|
Posted on April 13th, 2012
Finding icons for your software application can be tough. There are many sources of free icons that you can easily find online with a Google search. If you’re on an incredibly tight budget, but have lots of time, this can make lots of sense. The problems with this, is the amount of time it takes to find the icons you need and often times you end up with an inconsistent look and feel in your application– your icons are often pulled from many different places, and your application looks that way.
I personally prefer to buy big sets of icons. IconShock has been selling icon sets for years, and I can highly recommend their entire icon collection which is only $299 right now– that’s over 600k icons, for only $300. That’s less than $0.0005 per icon… Or roughly 20 icons per penny. Buying icons in a set like this, it’s fairly easy to find just the right icon for every part of your application, and best of all they have the same look and feel(provided you pull from the same or a similar set).
I’ve also started to make my icons larger in my applications. Traditionally, icons are only 16×16 in menus, toolbars, etc… With higher resolutions on screens, I find it’s far best to use 24×24 icons in menus and either 24×24 or 32×3 icons in toolbars. This provides a larger area for the user to see what the icon is(showing off your snazzy new icons!), identify it with the function in your software, and click.
Posted on June 28th, 2011
As of last week, the JQuery Mobile people finally released beta 1. They’ve been releasing Alpha versions for a long time now, and we’re all still waiting for a “1.0″ release… I’ve used this JQM library for some mobile development I’ve done for a client, and while it’s been nice mostly, it’s been a bit annoying all the iterations they’ve gone through– changing compatibility and some interfaces along the way…
I just loaded the beta1 version and fixed up some breaking changes, and it appears to be the best release yet. I have yet to test it with all the mobile phones, but so far it works well in Chrome, Firefox, and even desktop IE! That’s quite something, as IE support has been lacking(even though they claim they added it in alpha3 or something, it didn’t work if you had a form element on your page!!!).
Posted on April 15th, 2011
After my recent post about Google Analytics not tracking downloads accurately, I had decided to go back to counting download using a weblog parsing method. After some consideration, and the suggestion of a colleague who tracks downloads using Google Analytics himself, I’ve decided not to use that method.
The reasoning behind it, is Goal tracking in Google Analytics lets me see what traffic sources(sites and keywords) are converting best. I lose this very important marketing feature if I use the web log tracking method. Being able to track my marketing methods for Overseer Network Monitor and Employee Scheduling Pro is far more important than seeking 100% accuracy for this number.
As an alternative, I’m using a download redirect option. Now on my software websites, a user will go to the ‘download’ page to view the links to download, and click the appropriate link to download the file. This takes them to a “your download will start now” page, at which point it uses a meta http-refresh to start the download. This should work with GA better to track the downloads. I have a funnel setup to require the end user to go to the download page before the downloading page, and set a noindex meta tag on the downloading page to try to prevent Google traffic being sent directly to this page.
Posted on April 1st, 2011
About a month ago I switched to using Google Analytics. I was previously using Urchin for web analytics, and had accepted that it simply didn’t work for tracking goals, etc.(I reported this to Urchin and they refused to acknowledge it). When I switched to Google Analytics, I setup goals for tracking downloads of my Network and System Monitoring Software. This seemed to work, and replaced my weblog analysis that counted the downloads for conversion tracking.
This past Friday, I launched my Employee Scheduling Software and setup goal/download tracking the same exact way. I downloaded it a few times, and it never showed up in Google Analytics as a conversion– or as content. I analyzed what could be wrong, and found that everything was setup perfectly.
So, being a software developer, I loaded my download page up in Chrome and turned on the Javascript console. I found that when clicking the download links, it would come up with an “undefined” error, yet still allow the download to take place. With some experimentation, I found that the tracking code always fails when linking to a binary/downloadable file, but works for linking to pages… Of course, that doesn’t work for me, as I need to track downloading of files… I couldn’t find any solutions online, and I tried multiple different ways to track the downloads with GA… It appears to be browser specific(with Chrome), which is why the problem was masked with Overseer downloads… But this just makes it clear to me that I can’t trust Google’s numbers…
So, it looks like I’ll be switching back to tracking downloads from my logs… The plus side of this, is I can go back historically and won’t be limited by GA’s lack of data, lack of Javascript support on some browsers, etc… The problem is I won’t be able to see ‘goals’ inside GA’s interface… I suppose there’s worse things.
Posted on March 1st, 2011
For many reasons, many people may want to Email a text message to their cell phone. This might be used to notify themselves when their servers or websites go down– or simply to notify them of backup completion or a new sale. If you’re interested in receiving Emails when your servers or websites go down, you may want to check out Overseer, which does exactly that– it is able to send an Email to your phone when your website goes down.
If you’d like to Email a cell phone directly from your Email client, from a script, or something else, you can still do so quite easily. This has the benefit of being free for the person sending the email, but the recipient may still pay to receive the email as a text message. To send a text message to someone’s cell phone via Email, you will need to know their phone number and what cell phone carrier they use. To send a text message to a cell phone, simply send an Email to the appropriate Email address:
| AT&T |
phonenumber@txt.att.net |
| Cingular Wireless |
phonenumber@mobile.mycingular.com |
| Cricket |
phonenumber@sms.mycricket.com |
| Metro PCS |
phonenumber@mymetropcs.com |
| Nextel |
phonenumber@messaging.nextel.com |
| Sprint PCS |
phonenumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com |
| T-Mobile |
phonenumber@tmomail.net |
| US Cellular |
phonenumber@email.uscc.net |
| Verizon |
phonenumber@vtext.com |
| Virgin Mobile |
phonenumber@vmobl.com |
Remember to keep your EMails short, as the recipient will be receiving them on a small screen, and long Emails may be cut off or split between multiple text messages(and they’ll get charged for each one by their carrier). Also, if your carrier isn’t here, it may be here: Cell Phone Email Addresses.
Posted on February 28th, 2011
Most mobile phone and pager carriers provide Email gateways into their SMS/Text messaging networks, allowing for the free sending of text messages to these devices. These Email addresses sometimes change, so I’ve provided a list of SMS cell phone Email addresses here. Some of these may not work– it’s best to try sending an Email to each address for your provider and see if you get the message. If you know of a provider/Email address combination that’s not here that you know works, please contact me at dkalweit@sensiblesoftware.com so I can add it to the list. Note that messaging rates on the device may still apply. For more details, please see How to Email a Cell Phone. If you’re interested in monitoring your servers, websites, and network devices, and getting Emails to your cell phone when they go down, please check out Overseer Server Monitoring Software.
| Provider Name |
Email Address |
| 3 River Wireless |
phonenumber@sms.3rivers.net |
| ACS Wireless |
phonenumber@paging.acswireless.com |
| AT&T |
phonenumber@txt.att.net |
|
|
| AT&T Pocketnet PCS |
phonenumber@dpcs.mobile.att.net |
| Advantage Communications |
pagernumber@advantagepaging.com |
| Airtouch Pagers |
pagernumber@airtouch.net |
| Airtouch Pagers |
pagernumber@airtouchpaging.com |
| Airtouch Pagers |
pagernumber@alphapage.airtouch.com |
| Airtouch Pagers |
pagernumber@myairmail.com |
| Alltel |
phonenumber@message.alltel.com |
| AlphNow |
pin@alphanow.net |
| Ameritech Clearpath |
pagernumber@clearpath.acswireless.com |
| Ameritech Paging |
pagernumber@pageapi.com |
| Ameritech Paging |
pagernumber@paging.acswireless.com |
| Andhra Pradesh Airtel |
phonenumber@airtelap.com |
| Arch Pagers (PageNet) |
pagernumber@archwireless.net |
| Arch Pagers (PageNet) |
pagernumber@epage.arch.com |
| BPL mobile |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| BeeLine GSM |
phonenumber@sms.beemail.ru |
| Beepwear |
pagernumber@beepwear.net |
| Bell Atlantic |
phonenumber@message.bam.com |
| Bell Canada |
phonenumber@bellmobility.ca |
| Bell Canada |
phonenumber@txt.bellmobility.ca |
| Bell Mobility |
number@txt.bellmobility.ca |
| Bell South (Blackberry) |
number@bellsouthtips.com |
| Bell South Mobility |
phonenumber@blsdcs.net |
| Bell South |
phonenumber@bellsouth.cl |
| Bell South |
phonenumber@blsdcs.net |
| Bell South |
phonenumber@sms.bellsouth.com |
| Bell South |
phonenumber@wireless.bellsouth.com |
| Bluegrass Cellular |
phonenumber@sms.bluecell.com |
| Boost Mobile |
phonenumber@myboostmobile.com |
| Carolina Mobile Communications |
pagernumber@cmcpaging.com |
| Cellular One East Coast |
phonenumber@phone.cellone.net |
| Cellular One PCS |
phonenumber@paging.cellone-sf.com |
| Cellular One South West |
phonenumber@swmsg.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@mobile.celloneusa.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@cell1.textmsg.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@cellularone.textmsg.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@cellularone.txtmsg.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@message.cellone-sf.com |
| Cellular One |
phonenumber@sbcemail.com |
| Cellular South |
phonenumber@csouth1.com |
| Central Vermont Communications |
pagernumber@cvcpaging.com |
| CenturyTel |
phonenumber@messaging.centurytel.net |
| Chennai RPG Cellular |
phonenumber@rpgmail.net |
| Chennai Skycell / Airtel |
phonenumber@airtelchennai.com |
| Cincinnati Bell |
phonenumber@gocbw.com |
| Cingular Wireless |
phonenumber@mobile.mycingular.com |
| Clearnet |
phonenumber@msg.clearnet.com |
| Comcast |
phonenumber@comcastpcs.textmsg.com |
| Communication Specialist Companies |
pin@pager.comspeco.com |
| Communication Specialists |
7digitpin@pageme.comspeco.net |
| Comviq |
number@sms.comviq.se |
| Cook Paging |
pagernumber@cookmail.com |
| Corr Wireless Communications |
phonenumber@corrwireless.net |
| Cricket |
phonenumber@sms.mycricket.com |
| DT T-Mobile |
phonenumber@t-mobile-sms.de |
| Delhi Aritel |
phonenumber@airtelmail.com |
| Delhi Hutch |
phonenumber@delhi.hutch.co.in |
| Digi-Page / Page Kansas |
pagernumber@page.hit.net |
| Dobson Cellular Systems |
phonenumber@mobile.dobson.net |
| Dobson-Alex Wireless / Dobson-Cellular One |
phonenumber@mobile.cellularone.com |
| EMT |
phonenumber@sms.emt.ee |
| Edge Wireless |
phonenumber@sms.edgewireless.com |
| Escotel |
phonenumber@escotelmobile.com |
| Fido |
phonenumber@fido.ca |
| GCS Paging |
pagernumber@webpager.us |
| GTE |
phonenumber@messagealert.com |
| GTE |
number@airmessage.net |
| GTE |
number@gte.pagegate.net |
| Goa BPLMobil |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| Golden Telecom |
phonenumber@sms.goldentele.com |
| GrayLink / Porta-Phone |
pagernumber@epage.porta-phone.com |
| Gujarat Celforce |
phonenumber@celforce.com |
| Helio |
phonenumber@myhelio.com |
| Houston Cellular |
number@text.houstoncellular.net |
| Idea Cellular |
phonenumber@ideacellular.net |
| Infopage Systems |
pinnumber@page.infopagesystems.com |
| Inland Cellular Telephone |
phonenumber@inlandlink.com |
| JSM Tele-Page |
pinnumber@jsmtel.com |
| Kerala Escotel |
phonenumber@escotelmobile.com |
| Kolkata Airtel |
phonenumber@airtelkol.com |
| Kyivstar |
number@smsmail.lmt.lv |
| LMT |
phonenumber@smsmail.lmt.lv |
| Lauttamus Communication |
pagernumber@e-page.net |
| MCI Phone |
phonenumber@mci.com |
| MCI |
phonenumber@pagemci.com |
| Maharashtra BPL Mobile |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| Maharashtra Idea Cellular |
phonenumber@ideacellular.net |
| Manitoba Telecom Systems |
phonenumber@text.mtsmobility.com |
| Meteor |
phonenumber@sms.mymeteor.ie |
| Metro PCS |
phonenumber@mymetropcs.com |
| Metrocall 2-way |
pagernumber@my2way.com |
| Metrocall |
pagernumber@page.metrocall.com |
| MiWorld |
phonenumber@m1.com.sg |
| Microcell |
phonenumber@fido.ca |
| Midwest Wireless |
phonenumber@clearlydigital.com |
| Mobilecom PA |
pagernumber@page.mobilcom.net |
| Mobilecomm |
number@mobilecomm.net |
| Mobileone |
phonenumber@m1.com.sg |
| Mobilfone |
phonenumber@page.mobilfone.com |
| Mobility Bermuda |
phonenumber@ml.bm |
| Mobistar Belgium |
phonenumber@mobistar.be |
| Mobitel Tanzania |
phonenumber@sms.co.tz |
| Mobtel Srbija |
phonenumber@mobtel.co.yu |
| Morris Wireless |
pagernumber@beepone.net |
| Motient |
number@isp.com |
| Movistar |
number@correo.movistar.net |
| Mumbai BPL Mobile |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| Mumbai Orange |
phonenumber@orangemail.co.in |
| NBTel |
number@wirefree.informe.ca |
| NPI Wireless |
phonenumber@npiwireless.com |
| Netcom |
phonenumber@sms.netcom.no |
| Nextel |
phonenumber@messaging.nextel.com |
| Nextel(Brazil) |
phonenumber@nextel.com.br |
| Ntelos |
number@pcs.ntelos.com |
| O2 |
phonenumber@o2.co.uk |
| Omnipoint |
phonenumber@omnipointpcs.com |
| Omnipoint |
number@omnipoint.com |
| One Connect Austria |
phonenumber@onemail.at |
| OnlineBeep |
phonenumber@onlinebeep.net |
| Optus Mobile |
phonenumber@optusmobile.com.au |
| Orange – NL / Dutchtone |
phonenumber@sms.orange.nl |
| Orange Mumbai |
phonenumber@orangemail.co.in |
| Orange |
phonenumber@orange.net |
| Oskar |
phonenumber@mujoskar.cz |
| P&T Luxembourg |
phonenumber@sms.luxgsm.lu |
| PCS One |
phonenumber@pcsone.net |
| Pacific Bell |
phonenumber@pacbellpcs.net |
| PageMart Advanced /2way |
pagernumber@airmessage.net |
| PageMart Canada |
pagernumber@pmcl.net |
| PageMart |
7digitpinnumber@pagemart.net |
| PageNet Canada |
phonenumber@pagegate.pagenet.ca |
| PageOne NorthWest |
10digitnumber@page1nw.com |
| Pioneer / Enid Cellular |
phonenumber@msg.pioneerenidcellular.com |
| PlusGSM |
phonenumber@text.plusgsm.pl |
| Pocket Wireless |
phonenumber@sms.pocket.com |
| Pondicherry BPL Mobile |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| Powertel |
phonenumber@ptel.net |
| Price Communications |
phonenumber@mobilecell1se.com |
| Primco |
number@primeco.textmsg.com |
| Primtel |
phonenumber@sms.primtel.ru |
| ProPage |
7digitpagernumber@page.propage.net |
| Public Service Cellular |
phonenumber@sms.pscel.com |
| Qwest |
phonenumber@qwestmp.com |
| RAM Page |
number@ram-page.com |
| Rogers AT&T Wireless |
phonenumber@pcs.rogers.com |
| Rogers Canada |
phonenumber@pcs.rogers.com |
| SBC Ameritech Paging |
pagernumber@paging.acswireless.com |
| SCS-900 |
phonenumber@scs-900.ru |
| SFR France |
phonenumber@sfr.fr |
| ST Paging |
pin@page.stpaging.com |
| Safaricom |
phonenumber@safaricomsms.com |
| Satelindo GSM |
phonenumber@satelindogsm.com |
| Satellink |
pagernumber.pageme@satellink.net |
| Simple Freedom |
phonenumber@text.simplefreedom.net |
| Skytel Pagers |
7digitpinnumber@skytel.com |
| Skytel Pagers |
number@email.skytel.com |
| Smart Telecom |
phonenumber@mysmart.mymobile.ph |
| Southern LINC |
phonenumber@page.southernlinc.com |
| Southwestern Bell |
number@email.swbw.com |
| Sprint PCS |
phonenumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com |
| SunCom |
number@tms.suncom.com |
| Sunrise Mobile |
phonenumber@freesurf.ch |
| Sunrise Mobile |
phonenumber@mysunrise.ch |
| Surewest Communicaitons |
phonenumber@mobile.surewest.com |
| Swisscom |
phonenumber@bluewin.ch |
| T-Mobile |
phonenumber@tmomail.net |
| T-Mobile(UK) |
phonenumber@t-mobile.uk.net |
| T-Mobile(Austria) |
Austria phonenumber@sms.t-mobile.at |
| T-Mobile(Germany) |
Germany phonenumber@t-d1-sms.de |
| TIM |
phonenumber@timnet.com |
| TSR Wireless |
pagernumber@alphame.com |
| TSR Wireless |
pagernumber@beep.com |
| Tamil Nadu BPL Mobile |
phonenumber@bplmobile.com |
| Tele2 Latvia |
phonenumber@sms.tele2.lv |
| Telefonica Movistar |
phonenumber@movistar.net |
| Telenor |
phonenumber@mobilpost.no |
| Teletouch |
pagernumber@pageme.teletouch.com |
| Telia Denmark |
phonenumber@gsm1800.telia.dk |
| Telus |
phonenumber@msg.telus.com |
| The Indiana Paging Co |
last4digits@pager.tdspager.com |
| Triton |
phonenumber@tms.suncom.com |
| US Cellular |
phonenumber@email.uscc.net |
| US West |
number@uswestdatamail.com |
| Unicel |
phonenumber@utext.com |
| Uraltel |
phonenumber@sms.uraltel.ru |
| Uttar Pradesh Escotel |
phonenumber@escotelmobile.com |
| Verizon |
phonenumber@vtext.com |
|
|
| Vessotel |
phonenumber@pager.irkutsk.ru |
| Virgin Mobile |
phonenumber@vmobl.com |
| Virgin Mobile Canada |
phonenumber@vmobile.ca |
| Vodafone |
phonenumber@vodafone.net |
| Vodafone Italy |
number@sms.vodafone.it |
| Vodafone Japan |
phonenumber@c.vodafone.ne.jp |
| Vodafone Japan |
phonenumber@h.vodafone.ne.jp |
| Vodafone Japan |
phonenumber@t.vodafone.ne.jp |
| Vodafone Spain |
phonenumber@vodafone.es |
| Vodafone UK |
phonenumber@vodafone.net |
| VoiceStream / T-Mobile |
phonenumber@voicestream.net |
| WebLink Wiereless |
pagernumber@airmessage.net |
| WebLink Wiereless |
pagernumber@pagemart.net |
| West Central Wireless |
phonenumber@sms.wcc.net |
| Western Wireless |
phonenumber@cellularonewest.com |
| Wyndtell |
number@wyndtell.com |
Posted on February 16th, 2011
I’ve known I should be blogging on my sites for years. Recently a friend of mine finally motivated me to just do it. I really wanted to integrate the blog into my websites instead of having some disconnected look. This was difficult, as most blogging software is PHP based, and my websites are generally ASP.NET based. I looked into some .NET solutions such as BlogEngine.NET, but based on some forum posts, it didn’t appear it would integrate with my master pages very well anyways.
What I ended up doing, was creating a simple master-page based ASP.NET file in my ASP.NET project with the appropriate pieces needed for a basic WP Theme. Then, on application startup in the global.asax file, I retrieve it and write it out as index.php in the appropriate theme directory for WP. This means as I change my website’s master file, the theme will automatically be updated… The only bad part of this, is any dynamic portions of my master page will be ‘burned in’ at application startup… The master pages for my product pages aren’t generally too dynamic, so this wasn’t a significant limiting factor for me, but it may be for some.
|