eAction

I’ve had another personal experience from which to draw some good advice.

At our Canadian Thanksgiving my brother announced that he had bought himself a new computer because the old one had died. It would only go as far as BIOS and that seemed to indicate he had no hard drive any more.

Well, I’d been thinking of replacing a hard drive in my own computer but since I’d never done it before I was a little hesitant. Suddenly I had an idea. If Tom’s computer was now garbage I could take it home, find some cheap, second hand hard drive and try installing on that computer first, before I bungled up mine. If it didn’t work out I would not have lost anything but some time.

I took his old box and keyboard home and eventually had time to fire it up and see. Sure enough, BIOS didn’t seem to know it had a hard drive any more. It must be toast.

Another day, walking home from downtown I stopped in at a computer store I had not been to for years. They seemed to have used ones to sell. I was able to get a used 8 GB hard drive for $25. A little steep if hard drives are suppose to be less than a $1 per GB these days, but I decided to take it.

When I got to opening up Tom’s computer I discovered that the cable plug had fallen out of the old hard drive. Hmmm! That might explain a lot. I plugged it in, and found room just above it to slide in this one I had just bought right above the old one. I got them both plugged in and turned the computer on to see what it would do.

Well! Now it complained that the Master drive had failed, but in BIOS it appeared to know it had two drives.

I went back online in my own computer to research this, and was pretty sure it had to do with Master-Slave settings. It took another day or two to find the right diagrams for those little tiny caps you put over two pins. I learned that yes, when you have two drives, they can’t both be master. One has to have first rights to kick in, and the other takes second fiddle.

The first couple of setting configurations I tried still gave me that “master drive has failed” message. Then I learned online that if I set both of the drives to “Cable Select” then the hard drive plugged in at the end of the ribbon cable would be the Master. That would work, I decided. The newer 8 GB drive would be at the end, so if the other drive wasn’t working right, I could still check it, but not need to count on it. (Tom had hoped to get some email addresses off the old drive).

I decided to try installing a Linux Distro, so I could partition and format the drives. It seemed concerned about mounting a Win96 drive, which threw me off a bit, until I remembered that the used drive I had bought had come out of an old Windows computer. In the partitioning stage I was able to change the setting so it would be formatted as a Linux drive. Presto! Then things began to roll forward!

Unfortunately I had my back turned, facing my own computer when the first CD was done, and didn’t get the second on in on time, so the installation was interrupted. I needed to get on with some other work, so I’ve left it. But now the extra Distros I had ordered from ShipLinux have arrived, and I’m hoping to try installing Ubunto over lunch today on Tom’s old computer.

If I can salvage those email addresses for Tom he’ll be a happy camper, and I’ll have a spare computer for an internship plan I have in mind for the new year! That makes two happy campers here!

Moral for you: old computers can be salvaged and yes, you can install a hard drive yourself!

I’ve had so many good things happen for me this past week or two, that I’m almost babbling. Let me just tell you one exciting thing that happened just this very hour!

I just saw a car skid on the freshly fallen snow, right to the spot where my car stood until late Monday afternoon!

My house is second from a busy intersection, (yes, in a residential area). People often come whipping around the corner because our street jogs half a block north before it continues east. I had my car parked in front of my house but have thought from time to time that it would be safer for the winter if I could park in the back yard. Only my gate was sagging from one hinge and really needed to be replaced. As did most of the back fence to make my yard more secure.

It wasn’t happening, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it. Then last week, my good neighbours, Joe and Penny, invited me to come along to Home Depot to buy the hardware parts for my back gate, and a new 9′ gate post. (the old one had been weak and then was mowed down by a big truck delivering a garden shed). On Monday I came back from lunch to find Joe and Arnold, the 79 year old Director at our mission, working on my gate. By the end of the afternoon they had it done. Including the hardware for a new padlock.

I raked up the debris and then went to get my car. I drove it around the corner and into the alley and through my gate. I locked the gate, and was delighted. One goal accomplished!

So now when I saw that car skid to the spot where I used to park on the street I just knew that the Lord in His great mercy had prompted Joe to push get my gate replaced on Monday!

When you run your business with God involved in every aspect, I am SURE He does things like that for you all the time too.

Sometimes we need to do something over and over a few times to develop a productive habit that we can start using in other areas too. For me, I’m discovering that an approach I took with selling tangible goods for my sister who is out of province and unable to look after the sale of these items is showing lots of promise.

At first glance you might think my example has nothing to do with you, but let me describe it first, and then help you find a principle that you can adapt for yourself.

Here’s the background. My sister Elsie had left things in storage at Dad’s house when she moved to the west coast in 1995. I promised to look after her stuff, but earlier this year after Dad died, I knew that I’d have to find myself a new place, and I wouldn’t have room for all of her things. We discussed it, and agreed that I should try to sell some of her things at Dad’s estate auction. That didn’t go over too well, and some things didn’t even get a bid. Now what?

Well, I got permission to store some of the larger furniture pieces in a vacant office, with the promise that I would advertise and sell them as soon as I could.

From what I’d learned in the past, just from reading online, I knew I could take photos and probably sell them on e-bay, etc. I was especially concerned about the stereo credenza and large speakers. As I researched them for the most effective keywords to use in my ads, I saw that this was not quite old enough to be an antique or collectible. Hmmm…! Antique dealers didn’t want to hear from me for another 9-10 years, but I needed to sell this suite. So I pressed on.

I took photos and cropped and carefully choose the best ones. Then I created a web page on my business site that would describe and show it off to best advantage. I decided against e-bay because I wanted to get my sister at least $500 for it. Once my web page was about as good as I could get it, with the most sought after keywords to describe this vintage credenza stereo, and I had described it as something to snap up now and store for 10 years and then make a profit – that’s when I wrote a classified ad very carefully.

Next I logged into Craigslist.org, the most popular classifieds site on the web, and placed my ad, including just a couple of my photos with it, and the URL to my special web page for more details.

I’m happy to say that after a few weeks the $500 is on the way to me!

But now I’m doing this over again with Elsie’s quilt-rack, and I’m about to do it once more with a course of binders for developing a business. I’m sure Elsie paid about $300 for this box of jumbo binders full of information, so I should have no trouble selling it for $50. But as I am going through these paces all over again, I realize that I’ve found a pattern for selling tangible goods that is working for me.

Now, do you see the principle or outline of steps you could take to sell something?

1. Get to know the product or items very well. Research the most effective keywords to use. What would someone looking for this item call it?

2. Take good photos and resize them so they load quickly.

3. Use the photos and your keyword list to write a winsome web page describing the features, but also the benefits of owning this product.

4. Write a good classified ad, with a link to your web page, and include a photo or two. Then place it on Craigslist and any other classifieds sites that you think will be useful.

You can do all of this without spending a penny!

Devotees of the SBI web business suite are so excited they are producing videos to brag on their SBI. Some of these are so touching, and others absolutely hilarious. If your computer allows you to see U-tube videos you can see these here

I’m one of those enthusiastic devotees too! I’m up to Day Four in following the steps in the Video guide and though they hold you back from ordering your domain until you get to Step or Day Five, already I’ve seen the tremendous value in using this SiteBuildIt! process to build not just a site but a profitable web business!

Listen, you can go see those videos for yourself and do as much as you are able just from the lessons. You only get to login to BrainstormIt! if you have paid up, but all the work is demonstrated for you. Go here to see the video series. Take time to follow the instructions… You’ll be amazed! Demo of SBI Action Guide.

I was going to go on with the lessons on using command line commands in the shell, but I’m pressed for time so I’ll just share another personal experience that may be of help to you.

I’ve had a problem the last few weeks with doing my regular Saturday update to my Suse 10.1. I suppose mainly because I’ve learned NOT to try to update the kernel. The Yast Updater doesn’t want to let me update the files I’ve marked because I won’t proceed on certain other files where it finds discrepancies.

What to do?

Well, I went online to see what reviews and news there was about Suse 10.3 now that it is out. Does it have the same problem with the Zen Updater, or is that fixed? I was happy to see that is not a problem any more.

So then to find a place to get this Suse 10.3. I could, of course, download the ISO file and burn it to CDs or a DVD. However, I’ve tried that in the past, and found it took hours and then was not always successful in the burning the ISO to disk. I’ve ordered from online stores which do the burning for us, and sell the disks at very reasonable rates. They are lightweight and easy to send in the mail.

Linux is always free, but people can charge you for the physical disks and the mailing, and any special services they give you. You do NOT have to pay large sums to put any Linux distro on your computer.

Sigh! I could not find the budgetlinuxCD site I have bought from before – he must have taken down that site.

So I did some Google searches, and compared prices. I settled on the site, shiplinux.com for their lowest prices and the chance to get several distros at once. The Suse 10.3 DVD was only $2.99. If I spent $10 I would get free shipping. So I clicked on three other distros, Mandrivia 2008, Fedora Core 7, and Gentoo Live CD. (only $1.49)

However, I discovered a problem with the shopping cart. I was required to register and check my email to use the shopping cart. No email arrived to confirm my registration, but I decided to try to make my purchase. Before I got to the payment step, it stalled with a message that my choice for shipping, US mail, was invalid. Yet I had not made a choice.

There was an area to attach a note to my order. I tried that and explained what had happened in case that would go through to the site owner. No go.

I waited until Monday in case the owner was out of town over the weekend. (Though a shopping cart is suppose to work even when unattended). I tried again on Monday, and still came to the same blockage. So I went to the Contact page and send a message. When I checked my email later in the day I had one from the owner, saying the problem had been fixed, and I should try again, and for my trouble he would throw in an extra distro free of charge. I suggested Centos 5.

Now I’m waiting for them in the mail. I’m thinking they should be here early next week.

The moral here? Shop around, and if you run into a problem with your purchase have the patience to report it, for you will likely get extra for your trouble.

When you test something, you try to be thorough, don’t you? It can be rather embarrassing to decry something as stupid and useless, only to have someone else come along and prove that it does work well. Often the key is merely persistence and the humility to ask questions of those who understand how it works.

Many books are never written because the author gave up on the first draft.

Gardens become wild jungles when the gardener doesn’t keep hacking those weeds with a hoe.

Often a piece of fabric gets pinned to the pattern pieces, and even cut out, but not sewn together into clothing.

There must be a zillion online businesses signed up for enthusiastically that vanish for lack of diligent fingers on the keyboard!

But you and I are not going to be one of them, are we?

We’ll keep plugging away convinced we will succeed eventually!

I seem to be re-learning a lesson about placing classified ads. The better quality ones, the ones set up for local cities, etc., do not allow you to post ads with affiliate referral links in them. They want ads for items for sale or for services and jobs, and community announcements.

Just yesterday I placed an ad for a free e-book to download, geared to work-at-home Moms. I soon had an email telling me it had been deleted for being illegal.

Illegal? Well, only on that site.

I’ve just done a search for classifieds that allow affiliate links, and it seems there is only AdlandPro and a great barge full of the ones that you really don’t want your ad to be seen in. Oh yes, there are classifieds sites that allow affiliate links, but the caliber of ads is low, and your ad will not come before the eyes of the people you really would like to join under you. – or I should say under me.

I’ve gone through phases of trying classifieds in the past, and found that most of them were free-for-all (ffa) sites, and those sites are set up to trap your email so they can flood YOU with their ads. That’s not the crowd I want to run with.

This tells me that I should work a little harder at my ads on AdlandPro, and I should be making room in my life for some other methods of promotion.

Since last year I’ve heard, or read, a lot of advice about writing interesting and informative articles that subtly refer to whatever website or affiliate program I want to promote, but with the clickable link in the bio or resource box which comes at the bottom. That is in fact, my deluxe ad, and since these articles are posted on article directory sites, the links to my site are worth far more than in a classified ad. It also means that visitors come to see my site and explore around it, rather then just landing on an affiliate program page, and clicking away as fast as they realize what that is.

If you can chatter helpful stuff on any given topic you should be able to write an article too, though, naturally, there are tips and tricks for writing a more productive article that will really score high for you.

I really want to be thorough about my campaign with classified ads, so I’ll work at submitting mine on a regular basis at AdlandPro for a while, to test the effectiveness of those ads. There’s no point in dumping the baby out with the bathtub water if there’s hope, right?

But you will find my advice here shifting to articles over the next while. We’ll see if we can’t make that a whole lot more useful to you. Even if you’ve never seen yourself as an article writer before. It’s a learnable skill!

But you’d like to get in on the bargains, and you have trouble getting out to the physical malls – I know! Me too! Guess what – now there’s MyPowerMall with over 1000+ online stores that have better prices than downtown (some with free shipping), plus MPM gives you rebates on top of that! No recruiting of signups with the Personal Mall; just shop as you need to. Have a look at this Bouquet of Enterprises

I need to interrupt my series of Linux lessons in this blog to give you some lessons learned through personal experience.

First, do not update the kernel in Suse 10.1 – at least, not on this computer!

I had that experience one weekend the beginning of September. I normally do my backups and then an update through Yast on Saturdays while I’m buzzing around the house doing my cleaning, etc. When the updater pointed out there was something new for the kernel I thought nothing of it and left it checked. Sunday morning when I rebooted my computer I had serious problems! I couldn’t login to Suse 10.1

Thankfully I could still get into my older Suse 9.3 on the second hard drive. After two long days of trying to solve the problem, and finally realizing that the first drive was toast, I re-installed Suse 10.1 on the second drive and managed to keep my files intact. Praise God!

The weekend of our Canadian Thanksgiving that happened again. Everything was coming along so nicely, what harm could there be in a kernel update? This time I could login, but my sound was gone, and I couldn’t connect to go online! It didn’t take quite as many hours to come to the conclusion that I had to re-install my Suse 10.1 again, but it sure is tricky to see to it that the system files are replaced, but not my personal files.

I tell you, I shouted “Hallelujah!” when I saw I had succeeded!

Well, this week I’ve had another lesson, albeit something different. Last Friday night my favourite internet radio station suddenly went dead. I clicked on their blue button several times, and no-go. It was nearly time to shut down for the night anyway, so I didn’t make much of it. But the next day and for the next four days. I could NOT get that station. Everything else was working fine.

For about a week or so they had been offering about five formats for receiving their streaming audio, now I discovered they offered only Windows Media and Adobe Flash. Well, this is a linux system, so the Windows Media does me no good. I did some hunting on their site and found a notice that they were now offering only these two most popular formats. Oh no!

Well, I checked and found I had a flash player, but to be very sure I went download the Adobe Flash player. I’m new to installing individual programs in Liinux so after trying two of the three ways described there, I was getting rather frustrated. Besides I was beginning to pine for my BBNradio.org. I missed it a lot!

I had other obligations so I didn’t work on the problem continuously. I could still switch to another internet station and get nice music there (though after a while I realized they were replaying the same stack of CDs over and over again).

I snitched a half hour here, and another there, over a couple of days, and discovered that I had the Adobe Flash player installed; all I had to do was move or link two files from the player to Firefox. Yes, but where were they? I couldn’t find them.

Finally, Tuesday evening I got back earlier after supper than usual, so I prayed about it, and went to look on the forums for dialogues with others who might have had the same problem. Within about 15-20 minutes I’d found such a forum thread, followed the instructions for locating those two files,libflashplayer.so and flashplayer.xpt and how to create symbolic links (sim-links).

Just in case someone else is hunting for this information I want to spell out the steps here.

1. Open your super-user file manager where you have to log in with your root password.
2. Navigate to the directory /usr/lib/browser-plugins/
3. Since you are really in Konqueror you can divide the window into two by clicking on Window on the top menu, and then on “Split view left/right” (or Split view Top/Bottom if you prefer).
4. In the second window navigate up one and then to firefox/plugins/
5. Now grab with your cursor the file in the first window, libflashplayer.so, and drag it over the divider line to the firefox/plugins/ folder – right-click and hit “Link here” on the popup menu.
6. Grab the other file also, flashplayer.xpt and drag it over, and also right-click and hit “Link here” on the popup menu.
7. There. Close the file manager Close your Firefox if it is open and re-open your Firefox.
8. Try a site and link that calls for your Adobe flash player to jump into action. See if it doesn’t do it nicely!

I am happy to say I have my BBNradio.org playing again all day or as long as my computer is on. Just be patient and keep learning to do better research for your linux solutions. They are out there.

I’m one day late, I know.

Here’s something that may never have happened to you, but it’s not something you need to dread. A dear pen pal friend (age 83) and her brother, who has retired from the farm and moved in with her, so they can look after each other, showed up in Saskatoon on Wednesday evening. They booked into a motel and Louise called me to invite me to have breakfast with them the next morning, that is, yesterday morning. I agreed, thinking this would be great. We could visit over breakfast – I could fit that into my day easily enough.

We had a lovely breakfast but then I learned that they had another plan. They wanted to come see my little home. Fine. I’d be happy to show it to them. they came bearing gifts. They had ordered in pizza the night before, and got an extra one, so they gave me that pizza to heat up and enjoy later. Louise had a lovely sweater and a jacket that used to be her sister Margaret’s that she wondered if they would fit me. Perfectly! And – she had a a card for me with an envelope inside and that had a wad of $100 bills in it!

That’s not all. Louise and John wanted to kidnap me from my work and take me shopping for the day. They asked for a mall that had a Bay and Sears store in them. That’s the Mid-town Plaza just 9-10 blocks from me.

Louise took a lot of time examining some lovely designer suits, but I didn’t have the heart to blow $300 on a suit (I needed the money for other things I considered more important), so I had to be careful not to admire anything too much – else she might buy it for me!

Delightful dilemma, eh?

When they got tired enough to stop and bring me back later in the afternoon, I sat down to make a list of priorities and then took off to do some quick banking and get a good haul of groceries. I expect to spend more online yet today, and I think I’ll go shopping tomorrow in another store where those nice suits might be a small fraction of the original cost.

Oh my, but I’m blessed with wonderful friends! I told Louise that I want to be like her when I grow up.

P.S. I had a very productive evening at my work, and as you can see, I’m a day late with the eAction, but that’s not the end of the world either, is it? Wouldn’t you like to be kidnapped to be blessed like that?