Someone asked me tonight if you could copy text from a portable document (pdf) formatted file into Word or some other program. The answer fortunately is yes! Find the text button and click it. Either drag the section you want to highlight, or click control + a to highlight all. Hit control + c to copy. That puts it on the pasteboard. Place your cursor in the next program and hit control + v and you are golden and off to the races.

News to me, a loyal WordPress user: there is a companion bulletin board software that apparently started back in December 2004. I’ll have to give bbPress a try as I am really tired of my existing bulletin board software.

I often use my laptop in conditions where the screen is difficult to read. This “tough man’s portable” says it is always visible. What is out there that is affordable to help with laptop screen visibility (and I’m not asking you to suggest that I pull it inside my sweatshirt … I already do that … or put a blanket over my head … I already do that on occaision too).

In reviewing the HTMLfixIT site content it occurred to me that we’ve done little or nothing lately to draw attention to Franki’s Statistical Hit Counter. This counter is the “jewel in the HTMLfixIT crown” in my opinion, and I’ve encouraged all of my clients to use it to analyse web traffic. It comes in two flavours: the advanced counter (which at $10 attempts to partially offset this site’s running costs) as well as a free version that we can all afford.

But seeing is believing, so please take a peek at the online demo and see what you think!

I wish I had a xyle scope! I was reading today how Mike over at MikeIndustries.com spiffied up a myspace page. He used his “xyle scope” that allowed him to look under the hood. Now I have parts of this functionality thanks to my Web Developer extension in Firefox, but it appeared as though this might just be slicker. Unfortunately I swore off any hope of a Mac after they mistreated me a few months ago with my daughter’s new but not working right i-Pod. To think that I had to use up my free consultation … without them asking me if I wanted to … to fix a problem that the item shipped with. Jerks!

Big news from our friend and business associate Reese!

Several years ago we met this bright and talented young designer from Canada in our html fix it live chat. The night I met her I troubleshot and fixed a minor mySQL issue necessary to allow proper function of a blog run on the WordPress platform. Over the years our relationship has grown and we have collaborated with her on a number of projects. Often we provide back-end php scripts, css coding, database modifications and other services to her as an aid to her providing the top notch design services to clients that she is now know for.

This designer was most recently working at em two Web Studios. She had developed a nice niche working on Expression Engine driven content managed sites, among other areas of specialty. As her business has grown and changed, she decided it was time to launch a new site to display her business better and give her more control as she seeks to serve her customer’s on-line business needs.

So welcome Design by Reese to the web design world.

May we also comment that we like your sliding door mouseovers on your new site. We have found that working with her has driven us towards deeper design (shadows, small nuances, etc.) that has more depth to the image being viewed. In turn, we have often found an ability to encourage her to drive her sites to be more efficient and utilize images in ways that, while preserving that wonderful depth, are not too resource intensive. It has — to our way of thinking — been a wonderful mix of work and growth for both of us. So good luck with Design by Reese!

I like Google! There is rumor that Google may be moving to Grand Rapids, Michigan … oh boy I sure hope so. One of its latest Google Lab Projects has been something called Google Page Creator. It is really a cross between static web pages I suppose and blogging. It allows someone to create pages in a what you see is what you get format. The pages are then hosted on Google (http://yourgmailusername.googlepages.com).

What is the advantage over a blog type of format? Nothing I can think of other than look. It seems to be the new geocities of the net to me. They allow you 100 megabytes of space. Certainly enough for most people.

This will be great I suppose for non-profits and others, especially as you can buy a domain name for under $10 and then point it to your Google Pages site.

One other interesting thing is the section on how to make your pages work well with Google Search. Well worth the read!

Need help setting one of these up? Contact me … and for a modest fee, I’ll talk you through the process.