Kids today are much more computer savvy than we are, so I would not recommend a single resolution that involves tweaking Internet Explorer.

Below are suggestions that offer different levels of security.

#1) Change settings in Internet Explorer

In most cases whatever you click and save in Internet Explorer is a Google search away from your kids changing it back, but it might be your first line of defense. I am assuming you have a computer running Microsoft Windows with Internet Explorer 5.5 or greater.

1. Open Internet Explorer
2. Click “Tools”
3. Click “Internet Options…”
4. Click on “Content” tab
5. In the “Content Advisor” section click on “Enable…”

You are now in the Content Advisor. From here you can set your settings.

* “Ratings” tab – Set rating levels for: language, nudity, sex and violence.
* “Approved Sites” tab – Name sites that you will allow your children to always view or name web sites you never want your children to view, regardless of the site’s rating.
* “General” tab *Allow or disallow your child to see sites that are not rated. *Create a password – this is great for use with older children. You set a password, then if your child goes to a site they want to see, but it is a disallowed site, you can allow the site using the password. You will have the option to always allow the site or only allow it this one time. *View or modify the rating system

#2) Tweak your router’s default settings

OK, this might sound a little high-tech and geeky for you, but it is easier than it sounds, and after you do this you can brag to your friends. If you have high speed internet access at home, odds are you have a router (Netgear, Linksys, Belkin, etc…). Look for the CD and information you wrote down when it was installed. You will enter an IP address into Internet Explorer, enter a username and password, and then see an interface similar to below. Click on the “Block Sites” link and start entering web sites you want blocked from reaching your children. Please be advised that this method will block web sites from reaching everybody in your house. Depending upon the make and model of your router, you might be able to restrict access to a specific computer within your house.

#3) Install Software

There is commercial software available designed specifically to keep your children safe while surfing the web. Blocking web sites as referenced in #2 is great if you know the web site you wish to block, but often you do not know the web site address until it is too late. In addition, times have changed and web sites are not the only item parents need to be worried about. With the explosion of social web sites (MySpace, Facebook, etc…), there are other items you may wish to control, such as instant messaging. Below are links to software designed specifically to restrict access to objectionable web sites, and will provide detailed logs for you to review.

NetNanny – netnanny.com
CyberSitter – cybersitter.com
Cyberpatrol – cyberpatrol.com

Please feel free to contact me with questions.

Good luck!

Jason

p.s. The solutions above can also be applied to keep a spouse or significant other away from sports web sites and shopping online!

Jason P. Levy
http://www.jasonlevy.com
http://www.jplwebdesign.com
internet marketer / web developer

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jason_Levy

Capitalizes on Teen Body Rhythms

Far from enabling laziness, Web-based learning programs actually can enable teens to study when they are most alert and to get the increased sleep adolescents need. According to the Nemours Foundation, a national non-profit focused on children’s health, part of adolescence is changing sleep patterns. A teenager’s body has a natural inclination to go to sleep later and stay asleep longer. Most teens need 8 to 9 hours of sleep a night, and not getting enough sleep can lead to short-term memory problems, decreased attentiveness, inconsistent performance, and slower response times. Web-based learning programs can allow teens to take their classes when they are rested and able to focus.

Ideal for Technology-Savvy Teens

Today’s teenagers are at home in a technology rich environment. From cell phones to video games to digital music players to computers, technology is part of their lives. Listening to music on an MP3 player while reading class notes on the computer and sending a text message to a classmate may be perfectly natural for many teens and does not necessarily detract from their learning. Web-based learning programs both capitalize on teenagers’ comfort with technology and help advance skills they will need in tomorrow’s knowledge-based workplace. They promote time management, self discipline, and self-directed problem solving skills.

Interaction Takes Place in Web-based learning Programs

A common concern is that students enrolled in Web-based learning programs are isolated from their peers and don’t receive adequate guidance from their teachers. Today’s technology allows for ample communication between student and teacher, as well as among students. Email, dedicated chat rooms, discussion forums and other digital means provide mechanisms for communication in Web-based learning programs. A Web-based learning class may, for example, follow a syllabus, involve class interaction by way of a discussion forum, and provide for assignments to be emailed between teacher and student.

IQity, a company that has developed a learning management system specifically for grades 9-12, also offers Liveboard, technology through which students interact with the teacher and with other students in real-time through video-conferencing.

Susan Bond is a part of IQ-ity.com – provider of a top-rated Learning Management System for schools seeking to teach courses online. IQity’s LMS includes an online study guide for the Ohio Graduation Test (OGT). Ohio teachers can add a product review of OGT practice tools and help other teachers.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Susan_Bond

Now, astronomers have actually detected a “universal web”. Vast filaments of hot gas tracing the web have been “seen”. Astronomers using NASA’s X-ray satellite observatory, Chandra, “viewed” the filaments stretching for millions of light years through space, with one passing through our own galaxy. They calculate that the filaments contain five times more mass than all the stars in the universe!

Invisible Filaments in Space

Astronomers say that the filamentary structures are so hot that it would generally be invisible to optical, infrared, and radio telescopes. These invisible filaments are detected only because higher density ordinary matter tends to accumulate and condense in them – generating radiation which can be measured by scientists to confirm their existence in intergalactic space.

Being invisible, they are by definition components of “dark matter and energy”. Dark matter and energy are invisible matter and energy that make up more than 99% of our universe – according to scientists. Studies show that both ordinary and invisible dark matter work in concert to build filaments in space, with dense junctions where galaxies cluster. The resulting structure looks something like a spider web, dappled with water droplets.

The filaments betray the presence of invisible dark matter because gas at millions of degrees centigrade found within these filaments has a natural tendency to spread. To find it confined into filaments means that a very strong gravitational field must be pulling it into place and only dark matter can do this – according to the scientists.

Invisible Filaments in the Subtle Body

In 1904 metaphysicist Annie Besant reported that “During human antenatal life a single thread weaves a network, a shimmering web of inconceivable fineness and delicate beauty, with minute meshes. Within the meshes of this web the coarser particles of the bodies are built together. During physical life, prana [which is a plasma of charged super particles according to plasma metaphysics] courses along the branches and meshes.” This web interpenetrating the human fetus certainly has features which resemble the cosmic spider web – with currents of charged prana (or qi particles) coursing through its ‘threads’ and denser material accumulating (i.e. “coarser particles”) on it.

It is a well accepted fact in metaphysics that there are filaments within our subtle magma bodies, which have been referred to as “meridians”, “nadis” and “channels” – in the Chinese, Indian and Tibetan literature, respectively. In Taoist and Qigong literature, they are also referred to as “circuits” and “orbits”. For example, Qigong practitioners may speak of microcosmic and macrocosmic orbits. The microcosmic orbit is really the main meridian through which particles are accelerated in the relevant practices to bring energy to the rest of the subtle body.

According to plasma metaphysics, these meridians are magnetic lines of force within the subtle magnetic plasma (or magma) bodies. The currents flowing through them are “Birkeland currents”, i.e. currents in which charged particles flow through magnetic field lines. The large scale structure of the universe, with a web of filaments punctuated with rotating galaxies, undoubtedly bears a strong resemblance to the web of acupuncture meridians or nadis punctuated with rotating chakras (or vortexes) and acupoints that is found in the etheric component of the physical body.

“I envisioned hundreds of little DC [direct current] generators like dark stars sending their electricity along the meridians, an interior galaxy that the Chinese had somehow found and explored by trial and error over two thousand years ago. It was obvious that the acupuncture charts had an objective basis in reality. Our readings indicated that these meridians were conducting current.” – Robert Becker, The Body Electric

The meridian system, chartered by Chinese acupuncture, can be considered the arterial system of what metaphysicists would describe as the “lower physical-etheric body” (which is not separable from the physical-biomolecular body). These meridian pathways are ordinarily invisible to the biological eyes – just like the invisible cosmic filaments. Just like cosmic filaments, these invisible meridians can be detected when they generate radiation.

French researcher Pierre de Vernejoul injected a radioactive substance into the acupoints of patients and measured the radiation using a special camera. He found that the substance migrated along classical Chinese acupuncture meridian pathways. Other injections made by Vernejoul into random points of the body and into veins and lymphatic channels were unable to demonstrate similar results, suggesting that the meridian system is a unique and separate network of pathways in the body. Further experiments showed that terminating a meridian that related to the liver resulted in a rapid degeneration of liver tissue. Without energy supply from the lower physical-etheric body via the meridians; tissues, organs and cells of the physical-biomolecular body do not appear to function properly.

The Universal and Human Physical-Etheric Bodies

The invisible cosmic web of filaments together with the dark matter that shapes them is in fact embedded in the lowest energy physical-etheric body of our universe. When we look out from Earth what we are seeing is the physical-dense universe, shaped by the lower physical-etheric body of the universe. Astronomers say that the invisible filaments in space are detected only because higher density matter tends to accumulate and condense in these filaments. Similarly, the invisible meridians in the subtle body can only be detected because of radiation from other substances that are channeled through them.

Plasma naturally forms filaments in response to electric and magnetic fields within the subtle body (which according to plasma metaphysics is composed of dark matter). Charged particles are guided within these filaments by the magnetic fields and accelerated by the electric fields – generating currents – as observed by Robert Becker.

Just as the lower physical-etheric body of the universe generates a web of filamentary currents (or filaments) that plays an important part in the large scale structure of the universe, the lower physical-etheric body of the human body generates a web of filamentary currents (or meridians) that is instrumental in developing the physical-biomolecular body of a human being. Of course, the Chinese already knew this – they have been exploring these filaments for more than three thousand years!

Jay Alfred is the author of three books on a new field called “plasma metaphysics”. The books include Our Invisible Bodies, Brains and Realities and Between the Moon and Earth. Plasma metaphysics is the application of plasma and dark matter physics to the study of our high energy subtle bodies and their corresponding environments. These bodies include the “bioplasma” bodies and “astral” bodies found in the metaphysical literature. Plasma metaphysics provides an internally consistent framework for the study of these bodies against the backdrop of modern physics. The books are available at Amazon online bookstores.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jay_Alfred

There are so many learn Spanish web sites out there, anyone can find one that will suit their own personal learning style and needs. In fact, you can even find some free tutorials and lessons when you search the Internet. A simple search with yield all sorts of results for web sites that can teach anyone to learn Spanish.

The Internet is widely known as a wonderful source of resources and information, and anyone can learn how to take advantage. There are free Spanish downloads, Spanish learning CDs, even online courses that help anyone learn Spanish in any way they want. Learning a second language is much easier when you can work on your own time, in your own personal space.

But even if the resources are available with many learn Spanish web sites, mastering a second language is no walk in the park. Learning any language, even one as widely-spoken as Spanish, requires patience and practice. There may be a lot of repeating and repetition. Depending on the learning program that you choose, there may be a lot of reading or listening to audio involved. It’s much easier to learn when you can go at your own pace, but that doesn’t mean you won’t have to do some work. Even with learn Spanish web sites, there will be some work to do before you can speak Spanish with ease.

Finding learn Spanish web sites is definitely the easy part. In fact, it might be a little too easy. You might have difficulty finding the right site for you, or remembering which site you were working with. Do a little surfing around between learn Spanish web sites, to find the one that’s right for you. What learning style suits you best? Are you more visual, or do you learn by what you hear? Some may want to do as little reading as possible, so look for sites that have more audio and less text study. Many of these learn Spanish web sites offer trials and free tools, so you can get a feel for what the site offers before you sign up to anything. Keep track of learn Spanish web sites that you like, and those that you don’t. There’s no reason you have to restrict yourself to just one site, and in fact it may be more helpful if you use several to learn Spanish.

Learning Spanish is a great way to advance, and opens up a lot of new job possibilities. With learn Spanish web sites, you can polish your linguistic skills at your own pace and in your own time.

…Was this Article Helpful? Learn Spanish Online For Free at I-WANT-TO-SPEAK-SPANISH.COM, 100’s of Online Resources for anyone who is Serious About Learning and Mastering the Spanish Language…….. For Free

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It is essential to design a website. However, only the design is baseless if it does not have a specific purpose to serve. Designs must have style, a creative expression, clarity and it must be organized. Web designing must cater to the public and have an appeal. The website has to be informative, attractive and offer sufficient insight. The website could be simple, but all the relevant information should be contained and formulated.

Web designing schools offer good courses for the candidates to excel in the technology. A university in Texas teaches Tech-skills, educating the candidates in information technology. Personal instructors also provide the relevant theory and there are laboratories for practical application.

Some institutes specialize in web designing for advanced-level certificate programs. This enables the candidates to procure jobs in the most reputed firms. The faculties and instructors in the web designing schools are experienced.

Apart from the regular schools, there are many online schools that offer certified web design courses. This is a convenient choice, since all the information is available by clicking onto the relevant site, filling an application form and getting admission online. Web designing schools help to shape the careers of many.

Design Schools [http://www.e-DesignSchools.com] provides detailed information on Design Schools, Fashion Design Schools, Interior Design Schools, Graphic Design Schools and more. Design Schools is affiliated with Top Photography Schools [http://www.i-PhotographySchool.com].

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ross_Bainbridge

Search engines are tools that allow you to search for information available on the Web using keywords and search terms. Rather than searching the Web itself, however, you are actually searching the engine’s database of files.

Search engines are actually three separate tools in one. The spider is a program that “crawls” through the Web, moving from link to link, looking for new web pages. Once it finds new sites or files, they are added to the search engine’s index. This index is a searchable database of all the information that the spider has found on the Web. Some engines index every word in each document, while others select certain words. The search engine itself is a piece of software that allows users to search the engine’s database. Clearly, an engine’s search is only as good as the index it’s searching.

When you run a query using a search engine, you’re really only searching the engine’s index of what’s on the Web, as opposed to the entire Web. No one search engine is capable of indexing everything on the Web – there’s just too much information out there! Additionally, many spiders cannot or will not enter databases or index files. Consequently, much of the information excluded in search engine queries includes breaking news, documents, multimedia files, images, tables, and other data. Collectively, these types of resources are referred to as the deep or invisible Web. They’re buried deep in the Web and are invisible to search engines. While many search engines feature some areas of the deep web, most of these resources require special tools to unearth them.

Estimates vary, but the deep web is much larger than the surface web. Approximately 500 more times information is located on the deep web as exists on the surface web. This consists of multimedia files, including audio, video, and images; software; documents; dynamically changing content such as breaking news and job postings; and information that’s stored on databases, for example, phone book records, legal information, and business data. Clearly, the deep web has something to offer almost any student researcher.

The easiest way to find information on the deep web is to use a specialized search engine. Many search engines index a very small portion of the deep web; however, some engines target the deep web specifically. If you need to find a piece of information that’s likely to be classified as part of the deep web, search engines that focus on such content are your best bet.

Like surface web engines, deep web search engines may also sell advertising in the form of paid listings. They differ in their coverage of deep web content and offer dissimilar advanced search options. Engines that search the deep web can be classified as first vs. second generation, individual vs. meta, and/or separate vs. collated retrieval, just as with surface web engines. Thus, you’ll need to familiarize yourself with the options that are available and gradually add the best engines to your bag of research tricks.

Let’s look at two popular deep web search engines for an illustration:

1. Complete Planet (www.completeplanet.com) is a free commercial search engine. It acts as a gateway to other search services, providing links to over 70,000 search sites. For easy browsing, the links are organized by subject into a “browse tree.” You can also search their links by keyword, which will retrieve a relevance-ranked list of results. While they do sell advertising, paid results are clearly labeled as such.

2. Scirus (http://www.scirus.com/srsapp/), in contrast, is more limited in scope. An academic engine, it does not sell advertising or feature paid listings. Rather than trying to provide access to the entire deep web, it focuses on scientific content. Users can search over 167 million scientific web pages, databases, and journals with Scirus. Results can be sorted in several ways, including by relevance and source. Scirus is provided free by Elsevier, a company that also markets databases to individuals and institutions.

Obviously, Scirus is a more scholarly search engine than Complete Planet, and thus is more appropriate for your academic research needs. Well, assuming that you’re conducting research for a physics or psychology class, of course! If literature’s your thing, perhaps you might want to try out another academic deep web engine, such as the Directory of Open Access Journals (http://www.doaj.org/) or the New York Public Library’s holdings (http://www.nypl.org/).

When doing research for a class, you need to be just as discriminating with deep web search engines as you are with other online tools. Always look for an engine’s advertising policy, and consider where it gets its funding. Look for non-profit engines that only index information from reputable sources. Search engines with a filter are a plus; for example, Scirus’s engine discards non-scientific web sites and relies mainly on information from the top-level domains “.edu” and “.org”.

As with the rest of the Internet, the deep web can be an excellent resource – but only when used with caution!

Copyright Kelly Garbato, 2005

Kelly Garbato is an author, ePublisher, and small business owner. She recently self-published her first book, “13 Lucky Steps to Writing a Research Paper,” now available at Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com) or through Peedee Publishing (http://www.peedeepublishing.com).

To learn more about the author, visit her web site at http://www.kellygarbato.com.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kelly_Garbato

By looking at the trends of today we can begin to develop a image of what the Web of the future will look like. I believe the Web will improve and grow in a way that will dwarf its present existence and will improve and enrich everyone’s lives way beyond what we can imagine today. The Net will become as integrated into everyone’s everyday lives as much as, and even more so, than the television or phone (in developed nations first, then everywhere). Television, communications and the Internet will merge.

The Web will become increasingly realistic, interactive, and three dimensional. Two dimensional displays will evolve into three dimensional displays. And the Web will probably incorporate more than just the two senses of seeing and hearing. It will first be incorporated into all other electronics found in household appliances, copy machines, automobiles, and anything else with a microchip. Then it will be integrated directly into our brains.

I also envisage this new Web creating an unimaginably sophisticated data sphere that surrounds and envelops the world like a warm electronic blanket, connecting everyone and everything. And it may some day become an autonomous and sentient entity in its own right that we may even come to depend on for life itself.

When a person switches on his wireless Web chip and connects with the Net, he’ll be looking at and interacting with the Web of the future. He’ll manipulate objects, click on links, download information, and communicate with anyone by simply thinking it. In fact, when he navigates to a grocery store to buy food, for instance, he’ll be able to “pick them up”, “feel them” and even “smell” the food he wants to buy just by thinking the appropriate thoughts.

In the future, Web-based software agents will constantly build dynamic lists and instructions to help people in personal and professional activities. These software agents are subroutines, or small programs, which may be part of a responsive ‘Internet Operating System’ that serves humanity, or possibly even destroy it. Programs may become responsible for doing some of the basic thinking that we get stuck routinely doing today. Additionally, it may be responsible for storing a percentage of our memories as well.

The Web has already become something we rely on for memory, and that reliance will only grow. We’d rather look something up on Google two or three times instead of trying to remember it initially. And eventually, we’ll come to rely on the Web for memories and immediate information so that it will seem like we are missing a part of our own brain when not “jacked in” to the Net, to borrow a phrase from science fiction writer William Gibson. The Net will be such a part of our existence that we may even feel profound separation and isolation when not connected.

The Evolution of the Web Display

Of course we’re not going to jump from flat screen LCD monitors of today to displays that exist only “in our minds”. Three dimensional displays may be the bridge. There is a device in existence today called a Heliodisplay(TM) that produces holograms which exist in three dimensions and are created with photographic projection using advanced laser technology. It’s possible that all displays will employ this technology in the future. The gaming industry ceaselessly works at making their artificial gaming experiences more realistic and is a powerful driving force in computer display technology.

The Web of our future will first be truly device independent where each piece of equipment is a different window that peers into the same global Web. From handheld devices not unlike the Star Trek Communicators, to cell phones, televisions, automobile dashboards, embedded refrigerator displays and MP3 players, all will be portals into the same World Wide Web.

And of course everything will be connected. Instead of applications running on individual personal computers and devices, applications will operate on the Net and be accessible to anyone, creating a loose Internet Operating System.

Ultimately, the Web of our future will most likely abandon standard two dimensional and even three dimensional displays and instead be projected right onto our corneas, skipping the middle man, so to speak.

FutureWeb is Closer Than We Think

Already demonstrated in the lab is the ability to cause a computer to react to thought alone. Duke University neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis works in the field of BMI (brain-machine interface). In an experiment involving a monkey, a computer and a monitor, Nicolelis and his team successfully caused the monkey to communicate with and control a robotic arm through its brain’s neural signals alone.

The monkey’s brain activity and signals were first monitored with numerous electrodes inside its scalp while it manipulated a joystick. The scientists taught the monkey to move the joystick with its arms to accomplish movement on the monitor. Nicolelis’ team then took the joystick away, but continued everything else the same way. Since the monkey’s brain was hooked up to the computer, each time it had the thought of moving its arms, the desired affect actually happened anyway on the monitor, triggered by the monkey’s thoughts alone. In fact, the monkey was even able to control an artificial arm over the Web 600 miles away in the same manner.

There are two important applications for this technology that are driving its research: medicine and war, two constants in all of human history. Doctors will someday be able to attach a prosthetic arm to a patient, wire it up to her brain, and succeed in enabling her to control the prosthetic fingers by simply thinking it.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) manages the research for the U.S. Department of Defense. In 2003, DARPA invested $23 million in BMI programs, including the one at Duke University cited above. Their goal is to allow soldiers to control weapons of all kinds by thought only. These super soldiers will be able to stealthily navigate through a battlefield willing robotic gliders above to drop their payloads of smart bombs on the enemy over the next hill, without endangering their own lives.

Ethical questions aside, brain-machine interfacing will someday mature and become integrated into our lives. Since the Web is already such a part of our world, the marriage of the two is inevitable.

This technology can be utilized in the other direction as well. Just like a thought can produce computer behavior, the computer will someday be able to send back sensory data other than just sight and sound. If a computer is hooked directly up to the brain, then smell, taste and touch can be affected as well. The Web will literally come to life.

The Semantic Web, Web 2.0 and the Collaboration of Humanity

Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the Web, wrote an illuminating book called Weaving the Web that I recommend all Web professionals read. Among the many profound ideas expressed are two concepts relevant here. One is the Semantic Web, which is explained as “The Web of data with meaning in the sense that a computer program can learn enough about what the data means to process it.” Metadata is the term used for data about data. Most Web pages today have embedded in the html code metadata that gives information about the Web page. Eventually, this information will become much more robust, allowing more intelligent searches to become a reality.

The Semantic Web may have the potential to help make the Internet an entity in its own right. Parallel processing, the connecting of computers to make super computers, has been in existence for some time now. In fact, that’s how the human brain operates, by conducting many operations at the same time.

The other fascinating idea Berners-Lee expressed in this landmark book is that his original idea for the Web involved much more of a two-way exchange of information. His original vision for the Web was one of collaboration. He wanted people to be able to post information to the Web as easily as it was to view information. Unfortunately, the latter has been embraced more readily by the general population.

But now we see the emergence of “Web 2.0″, a fairly new term that describes an innovative type of website that is built on the participation of its users. Blogs, wikis Podcasts and social networks all fall under the Web 2.0 umbrella. Today we are finally achieving what Berners-Lee had in mind all along. With websites such as MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, Squidoo, and Digg, non-technical users can now post information and contribute to the Web as easily as they can access it. The Web of the future will embrace this concept even more, causing its speed of growth to eclipse today’s rate.

It’s not difficult to see that the Web could be a vast parallel processing farm, that given enough artificial intelligence programming, the infusion of Semantic Web systems, and the constant additions from billions of intelligent beings (namely humans), it could have the potential of becoming something of a unified intelligence, a data sphere that surrounds the planet and is more powerful that the sum of its parts.

This concept of technology’s exponential growth turning onto something we cannot even imagine with the possibility of the Web becoming sentient is not new. Vernor Vinge, a retired Professor of Mathematics at San Diego State University, a computer scientist and a science fiction author, wrote about the Singularity in a 1993 essay.

A super-intelligence emerging out of the Web was also written about by Kevin Kelly in Wired Magazine in August 2005 and also published on KurzweilAI.com.

“. . . we are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth. The precise cause of this change is the imminent creation by technology of entities with greater than human intelligence.

This planet-sized computer is comparable in complexity to a human brain. Both the brain and the Web have hundreds of billions of neurons (or Web pages). Each biological neuron sprouts synaptic links to thousands of other neurons, while each Web page branches into dozens of hyperlinks. That adds up to a trillion “synapses” between the static pages on the Web. The human brain has about 100 times that number—but brains are not doubling in size every few years. The Machine [the Web of the future] is.”

An online search will yield many examples of bizarre concepts that existed only in science fiction later becoming reality. The Web is something that Earth has never seen before. It not only has the potential to connect everyone, but it can also extend every brain and grow exponentially. It may take a lot longer than anyone thinks, but eventually the Web of our future will be immensely different and much more powerful than anyone can possibly imagine today.

Jason OConnor is CEO of Oak Web Works, LLC (http://www.oakwebworks.com), an e-strategy firm.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jason_OConnor

Today, the internet presents the same equation. People judge the quality of goods and services before they ever actually experience those goods and services, based on the quality of the business’s Web site. Ethos-using text and visual language to build credibility and trust between an organization and the user-can make or break an organization. Does that mean that all organizations with fabulous Web sites offer extraordinary goods and services? Not at all. Just like that restaurant with the spray painted sign may really be the best brunch in town, but the sign does not encourage or support trust by the consumer.

School districts, while public institutions, are also organizations that rely on public trust in order to function well. Parents and new families moving into your community will go on-line to view the district or school Web site in their area. With public schools competing for funding with charter and private schools, building ethos in your community should be a priority. Does your current school or district Web site portray the image of trust and respectability?

Many schools and districts farm out their Web sites to well-intentioned parents, local college students, or the district IT department. While the focus is saving money, many times these sites are poorly designed, difficult to navigate, contain errors or outdated information, and look unprofessional. These sites damage the ethos of your school or district, and do not encourage a feeling of trust within the parent community. Parents want to feel like the school their children attend is keeping up with current technology, providing challenging curriculum, and using up-to-date instructional methods. If the school site has minimal formatting, is difficult to use, and looks unprofessional, that sentiment attaches itself to the school as well: unprofessional Web site = unprofessional school = unprofessional teachers. It may not be reality, but that’s the message users get.

Investing in their Web site is the first place schools should focus when trying to build ethos for their school and district. Hiring School Webmasters is an easy and efficient way to start. We design, write, host, and update sites specifically with the user in mind. Our staff of professional designers create pages that are easy for parents to navigate, pleasing to look at, and allow parents to find the information that’s important to them in a fast and efficient manner. Our professional content writers write text that is easy to read, conversational in tone, and engage the reader. We use formatting to your advantage, by incorporating bullet points and links within the text that are informative and lend credibility to your institution. The overall sites are clean, polished, and always up-to-date, which helps build that ethos with the public. If the school Web site is well put together, friendly, informative, and on-the-ball, I’m going to think the school and district must be as well. Your school and district Web site say so much more about you than the text on the page. Make sure it’s saying the right things.

Rachel Vidoni is a mom of three, freelance writer, and content writer for School Webmasters, an all women owned company based in Mesa, Arizona. School Webmasters focuses solely on designing, writing, and hosting award winning school and district Web sites. For more information about parenting and education, visit their Web site and blog at http://www.schoolwebmasters.com School Webmasters also has an affordable teacher Web site component and teacher blog at http://www.myteachersite.org

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And if you are a do-it-yourselfer, web cams can also be adapted to take long exposure astrophotos, pretty cool right? Plus there are ready to go, web cam based planetary imagers now available from Celestron, Meade and, Orion. Meade and Orion also have imagers for long exposure, deep-sky imaging. All these include software. They are however more expensive.

If you already have a web cam great, you only need some software which can be downloaded for free, and an adaptor to connect the web cam to your telescope. If you don’t own one the following cams have proven to be good for astrophotography and good deals can be found on eBay for example.

-ToUcam Pro by Philips PCVC740K or PCVC840K ToUcam PRO II. I have both of these. I am leaving the new one as a dedicated planetary imager and adapting the PCV740K for long exposure astrophotography.

-Vesta pro also by Philips. I haven’t personally used this web cam but others have with great success. It can also be adapted for long exposures.

-Quickcam pro by Logitech. I used to have one of these, but I prefer the ToUcam. It does a good job though and can also be modified for long exposures.

-There are other web cams which are good for astrophotography but these three are the only ones I have experience with.

Now for the adaptor to connect the web cam to your telescope. I use a Mogg adaptor, made by, surprise Mr. Steve Mogg. More information and purchasing can be found at: http://webcaddy.com.au/astro/adapter.htm
For either ToUcam you will want the UWAT-F, for the Vesta Pro the UWAS-F, and for the Quickcam Pro the UWAL-F. He has adaptors for other astrophotography web cams as well.

Next you will need some software to make this all work. Good news it won’t cost you a single penny. First you will need some capture software. K3CCDTools version 1 is absolutely free. It works very well to capture astrophotos with web cams. I use version 3 which costs $45.00 because I use some of the other features it offers but you won’t need that for basic planetary work (yet). You can download it at: http://www.pk3.org/Astro/index.htm?k3ccdtools_download.htm.

To get really nice detail in your shots you will need to combine(stack) multiple images. A really nice piece of software is called RegiStax. It is also freeware. You can download a copy at:
http://registax.astronomy.net/html/download.html.

The next article in this series will be on setting up your web cam and software, capturing your first image during daylight, then getting your first astrophoto (the moon).

Carl Gilbertson has been involved in amatuer astronomy for over 30 years and astrophotography for over twenty-five years. Learn more at his site: Web Cam Astrophotography

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Carl_Gilbertson

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