Vista tools

You want to find a program you do not use very often, you know it is installed, but you just cannot find it. Windows Vista lets you search straight from the Start Menu and you do not even need to take your hands off the keyboard because the first result is already selected.

This means that you can cut down on the number of shortcuts you need to create, but it does not come naturally to some people.

Since the desktop metaphor was invented, navigating your way around a computer has been about using the mouse, and having all the icons on display. It is like having all your books and tools out and within arms reach.

The more stuff you have, the less useful this method becomes, so it is only natural that we are moving to search-centric navigation.

The search begins as soon as you enter the first characters. You can search for e-mails and websites you have visited. It searches within other documents too, so you are not limited to searching for the filename of a Word document, you can look for matches inside all the Word documents you have.

Speech recognition

There are actually some features about Windows XP that I miss because they are still the quickest way of doing things for me. It is the File Menu I am talking about here. It has been so familiar, so long I feel a bit lost without it.


If you feel the same way, just tab the ALT key and it comes straight back. In fact, you can avoid pressing the keys at all, because Windows understands your voice.

Speech recognition within Windows is not actually new. There has been support for it hidden inside Office since 2002 and you have been able to buy off-the shelf software which does this for years. But now, Windows can do all that itself.

It is still not the easiest to start though, you have to go to the Control Panel, select Ease of Access, then Speech Recognition Options.

First you have to select the kind of microphone you are using, and then train the computer to recognise how you say different types of words. Normally this involves spending 20 minutes or so reading passages from out-of-copyright books. This can get very tedious, but it is necessary if you want the results to be anything like accurate. The only other thing you will need is a good microphone.
STUMBLE IT !

Microsoft begins Windows 7 push

The first public trial, or beta, version of Windows 7 has been released.

Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer used his keynote speech at CES to announce that software developers would get at the trial version on 7 January.

On 9 January members of the public will get the chance to download the successor to Windows for themselves.

Mr Ballmer said Windows 7 would be the pivot of a broader Microsoft push to improve the way its separate software and service families work together.

In delivering the opening keynote, Mr Ballmer has taken over from Bill Gates - who in 2008 bowed out of day-to-day involvement with the company he founded.

In a nod to the chilly economic climate, Mr Ballmer said: "We face some really big challenges. We are all feeling it and its impact will likely be with us for some time."

But, he said, the global economic slowdown would not hobble the pace of technological change.

"I believe our digital lives will only continue to get richer," said Mr Ballmer. "There's no turning back from the connected world."

The newest version of the Windows operating system would, he said, be the "linchpin" of an effort to make it easier for customers to do more with the different Microsoft gadgets and services they use.

Gadget family

Although Windows 7 was a trial version it was, said Mr Ballmer, almost "feature complete" and would help to re-define the way people thought of the software.

Instead of it being an operating system mainly associated with a PC, he said, Windows was becoming a "connected platform and experience".

Microsoft is expected to cap the number of copies of the beta version of Windows 7 available to the public. The minimum requirements for running Windows 7 are a PC with a 1 Ghz processor, 1GB of RAM, 16 GB of disk space, 128MB of video memory and support for DX9 graphics.

Some of the Windows 7's features help it work with other devices. A "home group" system makes it straightforward to enrol PCs, Xbox consoles, media servers and other gadgets into a local network that can share media and content.

Demonstrations during Mr Ballmer's keynote also showed changes to Windows Live online services that let it act as a co-ordinating centre for many of the things people do on the web.

In connection with this Mr Ballmer announced a deal with Facebook which would mean any changes a member made to their page on the social networking site would be echoed on their Windows Live pages.

Another feature shown off was a "Quick Add" system that made it easy to annotate e-mail and instant messages with weblinks and other information from specific categories, such as restaurant locations, without firing up separate applications.

Another demonstration showed a phone running Windows Mobile being used to control the list of favourite TV shows and movies that customers of Microsoft's internet TV system Media Room can compile.

"Today much of the stuff we care about sits in silos; on a PC, phone or the web," said Mr Ballmer. "Your experiences are split when you move from one to another."

"Increasingly these barriers are going away," he said, adding that the internet would act as the cloud linking all three.

He predicted that the PC, phone and TV would become closely connected devices that acted as an individual's digital "ecosystem".

"Connecting all these devices together is the last mile in creating a real breakthrough experience for consumers," said Mr Ballmer.

What are the benefits Of Todays Niche Marketing Opportunities

In the earlier days of internet marketing, when the web was less populated, most folks trying make a living online didn’t really try to target a particular population with precision. Many of the products offered were of a more “universal” appeal to anyone online and the idea was simply to reach as many people as possible.

Now that the internet is populated by millions of people pursuing a variety of specialized interests, internet marketing has become far more precise in its targeting.

Today, the “buzzword” for many in the marketing business is “niche.”

A niche is a subset of a larger population that shares a particularized interest. Some niches can be quite small, others may be larger. The idea, however, that is important is that they have sufficiently similar characteristics that they can be successfully marketed to as a group.

Internet marketers look for niches that are underserved. In other words, their interest often lies with those groups that have a special core interest to which others are not yet adequately catering. If you can find a significantly sized niche group and find out what it wants, you are positioned to make a healthy profit.

Boiled down to a simple process, the niche marketing strategy works like this. First, identify a discrete niche. Second, verify that the niche is underserved by the existing market. Third, determine the type of product most likely to appeal to members of the niche. Fourth, create, locate or obtain a suitable product.

Finally, sell the product to that niche.

Each of the five steps involves research, effort and hard work.

The results, however, can be amazing. Niche marketing is a perfect example of how many existing online marketing successes work smart in addition to working hard. Internet marketers look for niches that are underserved. In other words, their interest often lies with those groups that have a special core interest to which others are not yet adequately catering. If you can find a significantly sized niche group and find out what it wants, you are positioned to make a healthy profit.

By isolating the right niche and finding the right product, they encounter little sales resistance and can post well above-average conversion rates for their efforts. Instead of competing against thousands of other marketers for business, they are able to work in an area that is far less competitive, giving them an edge.

There is, of course, a downside.

A niche, by its nature, is a subset.

It’s a smaller group.

There are only so many people you can reach and sell to within the niche. Thus, its income production potential is capped somewhat. However, most of those who succeed in niche marketing are able to produce income equivalent or exceeding that earned by those working in larger markets. They may not have as many potential buyers at their disposal, but they make up for that fact with a higher sales percentage.

If you are considering duplicating a successful internet marketing strategy, familiarize yourself with the ins and outs of niche marketing.

socialmarker-bookmarking

Social bookmarking is a powerful tool in promoting a website. But going through all of those social bookmarking sites is very time-consuming and downloading all toolbars is madness! That's where SocialMarker.com comes in, the free service designed to reduce the time and effort needed to socially bookmark a website.


All you need to do is simply drag this button to your bookmarks toolbar, in order to create a submission bookmarklet. When you are on a website that you want to socially mark, simply select the text and click the SocialMarker button to pre-populate the submission form with the selected information.

keywords picking combinations

When you’ve finished working with a keyword tool, look at the final list to determine how popular a keyword phrase actually is. You may find that many of your original terms are not worth bothering with. You’ll also find other terms near the top of the final list that you hadn’t thought about.

It’s probably a very competitive term, which means ranking well on it would be difficult. You may be better off spending the time and effort focusing on another, more relevant term. It’s difficult to optimize web pages for a whole bunch of search terms, so if you optimize for one term, you won’t be optimizing for another, perhaps more appropriate, term.

Sometimes it’s a good idea to target terms lower down on your list, rather than the ones up top, because the lower terms include the higher terms. Suppose that you have a SEO Company London site and find the following list. The numbers are the predict numbers, the number of times wordtracker believes the term is used each day.

Free Search Engine Submission thanks to: Create a Website