If you have been following our blog, I have written about creating websites for free with the Microsoft Web Platform or Microsoft WebMatrix. And with creating a website, you need to think about search engine optimization (SEO). One of my favorite free tools for this is the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Toolkit from Microsoft.
Violation summary inside of the SEO Toolkit
With the SEO Toolkit, you can analyze your website for search engine friendly content. It can check links site wide, with or without 'noindex' and 'nofollow' tags. It can check page titles, page descriptions, metatags, images, etc. And it breaks down the site analysis report into four (4) categories: violations, content, performance and links. It's a full blown website crawler!
Content summary inside of the SEO Toolkit
The Search Engine Optimization Toolkit is an add-in for Internet Information Services (IIS). The IIS is basically a website server and the SEO Toolkit is a website crawler (it only crawls websites hosted on the IIS). If you have installed the Microsoft Web Platform or Microsoft WebMatrix, you have IIS installed. It is also a feature built into Windows, but not added by default. Here's a quote from the IIS site:
The IIS Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Toolkit helps Web developers, hosting providers, and Web server administrators to improve their Web site’s relevance in search results by recommending how to make the site content more search engine friendly. The IIS SEO Toolkit includes the Site Analysis module, the Robots Exclusion module, and the Sitemaps and Site Indexes module, which let you perform detailed analysis and offer recommendations and editing tools for managing your Robots and Sitemaps files.
For more information on the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Toolkit, just follow the links below.
Search Engine Optimization Toolkit
Getting Started with the SEO Toolkit
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Have you ever wanted to see what programs start up when your computer boots? Or maybe defrag your pagefile? Or how about finding out what files, registry keys, etc. are currently open? You can do all this and more for free with Sysinternals Suite by Mark Russinovicha and from Microsoft.
The Autoruns program from the Sysinternals Suite
Sysinternals Suite is a collection of extremely useful utilities for Windows. I have been using them since Windows 95. From everyday user to computer repair technician, there is something here for you. There is currently over sixty utilities included in the Sysinternals Suite.
The Process Explorer program from the Sysinternals Suite
For the everyday user there is Autoruns, Desktops and PageDefrag. With Autoruns, you can see what programs are configured to automatically start when your system boots. Desktops allow you to create up to four virtual desktops and switch in between them. And with PageDefrag, you can defragment your pagefile and registry.
The TCPView program from the Sysinternals Suite
For the computer repair technician there is Process Explorer, Process Monitor and TCPView. With Process Explorer, you can see what files and folders a program has open. Process Monitor is a real-time monitoring tool that provides detail information (PID's, path, etc.) for files, registry and processes. And TCPView gives you a detail listing of all network endpoints, local and remote, with addresses and port numbers.
For more information on Sysinternals Suite and all of the free utilities included, just follow the links below.
Sysinternals Suite
Sysinternals Utilities Index
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Are you looking for a program to manage your e-mail? Or maybe one to write a blog with? Want to remotely connect computers and sync files between them? How about creating a photo gallery or movie? You can do all of these and more for free with Windows Live Essentials 2011.
Windows Live Essentials installation options
If you're familiar with Windows, some of these programs you will already know about. Photo Gallery, Movie Maker and Messenger, for example, have been around for a few years. Writer and Family Safety, on the other hand, are new. And Outlook Express users will be happy to learn that Windows Live Mail is an updated version of OE. You can import all of your settings from an existing version of Outlook Express into it.
The main screen in Windows Live Mesh
With Windows Live Mesh, you can synchronize files, folders and program settings between different computers, PC or MAC. Or you can sync files to the cloud using SkyDrive. You can also use Live Mesh to connect remotely to another computer. There are so many programs / features included in Windows Live Essentials it's hard to list them all. Here's a quote from the Windows Live website:
Windows Live Essentials is a suite of products available in one easy download. Get them all at once, or choose just the ones you want.
Mail
Manage multiple email accounts, calendars, and your contacts, even when you're offline.
Family Safety
Help keep your kids safe online.
Mesh
Kiss your zip drive goodbye—keep your files and photos synced on your PCs. And connect remotely to all of your files and programs.
Writer
Create stunning blog posts in minutes, with photos, videos, maps, and more. Then publish them to any of your favorite blog service providers.
Messenger Companion
Bring your friends along when you browse the web. See and comment on links your friends have shared as you visit websites in Internet Explorer.
Outlook Connector Pack
Manage Hotmail from within Outlook.
Bing Bar
Get search results from Bing without leaving the site you're on.
Silverlight
See rich, interactive websites with this browser plug-in.
Windows Live Essentials is available for 32-bit or 64-bit versions of Windows 7, Windows Vista with Service Pack 2, Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows Server 2008 with Service Pack 2. For more information on Windows Live Essentials, just follow the links below:
Windows Live Essentials
Windows Live Essentials Overview
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Posted on:
1/7/2012 at 11:09 AM
Tags:
windows 7,
windows vista,
silverlight,
windows live mail,
windows live skydrive,
windows live essentials,
windows live mesh,
windows live writer,
windows live messenger,
outlook express,
windows live photo gallery,
windows live movie maker
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At Geeks in Phoenix, we like to spotlight useful programs (most of them are free). And in this day and age, who couldn't use some free programs! We had some really great free programs released in 2011. From streaming music to creating websites, the offering was quite nice. Let's take another look at my five favorite free programs of 2011 (in no particular order).
Microsoft WebMatrix web gallery screen
What a great package from Microsoft! You can get all of the software you need to create and publish a website. And you need is a hosting plan and you're ready to go. Yes, it does take a little time to install all of the software, but it's well worth it. Read the full article here.
Google Music website library
If you want to stream your music collection from the cloud, Google Music is the program for you. With storage for up to 20,000 songs, it's by far the best free music storage / streaming service. As of this writing, I have over 1,800 songs on Google Music. Read the full article here.
OpenOffice3 main screen
OpenOffice is not new program, it's been around for a while. But it is the best alternative to Microsoft Office. And it's completely free. What more can I say. Read the full article here.
Metro interface inside of the Windows 8 Preview
What can I say, I love to play around with new operating systems. And when I can do it for free, that's even better! If you want to give the Windows 8 Developer Preview a try, remember to use a virtual machine (like VirtualBox) or a computer that is non-productive. Read the full article here.
Google Voice website
I use Google Voice all the time. I love saving money on long distance and international calls. And for free, come on, it's a no brainier. All you need is a gmail account. Read the full article here.
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Tired of opening up your email program only to find your mailbox is full of spam? Or maybe your afraid of accidentally opening a piece of spam and getting infected? Then Mailwasher Free or Mailwasher Pro may be just what you're looking for.
The Mailwasher Pro 2012 main screen with email preview pane
I have written several times now about Mailwasher Free and Mailwasher Pro, as I have used the pro version for over ten years now. Having the ability to read just the text (no html rendering) of an e-mail without opening it is fantastic. I can see what attachments and links may be contained inside of any email. I then can decide to delete it, send it back as undeliverable (bounce) or download it to my email program.
The email information pane in Mailwasher Pro 2012
Mailwasher comes in two versions, Free and Pro. Both versions work with Outlook, Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail, G-mail and every other mail program. Mailwasher Pro allows you to check an unlimited number of email accounts, access to First Alert global spam database and the advertising banner at the top of the program is removed. The Pro version also has the latest features.
The folks at Firetrust have just released the latest version of Mailwasher Pro 2012. Here's a quote from the Mailwasher Pro website:
New Features in MailWasher Pro 2012
The overall look has been further simplified and tidied up to make MailWasher easier to work with.
There's a new preview pane with integrated spam tool evaluation which can be shown or hidden. The preview pane also has a 'show more info' link which drills down to give you more useful information about the email you receive. This is particularly useful when you're not sure of the legitimacy of an email.
New Preview Pane
Now you can see where it comes from, who really sent it, how many attachments, embedded links, ownership information and more, so the decision making process is much easier.
Easy Auto-delete
Lots of people kept asking us for an auto-delete function. It's always been in there, but it's now part of each spam tool, so you can go to the Options section of each spam tool and select 'Auto delete'. So if you want to automatically delete emails from people in your blacklist, now it's really easy to do.
Quick mark all for delete
One commonly requested feature is a 'Mark all for delete' option. There was already a right click option to select it, but we made it easier by having a check box at the top of the delete columns.
Hide Emails
Hiding emails is useful if you want to make other emails stand out. For example you might want to hide emails from friends so the spam is more visible, thus making it easier to deal with.
Better 'New Email' notifications
Clearer notification of new emails means if you only check one email account in MailWasher, you'll be shown a short notification of the content of the last 4 emails. If you check more than 1 email account, you get a short summary of new email for each account.
Speed improvements
Users of older computers will notice significant speed improvements since the 2011 version was first released, while everyone should notice the application seems more snappy.
More languages
MailWasher now supports 18 languages - English, German, French, Spanish, French Canadian, Dutch, Hungarian, Bulgarian, Ukranian, Swedish, Russian, Czech, Norwegian, Armenian, Croatian, Danish, Japanese and Pirate!
For more information on Mailwasher Free or Mailwasher Pro 2012, just follow the links below:
Mailwasher Free
Mailwasher Pro 2012
59da2d17-cdba-4b77-a92a-c43467c10d0f|1|5.0
Posted on:
12/10/2011 at 1:57 PM
Tags:
anti-spam,
mailwasher,
software,
windows,
windows 7,
windows vista,
windows xp,
mailwasher free,
mailwasher pro,
outlook,
outlook express,
windows live mail,
g-mail
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