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Test Website Performance using Page Speed & YSlow Simultaneously

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 19:02:05 +0000

Website Performance, especially speed, plays a very vital role in its ranking in Google Search Results. Page Speed and Yahoo! YSlow efficiently analyzes and gives results about How your Website is Performing in their test algorithms?

Both Page Speed and Yahoo! YSlow are available as Firebug Addons for Firefox Web Browser and Google Chrome. But with GTmetrix you can Test the Performance of your Website Online using Page Speed and YSlow Simultaneously! Moreover, the Website is Browser Independent, this means you can now make use of Page Speed and YSlow in any browser (indirectly)!

All you need is to enter the URL of Website/Blog Page on the GTmetrix Website and the Web based interface of GTmetrix will give you performance results completely based on Page Speed’s and Yahoo! YSlow’s test algorithms. See an example of Page Speed Results below:

Apart from Performance Results, GTmetrix also got a Good List of Recommendations/Suggestions regarding How you can improve your Website Performance? Make sure you also check out the Top 1000 Websites (Performance Wise) and FAQ Section on GTmetrix.

This Post: Test Website Performance using Page Speed & YSlow Simultaneously was originally made on MrinTech

Flickr Pro Account: Features and Review

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 13:21:32 +0000

Someday back I bought for myself a Flickr Pro Account (for Personal Photo and Video Collection) and Flickr Pro Services are just awesome!

In this post we will see Flickr Pro Account Features as compared to Flickr Free Account. If you are also interested in an Online Photo Sharing/Storage Solution, than a Flickr Pro Account is the best choice for you!

Difference between Flickr Free Account and Flickr Pro Account

Following are the main differences between a Free and Pro Account of Flickr:

With Flickr Pro Account you can:

Upload Unlimited Number of Photos – Flickr Pro Account enables you to upload Thousands of Photos during your whole subscription period. Here the maximum size for each photo must not exceed 20 MB
Unlimited Video Upload – With a Flickr Pro Account you can upload Thousands of Videos (including HD Videos) to your account. Here the maximum size of video must not exceed 500 MB and total duration of videos must not be greater than 90 Seconds
Unlimited Storage Space and Bandwidth – There’s practically No limitation on Storage and Bandwidth for your Pro Account
Access to Original Resolution Images – With a Pro Account you/your friends will have access to Original Resolution of Images.
No Advertisements – With a Flickr Pro Account, there’s No Advertising for your Account at all. Fully AD Free Browsing and Sharing with others.
Archiving of High Resolution Images – Flickr Pro Account enables Archiving of all your High Resolution Images!
Post Images and Videos in up to 60 Group Pools – Flickr Pro Account users can post their Photos and Videos in up to 60 Flickr Groups! A very useful feature if you are a Photographer and want to share your Work with people participating in very active Flickr Groups!
Complete Account and Referrer Statistics – Flickr Pro Account Users get complete Account and Referrer Statistics for their Photos and Videos. You will get complete information from where your Photo/Video visitors are coming from and which of your Photo/Video is the most popular among them!

While Flickr Free Account:

Have only 100 MB Storage per month. And the maximum size of photo must not exceed 10 MB
Have only 2 Video upload per month Limit. Here the maximum size for video is 150 MB and maximum video duration is 90 Seconds with NO High Definition Video Capability.
Only shows First 200 Images in your Photostream. Rest of the Images are Hidden permanently (though links will remain active for them) unless and until you upgrade to a Pro Account.
Have Advertisements
Have only Smaller (Resized) Images available. No Access to Original Resolution Images!
A photo/video can be posted only to 10 Flickr Groups.

Following are some of Flickr Pro Account Features I personally like:

Flickr Stats

The stats page is just awesome. This Page gives you complete information regarding What’s popular in your Photostream Today, Yesterday and throughout all Time?

The stats page also shows from where your visitors are coming? E.g. From Google Image Search, Yahoo! Image Search, Direct Landing etc. It also shows what Keywords people are searching on Search Engines before they lands on your Photo/Video.

Also Individual Stats Links are present for each Photo/Video. Just Click Photo Stats or Video Stats present in the Bottom Right of each Photo/Video (See Screenshot above)

Additional Layout for your Photostream

Flickr Pro Account users gets 2 Additional Layouts (Small + Collections and Medium + Collection) for their Photostream, which they can select from the Account Settings Page.

Enhanced Privacy

A Flickr Pro Account has got enhanced Privacy and Permissions Options. You have full control over What people see in your Photostream? What information your want to show and hide? like Hiding EXIF Data, Hiding certain Photos and Videos from Search Engines etc.

SEO Optimized

Your whole Photostream, Photos and Videos are highly SEO Optimized (Read How and Why?). Even you can use Flickr as a Photoblog!

Pro Batch for Every Pro Account User

Flickr distinguishes it’s Free Account Users and Pro Account Users with a Pro Batch (See Screenshot above). This Pro Batch will gets displayed:

At the Top of your Photostream (Example here)
Whenever you comment on any Photo/Video throughout Flickr (Example here)

Ability to Replace Photos

Flickr Pro Account Users can Replace any Photo with a Single Click! All you need is to click Replace this Photo present at the Bottom Right of each Photo Page!

Do check out following Screenshots (Click to Enlarge):

There are Tons of More Useful Features in a Flickr Pro Account. You can read more about Flickr Accounts in the Flickr FAQ Section and Don’t forget to Explore What’s Hot on Flickr!

Also If you want to Gift Flickr Pro Account to someone , Start from the Flickr Gift Section! If you already have Flickr Pro Account Gift Code, than you can activate your Pro Account using THIS PAGE

Indeed a Highly Recommended Online Photo Storage/Sharing Service!

Also See: Create Photo Collage Online, Gmail as your Photo Sharing Album and Convert Photo to Sketch

This Post: Flickr Pro Account: Features and Review was originally made on MrinTech

Import Contacts to Yahoo! Mail from Google Account

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 20:44:35 +0000

Gmail/Googlemail and Yahoo! Mail are widely preferred Email Services around the World. Almost all of us, use these Awesome and Free Email Services!

Now If you want to Import your Address Book/Contacts to Yahoo! Mail from Gmail/Googlemail, than this post tells How to do so!

Just follow these very simple steps for Importing Address Book/Contacts from Gmail/Googlemail to Yahoo! Mail:

1. Login to your Gmail/Google Mail Account

2. As soon as you are logged in, Click Contacts present in the Left Side of Gmail/Googlemail

3. Here Click Export, present just after the Search Box:

4. Now if you want to Export a Selected Group of Contacts, than Select the Desired Group from the Drop Down Menu. Else simply select Everyone (All Contacts), in order to Export your Entire Gmail/Googlemail Address Book:

Since here we are Exporting the Contacts to Yahoo! Mail, Select Outlook CSV format (for importing into Outlook or another application) under Which Export Format?

As soon as you are done with the selection, Click Export Button and Choose where you want to save the CSV File onto your Hard Drive. This CSV File contains Names of all your Contacts, along with their respective Email Addresses.

5. Now go to Yahoo! Address Book and Login there

6. Here Select Import Option, under the Tools Menu:

7. Now From the Drop Down Menu, Select Microsoft Outlook (.CSV File):

Click Browse under Specify the file to import: and Select the Location of CSV File you just downloaded from Gmail/Googlemail. Click Import Now.

Yahoo! Mail Server will take some moments in order to process your CSV File. Once it’s processed, your whole Gmail/Googlemail Address Book is imported to your Yahoo! Mail Account.

Also See: How to Import All Emails and Contacts from Almost All Email Services to Gmail? and Register Email as Googlemail.com or Gmail.com without any Country Restriction!

This Post: Import Contacts to Yahoo! Mail from Google Account was originally made on MrinTech

WordPress XML and XHTML Sitemap

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:45:52 +0000

A Sitemap lists all Pages/Posts in a particular given WordPress Blog/Website. With the help of Sitemap, you can help various Search Engines in discovering your Blog/Website Content (including URLs) that may not be discoverable by their Normal Crawling Process.

In this post we will learn (in short) about WordPress XML and XHTML Sitemaps. With the Help of both XML and XHTML Sitemaps, your WordPress Blog will get better Indexed by major Search Engines like Google, Yahoo!, Bing etc.

Before going into details, let me clear you Creating/Submitting Sitemap is completely Optional. We can say a Sitemap acts as a Path for various Search Engine Bots and helps them better discover your Blog Content/URLs.

Let’s see about WordPress XML Sitemap and XHTML Sitemap in brief:

WordPress XML Sitemap

XML stands for Extensible Markup Language and WordPress XML Sitemap is one of the widely preferred Plugin around the World for various Self Hosted WordPress Blogs.

With the help of this Plugin you can easily configure:

Priority for your Posts, Pages, Categories, Tags, Author Pages and Archive Pages
Change Frequency for your WordPress Homepage, Posts, Static Pages, Categories, Tag Pages and Yearly/Monthly Archives.
Which part of your Blog must be included/excluded in the Sitemap

In order to understand Priority and Change Frequency for WordPress XML Sitemap, you can refer Sitemap Protocol Page

The XML Sitemap Plugin also helps Pinging various Search Engines like Google, Yahoo!, Bing, Ask etc, as soon as you update/add content to your WordPress Blog.

If you want to Install XML Sitemap for your WordPress Blog, than you can get it from here. Make sure you go through it’s Installation Guidelines and FAQs. Installation Guidelines and FAQs covers almost all points relating to XML Sitemap, still you have any doubt you can ask it at Official WordPress Support Forum or just drop a comment below

Bonus Tips:

Make sure you include your WordPress XML Sitemap Address in your robots.txt file like THIS
Make use of All in One SEO Pack Plugin with WordPress XML Sitemap
Make sure you Submit your XML Sitemap to Google, Yahoo! and Bing

WordPress XHTML Sitemap

XHTML stands for Extensible Hypertext Markup Language. WordPress XHTML Sitemap helps you Link all your Blog Pages, Posts, Monthly Archives, Categories and Feeds from a Single WordPress Static Page (Example of XHTML Sitemap). This XHTML Sitemap is equally helpful for Search Engines as well as visitors!

Google Webmasters Guidelines Clearly States that:

Make a site with a clear hierarchy and text links. Every page should be reachable from at least one static text link.

Offer a site map to your users with links that point to the important parts of your site.

And to both the Points above, XHTML Sitemap serves the purpose. You can download and read complete information about XHTML Sitemap here

Some Important Points regarding XHTML Sitemap:

No matter whether your XHTML Sitemap Page consists of URLs greater than 100 or less than 100, It won’t hurt your blog in any aspect. Search Engine Bots may process or completely ignore this XHTML Sitemap Page, if it consists more than 100 URLs.
If you are using noindex meta tag for any of your Posts/Pages/Categories, than XHTML Sitemap is not going to change anything.

Feel Free to ask your Queries/Share your Thoughts in the Comment Form below. I’ll try my level best to solve your Queries or will give you suitable sources.

Also See: How to Add a Sitemap for Blogspot/Blogger Blogs?

This Post: WordPress XML and XHTML Sitemap was originally made on MrinTech

Do Search Engine Crawls Flickr Private Photos & Videos?

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 19:07:37 +0000

If you are using Flickr Photo Sharing, than a question may arise: Do Google, Yahoo!, Bing and other Search Engines crawls Flickr Private Photos/Videos and Indexes them?

The answer is NO, provided that you have set Privacy Settings correctly. In this post, we will see How to make Flickr Photos/Videos completely hidden from Search Engines along with an additional Tip!

When you are going to Upload Photos & Videos to your Flickr Account, it will ask you to Set Privacy for your Photos & Videos before the uploading process itself:

As per the above Screenshot, you have to Select Private (only you see them) option and also Check the Box before Yes under Hide these Items from Public Searches? Only after this Continue uploading your Photographs & Videos. Setting Privacy Options like above will completely Hide your Photos & Videos from all Search Engines!

If you are still more concerned, than follow this additional Tip:

As soon as the Uploading Process is over, Flickr will ask you to Enter Description for your Photos & Videos:

Click on Add a Description Link and in the immediate next page you are required to enter Description for your Photos & Videos viz. Titles, Descriptions and Tags. Now here:

Enter some really Random/Arbitrary combination of Letters, Numbers & Symbols – By this, if any How your Image comes in any Search Engine, it’s really hard to enter the Search Term for it.
Don’t Enter any Description for your Photos & Videos
Don’t Enter any Tags for your Photos & Videos – Remember Tags in Flickr acts as Keywords for your Photos & Videos

With the Help of above mentioned Privacy Setting and Tip, your Photos & Videos are Hidden from Search Engines and all People.

Also See: Use Flickr and Appear on Google Image Search and How to Convert Small Images into Poster Size Images?

This Post: Do Search Engine Crawls Flickr Private Photos & Videos? was originally made on MrinTech