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How do you use comments?

27th September 2011 33 Replies Christopher Roberts

How do you use comments? That’s my question. How do use comments on Technology Bloggers and other blogs, and are you getting the most out of your commenting experience?

In the past Kaushal has written about how to make the most out of blog commenting, and now I am going to do something similar, but in my soft of way.

So let’s focus on comments here first.

When you comment, do you ever take notice of others comments? Well if not you should! Comments often contain the most valuable content of the whole article (as I think I have said before) so it would be wise to read them.

Furthermore, making good use of the ‘Reply’ button is never a bad thing either. Not only does it show that you read others comments, but it also helps to spark conversation and ultimately relationships within the community.

The next thing to remember is that I don’t like to leave useless stuff lying around cluttering the place up. Hopefully this shows in the design of the blog, especially the comment field. This brings me onto my next point, make use of the information the blogger has given you.

Technology Bloggers comment form - found at the bottom of every article, and where you go to leave your contribution

Take a look at it, and you should see that it is busy, but not cluttered. Everything there is essential and telling you something.

The “we are a dofollow blog” bit tells you that you get ‘extra rewards’ for commenting here if you have a URL; the “check out the comment policy” bit lets you know that we have rules and values, and they are on show for all to see; each of the comment fields has its name and a brief description, to help you put the right thing in each box; below the post comment button is an anti-spam box, showing that we must care about your comments, and finally the CommentLuv box is there to help you squeeze the most out of your contribution.

Make use of this information, it is there to help you write the best possible comment!

What you can now do is apply this when you comment on other blogs. Okay, they may have slightly different systems and ways of doing things, but at the end of the day, they are all just helping you add your contribution.

Comment are very important, and that’s probably why I keep writing about them! Why not add a contribution now, either as a new comment or in reply so someone else’s below and demonstrate your knowledge of how to use comments?

Barcoding – a history and the future

1st August 2011 21 Replies Christopher Roberts

Many youngsters these days are not aware of how recent barcoding technology actually is. In the 1970’s a mere forty odd years ago, it would have been a rarity to see a barcode – anywhere.

Before the barcode, retail was not nearly as efficient as it currently is. Often, till assistants would have to memorise the price of every product in the shop, or products would be individually priced. Furthermore, it was almost impossible to keep tabs on stock levels in real time.

Barcodes revolutionised industry.

Barcoding in retail

Now when you pick an item and take it to the till, a barcode is scanned. The till is linked to a central database where all the barcodes for that shop (or even the entire shop chain) are stored. Information on the price of the product, the stock of the product and usually a description and or image of the product, is all stored in relation to the barcode. Upon scanning, the price is retrieved from the database and one unit is deducted form the shops stock list.

Barcoding makes it easy to increase prices and to reorder stock, that way if something has high demand and is selling fast, more orders can (sometimes electronically) placed and the store can consider raising the price.

Barcoding in car production

Barcodes are also used in many other areas, one example being car production. In car production, each car will be given a barcode. That barcode will often contain information such as the type of car that is to be made, how the car is to be styled, what colour the car is to be pained etc.

Parts that have been made for that car will often also be associated with the same barcode, to ensure that every bit gets to the right car.

The classic barcode is the one with lots of vertical lines, each of different thickness. Below is an example of a classic barcode.

Despite the classic barcodes uses, many people believe that the future of barcoding lies with QR codes.

QR Codes

QR codes are like barcodes in that they are all unique, however the image itself can actually store some information. QR codes are common in Japan, however they are slowly making their way westward, and and not uncommon in Europe now.

If you go to your fridge or a cupboard and pick up half a dozen items, the chances are at least one of them will have a QR code. I found one on some cheese the other day 🙂

‘QR Code‘ stands for ‘Quick Response Code‘ as they can quickly retrieve information, just by decoding the pixels in the QR code/image.

QR Codes are basically a code (durr) containing some form of information, be it text, a URL, etc. When you run the image through a QR decoder, it will work out what data is stored in the image.

Confused? Okay, let me give you an example. Below is a QR code image. If run the image through a smart phone QR decoder or an online QR decoder, you should find that it contains the information ‘www.TechnologyBloggers.org’. Why not try it out?

When decoded this QR Code says 'www.TechnologyBloggers.org'

That information is stored in the actual image, and there is no need for you to connect to a database. That is why many people believe that they are the future of barcoding, as a barcode stores no actual data in the lines, just a reference to a counterpart on a database.

QR codes could store the name of a product and the price on that actual barcode image – although to deduct stock, they would need to be linked into the stock database.

In many countries, QR codes are being used in advertisements, and in some places, that are being used as the actual advert. This is to try and encourage people to decode the image and find out what it means.

So what do you think, are QR codes the future of barcoding? Could they both coexist, or will one emerge on top? What is your opinion of QR codes?

Over to you 🙂

5 Reason Why Phishing Is Still A Popular Trick

14th July 2011 18 Replies Alan

Phishing had been widely used at least half a decade ago but it still remains as one of the popular method to scam internet users. Just recently, thousands of Tumblr bloggers were affected by a phishing attack which caused their credentials such as username, passwords, and email addresses to be stolen. Many of us might still be wondering why there are so many victims out there even though we had been taught from time to time to stay aware of a phishing scam. There are five reasons here why phishing is still a popular trick and below are the reasons.

#1 – It tricks the victim with fear.

One of the most common method is to trick the victim by sending them an email and tell them that their internet banking account is being compromised and need to click on a link to resolve the issue. Once the user followed the link, the user will be redirected to some forged website that looks similar to the banking website which requires the user to input his/her username and password. Once that form is sent, all the data will be transmitted to the attacker controlled server. Users who have a large amount of cash in their banking account will be scared to see this mail and some of them will follow the mail to avoid their account being compromised.

#2 – It tricks the victim with special interest.

Some scammers use the scenario such as winning lottery or viewing adult material to create a temptation for the victim to click on a link that redirects to the phishing site. Just recently, Tumblr bloggers were asked to re-verify their accounts by entering the username and password in order to continue and view the adult content. At times, it is not always money related issue can relate to phishing scam, but also special interest as mentioned can relate to a phishing scam.

A typical scam: a persuader is put out, but just as you grip hold of it, the trap snaps shut on you

#3 – It is not a rocket science technology.

Phishing attack involves creating a forged website and it might be difficult to certain people. However if it is to compare to hacking a banking server, creating a forged website is not that complicated. Therefore many novice or intermediate scammers will choose to use the phishing method over any other method in their hacking project. In short, phishing is not mainly about technical skills but it is also about how good the hacker in luring his victim into a trap.

#4 – It can be launched via many types of communication channel.

Phishing can happen not only by simply building a forged website and anticipate for the victim to come to you. It can also involve sending emails to the victims to lure them to the forged website. Besides that, a phishing scam uses as well the manipulation of a URL and post it as a comment or forum to trick them to the forged website. Apart from using the computer knowledge to lure the victim, phishing can also be done via phone calls. The conclusion is this type of scam can be done via multiple channels and multiple techniques.

#5 – Compromising one account is not the end.

After stealing one’s credentials is not the end, but it can be the beginning. Why is it so? Internet users nowadays have many online accounts for instance Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. In common, most users will use the same username and password for each of the account so that remembering them is not an issue. Hence this can lead to the users’ credentials that had been stolen can be used as well for other accounts by the scammers.

In conclusion, phishing can be an old technology but it is not an out-dated technology. There are still countless internet users who fell for this old technology. To have a better IT security, we should always stay focus and caution when using the internet and pay extra attention when something unusual occurred.

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