Create your own short url using Shorty

A week ago @ConversationAge and I twittered about tiny-URL type links. I said “building a link collection in a smarter way means having your own link profile” and that made me research the possibility of hosting my own short URL-library. At MakeUseOf I found Advantages of creating a short URL with your domain name which is about Shorty:

Shorty is a simple tool for creating shorter, human- readable links from long URLs. You install Shorty on your server, so the links you create with it never go away. You can also manage your links and see how often people click on them.

I decided to try Shorty, it is easy to install. You can read more about that at Shorty, a self-hosted alternative to URL shortening services.

Firefox and add-ons

I use Firefox as my standard web browser. Firefox is great as is but there are many add-ons that adds useful features. Here are the add-ons that I use.

All-in-One Sidebar lets you switch between bookmarks, add-ons andmore in the sidebar panel.

Cookie Monster is a great add-on that provides proactive cookie management on a site or domain level basis. Via the status bar, it provides easy access to enhanced cookie functionality.

Copy as HTML Link is great when blogging, it copies the selected text as a link, into the clipboard..

Download Statusbar lets you view and manage downloads from a statusbar, without an annoying download window.

Flashblock is terrific, it blocks Flash animations unless you either whitelist the site or click on the animation. An excellent add-on that makes sites load faster since Flash is blocked.

OpenBook improves Firefox Add Bookmark dialog.

Open Image In New Tab adds more functionality to the right click menu.

Options Menu gives easier access to options for add-ons by adding them to Firefox Tools menu.

PDF Download gives you the option to view the PDF-file in your PDF-viewer or to download the file.

QuickRestart is handy when you need to restart Firefox after enabling or disabling an extension.

Screengrab captures what you can see in the window, the entire page, just a selection or a particular frame as images – either to a file, or to the clipboard.

I also use the StumbleUpon toolbar.

Tab Mix Plus adds more features to Firefox tabs.

Greasemonkey gives you the option to run scripts. I run a package called Better Gmail 2 Firefox Extension for New Gmail which adds nice features to GMail.

I have tried NoScript (blocks scripts) and Adblock Plus (blocks ads and banners) but did not like them.

Running WordPress locally

WordPressI had a conversation with @greybucket on Twitter about design, he uses WampServer in order to run WordPress local. I had no success with WampServer, the exe-files I dowloaded were corrupt and could not be installed.

I went looking for another server software and found XAMPP for Windows. Then I followed Installing WordPress Locally Under Windows XP and got it up and running. Now I run WordPress WordPress locally and can test themes and plugins without messing up my blogs.

Update March 17,2009.
I went back to using a sandbox, a WordPress installed at my host. That gives me the option to use the sandbox from several computers.

Pixie colour picker

If you ever wonder which colors that are used at a website or blog then Pixie is the tool for you.

Pixie is an easy-to-use, fast and tiny utility designed especially to fit the needs of Webmasters and Designers. Its a colour picker that includes a mouse tracker. Run it, simply point to a colour and it will tell you the hex, RGB, HTML, CMYK and HSV values of that colour. You can then use these values to reproduce the selected colour in your favorite programs.

TweetDeck – Twitter on your desktop

TwitterI use TweetDeck which is a great software that makes using Twitter a lot easier. The multi column look is very helpful and needed to keep track of what is going on in your part of the Twitter stream. I use four columns:
• All that I follow
• Responses
• Direct Messages
• my Twitter Friends

The fourth column, Twitter Friends, is a group that I have created in Tweetdeck. It shows those I have selected to follow more closely, their tweets turns up here and is easier to find.

Learn more about How to use TweetDeck.