Category Archives: Net

Best Online Connection Speed Tests

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Connection speed measurement is a technique to assess the quality of your internet connection. This test measures the bandwidth of your ISP and latency that is causing the difference in the speed. Before we review some of the best online connection speed tests, you need to have a little know-how about these two terms: Bandwidth and Latency.

Bandwidth

In  computer networking, it refers to the data rate that is supported by the network connection or the interface used. It is often measured in terms of bits per second (bps). Bandwidth actually represents the capacity of the internet connection that you’re using. The greater the capacity of the connection, the greater speed you’ll get from it. For example, if your ISP says that you have a connection of 3.1Mbps (WiMax or ADSL), it means that you’ll get 3.1Mbps (Mega bits per second) or 300KBps (Kilo Bytes per second) speed, at least theoretically. The old V.90 modem only supported bandwidth upto 56Kbps and modern ADSL modems support upto 100Mbps speed.

Latency

It refers to the delays that occur during the network data process. Lower the latency, higher the quality of the connection, whereas, higher latency connections suffer longer delays and decrease in their speed (bandwidth). So if your ISP promised you the speed of 3.1Mbps and you’re not getting the same speed, latency might be a cause of it as it creates a bottleneck that prevents the flow of network data. Faulty phone lines or lower signal strength are some of the reasons for latency. Latency is measured in terms of milliseconds (ms). Ideal latency rate in a DSL connection is 100 millisecond. One way to find out latency of your network is the ping command.

(Before starting any network speed test, make sure that you’re not browsing any other website or downloading anything as it may effect the overall results of the test).

Speed Test

SpeedTest.net

It is one of the most used online speed test websites. You can choose from the several available internet providers and can also choose the closest server to you. SpeedTest.net uploads a 1MB file to a server and in the process measures the bandwidth of your ISP. For latency check, they have a sister site called Pingtest.net.

pingtest.net

With a cool flash interface, it’s real fun to measure the bandwidth and latency of your internet connection and at the end you can also compare your results with other ISPs or different servers. Speakeasy.net was also made by the people of SpeedTest.net

 

 

 

Broadband Speed Checker

Broadband Speed Checker

It’s a UK based website that gives you the option to check for the download and upload speed only. You can also see your previous results and share results with other people.

BroadbandSpeedChecker

 

Oz Broadband Speed Test

Oz Broadband Speed Test

This one is a little bit different as it provides you the option to run a test of your own choice. On the main page, you’ll get the options of different file sizes to choose from.

Optus Speed Test

It ranges from a dial up 70KB to an ADSL2+ 15MB file. The reason for different tests is that the larger the bandwidth you have, only a larger file can truly test the speed of its connection. On an ADSL2+, 50Mbps connection, a mere 1MB file won’t show the accurate results.

Optus Speed Test 2

Upon choosing a test, a pop up window will open and the test will start. The results will be shown after the completion. You can also compare different broadband connection results with different filters like peak or off peak data, speed and price.

Broadband DSL Reports

Broadband DSL Reports

This website provides different kinds of online speed tests not only for a PC but also for different mobile platforms, with latency support. There are two kinds of testing platforms, flash and Java based. Java platform provides more accuracy and like all other tests, flash based program may not show accurate results if you have slower computer. You can compare results and filter or get data of your ISP.

DSLReports

CNet Speed Test

CNet Speed Test

Last but not least, one of the oldest online speed test. With only a fixed server in the US. This will download a file of 1MB when you’ll choose your type of connection from the list.

Cnet Speed Test

 

 

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Improve Your Rankings and Analyse Keywords with SheerSEO Software

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Everyone who has worked on a blog or website knows the importance of SEO. Whether you need to get more visitors to your food blog or convert casual visitors into long time business clients, SEO is one of the strategies that will help your website or blog show up for the people who need it. If you have spent a considerable amount of time on the content of your site, have some amazing stories to share, business to provide or products to sell, SEO is what will help people find you.

So,  you have your SEO all set up, you got all the relevant keywords outlined,  good content to go with it, wonderful links being built because your content is just plain awesome and backlinks are pouring in. What next? How do you keep track of all these keywords, links, back links, keyword rankings and the rest of it? Of course, you’re going to need a tool. Even if you’re just starting out in SEO and have much to learn, the availability of a tool that helps you keep track of and gauge the effectiveness of all your work is very important.

We have tried out many tools for Webscopia and so far, one of the tools that has come out to be a useful SEO software is SheerSEO. With a wide range of options and tracking capabilities, it allows you to stay on top of your SEO efforts. SheerSEO is a web-based SEO software that automates your SEO tracking.

Here is an overview of how SheerSEO can help with your SEO.

Features

SheerSEO allows to keep an eye on the following areas:

sheerseo screenshot

Rankings

When doing SEO for your website, you will certainly have certain keywords in mind that you intend to get your website to rank for. SheerSEO’s rankings feature allows you to specify those keywords so it keeps track of them for you. It even send out a weekly report to you so you know how your keywords are doing, whether they have moved down in rankings or up.

Page Rank

Similar to the keywords ranking, the Page Rank feature keeps track of specified pages and checks periodically to see how they are doing.

Main Referrers

Main referrers are websites or links that include a link back to your website or post. This SEO software helps you keep track of these back links and see how much of this link juice is helping your page rankings by tracking follow/no follow links, the PR of the website and how much of a boost it is giving you.

Number of Back-links

As it says, it keeps track of the exact number of backlinks your website has. It even shows you a graph, over a specified period of time, to help you understand the growth of your back links.

Twitter, Facebook and Social Bookmarking

Sheer Seo makes it easy to see how much of a boost your website and posts are getting from social sharing on sites like Twitter, Facebook, delicious etc.

seo software sheerseo

Keyword Density

SheerSEO is perhaps one of the rare SEO software out there that show you the keyword density of your specified keyword. This feature shows you two graphs. One graph displays the “keyword density” while the other one shows “keyword weight. Both of these are very useful in helping you decide how your content is written and whether the keywords are placed appropriately.

Backlink Checker

The “Backlink Checker” is a feature which enables you to guard your site’s valuable backlinks. The chosen guarded links will be monitored daily and if there will be any change in the back link status you’ll be notified.

Directory Submission

This is perhaps one of the best features of SheerSEO. Submitting to various directories manually can be quite a time consuming task. With all the other duties that you have to perform, taking out time to do this may become very difficult. This SEO software gives you a list of directories that you can submit your site to so you don’t have to go to each site manually and repeat the whole process.

Summary

SheerSEO could do with some improvements and additions. For instance, their weekly tracking could be changed to user chosen times for people who might want to track daily changes. However, the graphs and visual representations of these changes do show you how your keyword if doing in terms of ranking in the search engines. Google is not the only search engine being tracked by SheerSEO, it also uses Bing and Yahoo to give to a more detailed and wider look at your rankings.

If you like, you can try out the SheerSEO free trial offer for 90 days like I did, and see for yourself. I’m sure you will find that the pricing is very competitive when compared to the features that this great SEO software provides you.

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Why Gmail is Better than Yahoo

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For someone who relies too much on sending emails for most of the professional and academic communications, finding a supreme email service is of a great concern. There are many email services available with different reliability, storage and spam control levels.

But on top of all other email clients, Yahoo and Gmail surely top the list because of constant improving and adding of new features. Why and how exactly is Gmail better than Yahoo, we shall try to argue about these two top-of-the-list email clients on the basis of different parameters.

Intrusive Ads:

Be it Yahoo Mail, Windows Live Hotmail or AOL Mail, every user who has used these email clients knows how the irritating amount of annoying ads keep slapping your face while you read your emails.

Of course, there are ads in Gmail as well but in a way that they cannot be termed intrusive in the same way as Yahoo ads. I have been using Gmail from last many years and have never found Ads disturbing my mail experience (or even noticing them), ever. Over Yahoo, loads of ads are displayed that reduce the real estate of the screen. Blinking ads while you work on a lengthy, serious email is well, too nauseating and unprofessional.

Hooray, no spam here!

After extensively using Yahoo Mail, Windows Live Hotmail and Gmail, I can undoubtedly say that Gmail keeps your inbox safe from spam the most efficiently. Yahoo and Windows Live Hotmail too have spam control techniques integrated but somehow I still end up having piled up spam mails sitting right in my inbox. It’s not all so perfect with Gmail, you can have a couple of spam mails every other day but hey, it’s easier to detect and delete them than working with hundreds of unwanted messages on yahoo everyday.

Gmail Filters:

Gmail’s filter feature is the best of all email clients out there. No question! Unlike Yahoo and other email services, that simply re-route incoming messages, Google Mail delivers the power that you want. In a matter of seconds, you can create a filter that searches through all mails matching with keywords or people in the mails, and after searching you can immediately categorizes it into some label, forward it to someone, or simply moves it to the trash or mark it spam, to name just a few features.

Filters seriously make email experience the best. No more need to spend hours finding one lost email in the piles of thousands (hint: Yahoo).

Google Apps:

Okay, apps are not the basic features of email clients but why not? When Google can integrate so many apps, labs in to the email service, what are the other giants like Yahoo Inc. and AOL doing?

With Google Docs letting you open and edit your attachments right on the web and being able to check Google Calendar and Reader, who will opt for other email clients that can’t beat the functionality and flexibly height of Gmail.

After all these major features, conversation style emails also attract me too much over the ol’ time based classic email viewing style. Many find it pesky at start but trust me, once you start using Gmail, in a week’s time Yahoo, AOL and Hotmail will stand nowhere near to your life!

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You Can Clone Your Circles on Google+ [How to]

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In addition to all the other cool options on Google+ there is an interesting option that lets you duplicate or clone your circles.

Google+ was said to have lost traffic few days back. What can be the reason behind that? I think it has something to do with the settings and options of Google+. The settings and options Google+ provides are far better than Facebook, in my opinion, but the problem here is, that they are hidden. Nothing is revealed to the users in any media by the way. Even on Facebook, the users took four years to get a grip over the privacy settings and other options.

One interesting option that Google+ provides you is very handy. Similar to the lists we make on Facebook, we make Circles here on Google+, and its pretty easy to transfer a friend from one list to another on Facebook, and this option is hidden here on Google+. I know you would have thought that this option is not even present on Google+, but no, Google has tried to clear every problem for their users.

On Google+, we can duplicate a Circle, and make another new circle with all the people that were there in that circle, or else you can also copy some bunch of people from that circle to another. A point that I would like to add here is that I know you can transfer people from circle to circle, but that is only individually. The method that I am drafting down here lets you transfer more than one person at once, from a circle to another.

1. Open up Google+, and go to Circle’s tab.

clone goole+ circle

2. Now select the circle you want to copy, or transfer people from. Now click on ‘View Circles in Tab’.

clone goole+ circle

3. Now select the people you want to transfer to the new circle, or if you want to transfer all of them, you can select all, by expanding the options by clicking on ‘More Actions’. Now just drag down those friends on the ‘Drop here to create a new circle’.

clone goole+ circle

4. That’s it, now name the new circle and your friends are transferred.

clone goole+ circle

If you face any problem while working it out, be sure to ask us in the comments below.

We covered how-to guides related to Google+ just for your help, so that you don’t get fed up of its services. If you have missed the previous how-to guides, well here they are:

Sync Your Google+ Posts to Twitter, Facebook and Identi.Ca

Google+ Notifier Saves the Day by Popping up Notifications on Your Desktop

How To Enable Google + Sms Notifications

Disable +1 Personalization on Non-Google Sites [How To]

Disable Photo Tagging Option in Google Plus [How To]

Hide Your Friend Circles on Google+ [How To]

Now You Can Add Other Social Accounts to Google+ Profile [How To]

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Enable the Save and Quit Warning in Firefox

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A default glitch in Firefox since the release of Firefox 4 until version 6 right now is the discontinuation of the warning of ‘Save and Quit’ whenever we close more than one tab in Firefox. This warning used to be very handy whenever we were doing something very important and accidentally click the CROSS on the top-right of the window.

That used to happen to me and if I didn’t remember which windows were open when that happened, I used to take the easy way of restoring the last session. We can do that easily by clicking the ‘Firefox’ on the left-top, move cursor to the arrow in front of ‘History’ and click ‘Restore Previous Session’. But still that ‘Save and Quit’ option comes in use most importantly when we are typing something and don’t want to lose it, so we can cancel that warning and continue to type.

The ‘Save and Quit’  is not removed from Firefox 4 onwards but instead is turned off by default, and we can turn it back on easily. For that I have brought you this simple guide below:

1. Start Firefox and type “about:config” in the address bar and press ENTER.

save and quit

2. Now in the new opened page, in the ‘Filter’ column, type ‘showQuit’ and you will see ‘browser.showQuitWarning‘ and in front of that, the value would be ‘False’

save and quit firefox

3. Now double click this line, and you will see the value turn to ‘True’.

save and quit firefox

4. That’s it, you are done now. Whenever you will close the window, you will get the ‘Save and Quit’ warning.

enable save an quit in firefox

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Is Your Child’s Online Safety a Priority?

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Parents often think that to monitor children on the Internet or over social networking sites is like spying on them, making kids feel bad. When you monitor the activities of your children, it is NOT spying; it’s a part of parenting, it’s protection.

According to Family Online Safety Institute, as much as 32% of all teens using internet have been somehow bullied on cyber space. There is only one choice for the parents: being proactive and not showing as if they know less than their kids do. This is the only way for kids, networking sites, and parents to safely live together.

What to do when you as parents (or as older people, generally) want to monitor kids online? Before you prevent, monitor and set the rules, you need to first educate yourself about the Internet and especially about the social networking sites.

Earlier, social networking sites, IMs and group chat room were the most prevalent way of cyber-bullying children. That’s history now. At this age it’s all about social networking sites from where children can go to private chats, porn sites or even face to face meetings without parental permission.

Few tips on how parents should monitor kids online are to:

  • Know the networking sites: Many parents are themselves active users but if you aren’t then at least keep a check on how these sites work.
  • Inform your kids: Like you educate your kids to not accept a candy from any stranger out on the street, also tell them that it’s the same on the Internet. Be friendly with your kids and try to ask them about their online friends. Your children shouldn’t feel bad or shy about telling you about any problems that they might run into on the Internet. Educate them about online behaviors and specifically about cyber bullying.
  • Observe your children: Do you think your child is acting strangely or his/her conversation habits are changing? Does your child seem to be sad or very ecstatic after being online? These are actually very solid indicators. Openly talk to them about what you feel and also give them assurance that they can tell you anything they want to.
  • Check your kid’s online activities: Seriously, it’s NOT spying and it’s also NOT killing your kid’s freedom. It is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to monitor kids online or in real life as a parent. Check their online (social networking) activities on a daily basis. You should know their passwords. Yes, it seems like a very tough task but you can make a deal “Use social networking site – Give us your username/password” – Sounds perfect!
  • Don’t Hide: When you monitor kids online, it becomes more effective if your children know that you’re keeping a check on them. That way, they’d actually be following some ground rules and become more careful about their online activity. Don’t threaten, be friendly and tell them why it is necessary for an older person to supervise a child.

How to Monitor / Protect Children on Internet and Social Networking Sites

Remember, porn sites are NOT the number 1 threat for your kids. Cyberbullying and Sexting are at the top. Kids feel bad if you sound too restrictive and like a vampire checking on them. The best way to monitor kids online and protect them online is to get them to work with you and for that part, sharing news does it best. When you share the news of some bad incident that was caused online like this or some good cause like this, kids get motivated and alarmed as well.

When you share news, don’t say things like “See, I warned you too” or “Look, this is what happens” – Share news like you do with people of your age just for the sake of sharing. That way children would themselves get alert.

Remember it’s their time, inform them, educate them, let them explore things and monitor their online activity. Monitoring and protecting your children on the Internet is not difficult, please don’t ban their usage. Let them be, and just keep a check, parenting would be fun then! You can also use some computer surveillance software to use on your child’s computer.

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Use Apple KeyNote App on Windows PC with 280 Slides

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What do you do when you have to give a presentation and you’re not taking your Mac there? How would you make the presentations run on a Windows PC? That is a common question now that KeyNote presentations are not compatible with Windows. Or simply because PowerPoint looks like too much work while Keynote is pretty easy to make presentations and you want to have KeyNote app on your Windows. But you can use KeyNote on a Windows PC. The solution is very simple. Use this amazing online replacement 280 Slides for all types of desktop presentation apps.

280 Slides is a browser based application. It’s fast, visual and works great. You don’t need to buy it, you don’t need to purchase it but simple go on to their site and click the all so inviting TRY IT NOW, FREE! Button and whoa, you’ve got your keynote app for Windows PC and your PPT for Mac. Good deal? Sure it is.

Features of 280 slides

Use Apple KeyNote App on Windows PC with 280 Slides

 

Some of the amazing features 280 Slides carries are:

  • Import existing documents
  • Increased portability with 280Slides servers travelling with you and you don’t need to carry even a USB
  • Media Search and addition of photos and videos directly from web services like Flickr & Youtube
  • Amazing, professional built-in themes to make your presentations look great
  • Web publishing option to your own website or just for emailing
  • Download to PowerPoint with a single click
  • Auto saving of your work after every few minutes. In case of loss you always get newest version of your work.

280 Slides is still in beta version but you can create your presentations as easily as you do in your Keynote and of course way more easily than PowerPoint. Otherwise what’s the point of finding Keynote app on Windows?

280 Slides is a work by 280North, that is a start up by two former Apple employees – one from iPhone team and other from iTunes clan – and has made itself quite a name during the time. The two basic reasons that the developers focused on – why would 280 Slides take off when many others have failed already – are quite winning: to give users a desktop look and NO browser-heavy feeling and to make it easy for users to download the presentation in PPT format with single click and no especial download.

280 Slides is a fairly simple application that gives you an illusion of having KeyNotes on your Windows PC. You might not find some advanced features like styling and charts, collaborations but basic stuff to work with is present. The powerful side is its support of publishing online on SlideShare, and adding photos and videos directly from Flickr, Youtube and other such sites.

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Which Online Syncing Service is Right for you?

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Dropbox is one the best file syncing services out there. It is quite convenient to use and has its own advantages. However, Dropbox is not the only file syncing service out there. There are plenty of alternative file syncing services which can do the job.  There are a number of file syncing services but not all of them are available on all platforms. SpiderOak, SugarSync, Wuala and Windows Live Mesh work with both PC and Mac. Linux users are limited SpiderOak, Dropbox and Wuala (no big surprise that Microsoft does not support its open-source rival.) The following file syncing services have the same features on all platforms, so it made sense to test it on my PC.

 Live Mesh

One of the leaders of the pack is Live Mesh, which  is Microsoft’s  foray into the file syncing market. It has a good brand name going in its favor but it can be a bit of a challenge to use. For starters you need to login with a Windows Live ID to download the software. They should have made the installation straight forward and easy. It also takes quite a bit of time and involves the installation of additional files. This can prove to be the deal breaker for those who want a swift setup without any complications. On the bright side Live Mesh users can get 5 GB of space on SkyDrive for local syncing. That’s a decent amount of space and is nearly twice the amount you get on Dropbox.

It is an ideal choice for Windows users who can sync their Internet Explorer and MS office settings and use them at other locations. Linux users are not as fortunate as there is no support for it nor does it have much support on major mobile operating systems. I haven’t had much of a problem using Live Mesh as it gives you the option of selecting which folders to sync instead of just sticking to one folder.  It is a neat file syncing system though without the relative ease of use of Dropbox. My only concern is that the data is not encrypted while they are on the server. They may claim that their servers are secure but there is no guarantee. It is better for them to start encrypting user data before there is a security breach and users lose confidence in the product.

 SugarSync

SugarSync could have been a DropBox killer but falls short because it lacks API support  and the ability to sync on the LAN. Alternatively, Dropbox has a lot of third party apps because it offers proper API support. It offers a free 5 GB account for starters, which is similar to the offering by Microsoft. It does hold its own against Dropbox by offering media streaming, mobile syncing (which means uploading photos and folders from Android devices) as well as selecting various folders and setting permissions. This added flexibility should make it more desirable for users. However this feature will be redundant in the long term as Google Plus is giving users options to instant upload their photos and videos on the Android (there also won’t be any storage limit). Apple’s iCloud service is poised to do the same thing though there is a limit to the storage. If you need more space, you can opt for the s 60, 100 and 250 GB option for $10, $15 and $25 dollars per month. The thing I like about SugarSync is that its web interface has more functionality and allows for editing of the apps. It also uses a smart filter to separate photos from files and also gives a more generous 500 MB per referral instead of a measly 100 MB offered by Dropbox. Overall this is a visually appealing, competent service which can hold its own against the other file syncing services.

Wuala

Wuala may sound like yet another file syncing service. The thing which sets it apart is the fact that it offers local encryption and syncing though they only offer 1 GB of storage space It is available on Windows, Mac, Linux as well as the iOS and Android platforms. One can also buy more storage but it is quite expensive as compared to other services. Wuala has a great folder management interface but then you still need to use your brains to come up with a folder management system to organize your files. The biggest advantage of Wuala is that all files are encrypted directly on your computer. The password stays within the computer and the provider is unable to access your files or password. It also helps that they use AES, RSA and SHA encryption technology for the files. As an alternative, this is useful for all those people who want to make sure their files are secure and are not comfortable using the likes of Dropbox or Live Mesh.

SpiderOak

SpiderOak is awesome because not only can you synch your mobile and desktop but you can also synch your external drive and Network drive. This is quite useful as other services don’t give you an  option to sync with your external drive or network. It also provides detailed information about all uploads, backups etc. the good thing about this service is that each referral nets you a 1 GB of space though the max you can get is 50 GB. SpiderOak also has a folder management system which is similar to Wuala.  My only problem with SpiderOak, as an alternative to dropbox,  is that their user interface can tend to be a bit confusing.  You have to backup your files separately and then choose the files you want to sync between devices. However, I wish they could have simplified it and made it as easy as DropBox. SpiderOak rates well for its privacy and security measures as all passwords and file information are unavailable to the company. It also has a two step authentication system which is the icing on the cake.  This should make it easier for people to trust them.

Conclusion

Overall all of these services are pretty good in their own way. One does not have to stick to Dropbox as they can avail any of these choices. I love the fact that I can rely on any of these services instead of sticking to Dropbox. Overall each service is unique in its own way and has its  own use. My personal choice is Dropbox but when it comes to security I prefer SpiderOak because of its two step verification system and the fact that my files will be safe.

You may also want to check out Apple’s iCloud as an alternative to Dropbox for Mac and iOs users. If you find this article helpful, you can always subscribe to our RSS Feed or follow us on Twitter, Facebook  and Google + for more.