Ma.gnolia: Frederik Van Zande's Bookmarks

Animated Progress Bars Using MooTools: dwProgressBar

2008-07-08T03:07:55-07:00

I love progress bars. It's important that I know roughly what percentage of a task is complete. I've created a highly customizable MooTools progress bar class that animates to the desired percentage.

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Tags: ajax, javascript, mootools, progress_bar

The Internet and Consumer Choice:Online Americans use different search and purchase strategies for different goods

2008-07-06T11:37:29-07:00

The internet plays an important role in how people conduct research for purchases, but it is just one among a variety of sources people use and usually not the key factor in final purchasing decisions. PDF report

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Tags: e-marketing, consumer_behavior, purchase_strategies

Obsessive CSS Code Formatting: Organization, Comments, and Signatures • Perishable Press

2008-07-06T02:22:24-07:00

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Tags: css, commenting

Web Form Design Patterns: Sign-Up Forms | How-To | Smashing Magazine

2008-07-04T12:33:36-07:00

If you want to maximize the revenue of your service you need to maximize completion rates of your web forms. Unless you have some revolutionary ideas to impress your visitors at first glance, it is not enough to simply enable users to sign up on your site. To make it possible for the service to reach a maximal exposure we, designers, need to provide users with a good user experience. We need to invite them, describe them how the service works, explain them why they should fill in the form and suggests the benefits they’ll get in return. And, of course, we should also make it extremely easy for them to participate.

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Tags: form, sign-up, sign-in, log_in, best_practice

SEOmoz | Cracking Google's 1,000 Page Barrier

2008-07-03T02:58:58-07:00

One of the frustrations of doing SEO for large websites is the fact that Google makes it very difficult to see more than a small part of the search index. Even in Webmaster Tools, Google's index search is built on the same mechanics as its web search, which only lets you see the first 1,000 pages of any result. Whether you're trying to get pages discovered, struggling with duplicate content, confirming robots.txt changes, or doing advanced index sculpting, that 1,000-page barrier can be extremely limiting when you're dealing with a site with 10,000 or more indexed pages.

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Tags: google, '1000, page, barrier', site, inurl, tools

SEOmoz | Reddit, Stumbleupon, Del.icio.us and Hacker News Algorithms Exposed!

2008-07-03T02:57:18-07:00

It is greatly ironic that algorithms, the quintessential example of all that is not human, would be so fundamental to social media. Last week I wrote a post about how Google gathers user data. This week I continue by exposing how popular social media websites use algorithms to utilize user data. Although humans power social media, it is algorithms that provide the frameworks that make user input useful. As proven by the countless social sites online, finding the correct mix of participation and rules can be extremely difficult. Below are some of the algorithms that when combined with the right people have proven successful.

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Tags: reddit, stumbleupon, del.ico.us, 'hacker, news', algorithms

Paranoid Engineering: CMS battle: Drupal vs Joomla vs Custom Programming

2008-07-02T16:55:12-07:00

In modern Content Management System (CMS) world there are two major figures - Joomla (descendant of Mambo CMS ) and Drupal. They both are open source and have large comunities with enormous amounts of extensions and themes. It's hard to choose which one to use without trying them out. As usually, there are more options - home grown custom programming or even building your own CMS (which I was once stupid enough to do). Programming from scratch is always fun and beneficial for your skills, however, if you need things up and running in no time or you don't do (or don't want to do) any programming, using a CMS is the way to go.

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Tags: cms, comparisson, drupal, joomla, custom

Total Search Marketing, Part 1

2008-07-02T10:23:51-07:00

It's been a long held concept that natural search, aka SEO, is a top internet marketing tactic for acquiring better conversions, leads, and ROI. Now, eConsultancy has collected data and documented a study in the U.K. showing that natural search is the best tactic for generating online leads, concluding it is greatly underused despite the fact that it outperforms nearly all other types of online marketing.

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Tags: seo, e-marketing, natural_search, paid_search, paid_inclusion, international_search, local_search

77 of the best logo design resources | Logo Design Love

2008-07-02T06:16:10-07:00

From time to time I’ll see a list of ‘logo design resources’ being circulated around social media websites, but more often than not, I’m disappointed at the quality of links. So I’ve searched through my bookmarks, trawled the other ‘resource’ articles, and asked some designers for their input. Here I present a choice selection of logo design resources that I believe are beneficial to serious designers (with a touch of humour here and there).

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Tags: design, logo, resources

A List Apart: Articles: Getting Out of Binding Situations in JavaScript

2008-07-02T03:33:18-07:00

Most developers don’t know about—or don’t care enough about—binding in JavaScript. Yet this single issue is responsible for a sizeable portion of the questions on most JavaScript-related support channels, and thousands—if not millions—of hairs being tortured away from developer heads every single day. Yet with a little attention to this oft-overlooked subject, you can avoid wasting your time, energy, and patience and move on to more powerful, efficient scripting.

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Tags: javascript, binding, best_practice

PHP framework comparison benchmarks | AVNet Labs

2008-07-02T03:23:34-07:00

In response to Wil’s comment regarding the PHP framework performance comparisons I made in my previous post, I have decided to post the results I got. My decision not post them initially was due to the benchmarks not being done in complete isolation (a seperate client and server machine) but the scores relative to each should still be accurate and that’s what I am testing for. Furthermore, while I only used requests/sec as a performance yardstick, I do realize that other factors do affect a web application’s response in the real world.

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Tags: php, framework, performance, cache, cakePHP, CodeIgniter, Zend_Framework

Study Confirms: Personalization Can Backfire - ReadWriteWeb

2008-07-01T18:39:30-07:00

A new study from the University of Illinois confirms what many of us may have suspected privately: "personalized" marketing communication online can often make us actively dislike the message's sender.

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Tags: personalisation, best_practice, e-marketing

Tracking Offline Conversions: Hope, Seven Best Practices, Bonus Tips | Occam's Razor by Avinash Kaushik

2008-07-01T11:27:19-07:00

There is perhaps no challenge greater than tracking offline impact of your online presence (campaigns or other activity). It is perhaps one of the last few complex nuts left to crack. Why? Because it is hard. Not impossible. Just hard. And for now it is equal parts quantitative, qualitative and faith.

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Tags: conversions, tracking, offline, online, best_practice

Avaleht Enter internetipood

2008-07-01T11:25:47-07:00

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Tags: e-shop, example, e-commerce, magento

15 Tools to Help You Develop Faster Web Pages | Mind Tree

2008-07-01T11:18:01-07:00

Response times, availability, and stability are vital factors to bear in mind when creating and maintaining a web application. If you’re concerned about your web pages’ speed or want to make sure you’re in tip-top shape before starting or launching a project, here’s a few useful, free tools to help you create and sustain high-performance web applications. I’ve tried to include a wide variety of tools that are easy to use, and have tried to keep them as OS and technology-independent as possible so that everyone can find a tool or two.

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Tags: performance, front_end, compressing, tools, firefox_extentions, development

Ten XML Schemas you should know

2008-07-01T11:15:27-07:00

In this article, look at some top XML schemas that provide solutions for all sorts of problems, from the basics of Web services to data description. You'll also cover database-like solutions that involve contacts and invoices. The schemas in this article were chosen for their usefulness and utility, plus their impact on the XML community in how information is shared and exchanged using the XML format.

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Tags: xml, shemas, soap, wdsl, rdf, vcard, docbook_XML, FIXML, SVG, dublin_core, Xforms

89% of Your Customers Will Remain Loyal, If They Know You’re Listening to Them!

2008-07-01T11:09:46-07:00

While most of Radically Transparent is about managing and monitoring your online reputation, we spend a lot of time explaining that customers are discussing your brand and would love to have you join the conversation. New research from ExpoTV.com shows just how badly your customers want to hear from you.

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Tags: e-marketing, reputation, brand, customers, listening, online_reputation

PHPExcel: Manipulate Excel Spreadsheets with PHP on Linux

2008-07-01T06:01:42-07:00

Have you ever faced a situation when you need to manipulate Excel spreadsheets with PHP on the server that is running Linux? If you had a Windows Server you could use PHP COM extensions. However they are unavailable on Linux. Hopefully, there is a solution. It is called Open XML. It’s a new format of Microsoft Office documents introduced in Microsoft Office 2007. Basically, an Open XML file is a ZIP archive that contains XML files that represent the document mark-up. You can view it yourself or read some documentation, my article isn’t about Open XML, but about the PHP library for working with Excel 2007 files. It also supports Excel 97 format by incorporating a PEAR library.

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Tags: excell, php, library, PHPexcell, excell_manipulation

Can Product Images Improve Conversion? Showing Products in Context | Get Elastic

2008-07-01T05:59:55-07:00

Yesterday we looked at examples of image zoom and alternate views, which can help customers experience the product better than one small view. A good photographer plus AJAX or Flash technology like Scene 7 or Magic Zoom can achieve this. But online retailers can go a step further and use photos that show products in use, or “in context.” This can reduce a shopper’s fears, uncertainties and doubts about a purchase like “how does this look on a person?” or “how large is this in real life?.” Images can also “sell” by triggering an emotion, showing the quality or versatility of an item or illustrating a products features and benefits.

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Tags: e-shop, images, 'produc, images', context, product_information, e-commerce, e-marketing

70 Amazing Business Cards - Fubiz™

2008-07-01T02:34:14-07:00

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Tags: business_cards, examples

Reduce Bounce Rates: Fight for the Second Click (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)

2008-07-01T01:46:42-07:00

Different traffic sources imply different reasons for why visitors might immediately leave your site. Design to keep deep-link followers engaged through additional pageviews.

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Tags: usability, nielsen, home_page, click_through, bounce_rate, types_of_visitors