Topics

[Content is King]

(Revised May 2024)

Content is King
The most vital aspect of your website is its content. It's essential to create material that's both engaging and informative, aligning with the intent of your visitors. Think like a search engine: prioritize clarity, relevance, and value.

Technical SEO
Modern search engines can parse complex scripts, but it's still best to ensure your content is accessible and indexable. Use JavaScript and other non-HTML elements judiciously, enhancing user experience without hindering crawlability.

Quality Matters
Spelling and grammar are more crucial than ever. Aim for flawless writing to establish credibility and trust. Keep sentences and paragraphs concise for better readability and engagement.

Originality
Avoid plagiarism at all costs. Search engines have sophisticated methods to detect copied content, and penalties can be severe.

Tags
Title Tags -- The title tag remains a cornerstone of SEO. It should succinctly describe the page's content, with your company name at the end, if included.

Meta Tags -- Meta tags have evolved. Beyond description and keywords, include tags for content type, language, and structured data to enhance understanding and visibility.

Alt Tags -- Alt tags are mandatory in XHTML and HTML5. They should accurately describe images and include relevant keywords.

Local SEO
Incorporate geographical locations into your content and tags where relevant, as search engines often favor local results.

Link Building
Cultivate quality backlinks from reputable, relevant sites. Mutual linking can be beneficial, but focus on the value and relevance of each link.

Privacy Policy
A comprehensive privacy policy is non-negotiable. It's a trust signal for both users and search engines.

Traffic
Genuine, organic traffic growth is a positive signal to search engines. Avoid artificial traffic spikes that could raise red flags.

Advertising
Paid advertising can increase visibility and traffic, but monitor your campaigns closely for the best ROI.

Crawlers
Ensure search engines can discover and index your site. Use legitimate methods like sitemaps and consistent, quality content updates to invite regular crawling.

Patience Pays Off
SEO is a long-term strategy. It may take months to see significant results, but persistence and adherence to best practices will lead to success.

Remember, SEO is an ever-evolving field. Stay informed and adapt your strategies accordingly.

C. Thomas Wright III, author and webmaster of Zelo.com which has brought the web such pages as First Names & What They Mean (#2 Google [first names]), Zelo Nursery Rhymes (#1 Google [nursery rhymes]), and his ever-funny Blonde Jokes (#1 Google [blonde jokes]) is at it again with a brand new web site... Name-Stats.com.

Says CT3 (his nickname), "this site goes beyond the origin and meaning of names and explores the popularity of names from all over the world. A lot of time researching popularity of names, not just here in the United States but from other countries is something I have not seen on the internet before, and thought it was time people had easy access to such information."

Name-Stats.com includes name statistics for first names (male and female) and surnames (last names [US only] from countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Belgium, Sweden, Scotland, and more are being added every day. Like all of his web sites, this web site is basic in design and heavy on information.

CT3 says he has plans for a site about people's birthdays as well as other ventures he is working on. He can be reached at zelo(at)zelo.com.

FTP Live is a Free File Transfer and Editing from your Web Browser

This service is great for making those quick-but-essential file uploads, downloads, or edits when on the go.  This service is free and you can even include it in your own web pages!

A sincere thank you to user RWILSON and unknown perp from Dubai, United Arab Emerites for working so well as a team to get our web sever listed on SpamCop.  Way to go guys!  It really helped to leave the form to mail script wide open in your web space without any password protection at all and allow the form to enter in unlimited number of recipients and any "From" address he pleased.  Hey, now THAT is a SPAMMER's dream come true right there

Took engineers a LONG time (and cost HostNed a lot of $$) to find out who was connecting to our web server to send 100,000+ spam and phishing emails!  Yes, got our server listed by SpamCop and also got the user's site Suspended and our Arab friend blocked and reported to FBI!  WTG guys.

One user FFSPIRA on a shared linux server was found today to have multiple directories full of other directories and files all with universal Read.Write,Execute (777) permissions.  Uh oh! HUGE sucurity NO NO there.  That got his site suspended right away.  SWEET!

[MSG - Slowly Poisoning America]

Do you believe that many of the foods we eat are slowly poisoning us?  In this web site
MSG - Slowly Poisoning America
the author makes the following claims:

The MSG triples the amount of insulin the pancreas creates...

Not only is MSG scientifically proven to cause obesity, it is an addictive substance: NICOTINE for FOOD!

The big media doesn't want to tell the public either, fearing legal issues with their advertisers.

Are you a believer or it it just hype?

[Basic RSS]

Get feeds from the forum in RSS format.  Here is the info to use:

Basic RSS
https://my.hostned.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss2

Advanced RSS
Limit to certain board
Example: "Domain Names" = board #10 so use the following RSS URL
https://my.hostned.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss2;board=14
Also limit number of items
Use the "limit" command so to limit to three items, use the following RSS URL
https://my.hostned.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss2;board=14;limit=2

[Here is your initial form:]

Let's say you have a web form and you want to make a couple of the fields required.  To keep this as simple as possible we will involve only three fields, "Name", "Email", and "Message".  In this example, all three fields will be required.

Here is your initial form:

Code Select Expand

<form method="post" action="whatevermailscript.php">
<input maxlength="256" size="35" name="email">
<p>Comments:  <textarea cols="55" name="Comment">  </textarea></p>
<p><input type="submit" value="Send" name="submit">
</form>
You might have noticed I didn't put a Reset button in there.  I think they are stupid, so I dont use them.

Now we need to plug in the validation.  We do this with good old JavaScript!  We will use a function, define the variables (the fields) and call for it on submission (when you click send).  So here we go.

Step 1. Add this in your html form page between the <head></head> tags:

Code Select Expand

<script>
function ValidateContactForm()
{
    var name = document.ContactForm.Name;
    var email = document.ContactForm.Email;
    var comment = document.ContactForm.Comment;

    if (email.value == "")
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (email.value.indexOf("@", 0) < 0)
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (email.value.indexOf(".", 0) < 0)
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (comment.value == "")
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a description or comment.");
        comment.focus();
        return false;
    }
    return true;
}
</script>

Step 2. Add this as an attribute in the form tag:

Code Select Expand

onsubmit="return ValidateContactForm();"

Finished Product

Code Select Expand

<html>

<head>
<title>Form Validation Example</title>

<script>
function ValidateContactForm()
{
    var name = document.ContactForm.Name;
    var email = document.ContactForm.Email;
    var comment = document.ContactForm.Comment;

    if (name.value == "")
    {
        window.alert("Please enter your name.");
        name.focus();
        return false;
    }
   
    if (email.value == "")
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (email.value.indexOf("@", 0) < 0)
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (email.value.indexOf(".", 0) < 0)
    {
        window.alert("Please enter a valid e-mail address.");
        email.focus();
        return false;
    }
    if (comment.value == "")
    {
        window.alert("Please provide a detailed description or comment.");
        comment.focus();
        return false;
    }
    return true;
}
</script>
</head>

<body>
Use this form to leave a comment:
<form method="post" action="whatevermailscript.php"
name="ContactForm" onsubmit="return ValidateContactForm();">
    <p>Name: <input type="text" size="65" name="Name"></p>
    <p>E-mail Address:  <input type="text" size="65" name="Email"></p>
    <p>Comments:  <textarea cols="55" name="Comment">  </textarea></p>
    <p><input type="submit" value="Send" name="submit">
    <input type="reset" value="Reset" name="reset"></p>
</form>

</body>
</html>

I hope you will be able to take this example form validator and use it in your own scripts successfully.  Enjoy 

What FTP program are you using to transfer your files?  Why do you choose that one?  Why do you think it is better?

[charging for web design work]

I am hoping to have a detailed, fun, and informative discussion about charging for web design work.  How much do you charge a client?  Do you charge some clients more than others?  If so, why?  Do you charge by the job or by time (by the hour, etc...)?  How important is a contract?

I do not mean to overwhelm with questions, just want to consider many different factors.

[supplement]

It appears that this forum has the ability to do all that the static site http://www.hostned.com/members/ does.  For examplr the FAQ's can be moved into here as sticky posts and the newsletters can be moved into their own category etc...  So what do you think.  Should this forum supplement or take the place of the members area?

Feel free to ask or answer any questions here in these forums.  Share ideas with others.  Get help with anything from scripting to preventing SPAM.

If posting, just choose the category you feel is most appropriate.  If looking for answers, use the search function or browse by category.

[The default feed is the 5 most recent posts:]

The default feed is the 5 most recent posts:
http://my.hostned.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml
To get RSS or RSS2 out of that [not viewable in most browsers alone], add ';type=rss' or ';type=rss2' to that URL.
There are several 'sub-actions' available to this action, specifying exactly what to display:

We just got the user forums up and going.  How do you like it? 
Thumbs up or thumbs down?