Aldebaran Web Design's Blog

I recently did some clean-up work on my robots.txt file, to stop Google from indexing all of the /feed/ and /trackback/ URL’s that are generated for each post. But I had trouble with two blog articles that started with the word “Feedburner”. I tried many variations for the robots.txt file, but the Google Webmaster kept saying those two were blocked. So I decided to change the URL’s of those two blog articles instead.

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I have many folks ask how to get started on their new small business web design. They are usually looking for a simple website, 4-10 pages, and just want to know how to get started.

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Last night I was watching reruns of Star Trek, the Next Generation (the one with Patrick Stewart). The episode was the one where “Scotty” from the original series put himself into a transporter loop for 75 years and was rescued. When he visited the bar (10 Forward) he didn’t like the taste of the fake whiskey, and so Data (the android character) offered him some real whiskey – Aldebaran Whiskey!

It was the first time I’d noticed them mention the word Aldebaran in Star Trek. I was delighted. For those of you who wonder what Aldebaran is, read this. I know, I’m a nerd. It was still a cool moment.

Very frequently I received emails and phone calls from small business owners who have websites that are in need of maintenance. Because I’m curious, I often ask them why the person who did their original web design can’t do the updates.

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Hey folks who read my blog – if you wouldn’t mind – please give my chat capability a try. I have 15 days to decide if I want to keep using it, and would appreciate any feedback from your end on what you think, how it works, changes, etc.

I’ve put it on my home page, my cost page, my contact pages and my portfolio pages. Give it a try, help me learn before “real” clients use it 🙂

UPDATE: It was a total miserable failure and I disabled it.

This morning I woke up and checked my email via my iPhone. I noticed an email from my website traffic tracking company Web-Stat that my website was unavailable (meaning it was down). Normally when I get these messages, there is another one from Web-Stat saying the website was up again. Usually they are spread apart by 15 minutes or so. But this time, the original “your website is down message was an hour earlier, with no accompanying “your website is back up”. Something was wrong.

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Every once in a while, I am reminded why I love doing small business web design for a living. I had one of these moments a few months ago.

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What happens when a small business that has a website switches ownership? Depending on how the domain registration and hosting are set up…and the relationship with the web developer, all types of things can happen.

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I often get clients asking questions about meta tags or some variation because someone has told them that these are really important things to have in their website. Hopefully this article will clear up the confusion a bit.

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You’re a therapist, or a psychologist, or a psychiatrist, or a counselor – but wait you say, can’t I simply have an entry on Psychology Today, isn’t that enough? No, it’s not enough.

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