EPR Creations LLC

Uses of Apple’s AirPort Express

Apple’s AirPort Express serves a number of purposes for its low price of $99. I recently used two AirPort Expresses when a client asked me to add entertainment systems throughout her house. I was able to use the AirPort Express devices to repeat the main WiFi signal in the house as well as to connect a stereo system, allowing the client

You can check out the AirPort Express at the Apple Store.

Here is a list of uses for the AirPort Express:

Router

The AirPort Express’ most basic use is that of a WiFi router. You can pull a signal from a cable- or phone-based system and send a 802.11n WiFi signal through the AirPort Express.

WiFi Repeater / Extender

The AirPort Express can act as a WiFi receiving or a WiFi repeating device. As a receiver, you can control music playlists or send documents to a printer. But as a repeater, you can repeat or extend your existing WiFi signal within your house or building. For example, if the WiFi connection in your house is located in the basement and the signal in the upstairs rooms is weak, you could use an AirPort Express to repeat and extend that WiFi signal, strengthening it for the upstairs rooms.

Remote Stereo Control

The AirPort Express has a audio minijack input allowing you to connect your AirPort Express to your stereo. Once the AirPort Express is set up, you will then see an AirPlay option on any of your Mac-based products or software. You could then play music from any device without wires from any room in your house. If you have multiple AirPort Express devices and/or Apple TV devices around your house, you could play the same or different music on each and every connected device. And you can control all of this from something as small as an iPod Touch.

Remote Printing Device

The AirPort Express also has a USB connection, allowing you to connect a printer to the device. You can then print wirelessly from any device connected to WiFi. You can also print directly from your phone.

Hotel WiFi Router

What happens when you go to a hotel with your iPad and all they have in the room is an ethernet line with no WiFi? Since the AirPort Express is so portable, you can now take the device on your travels and set up your own WiFi connection. Just plug the ethernet cord into AirPort Express and you will be able to access the Internet via WiFi with the same credentials you use at home. You could also open this up to your entire family or other friends traveling along with you.

If you travel a lot or need some of the capabilities listed above, the AirPort Express is a great device at a great price that provides a number of wonderful features.

Check Page Rank for my Website

Are you curious what your page rank is for your website? Use this tool below to find out how Google ranks your web page.

5 Minutes with Twitter

Congratulations. You’ve set up your Twitter account for your company. Now what? What is the best use of the next 5 minutes of your time?

Minute 1 – Fill in your basic information and get your company logo in there in place of of the Twitter egg.

Minute 2 – Search for other companies and friends who would be good contacts for your business. Follow them.

Minute 3 – Look at the list of followers for your competitors. These Tweeters are obviously interested in your business offering. Send Follow requests to your competitors followers.

Minute 4 – Search for important terms related to your business and see how other Twitter users are hash-tagging them. Hash tagging is where there is a # before a word. By doing that, the user ensures that his or her tweet will come up for searches for that word.

Minute 5 – Start tweeting and make good use of hashtags for terms relevant to your business. If someone retweets one of your tweets, thank that person.

And finally, as in other forms of content presentation, add value. Don’t get on your company Twitter account to describe mundane tasks. Add value to your follows. Let them know how your product can improve their lives. Offer discounts for the next 5 people who purchase your product when they show you the tweet.

The Website as the Hub

There are so many choices out there for promoting your company online. You can now have a Facebook fan page, multiple company Twitter feeds, a Linkedin profile, a Google places account, etc. Which ones should you choose for your company?

Are they all necessary?

No, they are not. There is no one size fits all answer for which option to choose. It really depends on your industry and where your potential clients are located.

Another important question is, with all of these additional options, how important is your website?

For some companies, a simple Facebook Fan page may do the trick. You actually might not need a full-blown website. You can now add a store to your Facebook fan page to sell your products, music, or services on your Facebook page. That may eliminate your need of setting up an Ecommerce website. I bought horse riding lessons for my wife a few weeks back and the time slot sign up calendar was on the horse farm’s Facebook page instead of their website.

However, Facebook is the only option from the list above that at this point could really take the place of your website. And even with the benefits of a Facebook fan page, it is still a good idea to have a website be the hub for your company. Use the profiles (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) to do what they do best – connect you to people and potential clients. But use your website to do the following:

• Your website should be the place where people interested in going deep into your company information should be able to search and find everything they want. Most users will not require that level of information, but make it available for those who do.
• Your website should connect to a database so that any information that users choose to provide are collected in your records forever.
• Your website should point to all ways that users can connect to you. Some users prefer Facebook others twitter, and some may just want to follow your rss feed. But give them a way to connect and stay in touch.

Is this work for my company or my employer?

If you are like many entrepreneurs, you are likely working in a company during the day while starting your business at night. This is a smart approach and one that removes some of the inherent risk of starting your own company. Oftentimes, your new company is in the same line of work that you do during the day for your employer.

So how do you divide what should be work under your employer and what should be done under your own company or even as a freelancer? For example, if you are a graphic designer for a big company during the day and you get a new client outside of the office, should that be under your employer or under your company?

I met with a business contact last week who provided a great rule of thumb for these cases. If you make the contact through anyone associated with your employer, that job should be completed under your employer, even if the communication occurs outside of your employer’s office.

On the other hand, if you meet someone outside of the office and outside of your employer’s network, you should take that client on under your own company or as a freelance.

Most of the time, you will make more money on the project as a freelancer or if it is under your own company.

Fudging Grades

With the recent teacher’s scandal going on in Atlanta, I was reminded of one of my experiences in the Atlanta school system. The current scandal involves Atlanta teachers fudging grades so that students were able to pass or move on. In my case, I had a science teacher in high school who would move test and quiz scores up a whole letter grade on a whim and during class time. It was 9th grade at Chattahoochee High School and I credit my lack of science skills to this one teacher. Since sciences skills build upon each other year after year, one bad teacher can have a detrimental result for all subsequent sciences classes.

I know I am to blame as well. Science did not come easy to me. I could have put in the extra effort to really learn the material and make sure I understood it. But in addition to fudging grades, this lady was just an overall bad science teacher. So, even if I would have put in the time to understand the material, I’m not sure she could have answered my questions. And plus, I lost incentive because I knew that if I got a C on a quiz, it would likely be bumped up to an A or a B. So why put in the effort?

And what really irked me was that I once saw this science teacher at a gas station driving a Mercedes.

I’ve rarely been given breaks in the working world or told that my C quality work was actually B or A quality work. Teaching students that lesser work can be counted as greater does not prepare them for what they will experience in life.

Luckily, I did have some great teachers and professors along the way. At Chattahoochee, one of my English teachers was named Mr. McDaniel. He was a practicing lawyer who took off two years to teach high school English. He was passionate. He loved novels and plays and made them come alive in class. I attribute his skill to having been in the working world and not having been a burned-out full time teacher. I also had an incredible chorus director in Rhonda Fossum.

So, as we continue to learn more about the Atlanta school system scandal, the effects of these actions will be disciplinary measures for the teachers, but a lifelong learning disadvantage for the students. The real tragedy is not that students have had poor role models, but rather that these students will always be at a learning disadvantage just so the teachers would look good. The problem seems to be endemic within the Atlanta school system, like this is a normal occurrence rather than the result of a few bad apples.

Hopefully these students have the initiative to learn on their own in order to compensate for the failings of the teachers.

Bouvé College at NEU

University:
Northeastern University, Bouvé College of Health Sciences

Website Link:
http://www.northeastern.edu/bouve/

Date Launched:
Redesign – Thursday, April 21, 2011
Original Design – October 1, 2010

Design / Development Notes:
HTML, CSS, PHP, Javascript, JQuery, Cascade Content Management System

Website Notes:
This is the biggest project that I have worked on. It was a two-part project. The first part was a complete site restructure where a new sitemap was generated to create a better user experience navigating through the website. Here, the expertise of Josh Willis was used to create a structure where every Department and School program could be reached from the home page of the website. Before this, only 3 departments were accessible from the Bouve home page.

The second part was the design. I tried to focus on a simple design template that could be used for each page of the website. There are a number of different content formats that needed to fit within the main content area of each page. One example of this is the faculty pages. For these pages, I worked with Craig Cocca of Threemagination who created the entire faculty database and code to allow for a dynamic, image-centric solution within the Cascade Content Management System. This was a very enjoyable project as design, development, and website architecture were all required to create a user-friendly solution.

Update

In April 2011, the redesigned version of the Bouvé College of Health Sciences website was launched. We made updates to the Home Page and to the Main Navigation. I worked closely with Bouvé staff and an outside consultant on the project. The home page used to contain Flash elements that did not work on mobile Apple products. The new slideshow on the home page is JavaScript-based and works on mobile devices. The menu also has a lighter feel. I used JQuery to soften the approach and have the menu roll out instead of drop immediately. I also changed it from dark grey and red to a transparent white background, providing a lighter feel for the website.

Use Apple TV for Your Presentations

I recently had a meeting with a client who said all school and company presentation rooms should now contain an Apple TV. Why? Because as more and more people purchase MacBooks, iPads, and iPhones, these devices can be used to wirelessly show presentation slides through the use of AirPlay. You can purchase a nice size flat screen and an Apple TV for less than most projectors.

Although Apple has recently released AirPlay, more and more apps will begin using this feature to show what is on your MacBook, iPad, or iPhone on a screen through Apple TV.

For now, it’s a little cumbersome, but you can show a PowerPoint presentation through AirPlay using your iPad or iPhone. Here are the instructions for how to do this:

• When complete with your PowerPoint presentation, choose the option to save the presentation as images.
• This will save each slide as a separate .jpg image.
• You can then upload these images to your iPad or iPhone
• You will need to join the wireless network that the Apple TV is located on.
• Photos on the iPad or iPhone are one of the items that can be used through AirPlay to show the images through AppleTV
• Once you have opened up the photos, move back and forth between the images on your iPad or iPhone and that will change the images on the screen.
• You can be sitting in the back of the room moving back and forth between the slides.

Buy your URL Name

Have you heard of Jon Huntsman? He is Obama’s Ambassador to China. Only, he’s about to step down to look into a possible Republican presidential run against Obama. If you’d like to learn more about him, you can go to his website:

http://www.jonhuntsman.com/

Or actually, maybe you can’t. You see, Jon never bothered to purchase his own name as a domain name. A Democratic activist purchased the domain instead and has posted a letter that Mr. Huntsman wrote to Obama about what a “remarkable leader” Obama is. I’m not politically astute, but I don’t see this helping Mr. Huntsman.

You don’t have to be considering a presidential run to purchase your own name as a domain name. It’s just something you need to do. If you think that would be completely narcissistic, then consider exhibit A listed above. If you don’t purchase it, someone else will. And then, they can do whatever they want with your name. A domain name costs around $11/year. Make the purchase to avoid a dumb mistake like this.

This also applies to your business name and any iterations of the name.

iPad: Uploading File from Email to FTP Area

A common request I get from my clients is to post a pdf news file to their sites. These are some of the older HTML-based sites where the client does not have the ability to upload the file into a content management system.

I was looking for a way to handle all of this on my iPad so I could take care of these requests on the road.

I found a solution. It’s not as fluid as using a computer, but it works if you are out and about.

First, download the iStorage HD app. It costs $5.99, but it is also acts as an FTP client.

Here are the steps to add a file from an email on your iPad into an FTP area to load onto a website:

1. Open the email in Mail and click on the file link.
2. Once the file opens, click the arrow button usually located in the upper right corner.
3. This will give you the option to open the file in iStorage HD. Choose that option.
4. Within iStorage HD, you will see a list of files, networks, etc on the left side.
5. Go to iPad/Documents and find your file. Open the file.
6. That arrow option will now be on the bottom of the screen. Click that and it will give you the option to Copy the file.
7. Choose Copy and then close the file you are viewing.
8. Now click the + sign in the upper left corner.
9. Choose “Add Network Account” and insert the FTP Host Name, Username, and Password.
10. Once logged in, go to the folder in which you would like to add the file.
11. Once you are within that folder find the arrow item and choose the option to Paste.

And there you have it. That file is now in the folder. From there, you can open up a page within your FTP area and create a link to this new