2Geckos Consulting, LLC

My Backups & Music are now in the Cloud

2011-10-27T14:06:00.000-07:00

I’ve uploaded 12,000 songs so far to my Amazon Cloud Drive

20GB of storage for $20yr and unlimited music storage.

http://www.amazon.com/clouddrive

I can listen or download to the music though up to 8 devices using the Amazon MP3 player for Android or almost any other device.

One bug in the Amazon Cloud Drive, or maybe I’ll call it a feature request, is the ability to use the cloud drive in my Windows 7 backup for key files. If I had an FTP location I can create a scheduled upload to my files. Additional storage is $1 per GB per year, 50GB is $50yr

Another bug/feature request is the ability to share my Cloud Drive music without requiring you to logon as me.

But this is a new service and they have been adding features but terms of use seem to prevent it.

2Geckos Consulting www.2Geckos.com
(520) 709-2079 or (602) 325-4862

2Geckos has been serving the technology needs of Arizona businesses since 1987

Dollars spent locally re-circulate locally and help to support and sustain our community.

From the Terms of Use from Cloud Player:

"...Subject to your compliance with the terms of this Agreement, we grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable right to use the Application solely for the purpose of management and playback of content that you have the right to store and retrieve and that is your own personal content (all such content, "Your Content"). You agree not to use the Application in any other way, including to store, transfer or distribute content of or on behalf of third parties, for any form of file sharing, to operate your own content application or service or to resell any part of the Application."

I disconnected my landline phone

2011-10-01T12:59:00.003-07:00

I just installed these to gadgets after I disconnected my landline phone.

My 2-Line phones now rings my cell phone on Line 1 and Skype rings on line 2.

They can also be configured to use distinctive ring to use same line.

If you want to keep you landline it will also have a distinctive ring.

This lets you send & receive cell phone calls on any phone.

Supports 3 Cell phones & landline at the same time

$54 Gigaset One 72-0435 Landline Telephone to Bluetooth.

This adapter acts as a bridge between your phone and Skype.

$40 FREETALK® Connect Me Phone - Skype Adapter

They both were extremely easy to install & configure.

Yelp.com does not support

2011-07-26T07:53:00.001-07:00

I began using yelp an reviewed several businesses then decided to create a Business Account.

When I did this Yelp deleted my original account and all of my reviews.

Have contacted Yelp for support but have had no response in 2 weeks.

Dangers of geotagging

2011-06-25T12:49:00.001-07:00

I’ve been investigating the use of Geo-Tagging of websites to improve SEO and wanted to share information from a Wikipedia article that many smartphone users may not be aware of.

Dangers of geotagging
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geotagging

Following a scientific study^[11] and several demonstrative websites,^[12][13] a discussion on the privacy implications of geotagging has raised public attention.^{[14][15][16][17]} In particular, the automatic embedding of geotags in pictures taken with smartphones is often ignored by cell-phone users. As a result, people are often not aware that the photos they publish on the Internet have been geotagged. Many celebrities reportedly gave away their home location without knowing it. According to the study, a significant number of for-sale advertisements on Craigslist, that were otherwise anonymized, contained geotags, thereby revealing the location of high-valued goods—sometimes in combination with clear hints to the absence of the offerer at certain times. Publishing photos and other media tagged with exact geolocation on the Internet allows random people to track an individual's location and correlate it with other information. Therefore, criminals could find out when homes are empty because their inhabitants posted geotagged and timestamped information both about their home address and their vacation residence. These dangers can be avoided by removing geotags with a metadata removal tool for photos before publishing them on the Internet.^[18]

TemplateMonster.com is more trouble than its worth

2011-03-07T10:13:00.000-07:00

My recent experience with TemplateMonster.com & TemplateTuning.com has made me bitter and angry. I recommend that anyone concider using them instead try one of the Free template websites, such as www.any-expression.com, www.spyka.net, www.expressionwebtemplates.org, or others.

The TemplateMonster template number: 23321 looked good but was not a search engine friendly design. It was just a series of nested tables.
My experience with template customization with TemplateTuning was terrible, they did not appear to have quality control. Nearly every edit was incorrect or incomplete.

I will never use Template Monster or Template Tuning again and will tell anyone that asks to stay away from your organization.

Dell Hell 2!

2009-12-11T20:22:00.000-07:00

Called the customer support number

Was on hold for a total of 25 min and they still couldn’t tell me why my computer was being delayed.

Someone with pretty good English answered the phone and put me on hold again when I asked for the reason for the delay, after 12 min he said he had no information but would Rush my order and send it next day delivery when it was ready.

My concern is that quality of the system, was the delay due to availability of parts or due to operating system problems. Time will tell.

Dell Hell

2009-12-11T16:52:00.001-07:00

I’ve ordered a new Dell computer on Nov 9^th for delivery on Nov 17^th.

The system has been delayed, and delayed, and delayed, and delayed, and delayed

And is now scheduled for Dec 18^th

Every week I would get a notice the it was going to be delayed, the notices gave no explanation of the delay. The only customer service I get are reminders that I can cancel my order at any time but I don’t respond to e-mail notifications, the order will be automatically canceled.

This is their only response, that they repeat if you ask any questions.

We, Dell's Delayed Order Notification Team, are solely responsible for informing our customer(s) about potential delays to the delivery of their order(s). If you would like more specific order information you may contact one of our customer care representatives at 1-800-456-3355 (Small Business) or 1-800-624-9897 (Consumer). You may also check the status of your order at www.dellcustomercare.com.

Thank you,

Dell Inc. Notification Team

Website interruption

2009-06-11T09:10:00.001-07:00

My webhost had a 24hr service interruption on Monday.

We were not alone, thousands of servers were down because of this service outage. My Webhost shares a data with many Fortune 500 companies and this data center was just in the newspaper for 100% uptime.

We have several sites and servers at this data center and we are very confident with their quality.

Here's exactly what happened.

It started out with massive thunderstorms and lightning on the East coast which created a problem with the connection from the AT&T backbone to the data center. All over the East Coast there were power outages.

They switched to another backbone connection and then the servers had to be rebooted.

Then there was an explosion in the building next door- which didn't affect the data center- but-made it necessary to switch the entire data center to generator power because the firemen turned off all of the electric around the area.

After the reboot -(it's been over a year since the server was rebooted) the server did a hard drive check to making sure that the data was all intact.

This took all night. The important part is that no data was lost during this entire process.

After the server did a hard drive check the server needed to be rebooted again.

And then all was back on-line.

Upgrading to FileMaker 10

2009-06-05T08:10:00.001-07:00

We have upgraded to FileMaker 10 and have begun upgrading our application to take advantage of some of the new features.

Newsletter Distribution Service

The Disseminator is our e-mail campaign manager www.TheDisseminator.com

I’m very happy with how well this service is working and have been adjusting the Templates to verify the formatting of the message to be sent.

FileMaker 10 supports sending of e-mail using built-in SMTP, currently we are using SMTPit Pro to distribute e-mail.

WebWizDirect is our RSS feed publishing application

WebWizDirect is a website and RSS feed publishing application www.WebWizDirect.com

The new FileMaker 10 features that will be most useful are the SMTP, Script Timer, and Field by name script step.

This will make WebWizDirect more flexible and simplify many of the scripts. Full implementation will take some work but I’m well under way.

Merchant Services reseller of Prolific Payment Solutions

2009-05-26T09:29:00.000-07:00

As your long term business partner, 2Geckos strives to continually provide you with the highest level of service offerings and has recently partnered with Prolific Payment Solutions.

We can now offer you the most competitively priced credit card processing rates in the industry. Whether you require payment gateway processing or a credit card machine for your store, we are now your one stop shop.

Prolific Payment Solutions rates are up to 33% lower than PayPal and other ecommerce providers, and up to 20% lower than major banks.

More information at http://www.2geckos.com/ww2g/ecommerce.php

Updated Policies

2009-05-19T11:35:00.001-07:00

Privacy Policy

2Geckos values the relationship we have with our customers and web site visitors, and are committed to responsible information handling practices. We take the privacy of our customers very seriously and want you to feel comfortable whenever you visit our web sites, access our online services, or participate in our online offerings.

Information We Gather

We do not gather information as you browse our web site. We do not set any cookies. When you request information we ask for your name, address, telephone number and email address. We collect contact information from all e-mail send to 2Geckos.com. This information is used to follow up with you as you, and adds you to the distribution list for our newsletters.

Third Parties

We do not share your personal information with third parties. We do not partner with or have special relationships with any ad server companies.

Use of contact information

We may contact you to make sure that you received the information that you requested. When you email us, we check the subscriber list for the newsletter and if you are not a subscriber or have not sent us an unsubscribe message, we add you to the subscriber list. We keep a record of what event added you to the newsletter list. If you choose to unsubscribe to the newsletter, we also maintain a list showing when that was done.

Our approach to responsible information handling is founded on the basis of the Fair Information Practices, the cornerstone of which is providing notice of our information practices and other privacy aspects in order to allow individuals to make informed decisions regarding personally identifiable information

We have appropriate security measures in place in our physical facilities to protect against the loss, misuse, or alteration of information that you have provided to us.

Return & Refund Policy

2Geckos offers 30-day trial versions of our software for customers to have adequate opportunity to assess the value of products prior to purchase.

We do not offer refunds on software where the activation code has already been sent to the customer.

Unlike physical goods, electronically distributed software and software licenses can be duplicated. Once a license has been issued, it is unfortunately not possible for us to recall all copies. Therefore, 2Geckos Software does not accept product returns or exchanges.

Hosting and Maintenance Contract Cancellation Policy

2Geckos will stop monthly or yearly automatic billing on any website development, database development, or web hosting, or other internet service accounts.

The cancellation of monthly, quarterly, or annual service will be done within 5 working days, starting with the date of your notification. Your account will be canceled and deleted from our system. No refunds will be issued for any unused portion of the services regardless of when you cancel the services.

To cancel your account, simply use the e-mail accounts@2geckos.com with your request to stop future billing to your account.

Please be sure to include your first and last name as well as your company name when making the request.

Non-refundable deposits

When a non-refundable deposit amount of 50% is requested, it is due at the time of the contract signing. Cancellation of any design project by either party will result is a refund to the client of all fees paid beyond the deposit amount, minus the amount already incurred in the development of the project by the date of cancellation, based on the amount of $120/hour. Cancellation refunds will be processed and delivered within 5 business days of the cancellation date.

Payment Policy

Unless other arrangements are made with 2Geckos, all 2Geckos projects require payment due upon completion.

Monthly agreements are available only with credit card, all others require quarterly or annual payments unless other arrangements are made with 2Geckos.

There is a 10% discount for quarterly contracts and a 15% discount annual contracts. There is no discount available for the past due amount.

Development Policy

2Geckos reserves the right not to accept projects that promote racism or anything that is of objectionable content.

Websites created by 2Geckos must have the statement "Website designed & maintained by 2Geckos" (and possibly include a small 2Geckos logo) placed at the bottom of each page, unless otherwise agreed upon by the client. 2Geckos reserves the right to include in our portfolio any projects created or developed by us.

Limitation of Liability

2Geckos will not be liable for indirect, special or consequential damages, or any loss of revenue or profits, arising in connection with the projects that we developed.

Project contents - All digital and non-digital materials supplied by the client to 2Geckos for project development must be, either owned by the client or given copyright permission for publication. 2Geckos is not responsible for copyright infringements found on these materials.

2Geckos policies are in effect as of May 2009, until further notice.

2Geckos reserves the right to change or update our policy, services, and prices without liability. If you have any questions regarding 2Geckos's Web Design policy please contact us by phone (520) 709-2079, or e-mail accounts@2geckos.com.

Dell Service Comments

2009-03-05T08:53:00.003-07:00

I have been using Dell since 1992 when I toured their Austin, Texas facility. It was fascinating to see Dell’s automated computer assembly line.

After working through communication problem with Dell’s support in India on Monday, parts were sent Next-Day and a technician was sent on Wednesday morning to replace my power supply and motherboard.

By noon Wednesday, 2 days after system failure, I was back on-line with all my files and settings intact.

Getting the extended warranty on my Dell computer I saved myself money and time.

In-House computer problems

2009-02-17T11:39:00.002-07:00

On Monday morning the power supply on my primary computer failed.
My system is under warranty but will take 3-5 days before I'm back on my computer and can get to any website development.
My last full backup was just 6 weeks ago and all of my drives are intact, so nothing is lost but productivity.

Cheers...
Roger

FileMaker Web server back on-line!

2009-02-07T08:03:00.000-07:00

At last, my FileMaker Server is available again.

My host, dbdom.com, has had to move my account to a new server so have to re-install my databases and licenses but it has taken over 3 weeks.

I have been told that because of performance issues they now recommend 2 servers to publish using IWP (internet web publishing). Although I agree that I want better performance I can’t justify the additional cost at this time.

Currently all of by web applications use IWP, a better alternative is PHP publishing but I am still learning to use it. I will be testing PHP publishing with the Gebhardt on-line quotes in the coming weeks.

Roger Biel RogerBiel@2Geckos.com
2Geckos Consulting, LLC www.2Geckos.com

Our Ad in the new DEX phone directory

2009-02-01T09:10:00.001-07:00

See our new ad in the Jan 09 DEX phone directory in the “Internet Web Site Developers” section.

Web Application server is down

2009-01-29T15:30:00.000-07:00

The FileMaker web server hosting service dbdom.com was recently purchased by M9 Systems and on 22^nd Jan, 09 they had a “general system failure” and went completely off-line.

This was the message I received this morning.

“They are not able to repair a configuration, only replace - they are also deciding if we are even going to offer the 1 server version for web publishing as the 2 server version is the only reliable IWP solution -

More time will be needed before the options are announced - if you are on our active list at the end of the month, there will be no charge to continue in February - we will go over options as soon as they are fully available – “

So the result is that in order to keep th same service, I will need to lease 2 servers instead on one. They said they would tell me my options next week.

Regards,
Roger Biel RogerBiel@2Geckos.com
(520) 709-2079
(602) 325-4862 NEW!

New 2Geckos Blog

2009-01-29T14:00:00.002-07:00

Hello, Just testing my new blog.

Regards,
Roger Biel RogerBiel@2Geckos.com
2Geckos Consulting, LLC www.2Geckos.com