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Sharing With The Bitly Sidebar

Dec25

bitly-sidebarHow To Get The Old Bitly Sidebar Back

I’ve been using Bitly for years and years. It’s been a great tool for shortening links on our many blogs and sharing updates, news, game contests and more. I LOVE the time it has saved me and the ease of use of the sidebar add-on.

No matter what browser you used, it was easy to install and easy to use. Until…..

In December 2013 Bitly changed their Bitly Sidebar with a new and “not improved” Bitmark. Long time users really didn’t like it and many people updated their browsers without realizing they couldn’t get the old Sidebar back.

If you liked the Old Bitly sidebar, you had the option to get it back by creating your own booklet or bookmarklet.

Update: 06/2014
Sadly Bitly has disabled the script that allowed this to continue, which now forces everyone to use their sucky pop-up. I hate that thing.

But here’s how you created the old sidebar bookmarklet. 

  • Right click on your bookmark bar.
  • Create a new Bookmark.
  • In the Name field, select a name that you like. I called mine “Bitly”.
  • In the Location field, paste this code:
    javascript:var%20e=document.createElement(‘script’);e.setAttribute(‘language’,’javascript’);e.setAttribute(‘src’,’//bitly.com/bookmarklet/load.js’);document.body.appendChild(e);void(0);
  • Save the bookmark and you’re good to go.

Some other bloggers have this code with a little extra in it that adds some annoying advertisements to your bitly sidebar. This is nothing but the original bitly side bar feature. I promise.  😉

Now on my browser, you can do all things you used to do except actually share the tweet. I’m guessing Bitly has disabled the script on their end. But I’d rather have the old bitly and then copy and paste the tweet into Tweet Deck and share it through the accounts I want to use.

I also suggest going to Bitly.com and sending the Support staff a note and let them know your displeasure with taking away a perfectly great feature. At the very least, they should offer both versions! Even if they don’t provide support to the old version.

 

© This material is the intellectual property of Author Springwolf
© 2006-2013 Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved, Springwolf, D.D., Ph.D.

 

App Update: Holiday & Privacy

Dec9

Holiday Apps

Now that the holidays are upon us, there are a couple of apps you might like for the kid in you. 

20131202-08Snowfall Live Wallpaper by Kittehface Software
Live wallpaper for the holiday. Falling snow, holiday lights on the trees, and you can even select an option to have Santa fly across the screen from time to time. He increases his appearance the closer it gets to December 25th.

This full version has tons of settings for colors, Christmas lights, time of day tracking, camera speeds, Santa sightings, snow appearance, and more!
PERMISSIONS: Coarse location is to allow calculation of accurate sunrise/sunset times!

ReindeerCam by ReindeerCam LLC
Do you believe in Santa? We’ve got proof he exists! Discover what over 1 million already have – that Santa is real! See Santa’s reindeer live on your mobile device! Watch with your own eyes as Santa himself feeds the reindeer!
Santa feed times everyday November 16th through December 24th, 11AM, 6PM & 9PM EST Continue reading →

Another Android App Review

Feb28

Skyvi (Siri for Android)Skyvi Voice (Siri for Android)

If you have an android phone and want Siri to speak to you, there is an option. It’s called Skyvi from BlueTornado. She has a pleasant voice, similar to Siri. She does everything Siri does and she’s pretty funny sometimes too.

As with most voice apps, it works as well as you speak. If you can speak clearly, Skyvi can understand you. If you have a very heavy accent of some sort, she can get a little confused. And that seems to be the biggest issue with Skyvi. Some people have reported problems with the speech recognition.

I have a slight southern accent. I don’t hear it, but people say I have it. I know it comes out when I’m tired. But Skyvi doesn’t seem to have a problem understanding me. On the few occasions where she has had an issue, I can usually speak the command or conversation again with extra clarity and she gets it fine. I’ve noticed she also gets better with use. The more you talk to her or use her, the better she gets at understanding you.

Our version has to put up with me and the Prince. So she has some extra duty to deal with. It would be nice if we could program two or more users with speech recognition. When he uses my phone for homework, it would be nice if she called him by his name and not mine. But that might be a lot to ask from a free app.

She does have a few issues recognizing names. I have a friend named Maura; Skyvi hears “more a”; when she repeats the name she turns the A into a long A, like ace. When I say call Maura; she doesn’t understand who I’m talking about. Since she displays the names when she asks you to connect it to a contact in your address book, it would be nice if you could edit that name and perhaps fix the issue.

The biggest disappointment to the Prince so far (remember he’s 10) is that he can’t say “thank you Skyvi” because she doesn’t seem to recognize her own name. That is kind of disappointing.

My biggest issue is that she overrides all the other phone sounds I have set and have gotten used to. That simply will not do. That one issue caused me to uninstall the app.

You can read all my Android App Reviews, but remember I’m simply a busy mom and retired IT geek. What works for me, may not work for your schedule or life. Take time to read the reviews on the apps before you download. Someone else may have the same phone or device as you and they may have experienced problems that I didn’t on my Galaxy Nexus.
© This material is the intellectual property of Author Springwolf
© 2012-2013 Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved. Springwolf, D.D., Ph.D.

Two New Android App Reviews

Feb14

valentinesLive WallPaper

Each time a new holiday or season comes around I go looking for a new wallpaper to celebrate the event. Today, it’s Valentines Day. After doing a little looking around, I also thought St. Patty’s Day is around the corner.

Being a Celtic Pagan Shaman, it’s a nice time of the year of me and my kind. We don’t celebrate St. Patrick, instead we honor our Celtic heritage, the magik of the little people and our friends the faery folk.

So I found the following two live wallpapers that are worth sharing.

You can check out my continually running Android App Review too.

Sweet Heart – by GO Launcher Dev Team ☆☆☆☆☆
shamrockA Lovely Live Wallpaper – I really like this wall paper. It’s great for Valentines Day with some very beautiful backgrounds. And for any time of the year, you can put your own picture on the background and let the hearts of love fly.

Shamrock Live Wallpaper – by 1473labs ☆☆☆☆☆
Fun wallpaper for March, Celts and anyone who likes the Luck of the Shamrock on their phone. Some nice background images to choose from. Set the number of clovers and fireflies to float across your screen. Along with a special gold 4 leaf clover! I like it!
© This material is the intellectual property of Author Springwolf
© 2012-2013 Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved. Springwolf, D.D., Ph.D.

Our Blog Was Hacked

Jan29

EvilWordsmith LogoRe-installation & Configuration

Is a total pain! On top of it, the backups I’ve been making haven’t backed up images or their placement. So after I waste the day fixing everything, I’ll have to research if there’s a way to make a full back up!

Then I have to figure out how it happened in the first place. Because the first thing you do when something like this happens, is to scan your pc for a virus and I’m clean. So how did this happen?

I’m so annoyed! I don’t have time for this.

An Update:
So it seems the xml backup works and does indeed capture the images. The problem is with the upload. Now get this…the upload changed the link to the images. It didn’t change the image file names, it changed the link on the posts to the image. WHAT? It added an ’11’ to the end of each src=”image” tag. If that isn’t the weirdest thing to do.

Now I’m on a search to find out if this was a unique issue, or if this has happened to others. And more importantly…is there a solution!!

© This material is the intellectual property of Author Springwolf
© 2013 Evil Wordsmith. Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved.

New Android App Review – Digital Frame

Jan16

Photo Slides (Photo Frame)Set Up A Digital Picture Slideshow

I’m a Mom and like all Moms I love looking at and displaying the pictures of my family. Today you can spend hundreds of dollars on digital picture frames and set them around your house. You can set up screen savers on your PC and show off your pictures when you’re not working. Or if you’re on Windows 7 or greater, you can set up a desk top widget and display your albums proudly.

Now when I’m working on my PC, I have multiple windows open and I’m constantly doing something. It’s not often during the day that the screen saver has time to kick in. So having a digital picture frame would be awesome on my desk. I received a digital frame for Christmas one year and it worked for about 10 months before it crashed and we could never get it working again. Thankfully the husband didn’t spend that much on it, but it was enough to steer us away from other frames and especially more expensive ones. 

When I picked up my new Galaxy Nexus one of the first things I did was move a few current family pictures to it. Mostly because I was going to meet family for lunch and I knew they’d want to see the latest photos of the Prince. On the way home I wondered if there was a digital frame app? It wasn’t until today that I had to really sit down and look for one. Continue reading →

Your 2012 Year In Blogging

Jan8

Wordpress Jetpack Blog Analytics

If you have a WordPress blog and you use Jetpack check out the Annual Report they put together for you. The report is private, but you can check it out and make it public.

We all put a bit of ourselves into our blogs and it’s nice to know that others find our posts helpful, interesting or entertaining. You can discover what people are searching for and if you’re so inclined, write more about the popular topics you’ve already shared.

Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage. In other words it helps you understand what visitors are looking for, how to increase traffic, maximize your marketing budget and resources. Continue reading →

Evil Through the Looking Glass

Dec30

Through The Looking Glass

Dealing With The Black Screen Of Death

My Queen’s hard drive went deep six on the day after Thanksgiving. It’s been that kind of year for us. At first I thought that it was simply that the OS got borked, because I put in a Knoppix disk and could see the hard drive. In fact, from Knoppix she backed up her important files. What ensued next is my odyssey through the looking glass to reinstall Windows 7 on her machine.

The first thing you do on a factory install of Windows 7 is to attempt to boot to the recovery console, check the disk and repair the OS from the backup copy on the drive. Unfortunately, the option did not show up for us. Booting every other possible way, safe mode, safe mode command prompt, minimum display resolution, etc… they all resulted in the same condition. A black screen with a movable mouse pointer. I know that there will be people searching this later so I wanted that phrase in the article. If they come here first they will know how to fix this and they will know just how screwed they are. Continue reading →

New App Reviews For Android

Dec10

Updates To My Galaxy Nexus App Reviews

I’ve added two new apps to my phone. HBOGO and CNN. And I’ve updated the review for the Nascar app through the Sprint network.

My laptop crashed right after Thanksgiving. Very irritating! But it meant I paid more attention to what we were watching on TV. I noticed a commercial on HBO about their new phone app, to take HBO with you. Thought that was interesting! It didn’t occur to me to watch HBO on my phone. And why not? We watch other videos, why not HBO?! So I ran off to the Google play store and there it was: HBOGO. I LOVE this app!

Not long after we were out shopping and someone at one of our local stores mentioned some breaking news. They were looking for information on the radio. Well I have a smart phone now (honestly I’m still not used to this). So I got on the browser and looked for info. In my search I saw a link to download CNNs app. Hey..there’s an idea. News at your finger tips.

That prompted me to check on our local news, for us that’s the local NBC station. Sure enough they have an android app. I didn’t add a review for them, since they’re local, but check out what we think of HBOGo and CNN’s app.

You’ll find all my app reviews @ Android App Review. Yeah..real unique I know.

© Springwolfs Hanko

 

 © 2012 Evil Wordsmith. Evilwordsmith.com. All Rights Reserved.