Windows Web Hosting, Web Technologies, etc
Posts tagged Web Technologies
Flash Photo Galleries
May 26th
I've been operating a photo gallery online for a long time, in fact I use https://gallery.menalto.com and recently upgraded to Gallery2 which is quite nice. But, with 5GB of images online it's time to clean up my act. Plus, we're a windows shop so I should have something more windows-centric. My gallery being over 5GB also made me realize that maybe this wasn't the best way to archive my images and I really don't need the original images online because no one but me seems interested in the full sized image. So what am I going to use? At home I use Picasa (http://picasa.google.com or http://www.picasa.com ) to organize all my images on my desktop, it scans your drives and sorts all your images via date and has an awesome interface. So for me the gallery solution I pick would be best to integrate with Picasa which narrows the field down. I'd also like to use a flash gallery. I think static galleries are just outdated and it's time to step it up. Initially I was going to go with the javascript app but the flash apps are just streamlined and the integration with picasa is a no brainer So the galleries that I've identified are:
- PiPiView – no it's not a view of my pee-pee, it's actually short for Picture Pile Viewer and can be seen here: http://pipiview.companje.nl/pipiview/2005/07/see-it-work.asp
- SlideShowPro – it's a bit more of a professional style gallery application, it can be seen here: http://www.slideshowpro.net/
- PostCardViewer – http://www.airtightinteractive.com/projects/postcardviewer/example/
- SimpleViewer – http://www.airtightinteractive.com/simpleviewer/instruct.html
There’s a new way to shop on the Internet
Apr 12th
It's at Jusmon's crazy online outlet mall: http://www.jusmon.com/. Great outlet products at 'outlet online' prices. Outlet online prices, what's that you say? Well, think about it. Online prices are generally less than retail right and outlet prices are generally less than regular prices right? So it would stand to reason that online outlet prices (TM) (and I'll coin the term) would be evenl less than regular online prices and FAR less than retail. So swing on by Jusmon's outlet mall and have a look.
Online merchants finally have protection against fraudulent chargebacks
Sep 9th
Cardinal Commerce offers the verified by visa program and is supported by both storefront and bvcommerce. It’s a service the client subscribes to that helps block fraudulent chargebacks. Say you have a online pc store and you sell someone a pc online. During checkout they’ll be asked for their password for their visa account, once they authenticate this information is sent to the vendor and the vendor is thus assured that should the customer attempt to perform a chargeback on the transaction that the vendor is protected. So what would this stop? Let’s say I sell you a pc from my store, you get it and say ‘hey guess what, I’m not happy with this, I’m not paying for it and I’m not sending it back either.’ Maybe go even further as to say ‘I’m going to tell the bank I never ordered’. Normally, an online merchant has no course of action against the client as online merchants do not share the same level of protection that brick and mortar merchants get. Generally the online merchant will have a tough, uphill battle with the bank to prove that the transaction is in fact fraudulent. Now if the client has Cardinal Commerce, the bank will say look ‘you entered your password when you purchased this product, you were verified, it's you.’ Thus the merchant is protected from a fraudulent transaction. At the same time the merchant isn't the only one protected, the shopper is also protected. Let's say you shop at an online store and purchase something from the store. Unknown to you the merchant uses one of these popular shopping carts that are knowingly vulnerable to SQL injection (yet the developers refuse to issue any updates to these applications or the merchant is left totally unaware that his shopping cart is in fact vulnerable). As a result some clever hacker comes along and gains access to your credit card information and goes on a shopping spree. Granted nowadays the credit card companies are quick to pick up on this, but let's say he tries to check out at a site protected by verified by visa, he's not going to be able to check out because although he's got your card information he doesn't have your VBV password. You as the consumer are also protected. So verified by visa is good for both the merchant and the shopper. These are ofcourse exaggerated examples but hopefully you get an idea of just what this service is and how it's useful. More information on verified by visa as offered by Cardinal commerce and supported by Applied Innovations can be found at: http://www.appliedi.net/newsletter/september_2005/cardinal_commerce/index.html
Web based site builders
Sep 1st