Dear Friend,

In this issue we provide insight on why domain name control is so important, information on the hidden yet important Vista Reliability Monitor and a great spell check application called I.E. Spell.

I am sure that you will enjoy this newsy issue for February. If you like our content, make sure to subscribe to our blogs and RSS news content feeds to read our daily content spread over three blogs by visiting our Syndication page.

Best Regards,

Nancy McCord

Keep Control of Your Domain Name | Vista's Reliability Monitor | ieSpell to the Rescue

Keep Control of Your Domain Name

When you are a website owner, it is important that YOU keep control of your domain name. I cannot begin to tell you the problems that I have come across where a new client has let the previous webmaster or the original web designer procure their domain name for them. In the most serious cases, that person had done so under their own name tied to their own private registration account, where the client and real domain name owner had no access.

My top tip for domain security is that every website owner should manage and own their own domain name! It sounds easy to let someone else control this aspect of your website, but if you choose not to work with a web designer or webmaster in the future, you have lost all control of one of the most crucial elements of your web presence - your domain name.

Here are my recommendations for domain security:

1. Before you work with any designer or webmaster, purchase your own domain name and tie it to your credit card, your billing address, and your name using either GoDaddy or Network Solutions. I personally like GoDaddy as the domains are very inexpensive, the control panel easy to use, and they have an auto renew function. Your domain name registrar is not the same as your web host! In fact, your hosting can be at one provider and your domain at another.

2. Don't let a new web host push you to move your domain registration to them. There is no benefit for you to do this. The hosting agent who encourages you, or misleads you, into believing that this is top priority, is simply looking for a domain registration commission every time you renew your domain.

3. Don't let your webmaster control your domain name. You can let them manage the changes or additions needed, but don't ever let them set up domains under their own personal account, with their name as domain administrator. They can be technical director, but not administrator.

4. Protect your domain name as you would your reputation! You never know what the future holds for whom you will use for your webmaster services. I can tell you "real life" stories of clients who have had to abandon their "bread and butter" domain name as the old webmaster either held the domain name hostage or refused to assist with access or transfer. If your name is not listed as the administrator on the domain registration, sometimes the only way to get back access to what you thought you owned, is expensive legal action and months of red tape. It is best to just be safe at the start and own your own domain name.

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How to Use Windows Vista's Reliability Monitor

If you are using Microsoft Vista as your operating system, you have access to a very cool tool to monitor your computer's performance. This is particularly helpful if you are having a crashing problem, or if you are simply are curious to know your rating.

I moved to Vista late last year. I had done my homework in regards to application compatibility first and did not anticipate any problems. After a clean install on a new computer, built with performance components just for Vista, I had a serious crashing problem. My Tech Director had the same exact computer, but without some of the applications installed that I used daily, and did not experience any of the difficulties that I experienced.

The Vista Reliability Monitor, through this process, became my new best friend. Not only did it help me to woefully review my poor reliability rating, but it actually helped me to eventually identify the culprit responsible for my crashes leading me to remove the application and solve the problem.

If you have Vista, here's how you access and view the Reliability Monitor to checkout your own system.

1. Open the Control Panel accessed from your Start Menu.

2. Then click the Performance Information icon.

3. Under Tasks on the left sidebar, click Advanced Tools.

4. On the next screen click the link for open Reliability and Performance Monitor - Vista will trigger its security alert to ask if you asked for this and say yes.

5. From the left side bar click Reliability Monitor and you will be show a reliability monitor and graph of daily performance as well as information about any of your crashes.

My own computer has gone from a Reliability Rating high of 10, (totally reliable) from installation, to a low of 2.44 to a current rating of 6.08. My Tech Director has a reliability rating of 9.25! So what's your Reliability Rating? Now you know how to find out.

One side bar comment, if you are having a crashing problem in Vista, make sure that you have enabled in your settings, the next time you see the crash window, to send the information to Microsoft for evaluation. Over time Microsoft and Vista will work to try to identify your problem. In my case, my crashes were caused by a driver from my Maxtor One Touch III backup drive. Even though Maxtor had said that the new driver was Vista worthy, clearly there were still problems with it. I resolved my crashing problem by removing the Maxtor drive.

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Bright Idea Tip: ieSpell to the Rescue

We've found a very handy tool and wanted to pass the link on to you so you can install it too.

How many times have you completed a form and clicked submit, just to see as it was being sent that you had a typo in the text. How about when you posted to a forum and you saw that you had misspelled a key word in the post title. Or even if you have WordPress as your blog platform and spell check seems to be broken? Now there is an answer, ieSpell to the rescue!

ieSpell is a small application that installs itself into Internet Explorer 6 and is even compatible with Internet Explorer 7. On Internet Explorer 7, once installed, it is accessed from the arrow button just to the right of the tools button on the right hand side of the tool bar.

I personally have found ieSpell to be very helpful and recommend it to clients who are using WordPress as their blog platform as the spell checker can be capricious. You can download ieSpell here and view the application information on the ieSpell website. Oh, the best part, it is totally free!

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