08 October 2013

Free Storage Limits in Picasa

I always knew that there are free storage limits in Picasa, but there are some details I was not clear about, which might be useful for you as well.

While Picasa Web Albums offers 1 GB of free storage for photos and videos, all files under certain size limits don't count towards this free storage limit. This rule applies to all uploads for other Google product that store photos and videos in Picasa Web Albums as well, including Blogger, Google+ and Google Maps.

Note that photos up to 2048 x 2048 pixels and videos up to 15 minutes won't count towards your free storage.

Also, all photos uploaded in Google+ directly will be automatically resized to 2048 pixels (on their longest edge) and won't count towards your free storage quota.

All photos uploaded from the Picasa software or in Picasa Web Albums over the free size limit will not be automatically resized and will count towards your 1 GB of free storage. When you reach your storage limit, any new photos you upload larger than the free size limit will be automatically resized to 2048 pixels (on their longest edge).

The free storage sizes are good for sharing photos on the web, but if you prefer to upload your images at a larger size for better quality (archival or print), you can buy more storage at any time. 


03 September 2013

Online Broken Link Checker

In the previous post, we presented Xenu Links Sleuth – free utility, helping to detect dead and broken links in your websites for proper maintenance. While the software is portable, free, and easy to use, I got request to recommend similar online service, which may serve the same purpose, with no need for dedicated software.

There are several sites, offering such functionality, but one of the best is Online Broken Link Checker, we will present today.

The main features:
* Scans webpages for bad hyperlinks.
* Checks both internal (local) and external (outbound) URLs and finds which are stale.
* Reports dead link's location in your HTML code.
* Validates websites online: the same way as how your users and Search Engines see those.
* Detects "linkrot" and other problems of web site integrity.
* Supports sub-domains.
* Works online so can be used on Mac OSX, iOS, Linux, Windows, Android and any other OS.
* Shows 404 errors and other unsuccessful HTTP response codes - for each dead or problematic hyperlink.
* No need for online registration, login, or authorization, except for captcha – code you enter to confirm you are a live person, and not a robot.
* Unlimited amount of website to examine.
* The free service limitation is 3000 links cap per site, which is still making the service extremely useful.
* Fast and smooth operation.

17 July 2013

Dead Links Detection with Xenu Link Sleuth

There is no doubt that dead links are bad for your web site and its reputation. And that is much more than just an annoyance for your visitors. Search engines are known to punish web sites with lots of dead links through the rating penalties. For example, Google is very clear in its demand to the web site owners, the demand, articulated in Webmaster Guidelines: Check for broken links and correct HTML.
Google consideration is simple and reasonable: if a site is old and it has numerous broken links, it would be logical to conclude that it has not been updated for a long time and that it should be downgraded as a result.

Search engines (Google) take your efforts to keep your site updated into consideration, but fixing your site has double effects, as it not only improves your search rankings, but your conversion ratio.

Xenu's Link Sleuth is a handy freeware, which checks Web sites for broken links. Link verification is done on "normal" links, images, frames, plug-ins, backgrounds, local image maps, style sheets, scripts and java applets. It displays a continuously updated list of URLs which you can sort by different criteria. A report can be produced at any time.

Additional features:
·         Simple, no-frills user-interface
·         Can re-check broken links (useful for temporary network errors)
·         Simple report format, can also be e-mailed
·         Executable file smaller than 1MB
·         Supports SSL websites ("https:// ")
·         Partial testing of ftp, gopher and mail URLs
·         Detects and reports redirected URLs
·         Site Map


06 May 2013

Facebook page is not displaying properly in Chrome



That happens, everything works fine, and suddenly without preliminary warning, you get a problem. You did nothing wrong, you have not installed any new software, you performed mandatory “cold reboot” – first action step for all computer issues – but… the problem is not going away.

Today, we will talk about the issue with Facebook page is not loading properly in Chrome. First, let’s outline the problem. In my case, the page is somehow loaded, but without images and some simplified weird format. Not so good.

Trying to load Facebook in Internet Explorer – it works. Trying to load Facebook in Firefox – the problem reappears, similar to the one in Chrome. At least we know, that the issue is not related to the particular browser, but can be linked to the computer settings, most likely, something with Security or Privacy. But before making experiments, let’s check other users’ experience.

It is comforting to learn that I am not alone, and the similar issue is quite common. Here is the list of recommendation I was able to find online to deal with the issue:

1. Check you are updated to the latest version of Chrome. Go to the Chrome Menu (or Wrench icon on outdated versions) > About Google Chrome and allow Chrome to update. If not, you can update Chrome manually by downloading it from http://google.com/chrome.

Since my issue is not confined by a single browser, it is unreasonable to expect that the Chrome update will help. However, if you have not tried Facebook loading in other browsers, updating or reinstalling it might help.

2. Log out of Facebook completely and clear your browser cache:
·         Click the Chrome Settings (three lines) menu on the browser toolbar.
·         Select Tools.
·         Select Clear browsing data.
·         In the dialog that appears, select the checkboxes for the types of information that you want to remove.
·         Use the menu at the top to select the amount of data that you want to delete. Select beginning of time to delete everything.
·         Click Clear browsing data.

As expected, cleaning the browser cash has not resolved the issue.

3. Try using Facebook through a HTTPS connection. To do this browse to https://facebook.com. If this works, you can set Facebook to go to a HTTPS connection all the time by going to Account > Account Settings > Account security. Tick the box next to Browse Facebook on a secure connection (https) whenever possible and save the changes.

If you already have secure browsing enabled, try disabling this option and see if your issue persists!

In my case, the connection was already secure through https.

4. Your Chrome profile may be corrupted, try creating a new profile.

Again, that might be a valid reason, but in my case, the Facebook loading improperly even before I log in. In any case, the same account works fine on other computer, so that is not the problem source.

5. Reset IP configuration:

- Close Chrome.
- Start > Run (or search for run if you're using Vista/7)
- Type 'cmd' (without quotes) and hit enter
- Once the black box appears, enter 'ipconfig /flushdns' (without quotes) and hit enter
- Once that completes, enter 'ipconfig /renew' (without quotes) and hit enter
- Once that completes, close the window, reopen Chrome and retry.

6. Disable any browser themes/extensions to see if they are causing the behavior you're seeing. You can do this by going to Chrome Menu (Wrench) > Tools > Extensions.

In my Chrome browser, there are no extensions, so that is not the case.

7. Update/reinstall Java and Flash.
·         Java:  http://www.java.com
·         Flash: http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer

Several users admitted that re-installing Java or Flash has resolved the problem with Facebook page.
The point is that when these add-ons are corrupted, you will experience the issue with loading some other pages, not just Facebook.

8. Check for problems with protected system files. Go to Start > Run. Enter the following: "SFC.EXE /SCANNOW" (without the quotes and make sure there is a space between SFC.EXE and /SCANNOW). This initiates the Microsoft utility that will scan and repair problems with protected system files on your computer.

9. Your computer may have been infected by a virus or malware; consider running a full security scan with reputable, up-to-date antivirus software such as Microsoft Security Essentials, McAfee, AVG, Malwarebytes or Spybot Search & Destroy.

10. After performing all the offered tasks, I have found myself at the same point I started the troubleshooting journey. Now, it is time to go back and think what may cause the selective block of the page. As said earlier, the suspects are Internet setting.

·         Opening Internet Options in Control Panel.
·         Choosing Security tab and picking up Internet.
·         If your security level is High or Medium-High, you may lower to Medium or Custom levels with minimum security.
·         Than go to Privacy and decrease the protection level to Low if it is higher than that.
·         Close Internet Options and try to open Facebook page again.

In my case, it finally worked. Hopefully, after going through these 10 steps, it will work for you as well!

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