AhYap’s Blog

Song Title: My Money Live Over The Ocean

Lyric:

My Money Live Over The Ocean!

My Money Live Over The Sea!

My Money Live Over The Ocean!

Oh Bring Back My Money To Me!

Bring Back! Bring Back!

Oh Bring Back My Money To Me! To Me!

Bring Back! Bring Back!

Oh Bring Back My Money To Me!

(click the play button to play dude)

This incredible WordPress audio plugin is provided by 1 Pixel Out for FREE!

(Skip this post if you don’t know what is Joomla, it is only meant for Joomla Fans)

joomla drupal phpnuke wordpress

Joomla is the MOST popular CMS today. They have a lot of users, a lot of developers, a lot of contributers, a lot of extensions and a lot of templates. I put in a very high expectation on Joomla and have play with it for the last few months. My experience ended up quite disappointed with Joomla and thus I take the time to try out over 30+ CMS, reading their documentations and users feedback. Finally, I admit that Joomla is not for me with the following problems.

#1. Joomla Uses UGLY URLs (No Built-in Friendly URL Support)

As the #1 CMS in the market, Joomla didn’t even have built in SEF (Search Engine Friendly) capability to display nice looking URL. The best built in capability is still something like www.yoursite.com/section/category/2/5 and sometimes it can be as ugly as www.yoursite.com/component/option,com_weblinks/catid,26/Itemid,45/

Long and Ugly. There are 3rd party extensions available, some are free and some are not! Installing and managing the friendly URLs do takes a lot of configurations and a lot of work. Joomla 1.5 is said to put in more attention to SEF, but it will be in 2nd phase. The current Joomla 1.5 beta still doesn’t have any improvement yet.

If you have already have a website and thinking of converting it into CMS, think twice before you choose Joomla. It’s very hard for you to configure Joomla to use your old addresses and naming. Unless you don’t mind losing your old addresses (i.e. lose all the traffic that is going to the old addresses).

#2. No Built-in Comment System!

This is really bullshit, as the so-called #1 content management system, there isn’t built in comment system support for your articles and blogs! You need to install 3rd party extensions and I tried almost all of them, but didn’t like any of them.

#3. Documents are group using Section and Category System

While there are people who like this, I prefer a hierarchy model. All documents in Joomla must be placed in a category. What that means is that if you have 2 sections call FRUITS and COLOR and categories APPLE, ORANGE and MANGO under FRUITS, GREEN, YELLOW, BLUE under COLOR, you must put your document in one of the 6 categories. You cannot put your document under FRUITS or COLOR, nor can you create subcategory under APPLE or BLUE. So everytime you create a document, you must pick 1 section and 1 category.

There are 2 problems. The first one being that if you just want a category call FAQ, you have to first create a ‘ghost’ section call FAQ that you will not use and create FAQ category under the FAQ section. So everytime you create a new item under FAQ, you need to choose FAQ under the section drop down, and then FAQ under the category drop down. This is not logical.

The second problem is already mentioned, you will not be able to have more subcategories. Even there is section and categories, note it is still 1 LEVEL only and not 2 level because you MUST put a document under a category, you cannot put it under a section!

Hierarchy method is a more logical way of grouping, you can create a 1st level call FRUIT, then 2nd level call APPLE & ORANGE and 3rd level call RED APPLE, GREEN APPLE (under APPLE). You can put you documents in any of them! Hierarchy method make more sense. That’s the way how our files are saved in our computer (directories, subdirectories, more subdirectories …) where you can save your file in any of them. That’s also the way how book are indexed (chapters, sub chapters, more sub chapters …).

#4. Poor Documentation for Developers.

Joomla core-developers are busy migrating all their Mambo codes to Joomla and they are too little effort on documentations. If you are new to Joomla and you are a hard-core PHP programmer, you will find it very difficult for you to start making extensions for Joomla. There are not enough tutorials and documentations. Maybe they think it is not worth it to make documentations for Joomla 1.0 as all their effort now is to fully migrate to Joomla 1.5.

#5. Nightmare if you want to add a little PHP code to your site!

Joomla is designed for end-users and expect everything to be easy so that grandma and grandpa can use it easily. However, if you know some PHP and wanna add some dynamic stuff to your site, it can be a nightmare! Even a simple echo “Hello World” will require you to create a complete module/mambot/component (writing XML file, a lot of joomla-integration PHP codes, etc). There isn’t a more simple way to quickly put some PHP code.

For other CMS like Drupal, MODx, WebsiteBaker, etc, you can easily add some PHP code to extend your site.

#6. A Joomla site is very fixed to its Pattern

What I mean is that you can easily recognize a site being made by Joomla by looking at a few things. Most of the time you can see from the urly URLs (look for the word component and option) This search in Google looking for both keyword in the URLs return 13 million pages

http://www.google.com.my/search?q=inurl%3Acomponent+inurl%3Aoption&btnG=Search&hl=en&safe=off

Others include the way they list our their categories with a bullet on the left and with a bracket that contain the articles count on the right. Also thanks to their Section/Category structure, you can only see a long flat list of documents listed in a category because there isn’t any hierarchy. There is also an easy recognizable filter, order, display row on top of listing. And lastly the << Start < Prev 1 Next > End >> Joomla Signature found under the listing of their documents.

Something Good About Joomla

Ok, I have bash too much about Joomla and with their fan base, I will not be able to stay alive long. So here are some praises for Joomla.

1. Should be the CMS with the most templates available! (only maybe WordPress can have a little bit more)

2. So many users that the website and forum is extremely active! Joomla.org is the top 500 most visited sites of the internet according to Alexa!

3. A very BIG and dedicated team behind Joomla. So Joomla will continue to grow rapidly in the future. You don’t need to worry that it will be abandoned like some of other CMS (or maybe wait very long for new releases).

4. Hopefully after they read this post, they will do something on it and I can blog “Why Joomla Rocks!” in 2007!

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the
ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer
be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it
wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by
istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

My mind always translate fcuk to fuck because I AM NORMAL! Waht a fcuknig brnad!

Received this Forwarded Mail and like it very much. Sharing it in my blog.

When someone tells you that you can’t do something…

Look around…

Consider all options…

Then GO for it!

Use all the things God gave you!

Be creative!

In the end, you will succeed and prove them wrong!

Always remember
“When there is a will, there is a way”

Full Respect to the Snail!

In my last post Google Domination #1 - Google Analytics (Do you know Google is using Google Analytics to Conquer the Internet?), I talked about how Google is getting a lot of important statistic about the entire Internet, by giving all webmasters a FREE professional statistic tracking software.Google Analytics is plant on a website. So a webmaster must place some code in their website. Although it is free and it provides a lot of great features to the webmaster, not all webmaster will be placing the code. There is several reasons why webmaster didn’t use Google Analytic, for examples,

1. The webmaster haven’t heard about this powerful tool yet.

2. They know about it but refuse to use it, for example, Yahoo and Microsoft will not use it!

Does that means Google is unable to track traffic going through websites that don’t have Google Analytics installed? For example Yahoo and Microsoft? Not really, Google has something call the Google Toolbar which are installed on almost all computers! You can see from here, Google Analytic is a watchdog placed on websites, while Google Toolbar is a watchdog placed on the end-users computer. Since Google Toolbar is again FREE and it provides a lot of useful features such as spell checking, ad blocking, auto form filling, etc. many people will not hesitate to install it.

Every toolbar installed is an extra eye of Google on the Internet. It allows Google to know everything that you do with your browser including what site you have visited, how long you stay there, how frequent you visit the site, what are you searching on the internet, etc. And that includes Google’s competitors sites such as Yahoo and Microsoft (BTW, Microsoft search is now renamed to Live). In other words, it do exactly what an ADWARE (also known as SPYWARE) do. ADWARE/SPYWARE are software that advertisers put on your computer to spy on what you are doing with your computer so they can serve you better ads! For example, if you are searching for cameras and your computer is infected by spyware, high chances that you will see a lot of camera ads even in other non related sites. Even worst, you might receive SPAM regarding camera ads.

(Do you know that among the Top 10 downloads in Download.com, adware remover takes the first 3 place?)

However, adware removers will not remove your Google Toolbar because it is not identified as Adware. Why? Because Google Toolbar are not using those information to serve you ads (directly), or steal your email address. But the way it track for user behaviour (sites he visits, what he is searching for, etc) is no different than an adware/spyware! It just didn’t use those data to serve you ads directly. It collects all those useful information and put them in a BIG database to generate a BIG statistics of the Internet. Its purpose is to monitor the all activities of the internet users .

With Google Toolbar, they track almost all users on the Internet. With Google Analytic, they track almost all websites on the Internet. By integrating information collected from both Google Analytic and Google Toolbar, they will have the most complete map of the entire Internet! These statistics are one of the most important asset of Google. They have started a lot earlier than their competitors, i.e. Yahoo and Microsoft. Yahoo and Microsoft are not providing any free traffic tracking tool like Google Analytics. Although they are offering their own version of Toolbar, they started too late and most users are already fall in love with Google Toolbar.

Soon or later (or maybe now?), Internet is Google and Google is Internet!

I am not trying to debate who is right and who is wrong in this blog post. That’s a boring news in the newspaper. You don’t need to read what newspaper have to say, nor did you need to know what the politicians have to say, because everything has a *pattern*. This pattern is so predicatable that if it is about stock market, I will make millions everyday.

1. Newspaper will support Pak Lah

2. Barisan members will support Pak Lah (I mean their speech, conscience is not sure)

3. DAP, Keadilan, etc (i.e. parti pembangkang, diu what is parti pembangkang in English?) will say although they won’t fully agree with Mahathir, but the goverment has to address his concern.

Unfortunately, most ordinary people cannot *see through* most things (I am not saying you, you are very smart I know ^_^). They see everything as it. As what the newspaper says, as what the politicians say. And they believe in everything they said. They can’t see the pattern behind all these.

1. Politicians don’t give speech based on their heart but give speech base on the situation and benefit. Najib must 100% support Abdullah because his future rely on him (If he want to be the next PM, he need to support Adbullah, unless he don’t want to), so as other UMNO minister that is speaking everyday in newspaper. So do you need to read anything they have to say?

2. Now this is the nice part. When today is history, Mahathir will be called the trouble maker (or stubborn old man) and Pak Lah is the hero. But what if (WHAT IF), Mahathir win the fight and Adbullah have to give up his PM seat? Wow, that is the fun part, Mahathir will now become the hero and Adbullah will become the loser. The UMNO minister who condemn Mahathir before this will now stand beside Mahathir and praise him for his good job.

As I have said earlier, I am not debating who is right or wrong. I am just saying that people who have the power usually are the one who are “right”. While the one with no power will have to be loser. All people who rely on the ‘power’ people will keep telling everyone why the powerman is right and why the powerless man is wrong. But if the powerless happen to turn the table, the same group of people will immediately change their mouth and say the other way.

Winners are always the good guy and Losers are always the bad guy.

History is written by the winners. Losers have no right to write the history. And Winners will always say why they are right and why the losers are wrong. If a winner say he is wrong, he is really something-wrong.

Can’t agree with this? Everyone think that Adolf Hitler is an evil and US is our super hero. That’s is because US win the war. What if US lose the war and Adolf Hitler rule the world? What do you think we will be studing in our history text book?! Adolf Hitler will be the good guy and US will be the bad guy!

It’s not really RIGHT or WRONG itself to decide who is RIGHT or WRONG.

It’s the WINNER who decide who is RIGHT or WRONG!

Watch this video!

Because I have to deal with Google everyday, I know quite a lot about them. I don’t care too much about their history because I am more worried about their domination of the Internet in the future! This will be 1,000,000 times more scary then Microsoft domination of the software world! Why? Because Internet will become Google and Google is the Internet. They will be controlling everything!

Let’s begin with Part 1 - Google Analytics. If you don’t run any website, it’s OK if you haven’t heard about it. For those who did run a website but never heard about it, you are REALLY OUT! Don’t call yourself a webmaster.

Google Analytics is a FREE (important keyword here FREE) web statistic analysis software provided by Google to EVERYONE (important keyword EVERYONE) who has a website (that means the whole Internet!). Google Analytics was previously known as Urchin before it is acquired by Google for 30 million in March 2005. 30 million only?!! What a pity for Urchin! YouTube was sold for 1.6 billion, that is 1,600 million!

If you don’t know what is a web analytics software, it actually gives you a whole bunch of statistics about your website TRAFFIC (visitors who came to your site). It tells you almost everything you want to know about your site traffic including the most important WHERE DID THEY CAME FROM (what search engine did they use to search for your site, what keywords did they use, which website/blog that refer them to your site…), what countries are they from, what pages did they look in your site, how many times have they came to your site, what browsers are they using, how long did they stay in your site, etc.

Google already indexed the whole Internet in their search engine. Now they are giving this professional level statistic software for FREE to everyone! Before that Urchin was charging $299/month for anyone who need the SAME service! WHY? Because they want to monitor EVERY WEBSITE and EVERY USER in the INTERNET! Do you know how scary is this now? They want to know everything about all the Internet users and all the websites. So they can draw a BIG map of the Internet and know exactly where is the ‘gold mine’, ‘oil source’, ‘osama bin laden’ of the Internet! In another word, it helps Google to know exactly where the money is! They also know exactly what to pay attention for.

If you don’t know how important these statistics are, maybe your brain are still not tuned to the online world. Just get back offline and imagine that you know exactly all the traffic (visitors) details of all the places in your country (especially businesses). You know specifically how many people visited WalMart in any specific day and hour, what did they buy and how much did they spend. You also get those info for Tesco and Ikea. You even got to know everything about the small shops around your neighbourhood. You know about the restaurants businesses, the education businesses, the plantation businesses, the medical businesses … Imagine you know almost everything, does it worth ’something’ to you?

Google Analytics allows Google to make a better search engine. This is because Google Analytics tells Google exactly which website or webpage is HOT and Google and easily take into consideration these data to rank their search results. The heart of Google is always the search and they spend millions hiring the best brain to work for them, they will do whatever they can to serve better search results. Google Analytics will be playing a very important role here.

Google Analytics has also integrated with Google Adwords (You use Adwords to advertise in Google) to track all your sales number! What that means is every business using Google Adwords and easily track their sales conversion and statistic using Google Analytic as well! All in one place. And this actually means a lot of businesses are telling Google exactly all their sales number! Are you interested in a business sales number, such as their advertising amount, their conversion rate, amount of items sold, etc?

To go one step further, Google is offering online businesses very cheap credit card processing gateway so they can easily take credit cards payments in their website. It is called Google Checkout. Again it is used to get MORE information about the Internet and I will talk about it in another Google Domination post.

Can you see Google is trying to get into every part of the PIPELINE from the source to the destination? Different services are tracking different part of the pipeline. Google Analytics are tracking the website statistics (where visitors came from) and Google Checkout will be tracking the buyers and sellers. They want to know everything!

I have been saying this for a long time. Sooner or later (or already today?) The Internet Is Google and Google Is The Internet. You got to be prepare for it!

Imagine you are using the ugly Sand King in a dota game. You farm for 90 minutes until level 25 which make you so fat and scary. You are ready to show them your ugly face in a team battle. Your turn on your BKB, stun into the 5 enemy heroes and click your E-key to launch your 3rd level Ultimate. You shake your green tail for 2 seconds and start shaking the earth like hell. The 5 enemy heroes run like chickens away from you but unfortunately they can only crawl like a snail under your slow effect. They are in deep pain and waiting to die. While you are laughing your ass off waiting for TRIPLE KILL! Here is what you get instead.

This application has encountered a critical error:

FATAL ERROR!

Google announced today that the company will acquire online video giant YouTube in a $1.65 billion stock-for-stock transaction.

The online rumor mill has been abuzz with speculation since last Friday, when word of the Google/YouTube negotiations leaked to the press. The announcement follows a busy day of announcements by the two companies, each of which went public with new partnerships with major media conglomerates today.

In a joint statement to the press, Google reps said that YouTube will operate independently and preserve its brand identity.

“Our community has played a vital role in changing the way that people consume media, creating a new clip culture. By joining forces with Google, we can benefit from its global reach and technology leadership to deliver a more comprehensive entertainment experience for our users and to create new opportunities for our partners,” said YouTube CEO and co-founder Chad Hurley. “I’m confident that with this partnership we’ll have the flexibility and resources needed to pursue our goal of building the next-generation platform for serving media worldwide.”

The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2006.

Do you know that YouTube is only 19 months old?!!!