The very excellent Google Search Console needs a bit of “real world” help. For anyone that doesn’t know what GSC is, it’s a tool for website owners and webmasters to understand how they are performing on Google Search, and what they can do to improve their appearance on search to bring more relevant traffic to […]
IT Talk, Discussion & Articles
Covering Domain Names, Email, Hosting, Internet, Publishing, Search, Software and Technical topics
Squarespace | Online Store Software
Squarespace empowers people with creative ideas to succeed. The platform empowers millions of people – from individuals and local artists to entrepreneurs shaping the world’s most iconic businesses – to share their stories and create an impactful stylish and easy-to-manage online presence. CREATE YOUR WEBSITE The leader in website design Stand out online with a […]
AVG: Too Many Conflicts
AVG has been my security software of choice for over 20 years. In that time, I have experienced many issues caused by the software in the guise of protection, but in the end, each time it was either false/positives or ‘over-the-top’ detection. I truly understand security is a multi-faceted, complex issue. The reality is its […]
NordVPN: 100% Online Protection
NordVPN is the world’s best known and trusted VPN service. Connecting a VPN to your devices protects you and your information 24/7. VPN stands for “virtual private network” – a service that protects your internet connection and privacy online. VPN’s create an encrypted tunnel for your data, protect your online identity by hiding your IP […]
Outlook v Mailbird – 2023 Review
I really believe Email Software developers do not understand the most important requirement of good email software.. managing spam and junk emails! I recently purchased a new software program to manage my emails. After 20+ years of watching Microsoft’s OUTLOOK descend into an unusable, unwieldy, time-wasting exercise, it was time for a change. Introducing Mailbird […]
Google Mobile Usability Report: Text too small to read
Sighs, we love Google but it can be frustrating at times: Mobile Usability > Text too small to read > Validation details The latest frustration: Google reports that 1031 pages on our website have failed its mobility test because the text is too small. The interesting aspect is 251 pages passed, but hold on, its […]
Get RoboForm Everywhere
After years of bitching and complaining about LastPass, I bit the bullet, downloaded and installed RoboForm.. and wished I had done it years ago. Extremely easy process of buying, download, install, register and then share to your devices. I aproximate it took me an hour to install on two PC’s, one laptop, one mobile phone […]
Hostjacking: Hosting & Domain Name Hijacking
Hostjacking is when a web designer highjacks website hosting and domain name management. The web designer uses practices including: – refusing to transfer a new design website to the site owners’ hosting – copying an incomplete design to the site owners’ hosting – incomplete transfers of plugins and software Tricks that the designer blames on […]
Google: Content wider than screen FIXED
Our issue was Google continually reporting: Content wider than screen. Our image was correctly sized (700 pixels wide) and configured in CSS to be mobile responsive: img { max-width: 100%; display: block; } But Google was having none of it. Then we noticed something.. the offending image had no borders and a considerable amount of […]
Managing SPAM 2022: SpamBully
OK, OK, I hear you.. here he goes again, banging on about spam! To give you some idea of how bad spam is for us.. on an average day we receive over 1,000 spam messages .. yes, a day! Many of the messages include phishing and hacking code. In September 2022, time caught up with […]
spamrl.com – UN-Reputable Blacklist
spamrl.com users are urged to rethink any association with this blacklist We have researched spamrl.com and cannot find any information about the company, location or how they source their data (IP Address). What Next Consider a reputable blacklist (Spamhaus and Spamcop) IP Address blocked by spamrl.com – take weeks to unblock Threads There were hundreds.. […]
How to Block Repeat Spammers
Anti-Spam software developers use this logic to build block lists! Here is the simple logic.. Spammers use known email address lists! Lists sold online. Spammers send the same message to multiple email addresses.. the same “display name”, same “title”, same sending “email address domain”, same “body content”, so software developers use these “known” factors into their […]
Logo Designer: 99designs
Every business needs a logo! A logo shows a professional appearance on websites, business card, stationary and other printed media. But where do you get a new logo designed? For many years, we have used the services of 99designs. When a client requires a new logo, armed with some basic information we set up a […]
AusPost: PO Box Bourke Street Melbourne
If you have a Post Office box located at 380 Bourke Street, Melbourne then be afraid, be very afraid! The postal manager at 380 Bourke Street is Phil Freeman. A man clearly stuck in his public service role way too long, making unprofessional decisions, without empathy or compassion. If it’s not in his database, or […]
Adobe Fireworks CS5 Internal Error – FIXED
I wish to begin with.. I love Adobe Fireworks CS5. I purchased the software a long time ago (2011) and its worked wonderfully ever since but then one day in 2022 up popped a CS5 Internal Error””. Nothing I tried would start the program. I was mortified! I Googled the error and found lots of […]
Mailing List Software: Best by a mile! aWeber
One of the best ways of marketing and a must for every website is a mailing list. Don’t miss the opportunity of a new customer when they visit your website simply by getting them to subscribe to your mailing list. Now you understand why, lets move onto software.. There are two forms of mailing list […]
Optus Mail Block Review
Optus Spam & Phishing Filter is out of touch and a waste of time! Everyone has their own software. We use AVG and SPAMFighter. We simply do NOT need Optus filtering our mail. Customers should be able to opt-out. The filter constantly blocks good emails sent to known customers and brand companies. I don’t have […]
Good & Bad Affiliate Advertisers’
There are most definitely good “and bad advertisers’. In a previous article I mentioned bad conversions, some advertisers’ simply don’t stack up. There is the advertiser that you send hundreds of genuine visitors to without ever making a sale, or making so few sales that you end up questioning who’s to blame. In our case, […]
Best WordPress Plugins
We’re often asked where do we get WordPress plugins. Everyone knows you can search the WordPress Plugin directory (Admin) but the results are misleading and don’t always provide full results. Fine if you know the plugin, but if you want the “best” plugin, the reality is the best plugins cost money. The Lite version does […]
CloudFlare: Unable to Login
I am both a fan of CloudFlare and a critic of CloudFlare protocols. Very very American and wayyyyyyyy over the top. I was locked out because of Two-Factor Authentication. Instead of simply saying email support@cloudflare.com with: list of domains (1 or more) in your account IP address(es) Hosting provider Datacentre Your name and email address […]
Reebelo: Bringing Electronics Back to Life
Reebelo, APAC most trusted secondhand and refurbished tech devices online marketplace. Pioneer and market leader for refurbished electronics in APAC. We offer tech devices refurbished by experts, at up to 40% discount from the original pricing along with free warranty, delivery & returns. Our vision is to reduce global e-waste while making refurbished lifestyle devices […]
How to stop cpanel changing htaccess
cPanel in it’s wisdom are updating htaccess files changing the package type, in our experience “ea-php52” package to “ea-php56”. cpanel forums confirms the modification is part of a regular update to users code. In our case, all it did was break our website causing 500 server errors. Yes, we can access cpanel/file manager/public_html/.htaccess then change […]
Missing Bootstrap navbar toggler icon fixed
The issue: Toggler icon does not display in mobile view. OMG, I spent hours looking for the answer and it was as simple as a stylesheet. By default, Bootstrap advises to use a MIN stylesheet. The toggler csss is included with the full stylesheet: Not: bootstrap.min.css Change to: bootstrap.css Bootstrap 4 Stylesheet HTML More information […]
What happened to eBay Plugins: phpBay & phpZon?
We used phpBay and phpZon for many years and suddenly in 2020 discovered they were gone. A little research revealed phpBay and phpZon have been abandoned by its authors. phpZON vanished in 2018 and I suspect the final straw for phpBay was eBay withdrawing products feeds in September 2020. From what I hear Wade Wells […]
Outlook: Sender DISPLAY Name Messsage Rule
How to manage emails by DISPLAY name. Display name is the name given to the field we see in the Inbox, sometimes confused as the Sender Name. For many years this proved to be an issue because AntiVirus (AVG), SPAMFighter and Outlook were unable to deal with spam emails from repetitive senders. Message rules failed […]
Missing ads.txt Earnings At Risk – FIXED
How To Fix missing Ads.txt File In our case, Google was incorrectly reporting that websites were missing ads.txt file. For months, the “Earning at risk” message showed in Adsense for some of our busiest websites. The message would sometimes disappear for a website, only to re-appear. Each time we checked the ads.txt file was definitely […]
iThemes WordPress Security Webinar – Free
iThemes (free) WP security webinar to help you make sure you’ve locked down your website: Getting Started with WP Security for 2020. Getting Started with WP Security for 2020 Our friends at Cloudflare recently revealed that hacking and phishing attempts have been up by 37% and, on some days, they are blocking between four and […]
PayID: New Simple Payments
This is fabulous Australia.. receive payments to your phone number or email address. PayID is a simple service that makes paying money into your account easier. You can create a PayID by choosing something easy to remember, like your phone number, and registering it with your bank. The next time you want someone to pay […]
iOttie Car Mount Phone Holder
iOttie Easy One Touch 4 Dash & Windshield Car Mount Phone Holder || for iPhone, Samsung, Moto, Huawei, Nokia, LG, Smartphones
Happy World Password Day
To celebrate our favourite day of the year and the importance of healthy password practices, we’re sharing mind-blowing statistics behind password behaviours across the globe. Before you dive in to the full infographic, here’s a sneak peek at some of the most shocking takeaways: #1 We use the same passwords over and over again #2 […]
Domain Transfer Notification
If you have received a Domain Transfer Notification email from TPP Wholesale, then I can confirm it’s all good. It is a poorly worded email alerting you that TPP Wholesale Pty Ltd has yet again changed hands except this time, they are moving the domain name to a new interface where we will continue to […]
CleanMaster Junk Files
I have noticed this anomoly.. CleanMaster reports different amounts of junk files. CleanMaster Process Step 1: CleanMaster pops up (bottom right of screen) saying it has detected 1.61GB of junk files , click to delete now. Step 2: After clicking the Clean button on the pop-up, CleanMaster runs a check and finds 1.9Gb of of […]
How To Fix OUTLOOK.exe error: (0xc0000142)
This is how to fix error: (0xc0000142) Error After rebooting PC (Windows 10 + Microsoft Office 365), I clicked on Outlook in status bar and this error appeared. Fix error: (0xc0000142) Step 1 Perform the troubleshooting steps on the Repair an Office application article. If Outlook still does not work.. Step 2 Install the latest Office […]
Best Wifi Router: Google Nest Wifi
Looking for networking Wifi routers? We were experiencing wifi problems in our home, found this article (below), sourced Google’s Wifi mesh system and solved all our networking issues. Google Wifi mesh system store.google.com The Age Digital Edition: Ease of use is king After years of waiting, my home has finally been connected to Australia’s half-baked […]
Stop, Breathe and Think before Clicking
Shoppers must “think” before they click as fraudsters come out in force during sales like Frenzy, Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Boxing Day. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s deputy chair Delia Rickard has warned consumers “to stop, breathe and think before clicking on things” . “Shoppers are time poor and we don’t think as much […]
Blocked Website
Types of The web needs security but, it must be accountable. Before the govenment or software providers block a website, the owner must be given cause to challenge. The number of false blocks is staggering, no doubt as many as genuine blocks. When a website is falsely blocked, it is a restraint of trade. […]
Negative Reviews
How to get rid of a negative review? Sadly, a common question. How to deal with negative reviews Contact the website and ask to have the review removed if it’s defamatory in nature or fake. Respond to the reviewer on the website in a polite way offering further assistance and ask them to contact you […]
Google: Indexed, blocked by robots.txt
I wonder how many millions of webmasters have received these warnings from Google? Google Search Console Team <sc-noreply@google.com> New Coverage issue detected for site https://www.domain.com/ Indexed, though blocked by robots.txt The reality is, we don’t want to pee Google off, so the simple solution is to remove the offending block. In our case, it was […]
File Path to SpamFighter
We experienced an issue with not being able to open SpamFighter to enter a product key or manage settings in it’s control panel. We were advised by the team at SpamFighter to add an exception to our security software AVG. We had trouble finding the path to the program in Windows10 Path = C:\Program Files (x86)\Fighters\SPAMfighter\* […]
How to Completely Disable WordPress Comments
Like everything in WordPress there is a plugin to achieve this and very good one at that; a simple checkbox to completely disable all comments on the website.. yay! Disable Comments allows you to completely disable comments everywhere on your WordPress site. You can also disable them on specific post types like posts, pages, media, […]
Saved by WordPress AUTOSAVE
Alright, I know I bang on about how much we love WordPress but this handy little feature has saved my ass many times, like today. Yesterday, I spent quite some time working on a page, we’re talking hours here. Just as I was about to UPDATE, kaboom, the power went and my PC powered down. […]
#1 WordPress Plugin: Cache Plugin
Of all the plugins recommended for WordPress, the Number #1 plugin at the top of the list is a Cache Plugin. For a minimal amount of work the benefits are massive to bothe website owner and the hosting server. Faster web pages Less drain on server Increase page rank on search engines What is caching? […]
SEO & Advertising Services
Thank you so much for contacting us regarding your SEO service. We are very impressed with your claims. We work with a simple mantra here at Ripefruit regarding SEO services.. SHOW US! Prove your claims Show us you can get your company website on Page 1 of Google and then we will consider your services. […]
Facebook Post Images Missing
Facook post images not resolving from hotlink. Help needed: When I submit a new post to Facebook, I include a short description and URL. Facebook dynamically pulls an image from that url and displays it in the post window but when the post is added, the image is no longer there. OK. step by step. […]
Save iPhone Data
Optus keeps telling me my data usage is out of control when in reality, I hardly use my ISP data (use WiFi at home). So, I need to manage what APPS are using my data. Take control of how your iPhone uses its data connection. Restrict iTunes and App Store downloadsYou can prevent iTunes and […]
Credit Card Shield Card Number
Yesterday for the 4th time (in 3 years) my business credit card was cancelled by my bank because it had detected unauthorised use. Kudo’s to the ANZ falcon for spotting the bad transactions and protecting my business by not authorising the transactions. We only use our credit card with known merchants with SSL. This means […]
AVG: URL: Phishing Threat
Shock horror: AVG pop-up warning that one of our own websites is a potential phishing website. I googled it and found thousands just like me.. false / positive Incorrect URL.Phishing | AVG URL:phishing stays after scan | AVG AVG is blocking my web site due to phishing | AVG Report incorrect AVG detection on your website […]
How to FIX Invalid URL
How to fix Invalid URL issue This worked like a treat, easy to do and works every time. FIX – flushdns Click on Start Click on Run Type cmd and click on OK button In the command prompt windows, type ipconfig /flushdns and hit enter button. FIXED – try the website again.. Refresh page (F5) […]
Stop Contact Form 7 Spam in WordPress
After a flood of spam originating through our WordPress Contact forms with No CAPTCHA reCAPTCHA, we needed a fix. This excellent article by barn2.co.uk shows 6 Ways to Stop Contact Form 7 Spam in WordPress The 2 we liked and are now trying are: 1. Quiz Simple quizzes are becoming a popular way to combat […]
Spam Emails: trаnsfer 0.5 bitcоins
Has anyone else received “trаnsfer 0.5 bitcоins” message over the past few days (August-September 2018)? We’re receiving 100 an hour. To make matters worse, setting up a rule to deal with them doesn’t work. First I tried: “bitcоins” and then “0.5 bitcоins” but the rule does not remove all the messages. Any suggestions? From: MiguelGyday […]