A few weeks ago one of my customers had a question about her website statistics program. “When I look at my website report page with the second highest number of page views is  ‘/’.  What page is that?”

Excellent question. The ‘/’ in the stats program indicates the home page. However you’ll want to look at the report closely.  Statistics for the home page are often broken down into two different numbers.  You have to add those two numbers together to get the correct figure.

Let’s look at an example.  In the case of this site, http://www.perryweb.com, statistics for the home page would show as either ‘/’ or as ‘/index.shtml’.  In other words, both http://www.perryweb.com and http://www.perryweb.com/index.shtml will take you to the home page of my website.  The stats program isn’t smart enough to know that those are the same page.

As an aside, your website may have index.php, index.html or some other type of index page.  The point is that no matter what technology your using, your stats program may be recoding statistics for your home page in two different groups.

Does it matter if people go to www.perryweb.com or www.perryweb.com/index.shtml?  Not a bit.  What matters is having visitors to your website.  You just need to keep the above in mind when looking at the statistics package for your website.

Popularity: 3% [?]

This weekend I had some extra time and so I made the switch to WordPress 2.5.1. Note that I installed 2.5.1 and not 2.5. The folks at WordPress already found and fixed a few bugs.

Overall the upgrade went very well. I only had two small problems.

The first was with the WordPress Automatic Upgrade Plugin. This is the third time I’ve used this plugin. It’s failed both times I’ve used it on this blog. I’ve also used it with great success on another blog. It can be really messy to cleanup from a failed “automatic” upgrade so I think I’m going to stick to manual upgrades.

The second problem was a minor issue with the Popularity Contest software that powers the “Most Popular Posts” section on the right of the page. Andrew Daum has a post about an code change that fixed the problem.

So far I’m enjoying the new dashboard layout in 2.5.1. Things are in different places but the changes aren’t overwhelming. It’s still good ‘ol WordPress.

Popularity: 8% [?]

An interesting thing happened late last week.  As you may know, I work from home.  Last week we had some problems with the power coming into the house.

The power line runs through a neighbor’s tree before it gets to our house.  The line had been resting against a branch. Over the years the wind moving the branch had turned it into a kind of saw. The branch movement had sawed through one of the strands of the power line.  The result was that some areas of the house had too much power and others didn’t have enough.

Our answering machine bit the dust.  The garage door opener almost caught fire.  However my computer is fine and dandy because it was on a surge protector.

Protect your computer with a surge protector.  You never know when you’re going to need it!

Popularity: 9% [?]

One of my customers received the following email last week:

Hi,
I want to place an order in your store,and i will like to know if you ship
to Australia and my method of payment will be credit card.so please let me
know if you can assist me with the order ,And please do not forget to
include your web page in your replying back to my mail.I will await your
prompt response as soon as you receive this mail,i will be be very glad if
you treat this email with good concern…

Best Regards
Dave Springer

He also supplied a physical address in Australia and an email address from Gmail.com.

This is a scam.

One way to spot it is the fact that good ol’ Dave used a Gmail account. Business deals coming from free email services should always raise a red flag. If he were a real business person the chances are that his email address would have been associated with the business he claimed to represent.

Dave asked for my customer’s website even though he sent her an email at that’s associated with the website. (Her website is something like www.DomainNow.com and he emailed her at Brenda@DomainNow.com.) He has her website address.

English doesn’t seem to be Dave’s primary language. While I’m sure there are people of all nationalities living in Australia it does raise a red flag.

You can also enter key phrases from this email into Google and see that this email is being sent out to a lot of people. Check out the January 25th entry on Noel Hefele’s blog. This is also discussed at the Etsy forum.

Dave may have used a fake or stolen credit card number to pay for his purchase. Maybe he would have asked to pay upon delivery and then never paid. If my client didn’t fall for either of those scenarios he may have paid with a fake money order. Then he might have been so low as to change his order and wanted a refund for part of his payment. His check would have been fake, my customer’s would have been real.

The Internet is a wonderful and wild place. Remember to proceed with caution.

Popularity: 18% [?]

As I coach customers through their website experience I urge them to trust their instincts. We also talk about using common sense when considering website issues. Sure website design is technical but you’d be surprised how far good instincts and common sense will take you.

This week in the Seattle area we had a great lesson in the use of common sense in conjunction with technical issues. A bus driver was taking a 12-foot-tall charter bus through the Washington Park Arboretum area. He was unfamiliar with the area and thusly he was using his high-tech GPS system to guide him. Common sense would have told him that he should pay attention to the signs warning him that he was going to pass under a 9-foot-tall pedestrian walkway.

Luckily no one was seriously injured as the bus driver ignored multiple signs about the height of the pedestrian walkway. As the bus approached the structure the driver apparently never thought, “Hmmm. That overpass looks a little low. I wonder if the bus will fit?”

He abandoned his common sense and trusted in technology completely. That’s a huge mistake. Common sense and good instincts will help you in all aspects of life, even the technological ones.

Popularity: 20% [?]

What would you do if another website approached you about a joint venture? How would you know if it was a good opportunity or not? To start with you’d want to know a little bit more about your potential partner. How do you go about researching other websites?

Here are some sites that may help:

• Whois Lookup - This gives you basic information about who registered the domain in question.
• Alexa - The data is gathered from a very specific subset of Internet users (those using the Alexa toolbar) so the data shouldn’t be taken as gospel. However Alexa is a fine tool for taking a look at overall trends.
• Technorati - This is a great place to look up the popularity of blogs.
• AltaVista - You can see how many people link to a given website by going to AltaVista and entering “link:http://www.domain-name.com” into the search box. Say you wanted to look up the sites that link to www.LitQuotes.com. You’d enter “link:http://www.litquotes.com” into the search box. You can see the results here.
• Quatcast - This is another tool that should be used for general trending purposes only.

Popularity: 23% [?]

Awhile ago I did a post about googlegangers. I explained that a googleganger is someone who shares your name. You can find these people when you look your name up on Google.

The New York Times recently did an article on the subject. (Did I scoop the New York Times? I did mine last October and they did theirs a few days ago. OK, probably not but a gal can dream can’t she?) The article talks about some fascinating aspects of the subject. Could you share more than just a name with your googleganger? Take a look at the article and see what you think.

Names That Match Forge a Bond on the Internet
By STEPHANIE ROSENBLOOM
Published: April 10, 2008
Why do so many feel a connection — be it kinship or competition — just because they share a name?

Popularity: 29% [?]

Over the last week I’ve received this email from several different people:

I checked with Norton Anti-Virus, and they are gearing up for this virus! I checked snopes.com, this afternoon ( 04-05-08) and it is for real!! Get this E-mail message sent around to your contacts ASAP.

PLEASE FORWARD THIS WARNING AMONG FRIENDS, FAMILY AND CONTACTS!

You should be alert during the next few days. Do not open any message with an attachment entitled ‘POSTCARD,’ regardless of who sent it to you. It is a virus which opens A POSTCARD IMAGE, which ‘burns’ the whole hard disc C of your computer. This virus will be received from someone who has your e-mail address in his/her contact list. This is the reason why you need to send this e-mail to all your contacts. It is better to receive this message 25 times than to receive the virus and open it.

If you receive a mail called’ POSTCARD,’ even though sent to you by a friend, do not open it. This includes all cards, too. Shut down your computer immediately.

This is the worst virus announced by CNN. It has been classified by Microsoft as the most destructive virus ever. This virus was discovered by McAfee yesterday, and there is no repair yet for this kind of virus. his virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disc, where the vital information is kept.

COPY THIS E-MAIL, AND SEND IT TO YOUR FRIENDS. REMEMBER: IF YOU SEND IT TO THEM, YOU WILL BENEFIT ALL OF US.

http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/postcard.asp

I’ve written about Snopes before. The site checks out urban legends and emails like the above. It let’s us know what’s true and what’s not. Since the above links to a page on Snopes it has to be real doesn’t it?

Not so much.

If you read the page at Snopes you’ll see that the above actually deals with two virus reports. One of them is real and one isn’t.

Last year a virus really was being spread by the use of fake postcard emails. The virus spread some really icky malware that could turn your computer into a zombie computer.

The fake part of the “postcard virus” email takes the very real virus threat and combines it with wording from a hoax virus - the infamous invitation/Olympic torch virus. Does this seem familiar?

WARNING

You should be alert during the next days: Do not open any message with an attached filed called “Invitation” regardless of who sent it. It is a virus that opens an Olympic Torch which “burns” the whole hard disc C of your computer. This virus will be received from someone who has your e-mail address in his/her contact list, that is why you should send this e-mail to all your contacts. It is better to receive this message 25 times than to receive the virus and open it. If you receive a mail called “invitation”, though sent by a friend, do not open it and shut down your computer immediately.

This is the worst virus announced by CNN, it has been classified by Microsoft as the most destructive virus ever. This virus was discovered by McAfee yesterday, and there is no repair yet for this kind of virus. This virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disc, where the vital information is kept.

SEND THIS E-MAIL TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW, COPY THIS E-MAIL AND SEND IT TO YOUR FRIENDS AND REMEMBER: IF YOU SEND IT TO THEM, YOU WILL BENEFIT ALL OF US

I think the lesson here is to get some good virus/malware protection software, be careful of links in emails and read the fine print at Snopes.

Popularity: 78% [?]

WordPress has released version 2.5. My plan is to wait a couple of weeks and then upgrade my blogs. In the meantime here are some reviews of people who have already made the switch:

• According to Socialized Software WordPress 2.5 is great but not compatible with the Popularity Contest plugin that I’m using.
• The Lost Art of Blogging gives a  Thorough Analysis of 2.5 .  It really is very thorough!

I’ve read a lot of reviews and they’re overwhelmingly positive.  So far the bugs seem to be minor and the biggest problem is that some plugin will have to upgraded.

I’ll let you know more when I take the plunge myself!

Popularity: 33% [?]

This post may be a little off topic but this weekend I faced a problem that some of you may one day face.   I came face to face with something that stopped me cold.   I installed Microsoft Office 2007 and I had a horrible problem.  I couldn’t open the darned box!

Luckily I found an online tutorial that shows you how to deal with the blasted thing.   It really is a clever design.  But I would have been much more appreciative had I been able to open it without a Google search.

Popularity: 35% [?]