Web Dev Notes

The majority of defects in a software system are introduced in the earlier stages of development. Requirements are the top factor in a projects success or failure. It is therefore very important to spend a lot of time prior to development discovering the needs of the users and the requirements the system will need to satisfy in order to avoid large time consuming problems in the future.

Another important thing to note is that the cost of fixing defects or problems discovered is significantly less the earlier they are discovered. The saying time is money is no stranger to software development. Web development is no exception to these rules!

Here is a list of nine common causes of software errors that you should look out for and try to avoid!

Nine Causes of Software Errors
• Faulty requirements definition
• Documentation errors
• Client-developer communication failures
• Deliberate deviations from software requirements
• Logical design errors
• Coding errors
• Non-compliance with documentation and coding instructions
• Short-comings of the testing process
• User interface and procedure errors

The following are three general principles of quality assurance which I learned about at University and which I have found to be very important to keep in mind. Every now and then, you should take a moment to sit back and ask yourself the following:

• Do you know what you are doing?
• Do you know what you should be doing?
• Do you know what the difference is between both?

The first question is pretty straight forward. Of course, you know what you are doing, because you are in the process of doing it! The point here is to actually take a minute to think about what you are doing right now so that you can then better determine if you should keep doing it. Remember, you should be doing something to satisfy the requirements as specified by your users!

Once you have identified what you are currently doing, take a moment to look back over your requirements and see exactly what you should be doing. Its amazing how easily we can steer ourselves off in the wrong direction. This is often the result of some geeky desire to make something incredibly cool and awesome, which can be fun but potentially disastrous to a project.

Finally, now that you know what you are doing and what you should be doing, you can identify where you are heading in the wrong direction and fix the problem as soon as possible.

I know I know, it sounds like common sense, but it’s not as simple as you may think. How do you actually measure the difference between both? It’s not always going to be a clear cut situation! You will need to use certain methods which may be mathematical formulas, testing, inspection or metrics.

When in doubt, always go back to your users. Software development is all about the users. You can be the greatest programmer in the world, but your knowledge will be useless in practice unless people use the resources you develop!

Yahoo has a great article in their developer section which lists 14 different tips for speeding up your website.

1. Make Fewer HTTP Requests
2. Use a Content Delivery Network
3. Add an Expires Header
4. Gzip Components
5. Put Stylesheets at the Top
6. Put Scripts at the Bottom
7. Avoid CSS Expressions
8. Make JavaScript and CSS External
9. Reduce DNS Lookups
10. Minify JavaScript
11. Avoid Redirects
12. Remove Duplicate Scripts
13. Configure ETags
14. Make Ajax Cacheable

You can find more information about each of these by reading the original article on Yahoo.

If you’re looking for a web host for your website or blog, stay as far away from Ipower as you possibly can! Any website that requires a MySQL back-end such as Wordpress, Joomla or phpBB will take approximately 30 seconds or more to load. This is a problem affecting all of their clients, yet they still reply to support tickets saying that either nothing is wrong or that Wordpress, used by millions of people, is the source of the problem.

In case my opinion is not enough to convince you, the following are links to other pages I’ve found mentioning their horrible experiences with Ipower.

HostJury - To give you an idea about how bad Ipower is, this blog post at host jury was first posted in May 2007! As you can see, people are still posting comments reporting the same on-going issues to this very day.

IpowerComplaints - Still not convinced? This guy registered the domain IpowerComplaints.com just too give Ipower clients a place to post all of their complaints. Visit the site and you’ll notice its disturbingly active!

phpBB.com - phpBB is probably one of the best free forum software packages available. It’s so good, most hosts, including Ipower, will let you install it by a click of a button. Here is a forum post on phpBB.com with users discussing how using Ipowerweb to host their forum has been unsuccessful because the pages just take way too long to load.

What About vBulletin? - Since Ipower will normally respond back to support tickets saying the reason for the slow load times is due to the software, how do they explain that any php-based software requiring MySQL experienced this problem? Here is an example of a vBulletin website experiencing this problem.

More Ipower Reviews - Take a look what others have to say about Ipower here. At the time of writing, their uptime is rated at 13% and their support at 5%. Honestly, thats as good as 0. Do not register a website with Ipower if you hope to ever actually monetize the website or run a business online.

SitePoint Discussion - Just another discussion discussing why you should stay away from Ipower.

HostSearch Forums - Example of another frustrated user who moved his website after attempting to first solve the problem by dealing with Ipower support. It honestly seems like Ipowerweb does not even care to lose customers.

Problems won’t get Fixed - If you are experiencing this problem, it won’t get fixed even if they tell you it will. Ipower will tell you that you were experiencing a temporary issue, however that issue will return to haunt you constantly. Here is another example of a user trying to solve the problem and realizing the only solution was to switch host.

The list could go on and on, but I think you get the idea. Stay far far away from this web host!

Which web host should you go with? Before making a purchase from any company, take the time to research reviews first on reliable websites such as HostJury. HostJury continually makes an effort to make sure all reviews on their site are real and honest. I’d personally recommend HostGator or 1and1.com.

Last week I posted about How to Keep Yourself Organized and linked to an article which had 27 great tips. I mentioned applying those tips to blogging as well because having a GOOD system is important…

The most important thing you need manage when writing a blog is TIME. Having a regular posting schedule is the best way to get regular readers instead of casual readers. People have habits and routines and your goal is to ensure that people make browsing your website part of their routine. The ideal posting time and frequency depends on how much time you have available for blogging and the audience you are hoping to attract. If your blog appeals to teenagers, you’ll probably want to make sure new posts are up by 3PM when they start getting online after school. However, if a large part of your audience are working folks, you’ll find that many of them spend some time browsing the internet as soon as they get in the office! In that case, you’ll want new posts up by 7AM!

Once you decide on an ideal posting time, try to stick to it. You want your regular readers to have their dose of content when they come to get it! If you only have time to blog once every week, try and do it on the same day so readers know when to stop by! If they know when they should come back, they are more likely to do so. If you are using Wordpress, take advantage of the ability to schedule when your posts appear.

If you have decided to post daily or weekly, try and get ahead of yourself if ever time permits. By this I mean, if you are posting weekly but have some free time to write a few extra posts one day, write them but do NOT post them! Keep them saved and ready to post on a future date. It is MUCH better for your blog to continue posting on a regular schedule rather than posting a lot one week and nothing the next. If the following week you experience writers block or just don’t have the time to write, you can use your stash of extra posts to keep on schedule!

Finally, get in the habit of writing down ideas. I’ve started carrying around an agenda with me and scribbling little notes down in it has done wonder for my blogging! When I’m not sure what to write about I just open up the agenda and read the little notes I’ve scribbled down to find topics which would make good blog posts. Also take advantage of tools like Google Reader and subscribe to the feeds of websites you enjoy. Use Google Reader to “star” posts you have really enjoyed and use them as inspiration for your own posts in the future!

We’ve told you How to Start that Big Development Project, but we haven’t told you how to go and find all that information we say you need!

The two main ways you can collect the information you need is through observation or elicitation both of which can be either direct or indirect.

Observation

Direct - Go to the work site and watch people doing their jobs! Try and not be too creepy about it so you don’t make people feel uncomfortable.

Indirect - Set up audio and video recording devices in the work place and set up software to record keystrokes and log information. Obviously it is unethical to spy on people, so please make sure you tell your users when they are being watched and have them sign a consent form.

Elicitation

Direct - Conduct interviews or organize focus groups.

Indirect - Consult corporate documentation and have users respond to questionnaires. Don’t make big long boring questionnaires because people will hurt themselves smacking their head against a wall out of frustration.

Are there other ways to collect information? Definitely! Please let us know how you go about doing it and we will link up to your article!

ArticleDashBoard.com is a website which allows authors to write and share their articles online! Submitting articles online is a great way to get discovered and to boost traffic to your website. Lynn Little at SeoDance.com suggests some good websites to submit articles too and explains why you want to do so!

For the Web Developers reading this, perhaps writing/sharing content is not your main interest if you are not writing a blog. For you guys however, you may be interested in knowing that you can download the Article Dashboard software and use it to start running your own article directory website!

Thanks to the continued support from 451 Press, I will likely test this software on the web-hosting they kindly provide me with and then write up a review for you all! If anybody has any experience running an Article Dashboard website, please let us know what you think about the software!

Update: I now have a website called Writer Database up and running that is using the Article Dashboard software. The site has been online for a few months and so far I am very satisfied with the results! There have been no problems, the software is very easy to use, and people are definitely eager to submit when doing so is free and beneficial to them!

Feel free to visit the website and submit a few articles!

The only issue that I have with Article Dashboard right now is that approving articles can be quite a time consuming task! While it has not been a problem, thus far, if the site were to suddenly take off and receive hundreds of articles a day, it would become a full-time job approving new submissions! It would be great if instead there was an option to auto-accept new submissions and then give users the ability to report or flag poor content so that at this point an editor can take action. Meanwhile, editors can still maintain the site and moderate the content, but in the meantime those submitting articles will not end up in a huge-backlog delay because their content would appear right away.

Another thing that I found quite confusing at first was the method for subscribing to RSS feeds. When you click a feed, it seems like nothing happens. Many users would likely take this to mean the page is broken or the feeds are currently unavailable. However, what actually occurs is that the address to the feed is posted in a text-box at the top of the screen. At this point users can copy/paste this info to access the feed. It would definitely be way better if clicking the feed link simply opened the feed, since most browsers will take action on this and ask the user how they would then like to subscribe to it.

Overall though I am very pleased with the results! I definitely recommend the software to anyone who wishes to setup their own directory!

The easiest way to boost your websites rank and increase profitability is to download the Alexa toolbar.

What is Alexa? It is a site that ranks all websites on the internet. Many people will use this as a reference when estimating the value of a website or when deciding whether or not to advertise on a website.

How does it work? Let’s ask Alexa:

Alexa’s traffic rankings are based on the usage patterns of Alexa Toolbar users over a rolling 3 month period. A site’s ranking is based on a combined measure of reach and pageviews. Reach is determined by the number of unique Alexa users who visit a site on a given day. Pageviews are the total number of Alexa user URL requests for a site. However, multiple requests for the same URL on the same day by the same user are counted as a single pageview. The site with the highest combination of users and pageviews is ranked #1.

So in a nutshell, if you have the Alexa toolbar, then every time you visit a website, you will basically cast a vote for that site. All your votes and the votes of everyone using the Alexa toolbar then get added up in order to rank all the websites in the world.

Guess what? Nobody visits your website more than you! Download the Alexa toolbar now so that every time you visit or update your website, you cast yourself some votes and boost your own rank!

The Alexa toolbar itself is actually pretty useful too. It will give you a search box for browsing the web and list the current rank of the page you are browsing. You will also have the ability to easily find and access more information about websites you visit and even compare your website against others.

Alexa is owned by Amazon which is a well known trusted company. Your Alexa toolbar will also give you a handy little link to Amazon.com and all of the great products they offer at excellent prices.

What are you waiting for? Download the Alexa toolbar now!

Joomla is a free content management system which many people use to easily run their own website with little to no programming knowledge.

One great thing about Joomla is that it is very easy to change the look of your website simply by downloading a new template. The following video will show you how to install a new template so you can quickly move on to the next step of filling your website with awesome content!

Did you know that by moving around your ad placement from time to time or changing the background or border colors of your ads, you will help yourself get more clicks?! If a lot of your traffic is from return visitors, after a while they will subconsciously block the ads out from their mind. By moving them around or changing their appearance, people will suddenly notice them again for a while, increasing the chances of potential clicks!

Give your site a breath mint from time to time by freshening things up with some changes! You’ll see people won’t hide from your ads quite as much!

Looking for Web Development Software or Books? Visit my Web Development Software and Books Store!

Want to Increase your Websites Page Rank and Incoming Traffic? Submit your Articles to WriterDatabase.com. It’s Free!