PSLV-C9 blasts off from Sriharikota

Setting a world record, India's Polar rocket on Monday successfully placed ten satellites, including the country's remote sensing satellite, into orbit in a single mission.
India's PSLV-C9 blasted off into space, carrying ten satellites including the country's latest remote sensing satellite CARTOSAT-2A, from ISRO's Satish Dhawan Space Centre here on Monday.
Scientists cheered as the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, in its thirteenth flight, soared into the clear sky in a perfect lift off at 9.23 am from the second launch pad.

PSLV-C9 is carrying:

• India’s latest Remote Sensing satellite, CARTOSAT-2A

CARTOSAT-2A weighing about 690 kg carries a state-of-the-art Panchromatic camera (PAN) that is capable of taking black-and-white pictures in the visible region of the electromagnetic spectrum.

• Indian Mini Satellite (IMS-1)
  
• Eight nanosatellites built by universities and research institutions in Canada and Germany are also being launched under a commercial agreement with Antrix Corporation. The weight of these Nanosatellites vary from 3 to 16 kg with a total weight of about 50 kg.
  

No vulnerabilities are being exploited : Microsoft

Microsoft Corp. late Friday denied that vulnerabilities in its Web and SQL Server software had been exploited to hack hundreds of thousands of Internet pages.

"Our investigation has shown that there are no new or unknown vulnerabilities being exploited. This wave is not a result of a vulnerability in Internet Information Services or Microsoft SQL Server," said Bill Sisk, a communications manager at Microsoft's Security Response Center, in a note posted to the group's blog.

Sisk said the post was in response to reports that over half a million pages, including some belonging to the United Nations, have been compromised by SQL injection attacks. Once hacked, those sites were modified to download malware to visitors' PCs.

Early on Friday, Panda Security said it had notified Microsoft of what it called a "security issue" in the company's Web server, Internet Information Services (IIS). However, Panda stopped short of dubbing the problem a "vulnerability."

Sisk said that the site hacks were essentially run-of-the-mill SQL injection attacks. "[They] are not issues related to IIS 6.0, ASP, ASP.Net or Microsoft SQL technologies," he claimed.

Microsoft's IIS team also chimed in to deny that the attacks were exploiting any bugs, known or not, in its software. "For end users, the investigation also shows no indication of an unpatched vulnerability in IIS, SQL Server, Internet Explorer or any other Microsoft client software, so we recommend customers apply the latest updates to be protected from these attacks," said Bill Staples, an IIS product manager, in an update posted to the software's support forum on Friday night.

And although there has been speculation that the attacks were related to a vulnerability mentioned in an April 17 advisory, Sisk said that wasn't true either. "We have also determined that these attacks are in no way related to Microsoft Security Advisory 951306," he said.

Sisk and Staples urged Web site developers to follow Microsoft's guidelines to protect their domains from SQL injection attacks.

Source: computerworld

Recycled plastic material

Long ago(in 1862 to be precise) first man-made plastic was created by Alexander Parkes.But even Parkes wouldn't have imagined the different ways in which plastic has become a part of day to day life. Everything that was big and bulky was replaced by light and richly colored plastic.Being a cheap,throwaway substance plastic found many applications like bags,water bottles, cups etc.But this wide range of applications has alongwith it ,brought its own set of problems. The Plastic bottles take 700 years before they even begin to decompose in a landfill.Currently there are hundreds of billions of bottles in the landfill with more billions adding up every year.This posses a serious threat to the environment and this problem can only be solved by using recyclable plastic materials like HDPE( High Density Poly Ethylene).Due to this recyclable materials plastic can be used over and over.
HDPE has characteristics like stiffness, strength, toughness, resistance to moisture, permeability to gas. It is used for many packaging applications because it provides excellent moisture barrier properties and chemical resistance.In HDPE Film form it is used for snack food packaging and cereal box liners.General uses of HDPE include bread trays, films for grocery sacks, HDPE Milk Bottles and household chemicals and injection-molded beverage cases.
Because of its chemical resistance HDPE has many applications in industrial sector as well.

Suspicious Orkut albums will be opened to police

Google is to give Brazilian police access to 3,261 private photo albums on social networking website Orkut, which may contain child pornography.

The move is part of a strategy announced by the head of the company in Brazil, Alexandre Hohagen, to a Senate Committee set up to investigate cases of paedophilia in the country.

During a hearing this week, Alexandre Hohagen and Felix Ximenes, director of communication for Google Brazil, claimed they are currently implementing more effective image filters that will detect and prevent the uploading of child pornography.

Ximenes told The Register the new filter is 60 per cent more efficient than the current technology. "But I can't tell how you it works, or we would just be telling how to fool it and throwing away months of development."

Orkut has more than 60 million users, most of them in Brazil. According to Sergio Suiama, the federal prosecutor for Sao Paulo, in the last two years nearly 90 per cent of the 56,000 complaints in Brazil about net-based paedophilia were linked to the website.

Ximenes said that until September 2007, all requests for information about users suspected of crimes such as racism or paedophilia were sent to Google US to be examined.

"But since then we have been dealing directly with that, providing the police with user IPs and navigation logs whenever it is requested. It's happened in more than 1,000 cases so far."

He said giving investigators personal information about suspects and access to their private albums "is not an issue", but conceded that Google has not yet received any official communication, so he can't say when this information is to be handed out.

Ximenes and Hohagen told the Senate panel that Orkut will keep users' navigation logs for six months, instead of the current 30 days.

However, he explained there was a legislative grey zone regarding child pornography in Brazil.

Every time abuse is reported within Orkut, the administrators must immediately delete the images, destroying the proofs.

"There is no Brazilian legislation ruling these situations, and according to US law, if we keep these images or forward them to anyone else we are committing a crime," says Ximenes. "We are only allowed to forward them to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, in the United States, before deleting them from our database."

He says the company is working on a collaboration between Brazilian authorities and the US organisation.

The private photo albums, considered by some as a safe haven for criminals, were introduced in November 2007, and allow users to block access to the pictures by anyone outside their direct network.

"We created this to protect the privacy of those who didn't want personal pictures to be seen by anyone," says Ximenes. "And it is being well used by the majority of the users."

Google apparently has no plans to disable this option. "Every technology can be used for good or evil. What we are doing is trying to stop and prevent bad ways of using this technology," says Ximenes. ®

Source: The Register

Video of Vista running 100 apps simultaneously

"I'm runnin a stock Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 with 4GB of RAM. I counted 108 apps total and gave up bored after I had running anything from Photoshop, Visual studio 2008, Office professional 2007, Safari, and Media Center all the way down to that rescource hog, Minesweeper"

read more | digg story

Office 2007 tips and tricks

• Copying a Worksheet:

Here’s how to copy a worksheet to another place in your Excel workbook:
1. Click the tab of the worksheet that you want to copy.
2. Leave your mouse pointer on the tab.
3. Press and hold down the CTRL key.
4. Press and hold down your left mouse button and drag the worksheet that you want to copy to the left or right. Watch for the little black arrowhead that follows your mouse pointer as you drag left or right.
5. When you release the mouse button, Microsoft Office Excel inserts a copy of the worksheet where the arrowhead is pointing.

• Customize Your Quick Access Toolbar

In each 2007 Microsoft Office system program where you see the Ribbon (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and parts of Outlook), you also see a Quick Access Toolbar, which appears by default above the Ribbon, beside the Office button. To add the commands you use most to the Quick Access Toolbar in each program, right-click a command on the Ribbon, and then click Add to Quick Access Toolbar. You can also click the arrow that appears at the right edge of the Quick Access Toolbar, and then click More Commands to open the Customize tab of the Options dialog box for the program you are using. In this box you can add commands that don’t appear on the Ribbon, or create a custom Quick Access Toolbar for an individual document or template.

• For Microsoft Office Outlook 2007

Use Search to Find E-Mail Messages
In Microsoft Office Outlook, e-mail search helps you locate messages by keyword or phrase. You can also use search folders to find mail by type of message.

To locate specific keywords or phrases within e-mail messages:
Type a word or phrase in the Search box at the top of your Outlook Inbox. The search starts automatically as soon as you stop typing. Search results will appear in the main window of your Inbox. To return to your normal Inbox, click Clear Search (the green ×) to the right of the Search box.

You can enable search folders from the mail pane on the left of your Inbox. To expand the folders tree, click Search Folders. Outlook comes with three default search folders: For Follow Up, Large Mail, and Unread Mail.

To add new search folders, click File, point to New, and then click Search Folder.

• To build a custom search folder:

1. Click Search Folder, and then either click a predefined folder name, or scroll down and click Create a custom Search Folder.
2. Click Choose, give the new folder a name, and then click Criteria to fill in the search terms.

• 2003 to 2007 Document Information Panel

With the Document Information Panel in Microsoft Office Enterprise 2007 and Office Professional Plus 2007, you can edit document properties directly in the program.

1. Click the Office button, and then click Prepare.
2. Click Properties. The Document Information Panel appears below the Ribbon.
3. Enter the appropriate information and save the document.

Keep in mind, search engines like the ones included in Windows Vista and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 use document properties to deliver search results that are more relevant. So if you want to make something easier to find, make sure your document properties are up to date.

• For Microsoft Office Outlook 2007

Choose a Signature for Different Recipients in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007
If you want to use a different e-mail signature for different recipients (a different one for coworkers than for customers, for example), you can change your signature with two mouse clicks. Right-click your signature, and then click the other signature that you want to use.

• Zooming to Fit a Selection

1. Select the range of cells that you want to focus on.
2. Click the View tab, and then click Zoom to Selection.

• Fine-Tuning Objects in Presentations

When working with text in Microsoft Office PowerPoint, you can use the F2 key to switch between selecting text in a placeholder and selecting the placeholder itself. So the next time you've edited some text and want to reposition it on the slide, instead of clicking the tiny edges of the box, just press F2. The entire text box will instantly be selected for you, ready for alignment.

Expand your social network with 3gb.biz

Missing your old friends? Sick of all those boring social networking sites?
3gb.biz community is a relatively new social networking site where you can connect with your old friends and upload your photos ,mp3s , blog about things you like.You will be able to chat with your friends and hear your favorite music tracks. The community provides excellent privacy features which are hard to find anywhere else. As a user you can keep your profile private so that only users permitted by you will have access to.A blocked user list is also provided so that you can block someone from contacting you.You can blog about anything from rocket science to your personal life,the good blogs get listed on the homepage which is really cool. So join the community and start inviting your friends.

ASUS G35: World's First Platform with onboard DirectX10 support

Looks like Vista is finally getting the manufacturer support it needs.With this announcement Asus unveiled new motherboards, which are the world's first to provide an Intel platform with an onboard integrated VGA solution that features built-in support for Windows Vista DirectX 10.
"The ASUS´ Intel G35 chipset motherboards allow users to enjoy enhanced Microsoft Vista DirectX 10 graphics on a motherboard solution “right out of the box”. This series of motherboards are the world´s first to provide an Intel platform with an onboard integrated VGA solution that features built-in support for Windows Vista DirectX 10."

The Asus motherboards with IGPs supporting DirectX 10 include the ASUS P5E-V HDMI, P5E-VM HDMI and the P5E-VM SE motherboards.

The Asus P5E-V HDMI features the Intel G35/ICH9R chipset, 1333/1066/800 MHz FSB, Dual-channel DDR2 800/667/533 MHz, 12xUSB 2.0, HDMI and Intel GMA X3500 Graphics chipset with Quad VGA output support.

The Asus P5E-VM HDMI is similar to the P5E-V, but only has dual display support.

The P5E-VM SE has fewer features than the above two and only supports one display and has no HDMI.

All of the above motherboards support Intel's latest 45nm processors.

Microsoft, HCL launch world's cheapest laptop

Microsoft Corporation and HCL Infosystems on Friday announced a series of joint initiatives, including launch of world's cheapest ultra portable laptop and setting up of centre of excellence, which will employ over 500 professionals.

Priced at Rs 16,990, MiLeap brand of HCL laptops with Microsoft Windows XP Home operating system is the lowest priced among the MS operating system powered laptops, the company officials said.
Source:The Economic Times

SONY ERICSSON W810i : Review

SONY ERICSSON W810i:
Size:
Dimensions: 100 x 46 x 19.5 mm
Weight: 99 g

Display Type: TFT, 256K colors
Display Size: 176 x 220 pixels, 28 x 35 mm
Wallpapers, screensavers available.

Ringtones
Type: Polyphonic (40 channels), MP3
Composer, downloadable available.

Memory
Phonebook: 1000 x 24 fields, Photo call
Call records: 30 received, dialed and missed calls

Card Slot : Memory Stick Duo Pro (up to 2GB), 512 MB card included and 20 MB shared memory

GPRS :Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps

HSCSD :No

EDGE :Class 10, 236.8 kbps

3G :No

WLAN :No

Bluetooth :Yes, v2.0

Infrared Port :Yes

USB :Yes, v2.0

Features

• Messaging

• SMS, MMS, Email, Instant Messaging

Browser : WAP 2.0/xHTML, HTML (NetFront)

Games : Yes + downloadable

Colors :Satin Black, Fusion White

Camera :2 MP, 1632x1224 pixels, autofocus, video, flash


- MP3/AAC/MPEG4 player
- Video player
- Java
- T9
- FM radio with RDS
- Image viewer
- Picture editor
- Organiser
- Voice memo
- SyncML
- Built-in handsfree

Battery :Standard battery, Li-Ion

Stand-by :Up to 350 h

Talk time :Up to 8 h

Overall verdict:
Bluetooth is solid for transferring files and working with Bluetooth headsets. A 512MB Memory Stick Duo card is bundled with the phone and has the capability to upgrade to 2GB storage for photos and music.This really cool gadget with xenon flash and price less than 10000 is a must buy.

Gmail and yahoo! mail : new dens of a spammer

Since the day i got my first mail ID, i have been getting spam mails. And it wasn't before long that these mails used to carry obscure(read crap) addresses as sender with no reply possible.But the scenario has changed dramatically with spammers realizing the worth of having a reliable looking address. Just before few months there was a story about some hack used to compromise CAPTCHA* (you might have seen this in action many times).This hack allowed users(read spammers) to bypass the word verification which traditionally is used to tell humans and software robots apart.

There are different antispam measures taken like blacklisting any suspicious IP so that it will no longer be useful.But most of the times these IPs belonged to someone who had no idea of the abuse.But services like Gmail and Yahoo! are highly popular,free and highly unlikely to be blacklisted a spammer gains a lot by using these.

Anti-spam filtering services such as MessageLabs have responded by throttling or slowing down the connection. "We're seeing more spam coming from Gmail and Yahoo!. Where a service is widely abused its reputation goes down and it's held back in the queue. This happens automatically," explained MessageLabs security analyst Paul Wood.

The approach, one stage in a multi-stage scanning and filtering process, is designed to make life difficult for spammers using botnets(a software robot that runs automatically) to send spam through compromised webmail accounts.

"These traffic management controls are not designed to block messages, they are intended only to slow down their transit. For messages that are subsequently blocked there should be a reason given in the non-delivery report," Wood told El Reg.

An analysis of spam trends in February 2008 (the last available monthly figures) by MessageLabs revealed that 4.6 per cent of all spam originates from web mail-based services.

The proportion of spam from Gmail increased two-fold from 1.3 per cent in January to 2.6 per cent in February, most of which spamvertised skin-flick websites. Yahoo! Mail was the most abused web mail service, responsible for sending 88.7 per cent of all web mail-based spam.

It was first thought that automated tools were used by spammers to defeat security checks and establish webmail accounts that might later be abused to send junk. More organisations are coming around to the theory, first floated by Brad Taylor, a Google software engineer, that bots are signing-up for accounts before sending the puzzles to real people.

Source: The Register

With mighty GOOGLE having registered this little problem atleast Gmail users can rest assured that it wont be long before their mailbox becomes spam free again.


*CAPTCHAs typically help ensure that online accounts can't be created until a user correctly identifies letters depicted in an image. The tactic is designed to frustrate the use of automated sign-up tools by spammers and other miscreants

The Zen of Blogging-an ebook every blogger should read

Why do bloggers blog?
Thats the million dollar question.For most it is about sharing their ideas,thoughts or just ranting about things they like.For rest it is about making money and to be honest i belong to this group.But this is not as simple as it seems to be.There are just so many factors to consider like choosing the niche ,writing style etc.A new blogger like me looks up to people like Darren or Steve and try to figure out right methods for optimizing blog,increasing visitors.But every one of these established bloggers have their own style and unique way when it comes to this.So till now i was just too confused to get up and running with my blog as i had become unsure even about my niche.There were just too many questions to find answers for.Fortunately i subscribed to problogger last month and i got a real treat in my mailbox today.The article spoke about an ebook from Hunter Nuttall. When i opened it (its free you see) i was pleasantly shocked to see that this ebook wasn't that conventional "make money from blogging" ebook at all. The book answers almost all the important questions a blogger may or may not face in most funny manner i have ever read in this category.
I am quite sure that should he take to full time writing Hunter will be a serious competition to JKR. He has explained most important things like choosing niche,platform,domain names in simplest possible language that one can read this book as bedtime story.
Download the ebook from here

PS:
On sixth page he says his "vista with IE7" didn't crash even after opening many pages in tabs at a time. This just proves that he was actually dreaming about all this.

Accepting Payments Online: An ECommerce Web Site Overview

There are a seemingly infinite number of choices and configurations to accepting payments online. Choices range from almost total "do it yourself" programming to turnkey packages.

You can accept online payments from an ECommerce Web site in two general ways:

1)Through your own online merchant account and/or
2)Through a third party online payment processor.

Accepting Payments Online through your own Internet Merchant Account

Accepting payments online via a merchant account puts you in control and limits your reliability on outside payment acceptance services. This approach can also seem like a jigsaw puzzle. Besides an Internet merchant account, you will need shopping cart software, a store or site host, a processor, and a secure payment gateway.

You may fit these pieces together in several different ways. On one end of the spectrum, you can choose the provider for each piece individually. On the other end, you may choose a turnkey solution, where a single provider has completed the puzzle for you.

There is no single best solution. Your choice will depend on your particular needs and experience. Among other considerations, you should factor in your own comfort with the technologies, customer convenience, providers' service levels, available technical support, reliability, costs, and time commitment involved.

Fees

There are a myriad of potential costs and fees involved in accepting payments online, making it difficult to compare different options.

Potentially, you could be charged fees by each provider involved in helping you accept payments online - application fees, set-up fees, yearly memberships, monthly statement charges, monthly minimums, gateway access fees, statement fees, fixed transaction fees, variable transaction discount rates (processing fee for each transaction), and cancellation penalties are all common.

Often, it is easy to misinterpret the fees you will owe. Rarely are all costs revealed in one place. If you are reading about a merchant account, for example, the quoted costs may not include gateway access, hosting, and/or shopping cart. Because you may be comparing "apples to oranges", options that at first appear low-cost can - upon implementation - turn out to be pricey. Similarly, expensive-sounding solutions may actually be reasonably priced.

Accepting Payments Online through a Third Party Online Payment Processor

If you are not ready to set up your own online merchant account and/or you want to offer additional online payment options, you can turn to a variety of third party online payment processors.

Third party online payment processors provide a way to accept payments online without the extra cost and obligation of a merchant account. To compensate, transaction fees and/or discount rates are significantly higher than for merchant accounts.

Each program is a little different and no single third party payment processor is right for all situations. Clickbank, for example, helps you sell digital products online. At last check, CCNow processes payment for tangible items only.

Deciding What's Best for You

Whether you accept payments online through an Internet merchant account, through a third party payment processor, or both, read all agreements carefully before committing. Do not hesitate to ask the providers questions if information is unclear or incomplete.

There is more information about accepting payments online - including explanations of merchant account fees, finding the right ecommerce providers, and third party payment processor overview - on the ecommerce information site Take-Payments- Online.com, here.

Put together the "puzzle pieces" for accepting payments online and your ecommerce Web sales will flourish!
About the Author

Bobette Kyle is publisher of the ecommerce information site http://www.Take-Payments-Online.com . She is also proprietor of The WebSiteMarketingPlan.com Network, subject-specific Web sites designed to help you find the right information for writing and implementing your marketing plan.

Earn money from home

Want to earn real money online?
Yes?
Then finally you are at the right place.Just spare a few minutes and go on reading.

Since 1998, SFI has been leading the Internet income revolution with its cutting edge affiliate program that empowers even average people to earn $20, $50, even $100 per hour working from their home computer.

SFI has shown millions of men and women from over 200 countries worldwide how to cash in on the Internet. In fact, our system is so successful that OVER 8000 people join SFI every week!

SFI is totally FREE for affiliates to join. And there's absolutely NO OBLIGATION. SFI provides you with FREE Websites, a FREE course that teaches you everything you need to know to make money online ($295 value), and hundreds of exciting products to stock your online store shelves with.

Plus, SFI takes care of all orders, product shipments, and customer service for you. You just have to cash the commission checks!

Want to know more. Here is "open sesame" of your fortune.

Blogs, Podcasting and RSS | eCommerce Impact

Blogs, Podcasting, and RSS Overview You probably have heard all these terms an awful lot lately. You wonder about what these technologies do? What value to they provide? If you aren't up to speed on these new applications and how they are impacting online interactions then read this brief further. Will these technologies impact you? To be honest, it's too early to tell - but awareness will drive innovation and maybe your team will develop an idea/application that utilizes these technologies to enhance a portion of your eCommerce business.

Here's the rundown: Blogs What they are: Probably the most well known of the three, blogs allow everyday people to quickly develop a website presence and distribute any type of content that they desire. Look at the metrics relating to blog penetration.

* 7% of the 120 million U.S. adults who use the internet say they have created a blog or web-based diary. That represents more than 8 million people.

* 27% of internet users say they read blogs.

* Only 38% of all internet users know what a blog is. The rest are not sure what the term "blog" means. What a "blog" actually means is weblog. In basic terminology, it's the ability for someone to update web content directly though the Internet, using a web browser as the publishing mechanism. This makes the creation of content easy and many people are using blogs to establish authority sites within unique business and hobby/interest niches. Where blogs impact online retail most is within these targeted online communities. Certain blog authors develop a large base of specific visitors, hence the site becomes a potential target market for viral marketing efforts. Many web entrepreneurs us this functionality to develop affiliate hubs within niche markets, and use search popularity to beat out larger retailers within corresponding natural search results.

By integrating your brand image within the site experience at that SPECIFIC blog, you as an online marketer are able to segment your marketing PRIOR to converting someone as a customer. It is a place to communicate with current and potential customers about current offerings/promos while boosting the credibility of the brand. Should you care: If you have a very unique value proposition, or sell to a very specific or high-value customer segment, blogs can be a great way to increase overall brand awareness. You can better connect with your customers and provide detail into the current happening within the business (ex. Current sales on XBOX 360). Potentially, one person within your organization should own the monitoring of blogs within


your vertical and look to post new content to meet the needs within the unique blog community.

Podcasting What it is: Pocasting should be just called mobile video broadcasting. However, Apple's marketing/development team did a great job with branding their device to a type of emerging media - hence the term podcasting! Similar to traditional radio and television, mobile video broadcasting delivers branded content in either a paid/free environment, on someone's mobile media player (Apple only does video currently, but that will change shortly). Retailers can potentially use this communication channel to deliver targeted content to their customer base, while integrating advertising within the video content.

Should you care: Not really. Until video podcasting penetration increases, it's still a limited channel for advertising. The best application available right now would be an online audio content segment that is digitally delivered to an opt-in list. As technology advances, you can potentially do this from your current opt-in page on your website and not from Apple's iTunes platform.

RSS RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication and is a method for electronic content distribution. RSS is transmitted via the internet, but what makes it unique is that no downloading efforts are needed by the end receiver of the content. The content streams instateneously within a webpage.

Advanced consumers have RSS news readers on their computers, either integrated into an email client, or utilize an aggregated web application such as News Gator. This essentially saves them time in aggregating all new and updated content that meets their interests. Already gaining steam in the travel industry and within comparison shopping engines, RSS seems to be a valuable way to push news and time sensitive offers to customers. Travel companies are able to provide a streaming supply of last minute airfare offers to their customer segments, without that customer having to open an email or visit a webpage.



Should you care: It completely depends on the nature of your business. Do you consistently offer new prices? Do you obtain new products to your assortment consistently? Do you have a customer base that is extremely loyal that you want to reach out to with messaging? If so, RSS may another channel to help build your brand. Call us today to learn more about these technologies and the potential impact they can have in reaching your customers with targeted messaging and fresh content.

About the author:

http://www.trinityinsight.com

Ecommerce Solutions Compared

There are dozens, perhaps hundreds of businesses and organizations eager to assist and sell product online.

Basically, they fall into four categories:

• credit card transactions,
  
• digital cash transactions,
  
• electronic fund transfers and telephone billing systems

The right choice for you depends upon your specific business requirements.

1. Merchant Internet Accounts.
Pros: Consumers are familiar with credit cards with credit card transactions, consumers dont have to download and install special plug-in. Credit card sales lends itself to impulse buying.

Cons: Consumers still have concerns regarding providing financial information online. This method does not lend itself well to the purchase of down loadable soft goods, such as software, art, graphics, etc

2. Electronic Cash Transactions.
Electronic money is an arrangement whereby the customer pays for the merchandise using, well, electronic money. Examples of this are the well known DigiCash, Cyberbucks, CyberCash, etc.
Pros: No credit card transactions are required. No concerns re charge backs. Lends itself well to micro payments.

Cons: Many people are unfamiliar with the concept and shy away from unknown entities. Eliminates the possibility of impulse buying, unless both customer and merchant are already in same scheme. May not be available globally.

3. Electronic Fund Transfers.
Funds are transferred electronically from the customer's bank account to yours. The best known method is the issuing of electronic checks.
Pros: No credit card worries. Available to persons who dont have credit cards

Cons :A very new technology that some perceive as being less secure than other forms of ecommerce. Many customers arent set up to issue electronic cheques; time required to make the arrangements eliminates impulse buying. May not be available to international consumers.

4. Telephone Billing Systems A very new approach, telephone transactions allow the customer to purchase an item or service, and the amount is billed to his or her telephone bill.
Pros: Eliminates worries about credit cards (for both consumer and merchant) Safeguards soft merchandise no possibility of theft or pirating.
Cons: Customer is required to download and install a plug-in. currently only available for soft merchandise but can do some limited transactions for hard goods. Currently available for sales using telephone modems and will not work for transactions over cable modems and ISDN lines.

For more information on credit card processing,please visit http://www.paynetsystems.com

Ecommerce Hosting Considerations

Website hosting can be a complex undertaking. Determining how much space you need, how much transfer, finding a reliable host, and getting everything online is no simple task. Add ecommerce to the mix and things become even more complex. This article will deal with some of those additional complications to finding a host for an online store. All of the same considerations to finding general hosting can be applied to ecommerce hosting, there are simply a few additional ones that need some attention.

Basics- Disk Space and Transfer

The core states of any kind of hosting, ecommerce or not, remain space and transfer, or traffic. Generally measured in monthly increments, your space and transfer will place a crucial role in determining just what size plan you need. Ecommerce sites will, generally speaking, require more space and transfer than an equivilant sized site without ecommerce. This is due to the presence of the shopping cart upon which the online storefront is based. Shopping cart programs are installed to the account on which they operate, requiring space, and their scripts for running the store will require additional transfer to handle customers as they browse, add items to their cart, and check out. Will there be a tremendous amount of extra transfer required by the cart? That depends on how many use the cart and on the cart itself. This is why its best to start small and having a clear upgrade path to handle future popularity.

Prospective online merchants will generally have a good idea how many products they'll be selling initially. This will vary wildly from merchant to merchant, and many merchants don't put their entire stocks online. It is wise to start with a considered selection of products first, especially if you wish to initially keep your hosting plan small and upgrade as the store prospers. Those with a great deal of products need to be aware they will probably be facing a bigger monthly fee for a larger hosting plan. Once the decision is made regarding the products, attention can be turned to finding a suitable shopping cart program to contain them.

Shopping Cart

The choice of shopping cart can be a personal one. Those entirely new to ecommerce will probably not have any experience with any kind of shopping cart software. There are a number of popular choices, and most hosting companies will provide one, if not a variety, from which you can choose. It is important to find a shopping cart that suits the individual user, as attempting to change your shopping down the road can be a long process that will, most likely, bring your store down during a transitional period. Don't immediately jump at the first cart a host offers. Ask if they have demos and try them out. Be sure it's a program you can learn and use, as it is the primary way you'll be doing your online business. Even if you have a large business and have a design firm setting up the cart, a rudimentary knowledge of the cart's processes is highly recommended.

Learn as much about your prospective shopping cart software as possible. Make
sure it supports SSL, a common site security protocol that will help keep your customer's credit card numbers safe when ordering online. It will need to support your merchant account and payment gateway. In many cases a host might bundle these services, so compatibility isn't an issue. If you secured your merchant services separately from hosting, be sure they are compatible. Find out if the cart has a recommended maximum product limit and, of course, try not to exceed it. The store may slow down and perform poorly if there are too many products in it.

Finally, make sure it will do everything you want it to do. Some merchants sell services and downloadable items that don't conform exactly to the order-product-ship-product flow. If your cart doesn't support these features by default, there may be 3rd party add-ons that will provide this functionality. Miva Merchant is one such shopping cart with a very active 3rd party developer community providing a wide range of add-ons, or "modules" to extend the feature set of the original program. The merchant will have to buy these add-ons and have them installed on their own initiative, though, and the hosting company will not be able to support them.

Reliability and Support

Perhaps of greatest importance is reliability in your chosen host. Think in terms of a "brick and mortar" storefront. If someone locks the front door during business hours, then no customers can come in and nothing is sold. Similarly, if an online store is down at any hour, no customers can come in and nothing is sold. You want the most reliable hosting for such a mission-critical site. Never just take the word of a hosting company's site in regards to their uptime. Do research and look for customer reviews of your prospective host. Online merchants should always be willing to pay more for a reliable hosting company with good uptime and support. A good rule of thumb is to stay away from free or "bargain basement" hosts, since support and uptime are usually the first things to suffer with this kind of hosting.

Conclusions

Finding the right ecommerce hosting company requires a few additional considerations. Decide on your products, your shopping cart, and then shop for your hosting company. You will need more space and transfer than an equivalent site, but start small with your product selection and you can still save money on your hosting. Find a shopping cart that's easy for you to use and understand, as switching at a later date can result in downtime and a lot of work transferring your products. Finally, make sure your host has solid uptime, as an online store that's down isn't generating any sales.

About the Author

Mr. Lester has served for 4 years as the webmaster for http://www.apollohosting.com and previously worked in the IT industry an additional 5 years, acquiring knowledge of hosting, design, and search engine optimization. Apollo Hosting provides website hosting, ecommerce hosting, vps hosting, and web design services to a wide range of customers.

Must have apps for FIREFOX

The best but relatively unused firefox extensions:

• Fast video download:

For me this is best of the lot. As youtube does not provide any option for downloading videos the only way was to use sites like Keepvid. Fast video download solves this problem and provides an option to download youtube videos at the right corner of browser.

• PicLens :
  

PicLens instantly transforms your browser into a full-screen 3D experience for viewing images across the web. Makes browsing through pictures a wonderful experience. The interactive 3D Wall and built-in search function, lets you effortlessly drag, click, zoom, and zip your way around a wall of pictures for an amazing viewing experience.

• Snap Links
  

This is another great tool that saves a good deal of time by allowing selection and opening of multiple links at once.Especially useful while searching for something.

• Tab Scope:

With Tab Scope you can hover over a tab to get an instant preview of the web page. The cool thing is you have real time navigation, zoom, and you can even click on links without having to switch tabs.

• Reminder Fox:

This is for people like me who can never stop surfing unless made to.This cool app. allows to set reminders.

• Download Statusbar:

You can view and manage downloads in a small status bar in the corner of the screen, without having that download window get in your way.

• HyperWords:
  

This one makes a newbies job really simple.Suppose you are browsing a fairly advanced site that deals with operating system concepts then you may encounter many new terms and get stuck, with this add-on enabled just hover over the particular term and find its exact meaning

• Tab Effect

It adds a nice effect to Firefox by simulating a 3D cube being turned when switching through tabs.Hot!!!!!

• Cooliris Previews
  

Cooliris Preview allows you to surf through the web faster by giving you a small preview of the website, without you even having to click on it. Just imagine, surfing without wasting time by clicking on links and coming to realize that it wasn't even close to what you were looking for. All you have to do is just mouse over any link, and the Cooliris preview window immediately appears in order to show you the content.