Posts by happygeek

Dani Horowitz remains as passionate about our online community today as she was back in February 2002 when, while pursuing a computer science degree on Long Island, NY, she founded DaniWeb. Fast forward to now, and an amazing half a billion visitors later, DaniWeb has become a vibrant community of members learning, sharing knowledge, and engaging with other developers, IT pros, technophiles and computer hobbyists. I've been talking to Dani about DaniWeb in the context of a dynamic and evolving online advertising market...

HG: Tell me a little about how DaniWeb itself has adapted to a changing online advertising market?

Dani: DaniWeb was founded in 2002 and by 2003 had become one of the first online 'publications' to independently track and monetize user behavior. Skip ten years and, in 2013, I developed and launched an algorithm to match question askers with likely answerers based on tracking user behavior across DaniWeb. This was a necessary change as by 2013 we were dying a slow death thanks to there being no more demand for Q&A-based tech sites. Between the likes of Stack Overflow, Quora and Reddit they are successfully able to handle Q&As more efficiently than we ever could, and there's no use in competing with them.

HG: So was that a Google thing then?

Dani: It's not that Google is anti-DaniWeb as such, but rather that Google would love us more if we were able to figure out a way to hit their sweet spot like Stack Overflow has done. …

Welcome to DaniWeb Nancy. 'The Dallas' sure looks like Delhi from where I'm sitting though...

It was the old clear cache problem again. Cleared the browser cache and I can see that the image has been updating fine. Doh!

Can you try framing that question again please as it doesn't make much sense as is I'm afraid?

Morning William(s) - hope you make the connections and find the information that you are looking for during your time with us.

It just got worse. As I wrote at Forbes yesterday, FB has now confirmed (albeit very quietly as an update to a month old post and on the day the Mueller report was published) that millions of Instagram passwords were stored in plain text as well...

Building Links is Like Shaving - If You Don't do it Every Day You Look Like a Bum

I haven't shaved for years. I don't look like a bum. I look like a man with a beard. Just saying...

Six months ago I was reviewing my experience with another Anker 'Soundcore' earbud product, the Liberty Lites. I liked these, and they quickly became my everyday audio companion while out on my long walks in the Yorkshire countryside. I did, however, have some issues with the volume never being quite loud enough and ultimately the three hour playtime ended up being just not enough for long train travel or flights. So, I started looking at the alternatives. Naturally I started looking at the likes of the Apple AirPods (once I had discovered you can use them with Android phones) and the new Samsung Galaxy Buds. Both look really cool and feature 'true-wireless' connectivity plus super battery life. Unfortunately, both also break my 'never gonna pay more than £100 for freakin' earbuds man' rule; and then some.

Then I stumbled across one of the best kept secrets out there: Anker also sell true-wireless AirPod look-a-like earbuds and they come in at well under the £100. In fact, they cost just £79.99 here in the UK. Actually, scrap the 'just' as in the US they are $79.99 which at the current exchange rate is about £61. At that price they would be an absolute bargain, but even at a shade under £80 they are still half the cost of AirPods with the standard charging case (AirPods with a wireless charging case cost 2.5 times as much!) and the pre-order price on the Galaxy Buds is £139 …

This thread started nine years ago with a quote by Homer, so I thought it was time for another.

“I've learned that life is one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Flanders was dead.”

Welcome to DaniWeb Ashish. Take the opportunity to have a look around the subjects that interest you most, as well as absorbing the community rules, and I'm sure you will find everything you could want in a supportive tech community here!

Personally I hate being preached to within news reports and the like (either ereligiously or politically) where I value true neutrality. However, as far as individuals are concerned, at work or play, I see no reason why they should not be able to wear religious symbols as long as they are not evangelizing their belief in the workplace or to customers/clients whatever. I certainly don't regard someone wearing a crucifix nor a hijab nor a pagan tattoo for that matter (I have plenty of the latter as I identify with pagan spiritulaism rather than any formal/organized religion/faith.)

A lack of tolerance, not just in the religious sense, is at the heart of most of the problems in the world today - why add more intolerance into the mix? Live long and prosper, love and peace to all.

There are no 'trustable' sites selling followers and likes. How can you trust a service selling you something on the basis it will increase the producticivity/value of your account when the practise is against the terms and conditions of all social media sites and when (rather than if) you get caught your accouint will be closed?

You might want to be a little more specific in the problems you are having with this and the help you need. DaniWeb members are hugely experienced and skilled, but mindreading isn't usually one of their talents :-)

Truth is, we are just as ill-informed this side of the pond. Trying to figure out what is happening with Brexit is pretty much the same as trying to figure out WTF Trump is talking about on most any subject.

A no deal exit would, by every measure apart from those of the hard-right of the Tory party, be an economic disaster for the UK. This is evidenced by the amount of money the government has thrown at contingency planning for that eventuality which include such things as the stockpiling of drugs and even strategies for military operations in case of mass public disorder.

May has been playing a high-stakes game using the no-deal trump card with both the EU and parliament: give us the changes to the plan we want or we will walk away and everyone loses big time/vote for my plan or everyone loses big time. Which might have worked apart from the fact that May is the worse poker player ever and she is playing against the EU which has aces up the sleeve while she only has a pair of threes. Her ability to bluff is on a par with her ability to dance.

The second referendum idea makes a lot of sense, but has been played down by both the government (too scared of the European Research Group wing of her party and too scared of the government being toppled and another general election) and the Labour party (too scared of losing the vote …

Plesk, just to throw another into the mix. Why? A combination of legacy and lethargy with a bit of if it ain't broke for good measure I guess...

The Internet is mostly not truth

That's a bit of a Trumpian sweeping statement. I'd love to see the stats that back up your assertion...

This is what happens when you change your login password hash algorithm without considering to create a fallback mechanism

Apart from the fact that Dani did create a fallback mechanism, of course.

and we had a fallback mechanism in place until late-2017. (I think 2+ years should have been enough time to give everyone who cared to change thier password...)

a strong signal to get away if you are still here

some may be justified in asking why

C'mon guys, I appreciate that glitches such as this are annoying and I appreciate that DaniWeb isn't as busy as it used to be. However, Dani remains one of the most responsive site owners that I have ever encountered, and I've been around online communmities for 30 odd years now since the days of FidoNet, Prestel, Usenet etc. She's explained that it's been a tough couple of weeks, and we all hvae those, so cut her a break maybe rather than going for the jugular? Just saying...

You're welcome!

That has a distinctive smell of a homework assignment about it. People here won't just throw the answer out to such things, not least as that wouldn't really help you in any meaningful way. So, how about you show us the code you have so far and where you are getting stuck with it? Then people will be able to point you in the right direction...

Yes. And that message from Google explains how to download and save your data. It points you at this support link that has the step-by-step instructions for doing so: https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1045788

I think you had a very lucky escape with this one tun712. It's always difficult to turn down work, but if the client wants the impossible and wants it tomorrow you really have little choice. Good luck with your future projects.

You will have to tell us more first: what exactly do you need to know, in other words what are the precise problems you are having?

Welcome aboard EVOdev. As the Rev says, pick the right place for your questions, but other than that my advice is to not feel worried about asking 'stupid' questions because truth be told there are only stupid answers :-) Everyone here was a newbie in their area of expertise at one stage, and everyone here is happy to help others starting on their path...

Turing Machine? ;-)

OK, so we are thinking about bringing back the 'Member of the Month' feature in the monthly newsletter that goes out to all DaniWeb members. This was a staple in the DaniWeb Digest for many years, coming to an end at the start of 2016. The hall of fame was, aptly, entirely virtual but the kudos of being included as real as it gets.

Three questions then:

1. Would you read the Member of the Month interview if it was brought back?

2. Would you be interested in being interviewed, or want to nominate another member for the interview?

3. What one question would you most like to ask other DaniWeb members being interviewed?

Digital marketing is the traditional way of doing business. Or at least it has been for more than a decade now. No?

Sounds more like a list of keywords relating to a failed attempt at spam to me...

That's a rather broad brush question. What do you specifically want to know about MS Server 2016 support? Have you tried asking Microsoft?

Hi CorinthCom, the Galaxy Watch works with any Android phone (Android 5 upwards), and for that matter the iPhone (iOS 9 on) as well, but to get the best out of it you need to be using a Samsung device. The reason being that the watch runs on the same Tizen OS as the Samsung phones. That said, from what I can gather it's email and messaging that take the biggest hit - as in you can only get these apps on the watch if you are synced to a Samsung phone. You still get the notifications, but would have to go to your phone to access the actual messages.

My first smartwatch was pretty dumb, to be honest, and put me off the concept for many years to come: a Microsoft Spot.

Confession time: I'm a born again smartwatch fan. I used to not see the point, and then somehow managed to buy a Samsung Gear S3 Frontier and everything changed. That this thing looked like a watch, had an innovative rotating bezel as an input control mechanism and worked so smoothly with my newly purchased Samsung Galaxy S8+ were the main reasons for that. Having been a very happy smartwatch bunny for the past 18 months or so, I was both interested and annoyed when the next-gen of the Samsung Gear watch family hit the market. I know, I know, there's always going to be something a little better just around the corner and 18 months is a long time in technology. My annoyance was more about the cost, especially as the S3 Frontier wasn't exactly cheap.

Then along came Black Friday which at least got me exploring the possibilities of upgrading to the new Galaxy Watch. I use the term upgrading purposefully as well; that's precisely what I ended up doing. The Black Friday deal, directly through the Samsung Shop online I should add, didn't discount the watch itself which was still £299 for the 46mm Bluetooth (non-4G) version I was interested in. Instead it threw the 'Duo' wireless charger that charges watch and phone together into deal. This was previously only available to pre-orders on launch so a good deal and a value of £89 for good measure. The real deal-sealer for me was the trade-in offered for …

Click the messaging 'talk bubble' icon from the homepage to get to the member connect section, use the search box to find the user/conversation/send message. I also struggled a little with discovering this.

Dani, he wasn't asking if he could buy such a list from DaniWeb. He was 'asking' if he should buy the list from the spammy link which I deleted for the reasons already stated: this was not a genuine query about buying email lists, it was a specific plug for one seller of such lists.

I see no questions, at least no real ones. I see a spammer trying to promote a service. Why else go to the bother of including the URL and obfuscating it by padding before and after the '.' so that it doesn't show as a link (and therefore hopefully escape any spam detection) - or am I just being too cynical here? The answer is no, no I am not. I've also removed the link from the post, as the general question is still valid and the answer from rproffitt very useful to anyone considering buying such a list.

I can answer from the other side of the equation. I have been a freelance writer for close on 30 years, and the way people find me hasn't really changed all that much apart from one aspect: it's a lot easier to find me now than it was in 1991. It has always been the case that prospective new clients come to me because they have either: seen my work elsewhere, I have been recommended to them by someone who has already used me or they have searched Google for a freelance technology journalist (or freelance security journalist.) Generally speaking, most people these days come to me having used all three methods. So, they might get a recommendation, go google me and then go look at some of my work.

To answer your question more directly, I will say that you won't find 'good' freelance writers by taking the cheapest option from a freelance writing forum/agency. If someone is offering a range of prices depending on the quality you get then run away. Any freelance writer worth contracting will have just the one rate which is usually negotiable depending upon the nature of the work and the length of the agreement - I charge less if I am contracted for a year of monthly blogs than I do for a one-off arrangement. Certainly they will only have one quality level and that's the best, all of the time.

It really depends upon what type of content you are …

245x327 (43kb) did the trick

Have been trying to change my profile pic via the community profile update avatar option. I keep getting told that 'The image you are attempting to upload doesn't fit into the allowed dimensions.' However, there is no clue as to what the allowed dimesions might be. The one I'm trying to upload has been sized down to 490x653 (171kb) and I can't recall what the limits previously were, will keep trying smaller and smaller - but thought it might be an idea to flag the max size in the error message that is thrown up.

What is the problem, then, with allowing me to select "no filter" as the default? How does this negatively impact anyone else?

Can't argue with that, to be fair :-)

But because I didn't want to filter by recommended, I never clicked it.

Have to admit when I saw it said 'Filter: Recommended' I just assumed it meant that was the filter type being applied rather than an option to apply it - so clicked and saw I could remove all filtering.

You'll need to do better than just cut and pasting your homework assignment if you want help from DaniWeb members I'm afraid. Show us the code you have so far and explain where you are getting stuck, then someone might be able to point you in the right direction. Nobody is just going to do your stuff for you, sorry.

I am something of a self-confessed Anker hardware fan. I've been using their cables, power supplies and portable chargers for years now. However, I never really thought of Anker in the audio space, until now. Soundcore is an Anker brand with just audio products out there, as the name suggests. So, I needed some new earphones for my daily multi-mile walks and thought I'd give Soundcore a go. Especially when I saw these 'Liberty Lite' wireless earbuds were so much cheaper than the big brand versions from the likes of Apple, Bose and Samsung. Not that I have an iPhone, I'm currently a Samsung kind of a guy for my sins. Anyway, I took the plunge and as these earbuds have had something of a mixed bag of reviews on Amazon I thought I'd share my experiences with DaniWeb users.

First things first then, the price. Here in the UK, Apple is currently asking a whopping £159 ($200) for a pair of AirPods. Way too expensive an ask for me, especially as I say I don't have an iPhone. OK, so seeing as I do have a Samsung phone what sort of price are a set of the latest Gear IconX earbuds? Erm, amazingly they are even more expensive at £179 ($230) which is the same as a set of Bose SoundSport buds. All far too rich for my blood I'm afraid. There's always the you get what you pay for argument to consider, which is why I wouldn't go …

There are plenty of ways to undermine democracy without having to directly interfere with voting machines.

Indeed. I've just written something on Forbes about this very subject, after 81 million voter records (across 20 states) have been found for sale on dark web markets. Article is here if anyone fancies a read: https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2018/10/30/81-5m-voter-records-for-sale-on-dark-web-ahead-of-midterm-elections

Let me Google that for you... http://www.letmegooglethat.com/?q=what+is+google+tag+manager%3F

Or did you have a more specific question relating to Google Tag Manager usage?

Hello.

Yours Sincerely, Lionel Ritchie ;-)

also I really tried to quote you but it didn't worked

• Highlight text you want to quote
• Hit the " button in the reply editor
• Paste text

Seems to work for me, what method were you trying?

Morning! Tell us a bit about yourself then :-) Welcome to DaniWeb!

You've asked this exact same question in at least three other forums, all on 18th August, and had responses with regard to the solution from all of them. Why are you asking it again here?

You'd think a digital marketing agency would know this stuff already, but hey ho I guess there are true digital marketing agencies and spamming chancers eh?

More to the point why go back to an unsupported and insecure (certainly a lot less secure anyway) version of the OS? There always seems to be a lot of knock the latest version of WIndows attitude, and a lot of OS nostalgia.