can put one of those sites in the search box, and see how it compares to your site.

For example, I took a look at Chip Pearson’s Excel site. Most of his visitors came from USA, India, UK, and Canada, and they also searched for Excel formulas.

Dick’s Daily Dose of Excel visitors are mainly from the USA, with a few from the UK, and they don’t search for anything else.

My visitors at Contextures.com are from the same regions as Chip’s and have very diverse interests. I have no explanation for their search topics!

Take a Look

Check your site, and a few of the similar sites. Do you find anything that surprises you?

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For my desktop computer, I have two monitors – a 22” widescreen (that seems to be dying), and a 20” square. It’s easy to forget that other people don’t have as much screen real estate, and they’re reading my site or blog through a smaller window.

Today I found Google Browser Size, which shows the percentage of people who can see a specific area of the window, without scrolling.

According to Google:

Google Browser Size is a visualization of browser window sizes for people who visit Google. For example, the "90%" contour means that 90% of people visiting Google have their browser window open to at least this size or larger.

I typed in the URL for my main website, www.contextures.com and you can see the results on the widescreen monitor above.

According to Google Browser Size, 90% of the visitors would see most of the What’s New section. Only 40% would see the first project heading, for Microsoft Access Database Design.

I’m not sure if this includes people who are using an iPhone or Blackberry. They probably don’t seem much at all!

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Akismet blocks most of the spam comments on my blogs, which is great. I check the list of blocked comments, and have only found a handful that were incorrectly marked as spam.

Most of the flagged comments are obvious spam, with long lists of links to dubious sites, or completely off topic remarks with links, or comments in Russian with links. If I can’t understand it, I’m sure not going to approve it! Delete.

A few comments try vague flattery to get their link-bearing comments posted. “This is the best post I’ve ever read on this topic. Keep up the good work!” Delete.

Others try confrontation or controversy. “Your article had great content until the last paragraph. Then you went completely off target.” Delete.

There are a few gems buried in the rubble though. I saw a comment in the Akismet list this week that made me laugh. “I found your blog while searching for first aid for heart attacks.” Really? You took the time to bookmark my site, then came back to make a comment? I hope your dying friend or co-worker wasn’t inconvenienced! Nice try though. Delete.

Have you found any treasures in your pile of spam comments?

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Yes, I have a new microphone but don’t worry, I’m not using it for singing. The injuction that the neighbours filed is probably still in effect.

I’ve been making Excel tutorial videos for a while, and posting them on my Contextures site and YouTube. The most popular video, Drop Down List in Excel, was created in June 2008, and I probably used the $10 microphone that came with the computer.

The sound quality isn’t too good, and I’ve tried other microphones since then, with varying results. So, to improve the videos, I decided to splurge on a better microphone.

After hours of Googling, and reading reviews, I chose the Rode Podcaster USB microphone. I ordered it from Vistek, a Canadian chain that specializes in cameras and video equipment.

The microphone, at $349 CDN, wasn’t cheap, and I hoped it would prove to be a good investment. I unpacked the microphone and plugged it in, and after a bit of fiddling with the audio settings, it worked well.

However, the microphone is quite heavy – the specifications say 21.5 ounces, which is about 1.5 pounds. If you’re trying to record your voice and use the keyboard at the same time, it’s a bit of a challenge.

The microphone came with a “Microphone Stand Mount” but I discovered that’s something you attach to a microphone stand. And, of course, I didn’t have one of those lying around the office. (To the people at Rode and Vistek: It would help if you mentioned what accessories are required.)

So, it was back to Vistek to order a microphone stand. After waiting, and waiting, I learned that the new guy who took the order hadn’t processed it. He just took the money and put the order in a drawer somewhere, or forgot to push the right button.

The stand finally arrived, and I tried to figure out how to attach the stand mount and microphone to the stand. There were no instructions with the stand, and no pictures anywhere on the web, that I could find. All the pictures show the microphone separately. What help is that?

Finally, I found instructions that said to attach the microphone through the loop in the stand, using the locking collar at the bottom of the microphone. That was helpful, except that my microphone didn’t come with one of those.

Another phone call to Vistek, and they found another Rode Podcaster in stock. So, they took the locking collar from that one, and gave it to me. Here’s the Rode Podcaster Microphone attached to its microphone stand mount with the locking collar.

And a side view.

 

Now, after only five trips to the store, I have a new, fully functioning, microphone and stand.

But I’m too tired to use it!

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I’ve added pages for my sites at the AboutUs.org website wiki.

• Contextures
• Excel Pivot Tables
• Excel Theatre
• Debra D

Because the site is a wiki, you can create an account and edit your own pages, or other pages.

It seems to be well-managed, and I decided it was better to create and edit my own pages, than to leave the default entries that were created.

The account registration only took a couple of seconds, so I’d suggest that you check your site there, and improve the pages, if they exist. If they’re missing, add the pages, with a bit of information about your site.

I don’t know how much traffic you’ll get from the AboutUs.org site, but at least you’ll have another backlink to your site.

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I’ve added a new static page to this blog – Excel Videos – using the TubePress plug-in.

It was really easy to install and set up, and you can show YouTube videos for a specific user or playlist, or show popular videos, such as top-rated or most-discussed.

In the TubePress plug-in option settings, on the Advanced tab, you can create a Shortcode Keyword. Then, insert that code, in square brackets, wherever you want the TubePress videos to appear.

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Last weekend I transferred my domain registration for this site to a different web host. That went smoothly and quickly, despite the warning that it could take 5-7 days.

It’s Complicated

With my confidence bolstered by that success, I was ready to tackle the next step – pointing this blog to the new server, and moving all the content.

I prepared by reading everything I could find on the steps required to move a WordPress blog. It seemed complicated, but doable. Hah! Ignorance, as they say, is bliss.

The task that I figured would take a couple of hours took almost a day. Yes, some of that time was spent in gnashing teeth, complaining loudly, and consuming medicinal beverages, but it still took way too long.

Password Confusion

The trickiest bit was detangling all the user names and passwords that I had jotted down, for the old host and the new one. Every corner of each host’s site has a different password, and it’s very confusing.

After hours of hair pulling, I finally found an article that said the wp-config file needs the cPanel password. I’d been trying everything BUT the cPanel password.

With that change, I finally cracked the code, and got this blog back up and running.

Lost Settings

As my research suggested, I had exported my old databases, and imported them to the new database, but that had no noticeable effect on the blog. I lost all the settings, and had to re-do things.

Fortunately, I had also done a WordPress export, so I was able to import all the articles and comments that way.

If you notice anything that’s broken or missing, please let me know. Thanks! In the meantime, I think it’s time for a bit more medicine.

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Today I was backing up my RSS feeds in Google Reader, and was shocked to see that I’m subscribed to 386 feeds. Wow, that’s about double what I would have guessed.

There are only a few blogs that I read every day, and those are in a Google Reader Favourites folder. For most of the rest, I just read the titles, and skim through the articles that sound interesting. Occasionally, I’ll star an article to go back to it later, for a careful read, or to follow the article’s links.

Trim the List

In the feeds list, you can click on a blog name, then click Show Details, to see a chart of recent posts, and which ones you’ve read. If a blog hasn’t posted in a long time, or I never read the articles, I usually unsubscribe.

I wish there was a quick way to review all the Google Reader feeds, to see which feeds I use, and which ones I don’t. It’s a tedious process to go through the list individually, especially since the Show Details doesn’t stay open.

If you know of a better way to manage the list, please let me know.

Now I’ll go and do the backups for my blogs too.

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