Google Docs - An Essential Blogging Tool?

In managing my blog one of the tools I rely on is Google Docs. In this article I provide an introduction to Google Docs and explain its advantages to those running an blog.

What is Google Docs?

Google Docs is best summarized as a completely web-based, simplified, free version of Microsoft Office. It provides basic functionality such as word-processing, spreadsheets and presentations. The fact that it is an online service gives it a number of advantages, but there are also one or two disadvantages you need to be aware of.

Web-based service

The fact that Google Docs is an online service has a great advantage, you can work on a document from anywhere you have Internet access and a browser. This is more convenient than it sounds. For example, I have several computers and, using OpenOffice, I might create a Word-compatible document on, say, my desktop computer. If I am then on the road I don't have access to that document from my laptop as the document might still be on my desktop computer's hard-drive.

There are ways to transfer between computers, and one technique I used in the past was to email the document to Hotmail. This ensured that I could access the document from any of my computers and it was backed-up by Microsoft. This wasn't convenient though as I ended up having several versions of the document on different computers and keeping track of the current version proved difficult. Google Docs solves this problem as all the documents you create are hosted by Google. You can access your documents from any computer that has a browser and Internet access.

Summary

I would say I am addicted to Google Docs and find it to be an essential part of running my blog - it is one of the main reasons I use Blogger. It is convenient, easy to use and being able to store your documents (and publish them) on the web is a huge advantage. I no longer have to transfer documents between computers or worry about issues such as versioning. It is very easy to be able to export the documents to a local file, such as a PDF. So far, I have found Google Docs to be invaluable.

Google Docs can be found at http://docs.google.com

Tony Bedford first started blogging in March 2000. Tony currently maintains a free guide to more profitable blogging at http://the-business-of-blogging.blogspot.com

How To Achieve Pagerank 5 For Your Website For Free

There are many small business owners doing ecommerce online who are struggling, trying to increase their top page rank ratings. This is very time consuming and expensive. A lot of ecommerce businesses do not have a budget to allow them to take advantage of link buying, or other endeavors to increase the page rank ratings they need to make the money the big guns do.

How do you build a website for PR0 to PR2?

Here are some helpful hints that will work for you to get a top page rank on Google.

Get a private domain name. This is essential in this business. Be online for a few months. Make sure you change your content regularly, at least once a week. Have at least fifty inbound links that work.

This next step is tricky but not difficult. Have between 50 to 100 plus articles on your site. Submit your website to all of the necessary directories. Begin to link your website in the forums. Become a member of Google's PayPerClick Program. Google will welcome you with open arms. You invest twenty dollars to join Google's PPC program once. Done correctly, you will get back this small investment within a few short months.

It is a wonderful idea to make friends with Google. It is the number one search engine right now. Google's index spiders search the internet, finding sites to rank them against relevance. This takes some time for the spiders to do their job, sometimes up to several months, so have patience because it will take a few months for your site to get indexed.

A page rank of 5 can be reached by generating at least 10,000 links. This sounds daunting but it is not impossible. When you have 200 pages of content with each page having thirty or more links to other pages, those inside links will generate 6,000. Google's spiders will count the links inside the site because the size of your website is just as important as the links inside of it. This is especially valid when all of your website's content is alike.

This method will work for you, but you will have to be patient and allow some time to pass. Give it a few months, then begin checking at Google to see where your page rank is. From here, you will have a good idea in a few weeks if it is moving up, or down in page rank. If it is moving down, then you need to tweak your site, or adjust the keywords and keyword phrases.

Jaz Lai is an internet network marketing prospecting expert expert. Download your free white paper and audio on how to use the internet to Double or Triple your organization within the next 30 days. Available for the next 24 hours only, click below for instant access:

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Do Good CAPTCHAs Really Have To Be Unfriendly? An Expert Explains

For those of you who are not familiar with the term, a CAPTCHA is a feature on many user populated websites, such as Myspace with the purpose of blocking automated programs from spamming its users and for overall security. Here is how it works:

A user is required to enter a random letter and number password into a form before being able to submit information, log in, etc. This password is essentially given directly to the user in an image, rather than in text form, so that an automated program cannot detect the characters. The password the form field expects is the same as that shown on the image, but this sometimes causes problems.

Jeff Atwood at the Coding Horrors blog discusses whether CAPTCHAs are dead. This follows a news report that scalpers probably beat the CAPTCHAs at Ticketmaster.

Jeff links to a Chinese site that sells CAPTCHA decoders. The site quotes different prices for breaking different CAPTCHAs. An eBay decoder, for example, is being sold for $4000 and claims 70% accuracy.

What caught my attention were the unbreakable CAPTCHAs in the list. The Yahoo CAPTCHA is listed as unbreakable. That isn't surprising. Most of us can barely get it right ourselves.

Consider a Yahoo CAPTCHA. Sometimes you cannot tell the difference between a G or a 6? And the way that letters are often skewed, the difference bewteen certain uppercase and lowercase letters is virtually unrecognizable?

Contrast that with a Google CAPTCHA also listed as unbreakable. The Google image is clean and legible. Most of us have no difficulty getting it right. Google demonstrates that effective CAPTCHAs don't have to be unfriendly to users.

I am curious to learn which CAPTCHA libraries generate strong, yet user friendly challenges.