Webmaster tools provides a window into how google sees your site. Webmaster tools shows you how many pages in your sitemap are indexed in the Google directory, if your site and it’s pages contain errors, internal and external links, site crawls, page rank etc. Use this set of information for constant monitoring of your site especially if your websites information changes on a regular basis. Also use it to continually improve your sites Search Engine Optimization and improve the page rank.

Site Configuration
Sitemaps are your list of sitemaps that you have under that webmaster tools account, URL’s Submitted are all the URL’s in you sitemap that have been submitted to Google and URL’s indexed are the pages that have been submitted by Google to their directory.

Your site on the web
A very powerful tool is the search terms and positions you achieved that didn’t necessarily lead to a hit Top search queries. This adds a new dimension allowing you to see the search terms that are performing well and the pages that might need attention in order to entice visitors. There are other powerful tools on the Internet that provide similar information but webmaster tools are easy and accessible. Links to your site provide a quick snapshot of the links in the Google directory that link to your pages, note: this will not include every site on the Internet as you will see by having a look at you traffic sources in Google Analytics. Keywords is a quick look at what the Google Bot has picked up as your most frequently used words and terms on your site and should reflect the content you wish to promote. Internal links should include the majority of the hyperlinks that link to pages within your site.

For SEO improvements the Diagnostics Crawl errors are useful to identify dead links, page errors, not founds, unreachables etc. Always try and keep these down to zero if it’s possible on your website.

As I mentioned, there are many detailed softwares and sites that perform these functions, see my links page under SEO for more details.

Sitelinks are established by google, you may have seen them under the brief description in search listings. Once established you have the option to remove the irrelevant links, for example, your contact us may be identified as one of your sites most frequently visited page but is not necessarily the landing page you want listed in your sitelinks.

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More 80 Raves
“Around the world in 80 Raves” Chapter One – The proposal
“Around the world in 80 Raves” Chapter Two – Ready for the off!
“Around the world in 80 Raves” Chapter Three – Miami
“Around the world in 80 Raves” Chapter Four – Daytona Beach
“Around the world in 80 Raves” Chapter Five – Myrtle Beach

Hit the road around 11:00 the next day. We were travelling though the day so when I wasn’t looking out the window to see where we were and how the landscape quickly changed I tried to exercise in the isle of the bus and obviously got some quality sleeping time in. As soon as we arrived in Atlanta it was dark, so wasn’t worth exploring the place so we jumped straight into taxis and went straight to a club called Karma, which is owned by an English guy that would meet us later. How can I describe it, it was sort of a break beat / hip-hop / drum and base club, a place the stars apparently liked to hang out at and not be hassled by the fans. It was sort of underground, down some stairs and a regular sort of bar with a few added extras like the odd monster sized bed here and there to relax on with a DJ room and a dance floor where the punters were going wild. Some of us went down to the dance floor, but it took others a while to get used to being in a mostly black club. Apparently Christina Aguilera, Lenny Cravits and Michael Jackson were some of the names that had been to the club. Just as we were finding it a little hard to believe though Busta Rymes walked in as we were talking to the manager Pablo at the bar so we took the guys word for it. We remained cool and didn’t want to seen to be the only ones in there asking for his autograph and acted like he was just a regular guy, but Chantal couldn’t help herself she had to go and say hi and shake his hand. After lining the shots up on the bar for us Pablo gave us a sort of interview although it was hard, there wasn’t much space for us all to get in and hear what he was saying over the music. Basically he was a richboy from London who decided to go out to the states and set up a stylish bar, like you do. His club was cool though and we stayed till around 5:00 before going back to the bus via a 24hr BP garage for munchies and a pint of milk.

We were up around 12:00 the next day to begin our day as women. Before the trip Richard said if he could sort it out would we enter a transvestite beauty pageant and at the time we agreed. Although he didn’t manage to get us in the competition because the competitors were quite serious and it might seem like we were taking the piss a bit, he told us that all the audience would be dressed as women and if we didn’t we would be the odd ones out. So our day would be spent visiting a clothes / costume shop picking out women’s clothes and matching shoes. A tranny called fristy would show us around and pick out the lamest clothes I had ever seen so we ignored her and went with my intuition and picked out something completely different. It was actually turning into quite a funny day; we had got used to everyone laughing at us and now were making the best of a bad situation. Once we had an outfit it was onto to a make up and wig shop where we met our chaperone for the night in his male form. He gave us the lowdown on the event and scared us with some tranny facts, but we got the wigs or hair pieces as he liked to say and some make up tips here we also met two girls one of which was Pablo from the night before’s x girlfriend and I must ad she had possibly the nicest pair I have ever seen. Then went back to the bus where the girls had the most fun they’d had since playing with Barbies. They took it in turns painting our nails and putting all kinds of stuff on our faces until they were happy we would pass for ladies, well transvestites anyway. I put on my little black mini skirt on, tucked my balls into a tight pair of boxers and pull on my fishnets and to finish, a matching boob tube and a classy wig. You may be surprised but I made quite a lady if i do say so myself, me and Boppa got some whistles as we stepped of the bus. But wait… then there was Joel, imagine a poorly dressed Mrs Doubtfire that can’t walk in heals and that’s Joel. Our limo arrived driven by some weird looking bloke and out stepped the guy from the wig shop, completely different and I don’t even want to imagine how he achieved the look, it was scary. We got to the hotel where the event was being held and it was on one of the top floors so we had to walk from the limo past all the regular people to get there, but by now it was alright! we had gone way past the realms of embarrassment into the realms of who now gives a shit. We got in around 8:00 and surprisingly it had all already started, so we went to our VIP table where we had a good view of the stage and also the audience, and we realised that it was more a gay thing and we were definately in the minority being the ones dressed up. What the hell we had plenty of wine on the table and it wasn’t long before I’d forgotten what I looked like. Well at least till I went to the rest room. About half way though Boppa and I were set the task of going and talking to some trannies and gays and the like to educate ourselves and get it all on the Sony cameras. We got talking to a few groups of people getting them to tell us stuff to the camera. Then I spied, I think the only straight women there that evening, so while talking to her she noticed I had a pierced nipple and without asking had a look. I saw my opportunity and told her how rude she had been, tonight I was a women and that kind of thing is just not acceptable which resulted in her getting her tits out for all too see. Good work Glenn. They all came back to our table and Robin, the girl took quite a shine to me, I’m not sure why though I was dressed as a women so I spent the after show party getting to know her. I have no idea what the others got up to. It wasn’t too late and one of the guys we had met earlier invited us all back to his flat so we went there. I was still with Robin and the guy who was going to give her a lift home was walking us back to the bus so she came on board and we took advantage of the back room although we were soon to leave Atlanta so didn’t get any nookie although it was fun and she looked good naked.

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Ok, I’ve been doing a bit of usability testing recently and thought I’d push the boundaries of what I can record and offer as video output. In theory anything with a video out I can record, so there was no problem with most mobile phone devices so I thought i’d rig up and record my gaming.

Here’s the xBox and ps3 setup. I used an Apple MacBook Pro to record the video with a Formac Studio analogue to digital converter. It meant that I could take a digital signal to the computer and still run the xBox into the TV and keep playing a game.

Couple of things about the ps3, sometimes, on some tv’s you’ll have trouble with the analogue inputs so you have to go into the playstation menu while you are in your usual setup and then select analogue and restart. Not going to talk you through the setup it’s pretty self explainitory although here it is

And here is some sample footage.

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This was a request I had recently for a presentation style video. We shot voice overs in the studio and the request was to highlight certain keywords in a paragraph of text in time to the voice over. This is a simple concept but there is an inefficient and an efficient way of going about it.

Lets start by creating your title and finalise your text font and layout. Right click in the Project Pane and select New Item > Title and name accordingly. Pick up the text tool and click where you would like the text to appear in the window. I like to adjust my font, size etc previously and then paste my text in. Refine your layout and the close the window. Now duplicate the title you just created by right clicking and selecting duplicate. I usually name it with a .1 suffix or the word that is will highlight. Open up this title and highlight the first word you wish to appear in a different colour and change the colour. Close this window down and this time duplicate the .1 version of the title. Repeat this until all your words are highlighted in the new colour. Play the voice over in the timeline and pause at the beginning of the first word you wish to be highlighted in the paragraph. Refine using the arrows on your keyboard. Drag the second title you created down to the playhead and repeat until all highlighted words are timed to the VO.

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If you are used to using Final Cut Pro you will no doubt prefer to control your audio channels in the timeline rather than on the effects tab. At first this appear difficult if you use the button to the left of the timeline depicted here you shall reveal further controls in Adobe Premiere Pro.

This will allow you to control the levels from the timeline over time which is very handy if you have a soundtrack or voice over that needs to be taken in and out during your edit. Often these level changes will be clip dependent, meaning that if you move the clip around the point at which the levels need to change will remain the same. Sometime these changes in sound level will be relevant to the edit and if you move certain clips you will still require the levels to change at that point. Using the drop down here you have access to show clip toggles or show timeline toggles. Remember that clip levels works on that clips audio independent of the timeline and the timeline audio works on the timeline audio independently of the clips.

Add keyframes at the playhead using the black diamond next to the track or by using the Pen Tool.

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This another really simple error that encore throws up every time you check your build unless you manually set it. This error is merely asking what the DVD should do once it has played the video track.

Use the dropdown, End Action to select how it should act, often it will be just Stop or return to the main menu.

Also check out Title Remote Not Set

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No doubt you have come across this error many a time when you test your build in Adobe Encore especially if you have sent the project from Premiere Pro via Adobe dynamic link. This is merely the option to select what happens when the viewer presses the menu button on their remote control. If your project looks like the image displayed here then you don’t need to worry just ignore the error as it’s not really an error. I you have a menu on the disc you will need to select the drop down below and point it at your menu. You can pickwick this or select from the drop down.

Also check out End Action Not Set

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Since I was planning another possible relocation, this time from London to Brighton it seemed perfect timing that the findaproperty popped into the iTunes app store.

For a property app that searches a database of listings this app has a few nice touches that even eBay could learn from. The functionality and usability is well thought out and 15 screen shots and hints when you first launch the app means you are soon aware of the features. The findaproperty app has the usual search functions you would expect and makes use of your current location. The home screen adheres to Apples development concept of keeping things simple and supplies just 4 buttons along the bottom for new search, saved searches, recent searches and your account settings which leads me to the first of the nice touches. The app allows you to quickly sign up for an online account and syncs your searches and saved searches, recognising that users more and more like their online activity and how they access the Internet to lead how things function rather than design and development being led by the device. The other little extra that stood out was the ability to swipe through the listings while in the listing view. By this I mean that there is no need to hit back, go back to the listings, scroll and then tap the next house.

While in listing view the map button quickly loads up a google maps and the properties are annotated with pins which is very nice if location is a key criteria to your search.

The listing view is slick and if you are browsing on wireless the images are quick to load allowing you to quickly assess the property. The listings are not unnecessarily scrollable with links or buttons to further information and contacts rather than cramming all the info into one page.

One thing I would have liked to see and this merely reflects upon my search. I very much like on the website that in the listing view I can see the distance to nearest train station. As a commuter this info would effect whether I even look at the listing or not. However the map view allows you to make this assessment to.

Check out the App on the Findaproperty website.

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This Christmas I asked Santa for a new clock radio with an iPhone dock built in. My old one was perfectly alright but since it was built for the iPod it no longer charged my phone which had become quite annoying. My eldest sister rose to the challenge and being partial to my gadgets, I think had a little bit of fear of getting it wrong! But she got it so right!!

The new Sony Dream Machine and it is a DREAM MACHINE does everything I wanted a clock radio to do and a whole lot more, with a few nice touches thrown in there to polish it off.

Where to begin? Let’s start with the obvious! It’s got a 7 inch screen! As you know 7 inches is quite enough! And like you are wondering now and I was wondering as I took it out the box, is that merely a digital picture frame or can I watch movies through it? And yes, yes you can. The 7 inch display (800×480) allows you to watch your iTunes movies, video on YouTube, and even things like the iPlayer! Genius! and supports Mp4, M-Jpeg and Avi file formats. It also is a digital picture frame for when the machine is idle and this can easily be switched to sleep mode when you hit the hay with 3 taps of the snooze button.

The dock foe the iPhone pops out, spring loaded from the right hand side, you can control your music or video from the iPhone or from the dream machine. The sound is good and I’d so far to say more than you’d expect from a clock radio. Oh! Clock radio! The main function, it’s got a sweet clock radio that allows you to be woken up by radio, iPhone or sound of nature and matching image. One of the nice little extras is that you can set more than one alarm and adjust them from one button on either side of the display the alarms can also be programed to just go off over weekdays or just at weekends which if like me you are away most weekends saves having to remember to manually switch it.

The entire menu screen is based on the playsation 3 theme and is just as intuitive, you’ll get to grips with it with limited consultation of the instruction book.

The dream machine has 1 gig internal memory so that you can import photos, music and video. It has a USB slot SD slot and obviously the iPod dock.

The radio is pretty sweet an gets a better signal than the old clock radio I had in exactly the same position.

OK now for some negatives
The first USB stick I plugged into it could not be read, second one fine.
I cannot for the life of me figure out how to delete the sample pictures which is really frustrating having them on my little slide show.
Also, if the clock radio is on sleep mode and you drop the iPhone in you will get the this device is not supported error and it keeps flashing up but this is no biggy! Just tap snooze and drop the iPhone in again.

Nicks option

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This subject is not documented much so i thought I’d explain how to quickly import pictures from your camera role on your iPhone. The obvious thing would be to use iTunes to transfer your photos to your laptop but this is not the case.

You can set up in iTunes to sync a folder on your mac with your phone but this does not retrieve them. On the old iPod you could set the device to appear on the desktop or my computer as an external drive but I don’t think this possible with the iPhone.

With the iPhone plugged in, go to Utilities and open Image Capture. On the left hand side you should see you iPhone and in the main window you will see you entire camera roll. The rests pretty self explanatory! It’s the knowing which program to use which is the undocumented part.

For windows users apparently you can use regular camera capture software, alternatively… buy a Mac!

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