Buttons, Buttons everywhere… Twitter has launched a one-click ‘Follow’ button allowing site owners to “…increase engagement and create a lasting connection with your audience.”

Simply copy and post the code from here https://twitter.com/about/resources/followbutton into your website and users can click to follow you without leaving your site.  I have bitten and added the code see the nav bar.

Standard rules apply in terms of can you / should you be worrying about Twitter as a way to market your business.

It is essential that any new web design is thoroughly tested across the various browsers that the target site visitors may be using.  This is not as easy as it sounds there are a lot of browsers out there, Windows based users often use Internet Explorer (IE) but can also install additional browsers such as Firefox, Safari, Opera or Google Chrome.  Mac uses commonly use Safari but can also run Firefox or Google Chrome.  For more information see the W3schools.com  Browser Statistics.

While most modern browsers are fairly stable IE 6 and 7 are widely used and are particularly prone to displaying web pages with unexpected quirks.  The issue is further complicated by the limitations of Windows when it comes to installing more than one version of IE.  In order to test a web design there are thankfully a few alternatives to running a suit of Mac’s and PC’s:

Web Developers working with Windows
Luckily for me and other web developers who work with Windows the installation of the following software provides a good starting point for cross browser testing.

• IE Tester
  This fantastic piece of free software bypasses the problem of Windows limiting the number of IE installations on one PC.  Currently the software supports versions 5.5, 6, 7 and 8 of IE and you can view your page across all of these versions via a handy tabbed interface.
• Firefox
• Google Chrome
• Opera
• Safari
  Luckily there is a PC version of this the standard Mac browser.

Web Developers working on a Mac
Unfortunately Mac based Web developers are unable to run any version of IE unless they run virtual Windows software or set up a virtual PC.  Alternatives are to purchase a PC for testing purposes or to use the Cross Browser Testing Tools below.

Cross Browser Testing Tools
An alternative to installing software; there are a number of Cross Browser Testing Services available online, some free and some paid:

BrowserCam.com
A multitude of options on this rather confusing website include screenshots and live testing (depending on option selected).  Options include testing mobile devices and e-mail; prices start from $19.95 for one day of browser capture, but can sharply increase depending on your requirements.

CrossBrowserTesting.com
The service costs from $19.95 per month and includes automated screenshots and live testing.

BrowserShots.org
A free service; simply type in the web address that you wish to test, select the browsers and view the generated thumbnails. The service also allows you to set the screen size and enable or disable Flash and JavaScript.  It’s best to limit the number of browsers you select to prevent excessive waiting around.

Adobe Browser Lab
Compare side by side views of your test pages in different browsers using a Flash interface.  You will need an Adobe Account to view this site which is free until the end of 2010.

Plagiarism is a menace online, with disreputable web masters copying and using other people’s site content left right and centre without crediting the source. On the one hand I hate people passing my content off as their own work on the other there are countless articles online about duplicate content and the potential adverse affects of this content on search engine results. OK so Google don’t seem that great when it comes to picking up duplicate content, but I still hate the idea that the actions of others could have an adverse affect on my site.

Searching for segments of text from the source article is one way to seek out copied content; however I often find that parts of the text or titles have been changed and other times only a small section of the text has been copied.

So, what’s an honest webmaster to do?

If you haven’t done so already it’s important to add appropriate notices to your site to set out your position regarding your content see: businesslink.gov.uk and creativecommons.org

In addition to the above there are two websites that I use in an attempt to eradicate plagiarism as much as possible. Copyscare.com which can help you track down the plagiarised content and Tynt.com which can help you monitor and possibly gain a link back from others copying your site content. The real plus, is that in their basic form, both of these sites are free to use.

Detecting Existing Plagiarism with Copyscape

Detecting Copied Content & Existing Plagiarism with Copyscape

Copyscape is simple to use, just copy and paste the URL of the page that you want to investigate into the Copyscape toolbar and click search. When you look down the results and click thru to the pages you will see that Copyscape scans not just the page title, but also reports back pages containing smaller portions of text that are identical to the original.

You can then deal with any issues that Copyscape highlights using the information found here: copyscape.com/respond.php

Monitoring & benefiting from Copied Content with Tynt Tracer

You will need to register to use the Tynt Tracer by visiting Tynt.com. The tracer works by providing you with a piece of code that you insert on any web page that you want to monitor, you will need to add the code just before the </body> tag.

Once the code is included anyone copying even a small portion of your page content will add a link back to your original page each time that they paste that content into a blog, another web page or even an e-mail (see screenshot below). The link can include the most appropriate Creative Commons License to help reinforce the point that you need credit for the content.

Copied Text Showing Tynt Tracer link with Creative Commons License

The resulting links can be great for the search engines (if posted on blogs or webpages) but more importantly they provide you with an appropriate credit for your hard work.
For a real world example of how the Tynt Tracer works see the following video:

Google have modified Google Translate into a cool tool that offers instant translation results as you type the text into the text box: http://translate.google.com/translate_tools

Sure it’s not perfect “Justin March” comes out as “Justin Mars” when translated into Albanian (which is to be expected I guess) but it certainly is a powerful tool.

For more on the translate tool see: http://translate.google.com/ and the video below: