Some Logos I Did With PhotoShop

1712 days ago

Hey, don’t expect super professional-type logos from me as I just started learning Photoshop. But I hope that these logos would at least look presentable enough for me to showcase them...

Hey, don’t expect super professional-type logos from me as I just started learning Photoshop. But I hope that these logos would at least look presentable enough for me to showcase them on this blog. I applied what I had learned from tutorials I found on the Internet and surprisingly, you will learn a lot from these sites. You don’t really need to sign up for a course nowadays. All you need is the Photoshop software, some patience and a lot of hardwork. But the bad thing about searching for information on the Internet, it is kind like a piece-meal thing. You have to search for various sources for get a more complete picture. I also discovered that if you use online sources, you will miss out a lot on the basics because a lot of the tutorials found on the Internet assumes a lot of things and thus the readers lost out on some (even important) information.

And you really need some great ideas and colour matching which you can source for in those colour “wheels” or colour scheme generators. Great ideas plus Great colours = Great Looking Logos!

Okay, I think I need to improve on the colours used. Perhaps I should add gradients or something on the logos or the text. Anyway, it is just a simple try to brush up on my Photoshop skills. If you have any comments on these logos, I would like to hear from you. Or if you would like to give me some tips on creating beautiful and elegant logos (preferably simple but stylish ones), I am all ears. And I think the best way to learn is to look at other logos out there, you can get some great inspiration from them.

My PC is Slow, Very Slow…

1712 days ago

Indeed. Recently I felt that my desktop PC is getting very sluggish and it takes rather long to respond when I attempt to open up files. And it takes twice as...

Indeed. Recently I felt that my desktop PC is getting very sluggish and it takes rather long to respond when I attempt to open up files. And it takes twice as long when I am opening up photoshop files (.psd). Everytime it comes out of screen saver mode (no, it’s just some lines running around, not those graphic intensive screen savers), it becomes like a slow-motion robot. Everything goes in bullet time, yes, that is what you see in the Matrix movies. I think it could be because I have a lot of graphic editing and manipulation software installed like Photoshop, GIMP, Inkscape and so on. But the thing is that I am not using these software when the slow down occurs. I mean, sure, it may affect the PC somewhat, but I believe that it shouldn’t affect the PC till this extend. And when I check the processes in the Windows Task Manager, nothing is hogging my PC’s resources at all. I tried scanning for viruses (Antivir) and spyware (Spybot Search & Destroy) on my PC, got no threats either. I have several programs in my startup menu and all of them are software which are legitimate.

Well, it could be my PC is getting old. It’s a 4-year old Pentium IV 2.4Ghz processor with 1 GB of RAM. Is that considered old? Do I need the latest PC to run all my software? Or it could be my Windows Operating System starting to give problems. In the past, I will format and install Windows every 6 months, but now, with my huge workload, I couldn’t be bothered. And worse, all my settings, passwords and configurations I will need to redo once again. I have tons of passwords for the FTP access to my websites which is a bother to remember or even to take down. You know what would be great? Something that allows me to transfer all my settings to another PC without affecting the configuration of that PC. That would probably be worth a lot of money since it is such a time-saver for nearly everyone using the PC.

But anyway, I think it is inevitable that I will have to reinstall my trusty Windows XP system. So wish me luck on this bloody huge task. Hey, this baby lasted me over 2 years. I am quite impressed actually. Well, I really need to find a time to do this format. What a hassle.

Free PDF Converters

1713 days ago

Okay guys, just a few days ago I was tasked by my boss to find a cheaper alternative to Adobe Acrobat. However, his main aim to just to convert all sorts...

Okay guys, just a few days ago I was tasked by my boss to find a cheaper alternative to Adobe Acrobat. However, his main aim to just to convert all sorts of files to PDF, so I suggested to the brilliant businessman that you can get it for free if you just need to do conversion. His eyes suddenly brightens up when he heard the word “free” and he was hopping around mad like a bunny rabbit. And so I decided to go around the Internet and look for some great software to convert files to PDF. Some of which have quite a number of very useful features included as well. Don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars.

doPDF – I like lightweight software and this is certainly one. Fast and works without problems and doesn’t have any advertisements or adware in it. If you are just looking to convert your files to PDF and don’t need any additional features, this is it. Best it doesn’t require that huge download of a file called GhostScript. From it’s website, it says that it supports 64-bit Windows.

PrimoPDF – Feels a bit sluggish on my low end PC but it should be okay for others. This works very well and I have been using it for sometime now. The latest version supports merging of files so if you have several files with you would like to merge into one, this software does it. There is no advertisements or adware installed. However, Ghostscript is needed for operation.

pdf995 – A very long time friend of mine, this powerful software has tons of feaures which you can add-on through their other upgrades like PdfEdit995. However, the installer takes up a lot of space (for a converter) and it does use up quite an amount of resources. And those irritating advertisements and pop-ups really gets to you after a file, especially if you need to convert a lot of files. Go to their website to see the entire list of features supported by this powerful software.

CutePDF Writer – I don’t understand why everyone likes to call their software “cute”? I mean, I need a lean and mean program, not one that looks cute, unless you are a 10-year old litle girl. Then perhaps cute is important. Okay, now back to the software, this software does it work well but it is just a PDF converter without any other features. I would say both doPDF and CutePDF Writer are in the same league. Lightweight and lean. Cool. Only thing is that it still requires GhostScript, so I would recommend doPDF.

PDF Creator – Open source PDF converter. However, it doesn’t seem to get updated often, the latest version is more than a year old. Anyway, sadly it loads very slow on my system, a bit too slow for frequent use. But then it supports a number of useful features like files merge and encryption. There are no advertisements or adware installed with this software either. And Ghostscript is needed for it to work properly.

Hope this is useful to you. If you have anymore PDF converters that is not shown here, please let us know. Thank you.

Google Punishing Directory Submissions?

1714 days ago

Got this again from our beloved Digitalpoint forums. Someone claiming that after they do directory submissions (around 1-5 per day), their biggest keywords fell off Google recently. Well, I am not...

Got this again from our beloved Digitalpoint forums. Someone claiming that after they do directory submissions (around 1-5 per day), their biggest keywords fell off Google recently. Well, I am not sure whether directory submission is the cause of it. There are rumours that Google is supposedly “banning” directories and webmasters are worried that these “bans” on web directories will affect the listings in those directories. They are also worried that any penalty incurred in those directories will “flow” down to the listings on those directories. There are also people out there claiming that directory submission is dead and virtually useless for SERPs.

In my opinion, I doubt that Google will be trying to devalue directories. I mean, web directories are one of the most useful sites on the Internet. I mean, just look at blogs nowadays? Most blogs are about nothing and everything, making them a free-for-all kind of site. I have nothing against general blogs, but seriously, what value does these provide for their readers other than getting entertained? The main purpose of a directory is to help categorize other sites, and this in turn help Search Engines understand what those sites are all about. You know, it’s like a university library which arranges everything for you so that students and professors can find information much easier.

And as for bad links, I really don’t think Google will use this too much. First of all, webmasters don’t have control over what other webmasters link to. So if a webmaster with a bad site links to your site, you can’t do anything about it. It’s out of your hands, even if your site isn’t some crappy nonsense adsense gallery. We cannot stop people from linking to whoever they choose. And if Google did, then I am sure a lot of devious webmasters will be spending time submitting their competitors’ sites to these “bad” sites. It doesn’t make sense for Google to do it this way.

Well, I have to tell anyone who is worried about all these is that actually website submission is not as easy as it sounds. It’s requires tough work to get results. You need to create unique descriptions about 500-600 words (if the directory supports that much) in length for your sites. And you need to plan your title (aka anchor text) to get the maximum value from the link. Doing 1-5 submissions per day is good, but beware that those submissions may be rejected or the editors may take their time to approve your submission . So I would suggest more, about 10-20 submissions per day. And if possible, link to your internal URLs. You don’t want Search Engines to see only your main page. Deeplinking can also help push competition away from your main page to your inner pages.

Bad Times For Directories?

1715 days ago

I am sure all of you have heard by now that a lot of web directories are currently being affected by what is called a “Google penalty“. I am not sure...

I am sure all of you have heard by now that a lot of web directories are currently being affected by what is called a “Google penalty“. I am not sure whether this is the correct term for it, but it seemed that these directories have suddenly lost rankings and even have some of their pages removed from Google’s search index. And we are talking about supposedly high ranking sites here! Not that little directories that nobody knows anything about, but well-advertised, well-respected and well-maintained web directories. I must say, I am pretty worried about that. And the doomsayers are saying that it will affect all directories in the near future.  Whether what they are claiming is true or not, I don’t know. But I find it weird that Google is only penalizing directories. I mean there are a lot of websites out there that are crap, even blogs and forums, some of which virtual spam centers.

Surprisingly, my own directory don’t seemed to be affected by all these. Searching for my own domain name, my web directory pops right up in the searches. It looks like I am off the hook for the time being.

Shouldn’t all sites be affected if Google decides to take action against “bad neighbourhoods“? Why pick on directories in the first place? I know that there are a lot of pathetic directories, but truth to be told, web directories are usually started by people planning to make some money. And in order for them to make money, some effort must be made to create a reasonably working directory in the first place. It’s not like forums or even blogs where webmasters usually create and then go. You know what I mean? Compared to crap blogs/forums/websites, they have certain (okay, okay relative then) amount of quality in them.

I also believe that this is not really a penalty but perhaps a glitch or a “dance” in Google that went wrong. Google could be doing a shuffle or some modification in their algorithms for their Search Results and something went haywire in the process. Hey, you know how complex it is? Tweaking one part of the algorithms will almost definitely affect some other part and thus this is the result. Anyway, don’t get too worked up if you are a web directory owner, time will tell. I have heard that some of those directories which was supposedly being affected is now climbing out of that hell and things are starting to look rosy for them again.

I Am Become Death, Destroyer of Worlds

1716 days ago

Yes, I have been that. You see, I have just brought down my entire company’s network today. It was down for several hours as I tried to figure out what caused...

Yes, I have been that. You see, I have just brought down my entire company’s network today. It was down for several hours as I tried to figure out what caused the problem. And of course my boss was breathing down my neck the whole time. Crazy people these bosses. Anyhow, I am not exactly sure how that happened actually so I will start from the beginning. It started with me trying to setup a linux based server. I am using Ubuntu server edition and the basic installation went fine. So after the initial installation, I decided to add a little more software in it. I installed Webmin, ProFTPD, Samba and some other software into the server. After that I decided to change my IP Address for that server. This is when everything went wrong. At first, it started with this server alone not able to go onto the Internet or even through the LAN. Then in 15 minutes time, everyone else couldn’t get onto the Internet.

And so suddenly everyone in the office kept on calling me. Yes, it is kind of ironic that the time when people call me is when there is a problem with their Internet or their PCs. But this time, I am the cause of it. I don’t understand why changing an IP address on a Linux system will affect the entire LAN. Is it even possible for anyone to bring down a LAN with just one PC? Or did I screw things up so bad? I don’t think the PC is faulty in anyway since it was working fine just a few days back on a Windows OS. Can anyone explain to me how can this happen? It really boggles the feeble mind.

After troubleshooting the modems, routers and the switches, I realize all of them is working fine. Even tried phoning others with the same type of connection, they reported no problems. Then I remembered that the Linux Server itself was down and I don’t understand what caused it. So being an intelligent person,I removed this Linux PC from the LAN and poof….everything was okay again. Internet and the network was accessible again. Man, it really looks like I brought down my company’s network. I am become death, destroyer of worlds. Even my bosses’ worlds. That must at least count for something.

Spybot Search & Destory v1.5.1.15 released!

1717 days ago

Yes, the latest version of Spybot Search & Destroy is out and this seemed to be the final version for this series. Perhaps in the near future, we will see the...

Yes, the latest version of Spybot Search & Destroy is out and this seemed to be the final version for this series. Perhaps in the near future, we will see the beta version of Spybot Search & Destroy v2? Hey, if you don’t know what Spybot does, you are in deep trouble. You should have this software already installed on your PC if you are connected to the Internet. This little freeware helps to keep away those pesky spywares and adwares (irritating advertisements that pop out of nowhere) from your PC. And it comes with non-intrusive real-time protection, something which a lot of other freeware of it’s class doesn’t offer. I have seen the power of this software personally. You know my workplace? It’s a hellhole with tons of spywares and adwares in their PCs. And with this software, I have managed to kill off 90% of the spyware infection that happened in my company. I often used this with spywareblaster and Hijackthis for maximum protection. Oh, all these software are free as well, so it should go down pretty well with your cheapskate boss.

This release deals mainly with the Vista compatibility problem with the later versions. So if you are using Windows Vista and faced a lot of problems with other versions, you are recommended to update your software to v.1.5.1.15. I had just updated mine.

I was surprised that a lot of people don’t use Spybot orhave any sort of spyware protection. Luckily for those on Vista, Vista comes with Windows Defender, which should be up to the task. But still, it’s best to have additional protection against these kind of threats. I am sure everyone hates to see crappy advertisements for adult porn or health supplements on their desktops. And I am sure that everyone hates to see their browser have their homepage hijacked and redirected to some stupid website selling cheap software. Spywares can even slow down your PC significantly and render some other programs unusable. Worse, some of these spywares are actually trojan programs stealing your passwords and information.

Sometimes if Spybot can’t detect or remove some spyware, Hijackthis is very useful to help troubleshoot those spyware problems and you can even ask the experts in their forums for help. I think a combination of different software can offer better protection, especially nowadays with some many spyware whacking havoc on the Internet.

Slow Bus Service – SBS Singapore

1718 days ago

I had always said that Singapore’s biggest public bus service, SBS has probably the worst bus standard I have ever seen and today, they just topped it again. I took a bus...

I had always said that Singapore’s biggest public bus service, SBS has probably the worst bus standard I have ever seen and today, they just topped it again. I took a bus from my home to my workplace and it took like a hour to reach there. I have never seen any bus driving so god damn slow before. The bus driver was driving along the road like 10km/hr or sometimes even less. The roads today was pretty clear but nevertheless the bus driver was probably afraid that driving a little faster will result in road accidents.

Well, what can I say? A lot of the passengers in the bus was just as pissed as I am. I mean we are all rushing to work and this bus driver was cruising along taking his own sweet time. There was one guy who was swearing at the driver when he got off the bus, but the bus driver didn’t even care. I am not surprised that they are a lot of cases involving assaults on bus drivers. Hey, Singapore is a fast paced economy but the bus service seemed to be working in the previous century. But in all seriousness, I don’t think the problem lies with the drivers but mainly with the management. An empty bus makes no money, but a full (and overcrowded) one does. So in order to maximize their profits, the bosses at SBS think that a single bus trip should be packed to the maximum and thus, they are forcing bus drivers to drive slowly so as to pick up more passengers.

The bus services in Singapore are dominated by two companies – SBS and TIBS. Although they are supposed to be competitors, they are actually working hand in hand. Nope, not hand in hand improving our country’s public transport but hand in hand, trying to squeeze as much money from Singaporeans as possible. And recently the just launched a service which provides “premium” transport to the city area. The charges are more than double than normal. But sadly, these services should already have been provided by our public transport. It is not a “premium” service. Just normal regular service. I mean, there are no other public bus service in Singapore anyway. It’s their responsiblity to provide that service in the first place.

Before SBS was privatized, their service was way better. I remembered the time when bus was on time, cheap and reasonably fast. Now, it’s just so expensive, slow, frequently over-crowded and seldom on time. And some of the bus are in rather poor condition. Leaking, air-conditioning spolit, broken hand guards and railings, dirty seats and yucky windows that have never been cleaned. Sitting on a public bus is like sitting next to a rubbish dump. Service has not improved at all. Again, I have to say, I have no problems with people making money, but they have to do it ethically.

Which is better .html or .htm?

1720 days ago

I found this very interesting thread at Digitalpoint forums today. I have always said that the Digitalpoint forums is the best place for you to get useful information and I was...

I found this very interesting thread at Digitalpoint forums today. I have always said that the Digitalpoint forums is the best place for you to get useful information and I was right. This is posted in the Search Engine Optimization subforum there and I must say, it’s really interesting. Why? Because I am always interested in knowing whether using .html or .htm for my webpage is more useful when it comes to Search Engine Optimization. I don’t really care about my content or my website design or even links, but the file extension keeps me awake all night. I mean, they are so different using one file extension can mean the death of your site because Search Engines are very particular about the file extension.

So which is better? After countless years of research and experiments, I discovered that the file extension html works the best. In fact, my rankings improved ten fold after I switch my webpages’ extension. I guess the simple reasoning is that when Search Engine Bots visit your website and sees the extension “html”, it knows it is a “html” file. I mean, who knows what htm means? I don’t. The word html means Hyper Text Markup Language. I have no idea what “htm” means. So armed with this information, Search Engine bots will then be able to read and index your webpages properly. If it is htm, the Search Engine bots get confused and so they will just fail to properly render your webpages. Sometimes they will ignore the webpage altogether and this is very bad. Yes, file extension is that important that I would recommend everyone to immediately switch their file extension to html. Trust me on this. I have been in the Search Engine industry for 20 years now before the Internet was even born. Everyone considers me the father of Search Engine Optimization and I know a lot on the ongoings inside the major Search Engines.

I hope that this tip will help you in improving your websites. I have a lot of other SEO tips for you, like using images, audio and flash navigation for your webpages and pointing different URLs to the same page which I will add later on. So remember to come back and visit this blog soon.

Mooncake Festival Is Coming

1721 days ago

For all you Chinese guys and gals, you know what that means right? Yes, you get to eat tons and tons of mooncakes till you drop dead from exhaustion or get...

For all you Chinese guys and gals, you know what that means right? Yes, you get to eat tons and tons of mooncakes till you drop dead from exhaustion or get choked with too much lotus paste in your mouth. It is kind of sad to realize that nobody knows what is the Mooncake Festival all about. I guess everyone thinks that the Mooncake Festival is a festival where everyone just eats mooncakes. But that’s not the real story about the Mooncake festival. It’s actually called the Mid-Autumn Festival (some even called it the Lantern Festival because kids go around with lanterns and get burnt by candles). It is the Festival celebrating the end of mid-summer harvest(where in the past, farmers are the prominent livelihood of the people) and is meant to bring together the family (just like the Lunar New Year). And it is usually that time of the year where the moon is the brightest and hence the people look at the brightly lit moon and say “Cool, let’s make a cake that looks like the moon”. Of course, the people back then didn’t know that the moon was spherical so that made it into a disc like pastry. Okay, so now you guys know the truth about it. Does it make eating mooncakes more meaningful? No? Well…..

If you ask me why they use Lotus Paste, I have no idea. Probably it was cheap, widely available in China at that time and it is sweet. You see, life is sometimes as simple as that. Taking something cheap and easily available and then making it (with superb marketing) super expensive and laughing all the way to the bank (or to the metal box hidden under the bed).

Anyway, what I am more interested is to find out which stores/shops sells the best mooncakes. I know that the hotels and big bakeries are selling high end mooncakes like those with flaky skin, yam paste mooncakes (which I like very much), durian mooncakes, snowskin mooncakes, crispy mooncakes (yes, it’s available in Singapore), ice-cream mooncakes (also my favouritet as well), chocolate truffles mooncakes, cheese and raisins mooncakes, cempedak (taste a bit like jackfruit) mooncakes and more. The variety of mooncakes available is just staggering. Sometimes I get so spolit by the choices available that I just buy the original, saving me the headache of choosing.

And some of these mooncakes can be rather expensive, especially if you purchased from the hotels or restaurants. Those by Haagen Dazs, Goodwood Park Hotel and Raffles Hotel can set you back 50-60 for just 4 medium sized pieces. Some of those with egg yokes are even more expensive. I wonder what is so expensive with salted yorks? They are selling those 3 for S$1 at the market!

If you like mooncakes, have you wondered why you can’t find any when it’s not the Mooncake Festival? Why can’t I have mooncakes on normal days, why do I need to wait till it is the Mooncake Festival to eat mooncakes? Come on, tell me why? During the mooncake festival, everyone jacks up the prices till it becomes like some sort of 100 caret diamond gold “bun”. And traditional mooncakes are basically just lotus paste with covered with brown coloured pastry. You can find those in many stores in Singapore. Just that those they are selling are not cakes, more like buns. Those are cheap too. Have you wondered why changing it from bun to cake, the price goes up like 10 times? It doesn’t make sense right? My god, what are these business people doing?

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