Tech Savvy

Search Engines

2006-05-15T07:31:30+02:00

Stuck with some coding syntax, or looking for new terms/photos/concepts. The immediate one we look for is a search engine, Right? But are we making use of it to the extent possible!!!
Before we put forth our questions in the search engines, think once carefully frame the question that is in mind. Phrase it in such a way that search engine brings appropriate results.
We can avoid unwanted things only by giving proper phrases to search for that makes life easy. Lot of times the words we frame will be responsible for the unwanted results we come across. These may push the important result that we are looking for into the later pages. Best way to avoid this is use Advanced Search to pinpoint search results.
Also Google offers, Google Answers where the questions of users are replied by the experts in the respective domains.
Do not stick to one particular search engine, there are plenty of search engines specific to domains like blogs, technology and the list goes on.

There is this useful extension Customize Google available from Mozilla, it adds a list of other search engines can be checked along with the Google Search results. Not only this much it has more features to offer. Give a try to it.

World Wide Web

2006-04-26T05:35:00+02:00

How many can feel that we are making use of internet to the full extent?
Using WWW for most of us it is just checking mails, search for relevant things through search engines, or some companies’ websites/homepages. But Internet is beyond just mail clients, search engines. There is this beautiful extension “Stumble” available for mozilla browser. It provides a status bar and links through which we can tag the pages we like by category and also add some comments. The biggest advantage is we can view web pages tagged and commented by other stumblers (users of “Stumble”).
View my stumbles here.
More to come on how to make use of this beautiful and powerful WWW to the extent possible.

Mozilla Extensions - #2

2006-04-24T12:40:00+02:00

I think you all agree with me that developers working for the User Interface of the project may need to approach the Designers for some thing or other. At least I did approach for things like the size of the image, hex number of the particular color. I found these handy extensions of Mozilla, and they are really cool.

colorzilla:

What it does is, after downloading this extension a small icon will be displayed on status bar of browser. Once you click to on, and as we move the mouse over the page, corresponding color code (RGB) number is displayed in the status bar of the browser. Not only this, we can zoom the page that we are viewing and measure distances between any two points on the webpage. Know more about it from the home page.

MeasureIt:

On downloading this extension a MesureIt button will appear in the status bar or toolbar. Once you click to on, with the help of the mouse you choose any area, corner on the web page the dimensions of the selected portion will be displayed in terms of its width and height. To know more what MeasureIt is to offer, visit home page

Right Choice

2006-04-22T10:35:00+02:00

Today I would like to share some thoughts on how the choices play a role.

I am sure, everyone during their college days would have dreamt of settling in a big company as soon as they move out of the Institutions. This idea would have been result of many influences around the individual. Say, Branding, Pay scale, Security of job, Career interest …
Last weekend I was on my way to home town. In the bus, I met this Engineering Graduate who is doing job as Systems Engineer in a reputed company. During the conversation, I discuseed on how the interactions with the Tech Leads, Project Managers and the CEO of the company goes on. He said that he can count on his finger how many times he had a chance to meet their superiors. Then I asked how will he update the work? He promptly said by mails. He went on saying how long it takes even to proceed on a small things, since they need to get approval from the immediate superiors. I agree that this process as mandatory for the big companies to keep track of the happenings in the company, how far as the individuals especially fresher are benefited.

I feel that a fresher should consider the following at the starting of their career:
* Do they have a chance to meet experts?
* Is the superior regularly checking his efforts?
* Is there any one around to share his views/interests?
* Is he capable of grabbing the expertise of experts around him?
* Is he learning at least one new thing/concept everyday?

Of course the list goes on. What I strongly feel that the fresher should look upon for the company where he has a chance to grow up in his career along with the company.
So it is a Right Choice between the career or brand, interest or salary.

Power of Forums #1

2006-04-20T13:51:25+02:00

At my company, I was given a task of building a feed reader to fetch the updates from the selected websites/url’s in Ruby on Rails framework. After few attempts of building projects in Ruby on Rails, it flashed that I am working on Opensource technology. I then remembered few lines I read about advantages of Opensource - source code open, well documentation, good support … so where do I find these supporting groups/members? It did not take much time to figure out the appropriate one as FORUMS. Without an delay joined the Forum and posted the question, believe it or not within 5 minutes I was mailed the answer I am looking for. I did few changes to the solution as per my requirement. I do not mean that we should fully rely on the forums for every problem we come across, but checking if the problem was already discussed and solved by anyone else, would save lot of time.
For those who are interested in picking up Ruby on Rails follow up this blog:
Ruby on Rails: An extensive roundup of resources, projects, books, links, hosts and more.

Small List of Forums :
Ruby on Rails Forum
Ruby Forums
Ruby and Ruby on Rails
Sitepoint Ruby Forum

Mozilla Extensions - #1

2006-04-19T06:50:00+02:00

What browser do you use? Internet Explorer, Netscape, Opera, Mozilla Firefox …. Whatever it may be, here I am going to mention how the Mozilla browser helps developers in tweaking more details of webpages. I had been using all the browsers that I had mentioned earlier.
Why only Mozilla? Last month I was asked to do some interesting task on how to build extensions to Mozilla Firefox. That is how I first came to know about these very useful concepts of Mozilla - Extensions. Really, many extensions are available with Mozilla to make a developers life really cool. Though all the Extensions are listed under the mozilla Extensions, I like to mention few extensions that I am making use daily to the full extent possible. Hope they will be helpful to you some way or other.
Web Developer 1.0.2 – This is really useful for the starters. This adds a menu and a toolbar with various web developer tools which looks like this:

Though you can try upon right now with this extension, I would like to say little functionality.
-> The 'Cookies' option allow you work on cookies related like deleting cookies, session cookies, viewing cookie information, adding cookies…
-> The 'CSS' option next to cookies provide how to edit css, display css, block css, Border and box model…
-> I will switch on to option 'Information' which is next to 'Images', this will give you information regarding to colors, fonts, anchors, links, element information, class and id details, table information …
-> The next is 'Outline' option, this is very helpful as it outlines all the Frame, table cells, tables, links, Elements that are presnet in the webpage. There is an option 'Outline Current Element' through mouse you can select the element.
Try out the Web Developer extension and see the change in your developing style.

Why TechSavvy?

2006-04-18T13:50:00+02:00

As a Fresher Just out of the College, I have no idea on skills that software companies look for. So, I started reading many articles, blogs that are useful. Since I am on this way of improving myself towards smart programming, I would like to share everything that I explored. So you find here the problems that I encountered and the solutions. I will also be providing links to articles, blogs... that I find useful to developers. For now those who are interested in knowing successful tips to become a smart programmer, I would suggest to follow up Techmasala, a blog by an expert.