Saving a post if Blogger's Publish button doesn't work

This article is about how you can save a  post even if Blogger's Publish button won't let you save your work.

Imagine you've been working on a Blogger post for several hours.    It's finally ready: you've got the wording exactly right, everything is formatted with bold, italics and bullet-points, your pictures and links are all correct, etc.   

But then your internet connection stops working.   Or you click the Publish button - and get a message like  "Post cannot be saved due to HTML errors".   You can't work out how fix the problem, and you need to stop working on it now!

This may seem like a disaster - hours of work wasted.

But luckily there's a very easy way to save your work, and tools to help you diagnose problems.

Saving your work and recovering it later

How to save the post that you have written

• Switch to Edit HTML mode (this is a tab at the top left corner of the editing window. 

• Select all the text in the window (Ctrl / A does this in most browsers)

• Copy it.

• Go to somewhere outside of Blogger that you can save text:
  Perhaps a text-editor like Notepad, or a plain-text formatted email message.   Even a word processor like MS Word can work, provided you remember to save your file as text.  Or you may want to use a source code editor - see the section below about fixing code errors.

• Paste in the contents that you copied earlier.

• Save the file.

• Switch to Compost mode (this is optional - I usually recommend it so that you don't get confused the next time you come back to Blogger and see the "funny codes")

• Exit the Blogger post-editor by closing the window - say "ok" if the system asks if you really want to leave the page without saving. 

Recovering your work later on

This is the reverse of what you did to save the work:   open the text file, copy the contents, go to Edit HTML mode in Blogger and paste them in.

You should then be able to go in to Compose mode, and see the post as it was when you stopped working on it.

At this point, if the HTML is ok and you have fixed the issues with your internet connection, you can Publish your post.

Fixing problems with your HTML

If there are problems with the HTML, then you need to find them, and fix them.    Usually, fixing them is easy, once you've found them - but the finding can be  hard if you have a large and complicated post.

Sometimes Blogger will tell you what the problem with your HTML is, and show where it's happening by putting the "wrong" code into reverse text when you try to Publish it:  this makes it easy to see if you scan through the HTML for the post.

However sometimes Blogger doesn't show you where the problem is - I've noticed this more often recently when using IE 9.0 on complex posts.   Instead you get an error message like

Your HTML cannot be accepted: Closing tag has no matching opening tag: SPAN

or whatever the specific problem is, but none of your code is highlighted. This can make it hard to track down and fix the problem.

A low-tech way to find the problem is to paste the code from the saved file into Blogger's Edit HTML window in smaller sections, and Publish to work out if the problem is in the code that you just pasted:  if everything in the first section of code can be published, but there is an error message for the next part, then you know what section the error is in.

A major disadvantage of this approach is that you need to publish the post many times, and the first time it will definitely not be "finished".   this is OK if you use a pre-publication blog to prepare your posts, but if you don't do that, it can cause your RSS subscribers to form a bad impression of the quality of your posts.

A better option is to use a source-code editor like Notepad++ (free, Windows only) or XMLSpy (30 day free trial, far more complex code editor), which has tools to help you find and fix problems with your code.

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Putting a badge for a Facebook Page into your Blog

This article describes making a Facebook badge to promote your page, and putting it onto your blog.

What is a Facebook page

This article is about how to make a badge to promote a Facebook Page.

This is an example of the "follow me" approach to linking your blog and the social networks, although for Facebook pages your reader becomes a Fan rather than a Friend.

Many people are confused about when they should use each of the types of "thing" in Facebook, ie

• Profiles - accounts for flesh-and-blood, living, breathing, individual people
• Pages - for websites, brands, and organisations that don't want to approve all their Facebook members
• Groups -  for organisations that want to approve individual members who join (and in return, group-owners can send private messages to individual members.

The most common "thing" for blogs to have is a Page - and a Badge is the tool which Facebook provides to help you to promote a Page on your blog or other website.

How to make a badge to promote a Facebook Page

View all your Pages using the arrow drop-down at the very top right of Facebook's toobar.
(Facebook chance the place for actions like this from time to time - you may need to look around to find your pages.)

Copy the URL for the Page you want to promote
(One way is to right click on its name, and choose copy-link-location- or whatever phrase your browser uses.   Another is to to go the page, and copy the URLfrom your address bar.)

Come back to this article and click  here --- Facebook Social Plugins, to reach Facebook's tools.
(I used to have instructions to launch this from Facebook - but I cannot find any link to it from my Pages page any more.)

Choose Page Plugin  / Web.  

Scroll down the page, and set the options for your badge.  The first one is critical - the others optional:

• Facebook Page URL - this needs to be changed to the URL of your page (which you copied earlier)
  If you have less than 25 Fans already, then your page's URL will be something like http://www.facebook.com/pages/Blogger-Hints-and-Tips/144194435594821 and you can get it by copying the link from the list of Pages for your account.
  Once you have more than 25 fans, you can choose a  page-url on the Edit Info > Username screen.

• Tab - the tab on your page that is shown

• Width - choose a value that suits the space on your template where you want to put the box.
• Show faces, show header:  choose options that suit your purpose and blog template
• Show stream:  this controls whether you show posting from the Page inside your blog

As you choose options, the preview at the bottom updates to show what the button will look like:

When you are happy with the selections, choose Get Code.

• Currently, there are options for an iframe or Javascript SDK:   I recommend using the iframe, unless you are comfortable with the two-part installation needed for the Javascripit, and you are sure that the visitors you want to target will have Javascripti enabled. 

Copy the code provided

Install the code into your blog - there several options for installing the HTML, depending on where you want to put the badge or button.


Job Done!   Your blog will now display a gadget that promotes the selected Facebook page - people can view and like your Page from within your blog.

What your visitors will see

People who visit your blog through a web-browser will see a Facebook area, including a Like button and whatever other options you have chosen.

This can be quite a powerful tool:  you can easily use two or three different combinations on different parts of your blog:  one that has no border, no faces and no header but does show a Stream can effectively look like a "live" feed from your Facebook page to your blog, while another one with different options can show off the size of your fan-base.

Be aware that the Like button shown in this button gives people the option to Like your Page in facebook  - not your blog directly, and not the current post that they are reading.   If you want them to be able to Like your blog or blog-posts, you need to provide this option separately (and many of your visitors are likely to be confused by the different).

As always, people who read your blog via a feed reader (Bloglines, Google Reader, etc), or by email subscription (eg having used follow-by-email) may not see the Facebook item, depending on where is places and what options their email program has.

Customizing the code

You can change the characteristics of the box without having to generate the code from Facebook again.   For example you can later the width and/or height - just remember to do it in both of the places required if you are using the iframe option:

<iframe src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/likebox.php?href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fpages%2FBlogger-Hints-and-Tips%2F144194435594821&amp;width=160&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;show_faces=false&amp;border_color=purple&amp;stream=true&amp;header=false&amp;height=395" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" style="border:none; overflow:hidden; width:160px; height:395px;" allowTransparency="true"></iframe>

fyi, I could have just quoted this code, and said to use it on your blog.  But I don't usually do this when I'm describing how to link Blogger and any third party product, because it's likely that Facebook (or whoever) will change their code in the future:  it's always safest to get the most up-to-date copy of the code from the source-site when you need it.

The facebook page where you get the code from also has more information about controls you can set in the code, too.   Check it out for more information.

Do you need to own the page you want to promote?

No - not any more.

At one stage, the first step in these instructions was to

"Log into Facebook with a profile (ie personal account) that has administrator rights for the page you want to promote."

But that's no longer necessary.   You can promote any Facebook page that you want to, on your blog.

But be aware that if you show the page-feed on your blog, and you don't own the page, then you have no control over what is shown.   It's possible that a feed from someone else's Page will show material which breaks Blogger's terms and conditions - or which you simply don't want on your blog.    For this reason along, I'd recommend only promoting your own, or closely trusted, pages on your blog.

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How to rename picture files in Picasa-desktop

This article is about re-naming files from within Picasa-desktop, to provide SEO benefits for your blog.

Picasa's desktop software is a good tool for organizing and editing photos on your local computer.   And it is still available for you to use, even though Picasa-web-albums has been replaced by Google Albums + Google Album Archive.

For pictures that are important in your blog, I still recommend preparing them in a tool like Picasa-desktop and then uploading the finished versions to Google Photos before putting them into a post, because:

• The desktop tool has better editing tools (cropping, zooming, auto adjustment, adding watermarks) and Picasa-web-albums does.

• It lets you control the size of the uploaded file

• It's easier to ensure sure that you still have full-size files on my local machine for printing etc, as well as smaller, more optimized, copies to use on web-pages.

Picasa-desktop folders have a very nice relationship with files and directories with the Windows file system:

Each Picasa folder = one directory on your computer
Each Picasa photo = one file on your computer.

And this means that you can set various properties (eg file name) from either inside Picasa or from Windows.

Ways to associate keywords with photos in Picasa-desktop

Picasa-desktop has two tools for adding keywords to photographs:

• You can enter a caption for each photo. This is basically some text, which is stored "inside" the photo, in a hidden-field that is only visible when you are using a software tool that displays the captions. (In technical terms, the caption is stored inside the  IPTC/XMP Description field inside the JPEG etc file that you have.)

• You can enter one or more tags for each photo - again, text (individual words or phrases) that is stored in the  IPTC/XMP Keyword field.

Unfortunately captions and tags aren't shown when you put a photo in your blog.

This means that the captions and tags are possibly not used by Google in understanding what the photo is about: I've never heard any SEO experts recommending that the  IPTC/XMP fields should be keyword optimized.   For some bloggers this won't be an issue - but it is if SEO is important for you blog.

Another approach is to put the keyword(s) into the file-name, because file-name is one of the factors that Google looks at when it is indexing images.   And this has a nice spin-off for you as well - it means that they keywords are available to any file-search tools that you use on your computer, not just to specialised ones that work with images.

For a long time, I believed that to change the name of a file, I had to go out to my Windows files (using Windows Explorer or similar, and rename them there) - and then wait for Picasa to catch up with the change that I'd made in the file system.   But one day I accidentally hit the F2 key, and found that it opens up a very useful dialog box indeed.

How to Change the name of a file in Picasa desktop

Navigate to the picture that you want to change the file-name for, using the Picasa-desktop software.

Press the F2 key. This opens a Rename Files window.

Type in a new name for the file, for example    concrete-pig-outside-butcher-shop-in-ireland

Click the option buttons if you want to include today's date or the file-resolution in the name  (I don't usually do this, because I organise my photos into folders according to the date they were taken)

Click Rename to save the change


Job done!    The file has a new name in your computer's file system, and is still loaded in your Picasa database.

How to change the name of a file in Google Album Archive or Google Photos

Currently there is no way to change the name of a file after it is uploaded it to either Google Album Archive or Google Photos:  .

One option is to download the photo, rename the file on your desktop, and re-upload it.   But if you change the name in this way, you also need to change the link to the file in every place that it has already been used.   That said, if you only use your photos in one place each, then making a new copy with a different name, uploading it and changing all the existing links can be a good way to deal with copyright theives who have hot-linked directly to your photos.

How to choose "good" names for your picture files

Early SEO advice was to use:

• Lowercase letters only (some computers don't like uppercase)
• Only hyphens between words (not spaces, underscores, etc)
• Regular characters only (no á é etc)

Today, I'm not sure if it matters so much. In most cases, it's probably more important to use rich, descriptive key words  that describe all the aspects of the photo, than to worry about how they're laid out.   But I do tend to follow the advice anyway - just in case.

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How Secure Is Your Document Sharing Provider

Companies and Enterprises are constantly on the look-out for a reliable and enhanced way of sharing files among their employees without leaking vital information. This is where file-sharing services such as Dropbox and SugarSync come into play. Box, Google Drive and other cloud hosting providers offer users the ability to sync files and folders, make them accessible everywhere and emphasize on security thus a lot of businesses seek their well-regarded services.

The past few weeks have been overwhelming for the providers with the trending news of Dropbox going through so far another security breach. This begs the question, how secure is your document sharing provider? Dropbox being one of the most reliable cloud service providers had recently reset most of its client's passwords owing to a data breach that had occurred in 2012. Nevertheless, even with all these steps of ensuring user security they were hacked and data stolen from its users.

Owing to this, cloud service providers have put in place new safety measures to try and curb the threat. Some of these include the two-step verification whereby the user is required to enter a password and verification code sent to them via mobile phone. Another security step that has been put in place is advising the users to unlink any older devices that are no longer in use. These may be smartphones, tablets or even unused computers that were once attached to their Dropbox accounts. Another safety measures the providers have put in place, although it has been part of the package in their services, is file encryption and monitoring web sessions. By tracking and keeping a record of web browsers that have logged into a user's account, the client can monitor illegal activity in their account and report quickly.

But is this enough? Are your business and company files safe or are they vulnerable and at the mercy of your competitors? With the millions of passwords and personal data lost at the Dropbox security breach, a lot of uncertainty and questions have been raised on how secure is your document sharing provider?

Source: https://www.firmex.com/virtual-data-rooms/

How to turn your iPhone into a Wi-Fi hotspot?

There are many good things about turning your iPhone to a wireless hotspot. For example, you are travelling somewhere and you are carrying your laptop or tablet. You have two options, you can work offline on the tablet or laptop, or browse the internet on a very small screen. It would be great if you could use your 3G or 4G connection of the iPhone and go online on your laptop or tablet, right?

The good thing is that you can easily do this with your iPhone. It is quite easy to share your cellular connection with other devices you use. This feature is popular as tethering and it is really helpful -you don’t have to look for a café or a restaurant to use the internet or search for a free public hotspot.

Turning your iPhone to a wireless hotspot is quite easy. However, we recommend you to contact your carrier first and see if they allow this option or whether it is included in your monthly plan. This will exclude the chances of any unplanned extra fees. You also have to take care of your monthly bandwidth quota. In case you have a limited bandwidth for the month, make sure to use this option only when you really need it.

How to create an iPhone hotspot

Tethering basically transforms your iPhone to a wireless router just like the ones we all have at our homes. Of course, you won’t be able to login to the new router using its default IP (for example 192.168.1.1 and password) and tweak its settings, but it practically does the same job. Then the iPhone sends wireless signal which enables us to connect our devices to the internet. The laptop or tablet can connect to the iPhone either by USB, or Bluetooth or wireless. It is quite good to know that your beloved iPhone can do this. So, if you want to turn your iPhone to a wireless hotspot follow these steps:

1. Tap the Settings icon
2. Then tap on Cellular and turn on Cellular Data. Make sure to set it to 3G or 4G in the Cellular Data Options.
3. Go back and tap Personal Hotspot and turn it ON..
4. Tap on Wi-Fi Password and enter a password you would like to use to connect your devices. At the same time this will prevent others from connecting to your wireless hotspot.
5. On the laptop click on the Network icon and from the available networks select the one labeled as “iPhone” or similar.
6. Click on that network name and enter the password you have set up earlier.

Now you will be able to browse the Internet on any device you connect to your personal wireless hotspot. However, don’t forget you are using the data connection from your iPhone. Maybe you won’t get so good performance as with the Internet connection you have at home, but we are sure you will be able to do all the tasks you want to do.

Don’t forget to turn OFF the hotspot when you don’t use it since it will drain your iPhone battery very quickly.

What are the dangers of creating an iPhone hotspot

There is always a possibility that someone will try to connect to your iPhone hotspot and use your bandwidth without your knowledge. If you have set up a password as we have mentioned before you shouldn’t worry about this. However, if someone guesses your password you will be notified when he or she gets connected to the wireless hotspot. If this happens you will be notified so you can react in time.

Another thing you have to take good care about is the bandwidth. It is quite easy to forget paying attention to it while you are surfing. However, you can always use third-party apps to control the bandwidth. At the same time avoid downloading large files or updating your computer. This can consume large amounts of data and very soon you will hit the limit. So, always make sure to pay attention to this. Plus, when you use your iPhone as a hotspot you will notice the battery gets drained faster than usual.

SEO in 2017, Digital Home Assistants, Mobile Indexing, and AI - Oh My!

SEO in 2017, Digital Home Assistants, Mobile Indexing, and AI - Oh My!
Looking to discover a new SEO strategy that will help optimize your site? Have you taken into consideration how digital assistants and apps have changed the way buyers operate? If you haven’t already approached your boss with a model about how to adapted to these changes it might be too late.

As the rise of digital assistants like Siri and Amazon Echo become smartphone staples and home automation ports, it's important to recognize that changing your SEO methods is no longer an option. 180Fusion is a leading search engine marketing company that specializes in generating leading SEO terms and site optimization. We sat down with them, to help loop together what it is you need to understand about the ever-changing strategy of SEO content while catering to the world of artificial intelligence and mobile.

Here are three approaches to SEO that will better position you in a world conforming to assistant search:

Hey Google, Alexa and Siri: Optimizing For Digital Assistants

The number of consumers turning to digital assistants for answers to their questions is on the rise. Marketers will have to adapt if they want to stay relevant in a world where the use of personal operating systems and mobile apps for shopping becoming par for the course.

Digital assistants like Siri, Google Now, and Amazon echo are completely redefining the search and shop process. Rather than producing a run of results when they’re asked a question, they produce an immediate answer negating the duty of the user to filter through various options and stumbling across your website.

Your business should dodge becoming obsolete by playing the same game that these digital assistants relying on existing web search algorithms do. Because they use content that will supply them with sufficient and accurate answers, you should provide them with answers that are specific and significant.

As they are now, interactions with digital assistants are conversational, thus digital assistants seek out results that are conversational. Optimize your site's SEO by including colloquial terms, long-tail keywords, and detailed questions. Create posts that venture into niche territory. Be the source that a know-it-all digital assistant links to and your site your brand will score instant credibility points and increase user return.

Mobile First Is No Longer Optional

The amount of time people spend using their phones for searches is skyrocketing. Smartphones give people the luxury of instant access to information they had to drive home or to the office for. It’s why going mobile with your site isn’t an option anymore, especially because search engines like Google rewarding mobile-friendly sites with more positive rankings.

As you create and design content for your site, it becomes key that you reflect on how it is that you use and access the internet. Smartphones that have even more capabilities of a computer have changed the ways people want to receive information. Not only do they want instant access they want to have it fed to them easily. Secure visitors who access your site via mobile by presenting them with a site that is mobile responsive or designed to account for device screen size so that the site can be displayed on different screens. 180Fusion created a mobile responsive corporate website that detects the screen size of a device and accounts for its different dimensions. Use mobile SEO and optimization to provide a site designed and structured to run on a mobile at a page speed that won’t frustrate your user and turn them away. 

Do It All With Artificial Intelligence

The development and improvement of artificial intelligence means that we’ll have access to smarter and more human-friendly search engines. Results that come from a search take into account your location, the amount of clicks from similar queries and even your own search history. AI developments will allow for an adaptation in result rank as algorithms take in what prompts the most clicks and translate it into relevancy. This means a heightened importance of SEO optimization for marketers and the content that they create.

As search engines use artificial intelligence to improve analyzing search objectives, keyword research accuracy becomes more critical. Marketers have to hone in on keywords and then make them relevant to the content they create. Accordingly, frame of reference and content relevance are now more important factors than old methods that aimed to achieve keyword density.

Speaking of relevance, video content mustn’t be undervalued. Especially because search engines like Google have started to favor videos in search results. As they also improve upon detecting what visual content is about, the game for visual content creators completely changes. For them, considering SEO when creating visual content becomes crucial.

It might all sound intimidating, but improvements in AI will make SEO become a strategy that is more intelligible and regular. Focus on delivering valuable and suitable content to searchers and you’re already ahead of the game.

Productivity Tool Preview - Able2Extract Professional 11

The majority of our office documentation comes in PDF - the most known, universal format for viewing and storing documents. No matter the industry, profession or experience, everyone is still using it.

The PDF’s main trait is its non-editable nature. You cannot edit or change any content inside a PDF document, by default. Two reasons why:

1. Security - PDF format is the most secure type currently available, thus you are unable to easily alter documents.
2. Portability - PDF files tend to always keep the layout so they can be viewed and shared across devices and platforms.

Because you cannot copy or edit a PDF file, various companies develop software to help us solve that particular problem. One of those tools is Able2Extract, whose latest version is set to be released on December 5.

This brand new office productivity solution is called Able2Extract Professional 11 and we had the pleasure of reviewing it prior to its release.

Here is what you will have a chance to see in the latest build:

PDF Creation

Having in mind the latest document security concerns in almost all competitive industries, the developers of Able2Extract decided to up the ante and provide complete document encryption and decryption, upon PDF creation.

This means that you can set up document owners, configure passwords and share your documents securely. There are two ways to create PDFs in Able2Extract:

1. After clicking the right-mouse-button on a supported file, select the "Print" option and choose Able2Extract Professional 11 printer.
2. By clicking on a "Create" button in Able2Extract, the software will immediately make a PDF document from your desired file.

PDF compression is another sub-task, which allows you to set up image and text compression, therefore reducing file size for when you send it through email.

PDF Editing

Using Able2Extract’s upgraded PDF editing engine, you will have a chance to perform a wide variety of operations, most notably:

• Add, remove and edit PDF text
• Add images and vector shapes
• Change text size, font color, fill and outline text blocks
• Move and rotate all content blocks
• Rearrange one or several pages
• Combine multiple PDF files into one document
• Split PDF documents
• Rotate and delete pages across the document
• Resize any individual page

Additionally, users can now redact (black out) all sensitive information from their financial and legal documents.

PDF Conversion

Able2Extract Pro 11 will keep the main strength of its predecessors. After all, this software is primarily a PDF conversion software. Version 11 is empowered with an improved OCR engine that enables you to convert scanned PDF documents into fully editable formats.

All conversions work the same: open your PDF by clicking on the "Open" button and selecting the desired file. Since Able2Extract is one of the most advanced converters out there, it supports conversion up to 12 different formats, such as:

• PDF to Word
• PDF to Excel
• PDF to Image
• PDF to CSV
• PDF to PowerPoint
• PDF to HTML
• PDF to AutoCAD and more

As usual, users can use Custom conversion features to manually set up all needed parameters. Take note that the custom conversion is still limited to PDF to Excel and PDF to CSV.

PDF Annotations

In Able2Extract Pro 11 users do not need to install any plugins for annotations, as this new feature runs right inside the new Annotations Panel, which supports following annotations:

• Sticky notes
• Comments
• Highlight
• Underline and strikeout text
• Stamps and watermarks
• Hyperlink and attachment

Having in mind that this is just a quick preview, you can rest assured that the actual software provides even more productivity enhancing features, as these are just some of the new things you will get with Able2Extract 11. The tool is in many ways a useful product that can solve any PDF problems you might have.

A lifetime, single-user license will go for $129.95 and the software is available for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux users.

Wikipedia Becoming More Acceptable in the Classroom

Wikipedia has been the go-to source for many people over the last decade. Despite it being considered non-reliable, it is still one of the first places people look due to its ranking so high in search results. Academia is one of the industries that have not had a good relationship with Wikipedia throughout the years but this could be changing thanks to recent trends.

Due to Wikipedia not being considered a reliable source, many colleges and universities have banned its use by students for research projects. However, the Los Angeles Times recently reported that some college professors are actually using Wikipedia for classes, something that would not have been allowed just a few years ago.

Even though academia has shunned Wikipedia in the past, there seems to be a growing trend to allow its use in schools. There are many reasons why this could be occurring but here are some of the most common.

Wikipedia Now Being Edited by Experts

 Wikipedia is no longer edited by a small group of editors. Many of them are experts in professional fields such as physicians, lawyers, and even professors. This pool of editors volunteers their time to make improvements to the site, editing existent content and creating new pages.

Wikipedia has become so difficult to navigate because of its vast rules that people even turn to professional Wikipedia services. That means you now have volunteer editors as well as outside paid editors contributing content to Wikipedia.

Editors Are Becoming More Diverse

A study by MIT found that Wikipedia is skewed toward technical, western, and male-dominated subject matter. This is reflective of the male-dominated editor pool. Over the last couple of years, Wikipedia has become more diverse thanks to “edit-a-thons” that have focused on removing gender bias from Wikipedia.

When you bring diversity into any situation, you will have more of an unbiased view. The same applies to Wikipedia. With editors of all genders, races, religions, etc., you will have more of a neutral point of view with articles, making them a more reliable and accurate account of history.

Students Now Editing Wikipedia as Class Assignments

Evidence that Wikipedia has become more acceptable in education can be seen in how many students are editing it as a class assignment. I am not talking about using it as a reference, but learning how and performing edits to the online encyclopedia for class credit.

Wikipedia has worked with the academic community for some time now, even creating Wikipedia projects to help teachers use it for assignments. Some of the most prominent universities even employ “Wikipedians in Residence” who work within the college to help students and teachers with Wikipedia.

Students Learning to Use Wikipedia the Right Way

Despite earning more respect in academia, it is still not advisable to cite Wikipedia for class assignments. This is due to the open access format where anyone can edit. Citing Wikipedia directly is a no-no but there is a way to use it as a starting point which many students are now taking advantage of.

According to the guide to using Wikipedia in academia, always go directly to the Wikipedia article about the topic you are researching. Then, scroll to the bottom under the “references” section. There you will find a list of all the reliable sources that you can use to cite in your paper. Students learning to use Wikipedia correctly are causing professors to trust its use more and more.

What Will be Next for Wikipedia and Academia?

I highly doubt that Wikipedia will ever be used as a direct citation for research. However, more educational institutions will likely move closer to allowing its use to begin your research. In addition to class projects where students edit Wikipedia directly, academia is likely to produce future Wikipedia editors from those who enjoyed using it for class projects.

What has been your experience with using Wikipedia in the classroom?

5 Smartphone Apps That Parents Need To Worry About

Owning a smartphone filled with countless apps that can help one from keeping track of their appointments to telling them how many calories they have lost by walking down the road is a norm these days. Yet, there are a few apps that parents should worry about as soon as they see them on their kids’ phones. Here are 5 of the worse apps your child could have on their phones.

Vine

Vine is home to some of the most popular online celebrities like King Bach who makes vine one of the most entertaining and fun social networking platforms out there. But like everything else, there are good ways to use vine and then there are the bad ones. The bad ones being the fact that one can upload any kind of pornographic material on vine without any restrictions. Now Hofmann, Yusupov and Kroll, the founders, incorporated a 17+ age restriction to make an account for vine, however, it is fairly simple for teens to make an account on vine.

Other than just viewing inappropriate videos on Vine, they can also upload their own videos which may or may not be indecent in nature and may even contain child abuse content.

ChatRoulette or Omegle

Same as other social networking apps on this list, ChatRoulette and Omegle allow teens to talk to strangers from all over the world. Now, these two apps are a mile ahead from other apps of its kind, providing video chatting facility, it is one of the most inappropriate apps for minors on the internet these days.

There are several features that the founders and the owners of these apps certainly overlooked. One being the fact that you can record the online video chats and upload them anywhere on the internet meaning that what your child says or does can most certainly come back to bite them in the near future. It also greatly increases the chances of cyber bullying. A large number of people just log into these apps to bully people and turn them against the people they love.

Ask.fm

Ask.fm allows access to a feature that is unlike any other, it enable its users to ask fellow members questions. Now these questions can very well be of any nature, there is no profanity filter of any sorts that prevents people from asking personal or sometimes sexual question from other people.

The questions aren’t reviewed by anyone so that it can be filtered before being published, that is the reason that abuse on ask.fm has been growing rapidly. If you fear that someone is bullying you online on ask.fm, it does come with the option to block people. However, the people you block can still view your profile and know about all your likes and dislikes and you can’t do anything about it.

Blendr

Blendr is an app which allows anyone to communicate with someone anywhere on the planet. However, it also incorporates a feature that uses the GPS Location of a device to find users located nearby. It’s never safe when strangers know your child’s location up to the block you live in. Even if we ignore the GPS Locating feature, it is also a pretty harmful app for the young minds because it allows online predators to prey on their minds and without anyone finding out about it.

Kik

This is another free texting app that enables children to talk to strangers, you don’t need to know anything about the other person, and you could just type in random names and hope for the best.

Other than the fact that you can search random people, there are also apps available on Google Play Store and the Apple Store that can provide usernames for males and females, whichever you may be interested in.

You don’t need to download the app to find out that it is mostly used to sexting, the app description and the comments on the app says it all. There are several hundred comments of people providing their private information and asking girls and boys for sexting and role play which makes it seems like a 100% hookup site.

The Bottom Line
           These are just 5 of the hundreds, even thousands of apps in the market that put the mind of children at great risk. The fact that kids can gain access to these apps as soon as they learn how to operate a smartphone is a cause of great worry for parents all over the world. The thrill of having explicit chats with strangers could very well be the only thing that could ruin the rest of their lives and get them addicted to stuff like pornography which very well leads to an act that the children might regret greatly in the future. Hence, using a smartphone monitoring app is the best precaution for parents in the world today.



Author Bio: 
Elizbeth is a blogger and writer. She loves to write about digital parenting teens and issues related them. She is currently working on monitoring you kid’s text messages to keep an eye on you kid. Follow her on twitter @elizbethsewell6

Centering gadgets in Blogger

This article is about centering gadgets from 3rd parties that you install onto your blog.

Previously, I've described how to put HTML code from a 3rd party into your blog.

When code like this is put into a gadget, one common question is "how do I center it?"

There are (at least) three options for doing this, ie for putting a gadget into the middle (horizontally) of the area it is located in.   These are described below.

Option 1: Centre all the gadgets in your blog

To center-align every single gadget in your blog, just, add a CSS rule to your blog.  The rule to add is:

.widget {
  text-align: center;
} 

This will centre the contents and title of every gadget on your blog.

Option 2: Only center-align the specific gadget

To only centre-align one gadget, which is made from HTML/Javascript code, you can just put the gadget-code from the 3rd party (eg PayPal, Amazon, etc) inside a centering statement, like this:

<div style="text-align: center;">

PUT THE CODE FROM THE 3RD PARTY HERE

</div>

Install the code into your blog the way you would usually install this 3rd party code.

This will centre-align the contents (not title) of the specific gadget that you add.

Note the American spelling of the word "center" - and don't forget to put the closing </div> statement at the end.

There may be some gadgets where it would be possible to add the centring statement to the gadget code itself, rather than putting it outside.    I don't recommend this (unless you're so comfortable with HTML and CSS that you don't need to be reading this article), because it introduces a risk that you will interfere with some other aspect, or that you will lose the centering if you ever need to refresh the code.

Option 3 - Make a new style rule just for the gadget

If you only want to centre one (or several) gadgets - not all of them - then it's best to define a new style that is to be used on specific gadgets:  put this new style into your template, and then apply it to the gadgets like this.

<div class="YourNewSytle">

PUT THE CODE FROM THE 3RD PARTY HERE

</div>

This approach will only centre the gadget contents - not any header that you give to it.

There are lots of options that you could put into the new style rule, but at a minimum it needs to have

.YourNewStyle
{
  text-align: center;
}

Notice that there is a "." (ie a full-stop) before the name of your new style.

Also, it's best not to use a number as the style-name (eg "2nd-gadgetStyle"), because this doesn't work with some browsers.

---

Related Articles

Putting HTML code from a 3rd party into your blog

Adding a new CSS style into your template

Centering the header in your blog

Putting a gadget above your blog's header

Removing the attribution gadget from Designer-template blogs 

Lining up the first post and the sidebar

In some Blogger templates, there is a big gap between the bottom of the header and the start of the first post, and this means that the posts and the sidebar are not aligned.  This article explains how to adjust the gap, and so remove that problem.

In the templates that Blogger provides, as well as all third-party templates, the amount of space between elements on the screen is not accidental:   designers put a lot of effort into working out what spacing will look good, and then finding ways to put CSS code into the template so that the spacing they want is shown in any browser software that Blogger supports.


But there are times when you may want to change this spacing, and this is easy to do, provided you are willing to accept the disadvantages of editing your template, and if  you can work out exactly which part of the template code to change.

The pre-Header gap

A pet-hate of mine is the blank space above the first post, which looks strange unless you put something else in to the space.  In this example, I've got an AdSense link-unit in the area highlighted in red, just to fill in the empty area:

How to change the gap above the post header

1  Edit your template  - don't forget to take a backup.


2  Find this code

h3.post-title, .comments h4 {
  font: $(post.title.font);
  margin: .75em 0 0;
}

The exact numbers used in your template may be different:  the key thing is to find the CSS command that is putting a margin above the post header.  In the template that I took this example from (Simple), it's the "0.75em" - which puts 75% of the space of a the post-header characters as a blank space above the header.


3   Change the first margin value:  how much to change it by depends on your template, but in some cases I've used 0 successfully.

In CSS, when a margin statement has three numbers beside it, they refer to the

• top, 
• left-and-right, 
• bottom 

margins respectively.   So if you want to do something else to the post-header, eg indent it, this is the place to make changes


4   Click Preview to see what the blog will look like - keep doing this until you get the right setting.


5   When you are happy with the spacing, click Save Template to apply the changes to your blog.   (Or Clear Edits if you cannot get it right and need to stop trying).


Note:  If you make a big change to your template like this, it would be a good idea to check out out in at least one version of the other browsers that your readers use - at the moment, this usually means Internet Explorer 8, Firefox and Chrome.   But it may depend on your niche - a tool like Google Analytics will give you some statistics about what browsers, and screen sizes, your visitors have.

Also, it is possible to make this change by just installing a new CSS rule for h3.post-title into your blog - because the latest one found is always the one used, and because the template designer's Add CSS function puts the rules you add after the othr rules.   I don't recommend it here, though, because working with the original rule makes it easier to see the effect of making changes to any of the values in the area.

Other affected spacing

If you have more than one post per page, then this change will also reduce the amount of space between the bottom of one post and the header of the next one.   Depending on your template, you want want to add a little more space into the margin statement in the bottom of the post-footer, eg

.post-footer {
  margin: 20px -2px 20;
  padding: 5px 10px;
}

If you display comments in your blog, you also need to check the impact on comments, because the original command applied to h4 items in comments as well.

If you are making a lot of changes, you may want to make a test blog, and plan your changes in private before applying them to your main blog.

---

Related Articles

Setting up Google Analytics to get statistics about for your visitors

Adding a new CSS rule to your blog's template

Advantanges and disadvantages of editing your template.

How to edit your blogger template

Who did your blogger template come from - the quick way of finding out

Making a test-blog for template changes

Planning changes to your blog in private

How New iOS Features Strike the Technology World

The introduction of IOS 10 has created much hustle and bustle among the update cravers. It has been successful so far. IOS has ignited the flare of innovation in almost every built-in application. The IOS App Development Company has marked its success when millions of users upgraded their IOS software and left beaming reviews telling how every feature has lightened up the interface.

Anyhow, keep reading as I am about to fill you up with something which surely going to amuse you. There are much more amazingly innovative features in IOS 10 along with those Apple announced, back in June. I have gathered the list of those features below. Scroll down and cast an eye over the awesomeness!

Interesting features in Message

Read-Receipt feature

Unlike IOS 9 the new IOS 10 also have read receipt feature. The feature, however, is upgraded with some new facilities. In IOS 10 you can select the individual friends and send them read-receipt. You are given a choice to select the desired one. The rest of your conversation follows the default setting. You can also turn off the feature whenever you want.

Inbuilt image search

IOS 10 gives a chance to chat with your friends using funny GIF. Now those days are gone when the only messenger was the source for GIF keyboard as IOS 10 also facilitates us with this newness.

Emoji and new effects

Messages in IOS 10 is enhanced with replaceable and bigger sized emoji. Effects like invisible ink, tap backs, bubble effect, digital ink and stickers are introduced in messages. With the evolution of such eye-catching features, conversations have now become more entertaining.

The emoji and the effects are collectively adding fame to this new update. Now you can share your stories and happiness adding the touch of expressions in them. If it’s something exciting then add background effect, enhance the text into larger font and then boom!!! It will appear like a celebration. If you wish to give your loved one a cute hidden message then type it with invisible ink, simply rub with a fingertip and the message will appear on the screen leaving a cute memory on the mind. There are four different types of expressions along with this you can tag induvial messages too. Keep pressing the selected message and six options will appear on the screen.

Modified version of Maps

The modified version of Apple Map allows the user to easily pan and zoom to navigate. The navigation software is extraordinarily smooth and it facilitates the users to conveniently check the points of interest.
 
IOS 10 Update Siri

Among the many outstanding features, updated version of Siri is the best of all. Now Siri is available for third parties too. Which means you can send commands to other applications, book rideshare, order a pizza, transfer money to friends or family and many other benefits can be availed.

Parking Assistant

Those days are gone when you have to spot your parked position as parking assistance is here to help you in tracking the place you parked your car at. The specialty of this feature is that it will only inform you about the position when you park at any non-parking spot. This application is connected with Apple Map.

Organ Donation Sign Up

What can be best than to saving lives in a day? IOS 10 gives you a chance to save the life by providing you easy access to National Donate Life Registry. Simply sign in and fill the form and help patients by donating your organs. Millions of patients across the globe dies due to insufficient organ supply but now you can play your part in helping them.

Sharing Notes

With IOS 10 you can easily share your notes with your friends. Click the option on the top right corner and select the contact. Whenever you add any new note to your list they will be able to see it. Hence IOS 10 is playing its role in strengthening relationships as it is now easier to deliver your thoughts.

Clicking Pictures while listening to music

I know how disturbing it gets when you are asked to click a picture in a middle of your favorite song. You have to choose between the cameras of your music but now that helplessness is gone as IOS 10 allows users to click pictures while listening to their music. Isn’t it great!

Wake up Alarm clock

Do you want to make IPhone your friend? If so then without wasting any second update your software as it will provide you an IPhone alarm clock assistant. Along with updating many other features IOS 10 has enhanced the alarm clock too. It allows you to have two separate alarm clock one is the ordinary clock and another one is Wake up Alarm clock. This alarm clock guides you about your sleeping hours. It will remind you when you should go to your bed and when you should wake up. In short, it will manage your whole sleeping routine.

Mail Application

The mail app is enhanced too. It is now easier to filter messages by just one click. You just have to select the categories and it will get filtered. Along with this, the conversation threads are also managed properly. You will be able to see the full thread in your application.

Two features in Home Button:

IOS 10 has enabled users to have two different features in a single home button. Upon updating you will be asked to press the home button in order to enter the passcode but if one doesn’t feel like using this feature he can switch to previous setting by going to Setting > General > Accessibility > Home Button. Voila! Your previous button is back.

Hence these were some of the amazing features that IOS 10 has introduced but there still are a lot many features which you will discover. So it’s better to be updated then to be outdated.


About Me:
I am a content writer who have the keen interest in technology specifically covering the topics related to Android and IOS App Developing Company. I love to research and have been in this profession for five years. Besides this, I’m preparing myself to become a ghostwriter. I love to read and learn. My area of expertise in writing is related to industries like technology, designing particularly applications and research based work.

Email: Ayesha.Sameen@weatherlycloud.com
URL: https://www.appaustic.com/android-app-development

Getting the HTML code to put a picture into your blog's sidebar, header or footer

You can use the Post Editor to get the HTML code that you need to put a picture into your sidebar (or header or footer, or anywhere else a gadget can go).

The Picture gadget is the normal tool for adding a picture to your blog's sidebar.

But sometimes you want more control over the picture size or behaviour.  Eg, you may want to have two pictures very close to each other and guarantee that they're the same size.

To do this, you need to get the HTML code for the picture, and then put it into your blog as an HTML-gadget.  Fortunately, Blogger's Post-editor make it very easy to do this without writing the code yourself.

Using the Post Editor to generate the HTML for a picture

1  Start a new Post  (NB   you're not ever going to publish this:  it's just a work-area)

2  Don't enter any text:   just use the Picture icon on the toolbar to add a picture.   Blogger will prompt you to upload the picture, or to choose it from a Google-album-archive or to enter its URL:  add the picture the way that you usually would.

3  Switch to the HTML tab   (top left of the editing window).

This show you the HTML code for displaying the picture, as it is set to display in the Post (depending on the picture-settings you've chosen, it may be centered or right/left aligned, and the size may vary).

4  Copy the HTML.

5  Switch back to Compose, so that you don't get confused the next time you edit a post.

6  Return to the list of posts:  you may be asked if you want to leave the page without saving - the answer is Yes.  Or you may have a new draft-status post, which you can delete.



Job Done!   You now have some HTML code in your memory which you can paste into an HTML/Javascript gadget, or anywhere else that you may need it - even into another post that you are editing in a separate window, or into a totally different tool.

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Related Articles

Stopping pictures on your blog from being "clickable"

Inserting a Picture into a blog Post.

Putting 3rd party HTML into your blog

Center-align the gadgets on your blog

Hosting pictures outside of Google / Picasa

Inserting a picture into your blog as a gadget