Gordon's WebLog

What is Simple Picture Gallery Manager (SPGM) ?

SPGM is a program that - once installed on your website - renders pictures galleries dynamically. That means you just have to add pictures into your galleries and everything is taken care of ! Neither HTML nor PHP programming skills are required. It runs OK as is (meaning out of the package), and even Internet newbies can get it to work. The only requirement is the use of an FTP client to upload your pictures to your website and to set up SPGM

Why doesn't SPGM generate thumbnails automatically ?

That's because it is actually more of an administration task, which is not part of SPGM's scope for now. And that is why putting new pictures on line means putting their associated thumbnails as well. That being said, thumbnail generation could be done on-the-fly using GD (the PHP graphic library used for image manipulation), but this toolkit is not provided on every web hosting service, and SPGM must be compatible with as many configurations as possible. Most of all, such a process is awfully time consuming However, there is an EXCEEDINGLY good tool for creating thumbnails, pictures, descriptive text all ready for FTP to SPGM called Image Mage available from this web site which you can use as a standalone application.

Is SPGM it configurable ?

SPGM is massively configurable though, and you can tune the layout just as much as you want to match your exact web site's design. Several cool features are also included, while keeping in mind that the program aims to be as lightweight, simple and portable as possible. Don't expect automatic thumbnail generation, advanced search functions, nor per-gallery full statistics then. SPGM generates XHTML 1.0 Strict compliant code and makes extensive use of CSS style sheets to render galleries. It only requires PHP version 4 or higher and does not rely on image manipulation libraries (like GD), or any database system whatsoever.

Where can I get SPGM ?

From this web site and here is my site (also available from the top menu bar on the "Photo gallery" tab) with just a few picture galleries I prepared and uploaded - and it took no time at all.

Over the last 40 years my wife and I have never been without at least one dog. We have had seven in total, sometimes singly, sometimes in twos.

Here are pictures of them, starting with the most recent and working backward in time.

Belle

Haze

Timmy

Sandy

Patch

Tinker

Skip

Find out how many pages from your website are included in each of the major search engines with this search engine visibility checker.

The free automated tool will check AllTheWeb, (which shares data with Lycos), AltaVista, Google (which shares data with AOL and Netscape), MSN, Teoma (which shares data with Ask Jeeves), Yahoo!.

The tool automatically checks each search engine to see how many of your pages are indexed, and creates a free report - you can even have it emailed to you on a monthly basis.

The resulting numbers of pages visible to each search engine is displayed on the report as a hyper link Clicking this will bring up a list of the pages.

Interestingly enough MSN came out top when I checked this site, followed by AllTheWeb, AltaVista and then Google - there must be something I'm not doing right for Google to come so low. Shall have to investigate.

The same site has a free link popularity checker where you can find out how many Web pages have linked to your site. Once this is found you can begin working on getting more website owners to link to your site. Finding out how many websites have linked to yours is easy. Just enter your email address and website address into the form a report will be emailed to you - again monthly if you need it.

Both of these FREE tools, together with several others you will find on the site - including links to free search engine submissions sites - are great and well worth using.

Ever wanted a screen capture or a thumbnail ? Don't have the necessary software or expertise ?

Fear not - help is at hand at this web site.

Once on the site you can enter a URL and after a few moments click the Archive link and the thumbnail is displayed. You may then download it to your computer and use it on your web site or blog.

If you click the thumbnail the full size screen capture is displayed ready for downloading.

As an example of how easy it is, here is a thumbnail of this blog site downloaded from the site.

Click here to view the full screen capture, also downloaded from the site.

The whole operation took literally seconds to complete.

It really is great, and so easy !

Well done to the authors.

Fathers seem to change a lot over the years - here are some words from Anne Landers about this.

A GENTLE REMINDER NOT TO FORGET FATHER.

When I was ............

4 years old - My daddy can do anything.

5 years old - My daddy knows a whole lot.

6 years old - My dad is smarter than your dad.

8 years old - My dad doesn't know exactly everything.

10 years old - In the olden days when my dad grew up things sure were different.

12 years old - Oh, well, naturally, dad doesn't know anything about that. He is too old to remember his childhood.

14 years old - Don't pay any attention to my dad. He is so old-fashioned.

21 years old - Him? My Lord, he's hopelessly out of date.

25 years old - Dad knows a little bit about it, but then he should because he has been around so long.

30 years old - Maybe we should ask dad what he thinks. After all, he's had a lot of experience.

35 years old - I'm not doing a single thing until I talk to dad.

40 years old - I wonder how dad would have handled it. He's so wise and had a world of experience.

50 years old - I'd give anything if dad were here now so I could talk this over with him. Too bad I didn't appreciate how smart he was. I could have learned a lot from him.

What do you think is special about your father ?....

Eagle eyed visitors will see that the opening page of this blog now boasts Google advertisements at the end of the right hand sidebar. These advertisements are supplied by Google Adsense.

Why ? Well, click on any of the advertisements and I get a small commission.

Google AdSense is the programme that can generate advertising revenue from each page on the site — with a minimal investment in time and no additional resources.

AdSense delivers relevant text and/or image ads that are precisely targeted to the site and the site content.

Google AdSense is a fast and easy way for website publishers of all sizes to display relevant Google ads on their site's content pages and earn money. Because the ads are related to what the visitors are looking for on the site — or matched to the characteristics and interests of the visitors the content attracts — it's finally a way to both monetize and enhance the content pages.

It's also a way for website publishers to provide Google web and site search for their visitors, and to earn money by displaying Google ads on the search results pages.

Simple to join the scheme and easy to add various formatted advertisements to the site. Learn more and/or join here. It's a great idea.

Several people have suggested that I show visitors small picturs of my various web sites - so here they are. You may use the menu at the top of this screen to visit the various sites, or just click on the small pictures.

First, of course, this web log.

The template used for this web log is my own port for Thingamablog of an open source template for Serendipity by Rebecca Hemstad (BEX).

Next my own personal web site.

This site uses an open source template by Dave Reeder Design.

My photo gallery.

Finally, but not least, my church web site.

This site is based on my own template developed for the Etomite Content Management System, a brilliant PHP/MYSQL system.

ITV television's X Factor - Battle of The Stars - also came to a finish on Monday 5th June 2006.

Throughout the last week stars have been sining on stage and the general public invited to phone in their votes.

The final was between Lucy Benjamin, star of ITV soap opera Eastenders, and Matt Stevens, Bath and England Rugby Union player.

The voting was said to be extremely close, and the eventual winner was Lucy Benjamin.

The "Stars" talent show follows the "amateur" versions screened in recent years, with Shayne Warne being last year's winner. Now the hunt starts for amateur contestants for the next series, to be screened later in the year.

The BBC Television series Strictly Dance Fever reached the grand final on Saturday 3rd June 2006 - with 10 couples selected from tens of thousands of hopefuls over a period of 10 weeks gradually reduced in number based on votes received from the 4 judges and the phone-in public - and I actually managed to pick the winners.

If you haven't followed the series then full details can be found on the BBC web site.

Well done to ALL the couples who took part in the series. It really was an eyeopener how they progressed from rather amateurish efforts at the start of the series to very professional performances in the final rounds.

Three couples were in the final program, with Ben and Stephannie receiving the lowest number of votes, and thus going out of the competition.

That left Darren and Lana and Darrien and Hollie. Both of these couples achieved maximum scores from all of the judges, although whilst Darrien and Hollie managed that for both their dances, Darren and Lana on only one dance.

And so to the final pronouncement by compere Graham Norton, and the winners ?

Darrien and Hollie, who received their trophy from last year's winners, Joseph and Sadie.

The prize for the winners was £50,000.00, and contract to appear in the hit London West End musical Footloose.

Again, well done and many congratulations to Darrien and Hollie.