Author: Aditya Kane

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Editorial

Update on DW redesign

Many of our regular readers are aware that we are working on a new theme for Devil’s Workshop. Yes we are coming closer to completing this project. We have included a lot of new suggestions from our readers who commented and emailed us with their suggestions.

We have tried to include everything that was asked for without trying to change ourselves too much. The endeavor was to make a better Devil’s Workshop and not a different one.

We have tried to keep to retain the familiarity of Devil’s Workshop’s current theme and tried to improve on it with our new theme. We have opted to have a magazine style theme which a lot of readers did want. Personally I think Magazine styled theme does help a great deal to navigate a website a lot more easily.

Homepage features

The new homepage layout will show lesser than 10 posts that we show with our present theme. This is to highlight with excerpts only the latest posts on the homepage. This was a decision which was debated but we feel that showing posts under categories would be better than showing 10 posts on the homepage. This will help make it easier to navigate our website.

A new addition on our homepage will be categories gaining a lot of prominence. We have got some feedback that using categories for navigating our website has been an issue. This will change as all the categories with some of the recent posts under those categories will be displayed on the homepage itself. The design is still being worked on and you can expect the navbar to have some more additions.

I hope you liked the screenshots of some of the several new changes we will have with Devil’s Workshop’s new theme. Hope you like what you see at the moment.

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Note to Authors

If you are a guest author or privileged author with DW, you might want to look up and make some changes with your profile information. As you might have noticed we have stopped the Editor’s Note section for our guest authors as now there is a automated method of doing the same. See image below to check how the new information will be displayed.

As you can see the number of posts show up along with the website address. If you include your twitter account id, a link is generated for readers to get to your Twitter page.

Note that these changes are already in effect and all you have to do is

  • Log into DW and get to the Dashboard.
  • Once at the Dashboard click on Your Profile on the right hand side.
  • Carefully fill in all the details you want to show up with your guest post.
  • Ideally keep the biography short only up-to a line as you can see there is a space constraint for displaying the biography with the post.

Hope you all enjoy the new theme and do keep your suggestions and opinion on what you want through your comments.

Categories
News

Google Dropping Support for Internet Explorer 6.0

Before going into some of the pros and cons of if Internet Explorer 6 is a defunct browser here are some statistics regarding its market share. 20.99% of internet users use IE6 while IE8 the latest version is used by 20.86% of internet users. This basically means out of every 5 internet users 1 of them is on Internet Explorer 6. I took these statistics from Marketshare.histlink website.

This reveal that when it comes to Internet Explorer people prefer using an older version than the newer one. What has compounded the problem is that Microsoft as yet has not forced its users to upgrade.

Google has recently announced that it will not support Internet Explorer 6 as a browser version if you are using Google Docs or Sites. I think considering certain reports that the latest Chinese hacking into Google incident took place by taking advantage of a security flaw within Internet Explorer 6; Google might even stop supporting Gmail for IE 6.0 very soon.

So if you are using Google Docs and using Internet Eplorer 6 you will get a message to upgrade as certain new features will not be abvailable with IE6 at all.

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This is a bold move by Google considering they are now essentially telling 1/5th of the internet users to either upgrade their browser or not be able to use their services fully. I think Google probably has with this statement passed a silent message that people should now start using Chrome. 😉

Problems for Internet Explorer 6

  • Windows XP was well received and subsequently it’s default browser IE6 was also well received.
  • Windows Vista was not as well received and that led it’s default browser IE7 being not so well received. What probably should concern Internet Explorer developers is that many who did not opt for Vista also did not opt for IE7.
  • Now that Windows 7 has been well received you can expect the numbers for Internet Explorer 8 to pick up.
  • In the mean time more and more people are prefering to use Firefox and Chrome. Chrome is still an infant but it’s growth is quite phenomenal.
  • IE6 will see a rapid downward spiral considering many companies and security experts lampooning it for security flaws. Recently German government recommended people not to use it at all.

What do you think? Is it about time Internet Explorer 6 is given a retirement? Let me know your opinions through your comments.

Image Source: Spigot Design

Link: Google Docs

Categories
Video

Get Orkut updates on Chrome [Video]

Orkut users must be waiting for this one. You might be like me who was wondering that Orkut is owned by Google and Chrome is a Google product so why havent we seen Chrome extensions for Orkut. The wait is over and the Orkut extension will really go a long way to make it easy. If you frequent Orkut and use Chrome, I think this extension is a must have for you.

Orkut Extension for Chrome

  • Just install the Orkut extension for Chrome and sign into your Orkut account with the extension.
  • It keeps a look out for new scraps and status updates.
  • It also has a handy drop down menu for all that you might need to look up on Orkut features like photos, scrapbook, videos, Orkut apps and much more. Click on one of them and you are taken to the page directly.
  • The extension allowed me to look up my friends directly from the browser itself and visit their page directly. I was a little disappointed as I could not search for my Communities directly.
  • I could also share a page I liked through orkut with a simple click.

Try out the extension on your Chrome browser and let me know what you think about it? I am quite happy that Orkut is moving along with new features and options which is vital for a vibrant Social networking website.

Click here to download the extension.

For a quick demonstration of how this extension works while searching for friends I made this video.

Categories
News

Local trending topics on Twitter but no Indian locations as yet

Okay this is a sure sign that Twitter wants to go local. Many amongst us might not notice this new feature with Twitter as many don’t really visit the Twitter homepage. Almost everyone who is regular on Twitter uses some Twitter application or the other. One very powerful way to get noticed and also to notice new events happening around the world is to watch trending topics on Twitter.

For instance if you looked up the trending topic #iPad you will get a pretty much all the important tweets you ever wanted. This makes trending topics into fantastic resource of getting latest local news on Twitter.

So now Twitter page shows you local trending topics. For instance in the image above you can see Canada. If I select a country the related  cities show up below for me to select city specific trending topics which keeep on changing on the right hand side of the page.

This has great relevance when it comes to looking up Twitter for local reasons. India and Indian city is still not a part of the Local Trending options on Twitter but it will show up considering Twitter’s popularity increasing in India.

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This will certainly make Twitter useful not just for people to spread the word globally but also locally. As a blogger I might think of Twitter as a great way to spread the word globally. But it would be great for a local shop or electronics outlet to spread the word using local trends.

Will Local Trending topics monetize Twitter?

This is not a rumor, but a personal opinion that Local Trending can be a great way for Twitter to get monetized. Trending topics sort of behave like search engine results. Maybe Twitter can charge certain accounts extra for their tweets to be in Trending topics more often or for a longer duration.

What do you think about local trending topics on Twitter? Let me know through your comments.

Categories
Analysis

iPod Touch and iPad: Are they twins?

When I started looking up the presentation of iPad online, it errily resembled another product from Apple called the iPod Touch. The features started to be introduced and it seemed more like the iPod Touch. Ofcourse the iBook store access is probably not available on iPod Touch but most of the features look really similar. I do not own a iPod Touch and neither does my name start with ‘Steve’ and end with ‘Jobs’; so I do not have a iPad device either but in the spirit of comparison I decided to layout some very close similarities which the two share.

iPod Touch and iPad

  • Both the devices connect using Wi-fi, have a browser which allows you to view webpages in very similar formats. iPad obviously is bigger sized but the concepts are pretty much the same.
  • Web Apps are pretty much similar and even in the presentation it was said that the familiar apps from iPod are there but can viewed larger. 😐
  • Playing games on the iPad will be almost the same as playing on the iPod Touch. The interface and touch sensitivity controls seem similar (see image above).
  • Playing movies and music seem to be again eerily similar. The interface again being very similar.
  • The email feature of when you want to reply is also similar. I guess considering iPad is four times larger the touchscreen keypad will also be 4 times larger and hence less troublesome.
  • The major difference will be iBooks access. I do not think having the option to read books with a iPod will be convenient and thats where iPad has some sort of uniqueness.

Now I do not know what Apple is thinking but it seems they decided to take a fancy iPod Touch device, enlarge it and call it iPad. On the face of it, I think the only difference is that for iPad you need a bag and for iPod Touch your pocket will do.

So what do you think about iPad? It is really just a larger than life version of the iPod Touch?

Categories
Contest

Blogger$ of the month [December 09]

Okay first of all apologies to everyone for coming out with Blogger$ of the Month results so late. We at DW were a little tied up with our redesign project.

Blogger$ of the Month in December 2009 was a little different than any we had before. First and foremost we have three winners and not ranked 1-2-3 but rather winners who ranked no 1 for three different blogs on our rtBlogs network.

Devils Workshop: Blogger of the month

As you can see in the table below, Richie S wrote 7 good posts for us and his contribution was quite significant considering his 7 posts were out of a total of 18 guest posts on DW. Congratulations to Richie S.

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Name No. of Posts Points per post Total Points
richiesajan 7 3.40 23.80
pkarun 4 3.62 14.50
umeshmahato 2 3.50 7.00
gaurav 2 3.05 6.10
bobnewman 1 4.00 4.00
rishabhagarwal 2 1.85 3.70

Facebooknol: Blogger of the month

At our Facebook dedicated blog Facebooknol, Sauravjit seemed to win quite easily with a total of 17.70 points which was clearly miles ahead of anyone else. Congrats to Sauravjit on being Blogger of the month for Facebooknol.

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Name No. of Posts Points per post Total Points
sauravjit 5 3.54 17.70
rajeelkp 3 3.20 9.60
pkarun 2 4.30 8.60
rishabhagarwal 1 3.90 3.90
xphunt3r 1 3.70 3.70

CricTalks: Blogger of the month

Not many posts here as you can see but RajeelKP’s efforts paid off as he did contribute to Facebooknol too and that has got him winning Blogger of the month for CricTalks.

Name No. of Posts Points per post Total Points
rajeelkp 1 2.70 2.70
sdsh 1 1.60 1.60

Blogger$ of the Month

Blogger$ of the month contest was quite sucessful for getting a lot of people contributing to Devils Workshop and a sincere thanks to everyone who has ever written on DW for truly helping us grow. For the moment we have closed Blogger$ of the month contest temporarily as were are looking at new strategies for our blog. One of them is to compeltely redesign and you will be happy to know we have already started the coding work on the new theme.

Once again Congratulations to Richie S, Sauravjit and RajeeKp on being winners for the month of December 2009.

Categories
Tips

Me, myself and my Blog on Facebook

If you are a blogger and a have a facebook account the one question you might be stuck with is; What should you do with your Facebook profile? When I joined rtBlogs as an Editor I thought that maybe I should have two facebook accounts. One personal and the other for bloggers who might want to connect.

I started adding bloggers who I thought I might want to connect with on Facebook and let me say I was a bit disappointed. In most cases I a blogger’s facebook profile seemed to not really differ much from the Facebook page of his blog. It was disappointing and I decided to not go in for creating a separate Facebook profile for my blogging activities. With new privacy options I guess I don’t really have to worry about the privacy angle either.

Why avoid a blog related Facebook profile?

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If someone reading my blog takes the pains to find me on Facebook and add me should I disappoint him/her with a stream of links and feeds to my blog? If I added someone on Facebook the last thing I want is a RSS feed or a Twitter feed. I think I should be myself let the reader know the real me.

An argument against this could be if someone follows your blog on technology what does he care for about your favorite videos of a rock-band you out up on Facebook. My counter-point is why would that person add me on Facebook? He could just be a fan of the blog page on Facebook.

What works on Twitter might not work in Facebook

What might work on Twitter where people can have followers in the thousands might not work on Facebook. For instance if I post a link to my blog to 2000 followers chances are about 3 to 5percent of them will actually visit. But Twitter is known as a medium to exchange links. Facebook is not all about sharing links or feeds. It has a little more personality than Twitter with applications, photos and your wall where you can share anything from videos to your random thoughts. So be yourself on Facebook; your readers would probably appreciate it a lot more.

I want to know what do you think about it? Do you think a blogger should stick with being professional on Facebook and keep putting out a feed of his blog to his Facebook friends or should the blogger get real. I guess it’s really a personal decision on how much you want your blog to be your identity and vice-versa.

If you agree with me add me as a friend on Facebook; if you don’t I guess you can be a fan of Facebooknol page. 😉

Categories
Video

An introduction to iPad [Video]

After all the anticipation and also some feeling that Apple might not after all introduce a tablet device comes the truth and that is Steve Jobs has finally introduced iPad to the world. On the surface it looks an incredible device as it’s only 1.5 pounds heavy along with being 9.56 inches in height and 7.47 inches in width. The more incredible part is that iPad device will be just half an inch thick.

Ipad at the moment will come in two models that is the Wi-FI and 3G. The cheapest model will cost $499. One of the the main features with iPad will be it’s supposedly the best browsing experience. I was watching an Apple video on iPad (included below) and at-least heard the statement ‘iPad is the best browsing experience for the internet’ at-least 3 times in 3 minutes. It seems to be a obvious selling point of them.
The other feature that it is betting big on is reading books online. They will have iPad connect to a iBooks store and allow you to purchase and download the book onto the iPad. As iPad is not much bigger than a book it could be quite useful. I think it is safe to assume Amazon’s Kindle will start feeling the heat after iBooks. 😉

Here is a table of specification for iPad

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Display 9.7 inch (diagonal) LED-backlt glossy widescreen with Multi-Touch display with IPS technology. 1024 X 768 resolution. Fingerprint resistant coating.
Connectivity Wi-Fi model includes bluetooth.

Wi-Fi + 3G
Capacity 16GB, 32GB or 64FB flash drive
Processor 1 GHz Apple customised A4 high one performance low on battery chip.
Sensors Accelerometer and Ambient light sensor
Audio Freq response 20 Hz to 20000 Hz.

Audio formats supported are MP3, MP3 VBR, AIFF and WAV
Video 1024 X 768 Dock connecter to V GA adapter. Supports .m4v, mp4, and .mov file formats along with MPEG- 4 video format.
Battery and Power Built in 25 Whr rechargeable lithium battery. Upto 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-fi, watching video or listening to Music.

Charging can be done through power adapter or USB cable to the computer.
Input/Output Dock connector (USB). 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack, built-in speakers and microphone. SIM card tray for Wi-Fi + 3G Model.
Prices Lowest model will go for $499 and the highest being $829.
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I think the iPad rocks but considering its anticipated buzz it might still take more innovations to match up to the cult like status of iPod or iPhone. At the moment it looks like a bigger sized iPod Touch model.

Apple has a reputation of coming out with world class designed gadgets but I am not so sure of iPad being an instant hit. The main problem with tablet devices are they are much bigger than a cellphone and slightly smaller than a notebook or laptop. That makes it not as sophisticated as a laptop and unfortunately not as discreet as a phone or music player. If iPad is meant to be a device to be used on the go it might be facing an uphill task. Tell me what do you think? Will iPad take Apple to new heights or has the honeymoon ended?

Here is the video introducing Apple’s iPad.

https://videopress.com/v/wp-content/plugins/video/flvplayer.swf?ver=1.15
Link: Apple iPad

Categories
Analysis

The unique marketing strategy for Apple’s tablet

In a few hours Apple will probably talk about its Tablet and the internet will be abuzz with pictures and detailed views on how it could or could not be the next big thing to change the world. But considering Apple’s usual viral marketing for its product before its launch the so called Apple tablet has had nothing. No real confirmed leaked photos and no exclusives either. Just plain stonewalled nothing.

This seems to be a very different sort of marketing strategy used by Apple. Just imagine at no point has Apple talked about introducing the tablet. A few months ago they even outright refused that such a product existed. But they have not repeated the refusals and hence you can assume safely that the tablet exists.

The next rumors coming out were that Apple’s tablet will be called iSlate or even might be called iPad. Then rumors of talks with Harper Collins which meant it was taking on Amazon’s Kindle.

All these rumors are being hardly backed by Apple. The strategy is so unique but effective that now a few hours before it’s introduction I can see a continuous stream of links popping up every few seconds on Google. (How to look up Google search results to the second?)

With internet reviews popping up nearly by the second, trending twitter topics being updated by the second almost since the past couple of week and ofcourse any television news channel doing an exclusive at what to expect from Apple’s Tablet. It is one of the most anticipated product launch and has received unprecedented attention and awareness. All this has been done by Apple without spending a single dollar. They have done this simply by saying no such product exists and then stopped denying it. 🙂

Do you think this sort of strategy works or is Apple really pushing the boundary on the saying that ‘less is more’. 😉

Categories
Tips

Share webpages from Chrome to Email, Social networks and blogs

If you come across a web-page you like you might be using certain toolbars or features form an RSS reader to share web pages on various social networks, blogs and even through email. For instance I had a few days ago written about how to share from Google Reader to Twitter, Facebook and other services. But what I really would enjoy, would be a one stop shop for sharing a webpage.

Now it is quite an inefficient way to share a web-page as often, what you are doing is sharing a page from one service to another by using a third service. For instance you share a online article from Google Reader to Facebook, Twitter or even through email.

This is where I like Google Share extension for Chrome browser. With a simple click of a button I can access almost any web service to share the web-page across a host of services.

This is great as I do not have to only rely on Google Reader to share online pages. What if a page has no RSS feed. Google Reader has recently launched the option of monitoring changes in a webpage without RSS feeds which is still handy; but you cannot possibly expect to only stick with a reader for reading interesting material and wanting to share it.

I like this Google Share extension simply because it means now I can share an interesting post through email or a social networking service with just the use of my browser and not a web service acting as a go between.

Try out Google Share extension for Chrome browser and let me know what you think about it through your comments.

Link: Google Share extension