BlogGalaxy

Anyone who uses the Internet for anything, whether it’s simply checking their emails or conducting their food shopping online, will most likely have encountered a bug or few. Generally bugs pop up when you least want them to - you’re right at the end of placing an order, you click the final button and…. poof! Some sort of error sends you into a frenzy of anger at the website developers.

I produce thousands of lines of code a week for various websites and know how easy it is for a bug to creep in - usually developers don’t notice them. Because of the large number of sites I get involved in, the other day I conducted some research into bug reporting tools. Why? Because it’s impossible for a developer to test every scenario their code might possibly be subjected to - hence bugs appear!

Perhaps the biggest problem with bug “control” is the reporting process; when it comes down to software programs, company Intranets and major websites for example, people just don’t seem to grasp the concept of “unless we know what went wrong we can’t fix it”.

The most important thing in bug reporting is to provide as much information as possible - error messages, approximate time it happened, what you did before the problem occurred. I found a very good and informative article by Simon Tatham which outlines in his opinion how to report bugs effectively - perhaps next time you encounter a bug in a website or program, let the developers know and they can try to fix the problem for next time!

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There’s been plenty of blogging going on in the last week - has Google penalised GoCompare again? Haven’t they?

It would seem really unlucky for Google to dish out yet another ban - a colleague of mine pointed out a day or two ago they’ve recently redesigned their main site.

I conducted a little research - they still rank #1 for their brand name “GoCompare”, however that famous search term “car insurance” sees them on page 2. Considering the severity of the penalty over a year ago, it’s looking more and more likely that the site redesign (and restructure) is actually the cause of the drop. Looks like my colleague could be right?

There’s certainly nothing about a penalty on Search Engine Land…

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If you’ve visited uk.ask.com this week you may have noticed the reintroduction of an old friend - yes that’s right, it’s Jeeves! Ask removed Jeeves from their brand in 2006, and after several rebrands since the UK version of the search engine has a face again!

Their question of the day is “Why am I back?” - apparently “back to help“!

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When it comes to your website, however big or small, you need at least these two things:

• A reliable hosting company
• A good domain registrar or registry agency

EasySpace is both a hosting company and a registrar, among other things. However, my recent experience with them is short of pleasant, and their customer service “skills” leave me wondering how they ever got their registrar status with Nominet and ICANN.

Bad service

I currently manage two web servers, twelve websites and over 300 domains for a large UK company. Up until four months ago the domains were scattered among several domain registrars, and I was asked to consolidate them into one easy-to-manage account. Not a difficult task, albeit time consuming! When I reached the EasySpace accounts, it was a major stumbling block - it took four weeks to get an initial response from a customer representative! Once this had been established, they were keen to help me keep my account with them but seemed to place every obstacle in my path to stop me transferring away from them.

Fair enough, they don’t want to lose customers. Frankly though, email responses with “Transfer key: ######” (that was it, by the way), and unnecessarily obnoxious telephone manner is a sure way to drive anybody away! In a world where customer service means more than just taking renewal payments, I was actually offended by the service I received. Well, if you could call it service?

Knowledge is power, if you have it…

The other problem I have with them is their knowledge. There seems to be a worrying lack of substance when it comes to knowing what their customers are talking about. For example, I was told that I was “making the transfer process more complex than it actually is”. Really? Guys, you’re the only domain company I’ve ever dealt with thus far who make you call for a transfer licence key! Then there was the heart-stopper comment “I’m sorry, I don’t know what OpenSRS is.” Sure, those who don’t do much in the way of website domains may be excused for not knowing, but OpenSRS is a fairly major company in the domain industry. There was some other ridiculous spin about how I didn’t need two transfer keys and that I was the first customer they’ve ever had who has had a big problem transferring a domain. Let alone the fact I’ve transferred, registered and dealt with over 500 of the things in the last year…

Their hosting abilities are just as worrying - a distant memory of website accounts being cut off because the bill wasn’t paid - because EasySpace didn’t notify the account holders. See the pattern here?

There are alternatives!

We avoid EasySpace for all of the above reasons; our hosting is done through Fasthosts and eUKHost for dedicated and VPS containers, and put our own domain registrations through the system ourselves. When looking for somewhere to host your website, it really is important to find a decent hosting company - if your website is down, so is your business!

If you’re looking for reliable hosting or domain services and don’t fancy shelling out a large wodge of cash for a dedicated server to host your website on, why not get in touch? We offer competitively-priced website hosting and domain services, and can work to your requirements.

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Cyber-criminals could turn out the lights in America

The Conficker virus “failed” to deliver a suspected payload on April Fools Day, Microsoft claims 97% of emails sent are spam and cyber-criminals could make the lights go out in America.

US government officials admitted that software had been “left behind” - presumably over upgrades and system changes. Should a hacker gain access to the software, they may be able to shut down the entire US power grid! The hilarious thing is that the US Homeland Security Secretary admits [they] have known about the vunerability for years! Makes me wonder what the IT guys over there have been getting up to?

While most of us don’t work for the US power grid, we still use computers in our daily lives and so it’s just as important to keep your computer safe against viruses! I recommend AVG Anti-virus - it’s a very good package and you can download a free copy of AVG here.

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Following on from my previous post about Tiscali losing its last potential buyer BSkyB, they were given a lifeline by their lenders last week - JPMorgan agreed to put a hold on Tiscali’s €11 million (£10.1 million) debt repayments. In light of this, they apparently told their 1.7 million UK customers that broadband services would continue as normal.

If reviews I’ve read recently are anything to go by (here, here and here, for example), they’re certainly operating “as normal”. Broadband Genie covered this story - a couple of comments suggest Tiscali have made absolutely no effort to contact their customers!

Is the lifeline going to be enough to save Tiscali from going under? My thoughts are no, and I’d be surprised if they didn’t end up being subject to a fire sale of their assets. If you haven’t yet got an alternative in mind in case bad goes to worse, why not give PlusNet a look? They currently have some cracking deals on and are BT-owned so you know they won’t be going anywhere in a hurry! Go on! Give PlusNet a go!

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“Bankruptcy”, “administration”, “shares suspended” - three of a growing number of terms I hear almost every day.

Normally it’s about financial institutions, high street retailers or the construction industry. So you can imagine my surprise when I heard the words “Tiscali” and “shares suspended” in the same sentence this week!

Well, not a total surprise - they’ve been trying to sell off UK-based assets since early last year to help pay off their debts. However BSkyB, the last remaining potential buyer, pulled out of talks on Monday leaving Tiscali with a sore throat. £453m of debt, recent failure to meet debt repayments and two multi-million pound interest payments this week. All of this news results in a 40% drop in Tiscali’s share price and the suspension of their shares to prevent bankruptcy.

Ouch.

Tiscali own Pipex, Nildram, Freedom2Surf among a few other brands - if your Internet Service Provider is one of these it might be worth checking out a few alternatives just incase bad goes to worse. One of them is BT-owned PlusNet - their prices are really good, their service is brilliant (UK call centres, 24/7). Don’t just take my word for it - check them out for yourself :o)

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Ever heard of black hat and/or white hat SEO? If not, I’ll give you a very brief introduction. SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, is the art of optimising your website to give it the best chance of ranking at the top of the likes of Google, Yahoo and MSN (Windows Live Search).

As with most things in life, there are right and wrong ways of performing SEO - the good ways are known as “white hat SEO” and the bad ways, “black hat SEO”. Paying for links to help your website’s link profile, for example, is one such bad way - sometimes you’ll be issued with a penalty such as the hefty one Google gave Go Compare last February.

It would appear that Danny Sullivan has given us a new hat to wear. Stop shouting the rainbow at your screen - it’s not a colour! The phrase “crap hat SEO” - yes crap - has been used by Danny:

“Search engines have ‘rules’ that they themselves knowingly allow others to break. Arguments erupt over the idea that any type of marketing is ‘manipulation.’ But at some point, enough is enough with some tactics. And today, I’m done. I’m calling bullshit on anyone who is link spamming or creating crappy nonsensical content sites.”

At Search Marketing Expo recently he went on to say “Just don’t be a ‘crap hat.’ Don’t do the crap stuff. Off-topic link drops, automated link insertions. It’s all just crap. Just say no to crap. And tell others to say no. Make it like racist jokes, don’t put up with it. Enough crappy MP3 sites, comment spamming, god knows what else. Just enough. Be leaders. Grow up and if it’s money you’re leaving on the table, leave it.”

So there you have it. New hat for the selection. White, black, or crap - you choose!

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I’d like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, a happy new year and a positive 2009!

From myself and the RedGalaxy Team.

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Over the last month I’ve seen far too many complaints from users of Facebook - currently the world’s largest social networking site. The complaints have been sparked by Facebook’s development team launching a new design which, apparently, is a usability nightmare.

Personally I don’t see any issues - in fact once you get used to it I find it much more appealing and a lot faster to load, especially when viewing profiles. But one thing which concerned me a little was the discovery of a group on Facebook telling users how they can get the “old Facebook” back.

It relies on the user downloading Firefox 3 if they don’t already have it (you should do this anyway if you don’t use it - it’s a fantastic browser!) Once downloaded, they must embark on a full-scale challenge installing programs and changing settings on their computer. The instructions provided mentioned emulating Internet Explorer 5.5, which can only spell trouble. Microsoft’s IE5.5 was released back in 2000 and there is clearly something in this browser stopping the new design from working.

While following the instructions is all well and good, it means the potential for many of today’s websites to stop working is very high due to technologies developed since IE5.5 was released.

My advice? Take some time and get used to the new Facebook design. The Internet is an ever-changing world and nothing can stay the same forever.

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