Scott Hanselman

I've been loving FeedBurner for a while now. They serve my feed, keep awesome stats and provide piles of reports.

Aside: One of the nice things about DasBlog's built-in integration with FeedBurner is that everyone who is currently subscribed to your existing DasBlog RSS/Atom Feeds will be 301 Permanently Redirected to your new FeedBurner feed. HTTP 301s are Permanent while 302's are temporary. Aggregrators worth their salt know to update their local records when a feed issues a 301. DasBlog will automatically get everyone over to your new feed.
Opinion: It's REALLY poor form to visit a blog and see a post that says "This blog has moved" when there are protocols to express this fact. It's even worse to see posts written in prose with pleadings that folks "please update your aggregator to point to this other feed." Use 301s when they make sense.

FeedBurner has a feature called FeedFlare that lets you add interactivity to each post.

If you're on DasBlog 1.9 and you're using FeedBurner you can add this macro to your itemtemplate.blogtemplate file:

<script src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~s/YOURFEEDBURNERNAME?i=<%PermalinkUrlRaw%>" type="text/javascript"></script>

This will inject a little javascript into each post with little features that you can control from your FeedBurner configuration.

UPDATE: In the daily builds )(after today) of DasBlog, the <%FeedFlare()%> macro now corresponds correctly to the updated FeedBurner URLs. Thanks to Tomas!

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

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Unless you're a top tier blogger (I'm not one, and I'm not sure what the demographic of one is, as I don't know any REALLY big bloggers.) you're not likely to make a lot of money blogging. I make enough to pay my hosting company (ORCSWeb) and pay for lunches along with the occasional gadget or shareware app.

However, paying for your hosting costs and getting a little spending money isn't a bad thing to aim for. Here's the programs I use on my blog to make extra money:

• Google Adsense - I've got some Google Ads running just above the first post. I don't think it's too obtrusive and they'll do a direct deposit when the earnings get over a certain amount.
• Amazon Associates - Any time you post about books you read like I did last year, you include your Amazon Associates ID
  If you have a Cuecat, I made it easier to create Amazon links just by scanning the books directly into Windows Live Writer and blogging from there. You can also use Roy Osherove's Amazoner tool to create these links. Amazon will pay you in Amazon Gift Certificates or real money.
  • You can also start your own Amazon.com store and hand-pick the books. I've been running DiabeticBooks.com for years, ever since Amazon started the Associates program. The books are hand-picked by me, and I'm in control of what the site looks like.
  • One tip, use the newly-released-from-beta Amazon Link Enhancer. Add this script at the bottom of your blogs template to get a nice DHTML popup with details about the product.
    
  • <script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/s/link-enhancer?tag=diabeticbooks">
    </script>
    <noscript>
        <img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/s/noscript?tag=diabeticbooks" alt="" />
    </noscript>
• Sell premium advertising space directly. If you know what your traffic is like and you know your demographic (I've got a good idea of both) then you can offer premium space directly. However, only support products that you personally recommend. Xceed has had a banner at the top of my blog for the last several months. Their libraries are gold, especially their ZIP stuff.
• Some other companies have products that offer affiliate programs where you get a small percentage (~5%ish) if someone orders from your link. Often you'll be able to offer a coupon or deal to your readers. Again, only do this when a product kicks ass. I dig MaxiVista the virtual network Video Card software (kind of has to be seen to be believed and understood). SyncBackSE is another application that I recommend highly. I use it to synchronize trees between three local harddrives and an FTP server. Both these programs have affiliate programs that pay small dividends.
• I almost forgot (thanks Phil!) the best for last - FeedBurner and their FAN (FeedBurner Ad Network). They are starting slow, so you have to apply to get into their advertising system, but I've found them to not only be a classy bunch of guys, but also meticulous about metrics. They measure freakin' everything and give you reports up the wazoo. I was very down on RSS Advertising, but these guys changed my mine. I have control over exactly what ads I will show and how often I show them. I can decide against any ads that I think might be wrong for my audience.
• UPDATE: Another idea is jobs.codebetter.com and their referral program. They are a jobs posting site, except you can insert javascript in your own blog to spread the word about the jobs. You get a finders fee if a job is filled from an ad on your blog.

Again, none of this adds up to rent money, but if you're going to write blog posts occasionally, you should at least make US$6-10/hr doing it, right?

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

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Everyone is agog about Google searching code.

I find the language detection stuff to be really interesting. Are they using heuristics or just the file extension to figure out what language the code is? Probably extensions, but it'd be clever if they also used code keywords to guess.

One point that I think should be addressed by a future version is tuning of relevance data. If you search for DasBlog (not a really valid code search), you'll find folks that reference DasBlog libraries, and source inside ZIP files, but not the ACTUAL source at the ACTUAL location. It'd be nice to see them understand where the authoritative source of source is.

A few advanced tricks are:

• Restrict search to "C"-based languages
• lang:^(c|c#|c\+\+)$
• Avoid GPLed code
• -license:gpl

You can also include Google Code Search on your own side as a GDATA (~GoogleRSS) feed.  However, you can't restrict code searches by site using site: which is a bummer and limits its usefulness. I'd like to be able to have folks search for source on my blog.

Be sure to read their Google Code Search FAQ if you want to block them (robots.txt) from crawling your code.

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

About   Newsletter

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Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Special Edition is finally out. It's such a huge book physically that there was trouble at the printers.

If you haven't already bought the original one, this updated book is only $37.79 on Amazon, which is pretty good for 1584 pages. Here's a PDF of the Table of Contents. Here's the index as well.

The four new chapters and two Appendices we added are (from Jim's blog):

• Chapter 14 "Introduction to the Provider Model"  - 38 pages
• Chapter 15 "Extending the Provider Model" – 36 pages
• Chapter 30: Localization – 26 pages
• Chapter 32: Instrumentation – 38 pages
• Appendix B: Migrating ASP.NET 1.x projects – 12 pages
• Appendix C: Using Atlas – 16 pages

Then there's a long list additions within existing chapters:

• Chapter 2: Added Class Designer File and Open Test Bench
• Chapter 3: Added Build Providers
• Chapter 4: An additional more complex callback example
• Chapter 6: Added Uploading multiple files from the same page
• Chapter 11:
• Added: SqlDataSource Configuration Wizard to add optimistic concurrency
• Added SqlDataSource Events, Using the SqlDataSource with Oracle, AccessDataSource Control
• Added GridView events that fire when the data binding occurs
• Added Using the TemplateField Column in the GridView Control
• Added Using the TemplateField’s EditItemTemplate
• Added Expressions and Expression Builder
• Chapter 12:
• Added Using Oracle as Your Database with ASP.NET 2.0
• Chapter 13: Added "Generating Custom XML from SQL 2005"
• Chapter 16 "Site Navigation"
• Added what a HTTP sniffer does
• Added Security Trimming
• Added Setting up Role Management for administrators
• Added Nesting SiteMap Files
• Chapter 17 Personalization: Added new section at end on Managing Application Profiles.
• Chapter 18: Membership and Role Management
• Added locking out users who provide bad passwords
• Added generating random passwords
• Chapter 19: Web Parts
• Added 10 new pages on connecting Web Parts
• Chapter 24 File I/O and Streams
• Chapter 25 User and Server Controls
• Added Loading User Controls Dynamically – about 4 pages
• Chapter 31 Configuration:
• Added about 2 pages on trust levels
• Added about 3 pages on encrypting configuration files

Beyond that, there were numerous sections where a page or less of material was added, replaced, examples replaced, and so on.

You also get a DVD with the 180 day Trial edition of Visual Studio 2005. There's a CD with PDFs of chapters from 15 or 16 other Wrox ASP.NET 2.0, C# 2005, VB 2005, .NET 2.0, and SQL Server 2005 books. Most of the books on the CD provide 2 meaty chapters, plus full TOCs and indexes. There are more than 1000 pages of chapter content on the CD.

It's also hardcover so you can beat off hobos.

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

About   Newsletter

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My thirty-fifth Podcast is up. Carl and I discuss the current state of Hi-Def Television (HDTV).

We're listed in the iTunes Podcast Directory, so I encourage you to subscribe with a single click (two in Firefox) with the button below. For those of you on slower connections there are lo-fi and torrent-based versions as well.

Subscribe:

Links from the show are also always on the show site, although this show had no links to speak of. Do also remember the archives are always up and they have PDF Transcripts, a little known feature that show up a few weeks after each show.

Check out Aspose, the .NET and Java Component Publisher. They produce a wide variety of components with versions in both .NET and Java. Do check out their Aspose Demo Downloads as they have a huge catalog of tools to explore.

Our sponsors are Apose, /nsoftware, CodeSmith Tools and the .NET Dev Journal.

There's a $100 off CodeSmith coupon for Hanselminutes listeners - it's coupon code HM100. Spread the word, now's the time to buy. This coupon is good for the CodeSmith Professional With 1 Year Premier Support option.

As I've said before this show comes to you with the audio expertise and stewardship of Carl Franklin. The name comes from Travis Illig, but the goal of the show is simple. Avoid wasting the listener's time. (and make the commute less boring)

• The basic MP3 feed is here, and the iPod friendly one is here. There's a number of other ways you can get it (streaming, straight download, etc) that are all up on the site just below the fold. I use iTunes, myself, to listen to most podcasts, but I also use FeedDemon and it's built in support.
  • Some other clients are Doppler (also suppose Windows CE), FireAnt, Nimiq, and PrimeTime Podcast.
• Note that for now, because of bandwidth constraints, the feeds always have just the current show. If you want to get an old show (and because many Podcasting Clients aren't smart enough to not download the file more than once) you can always find them at http://www.hanselminutes.com.
• I have, and will, also include the enclosures to this feed you're reading, so if you're already subscribed to ComputerZen and you're not interested in cluttering your life with another feed, you have the choice to get the 'cast as well.
• If there's a topic you'd like to hear, perhaps one that is better spoken than presented on a blog, or a great tool you can't live without, contact me and I'll get it in the queue!

Enjoy. Who knows what'll happen in the next show?

About Scott

Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.

About   Newsletter

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