Friday 25 August 2017

How to make a facebook link show the image you want.

Here's a dilemma, you want to post info about your company, business etc. on facebook.
However you don't know what the image will look like etc.

Here's how we made it happen...

Firstly Facebook likes you to put tags in a link. This means that you can control how a link is displayed.

1, which text is used for the subject
2. which links
3. which description text
4. which image to use

Here's an example from worldofme.com

A screen shot showing the effect of using Facebook tags on a link.


The tags to use are

<!-- image -->
<meta property="og:image" content="http://worldofme.com/carrot.png" />
<!-- link title -->
<meta property="og:title" content="Woman finds long-lost diamond ring on carrot in garden" />
<!-- link description -->
<meta property="og:description" content="A Canadian woman got an extra carrot with her diamond ring when it was found in her vegetable patch 13 years after she lost it. This is not the first time someone has found a diamond ring on a carrot. In 2011, a Swedish woman found her wedding ring 16 years after she lost it. More details and picture here.." />
<!-- link URL -->
<meta property="og:url" content="http://worldofme.com/_carrot.php" />
<!-- link provided by mark@hopgood.eu - contact me to customise your links or web page -->


Feel free to use the above code.
There is also a free tool from facebook to check what a link will look like in advance.

Feel free to contact me via Fiverr.com https://www.fiverr.com/s2/535e183bf2

or email m



Thursday 8 June 2017

How to see cookies stored for a website, e.g. facebook

With the increase in ransomeware incidents, people are becoming more interested in and focused on security.

As a result, we present a method for showing what information is being tracked by web browsers and sites such as facebook that you visit.

Web browsers store and send information in chunks called cookies. These cookies store unique information about your activity on a website, but it's not always personal info. In order to see what information is being stored on behalf of a website, the following procedure can be followed.


1. go to the website you wish to check cookies on.

2. press F12 or right click and choose inspect ( both of these work in chrome)

3. click console

4. paste the following code into the console...

var theCookies = document.cookie.split(';');
for (var i = 0 ; i < theCookies.length; i++)   console.log ( (i+1) + ' ' + theCookies[i] );


The following type of output is generated:

1 TL=-                                                                                      VM20584:2
2 BLOGGER_EPRIVACY=y                                                  VM20584:2
3 preferredOpenIDProvider=openid                                        VM20584:2
4 SID=ZATpDip9ARftiKoy1vCjWW862rdJq8YDw.             VM20584:2
5 APISID=eP3x16b2KODr4CpU/A34TCD8FSssoJAgMw    VM20584:2
6 SAPISID=viWf88-vk25xl_-R/AhhR7P_EFJbNdX09d        VM20584:2
7 _ga=GA1.2.776065685.1476177244                                    VM20584:2
8 _gid=GA1.2.585868064.1496912034                                   VM20584:2


from the above I can see that there are 8 cookies at this site

heres how to tell what is going on here, e.g.

7 _ga=GA1.2.776065685.1476177244                                    VM20584:2

cookie number 7 for this site is named _ga with the value GA1.2.776065685.1476177244
the code that printed this was on the second line of code and the temporary number given to this session by google chrome is VM20584

_ga represents google analytics, so in this case the site is using google analytics code to track my movement.

As you can see from the report there is no personal information stored here. My identity is safe from other users of this PC!


Monday 8 May 2017

Alexa, what if my daughter is called Alexa? How to change it.

As I've seen many adverts for the Amazon Echo speaker device, and I have a friend who's name is Alexa, I wondered what could be done to stop the Echo / dot from responding everytime someone speaks to my Alexa, or at least calling her name.

A quick look on the internet revealed that you can't change the Echo / dot's name, but you can change the call sign or watch word.

Here are the available options and how to change it.

original
https://www.howtogeek.com/249342/how-to-change-the-amazon-echos-wake-word/


Home, Settings, Alexa Devices, "Wake Word"


or from the app




  • Tap the Alexa icon to begin.
  • On the Home screen, tap the “hamburger menu” icon in the upper left-hand corner of the app’s screen.
  • Tap “Settings” from the menu that appears.
  • On the Settings screen, tap the device you wish to change the wake word on.
  • On the next screen, scroll down until You find the “Wake Word” menu option. Tap it.
  • Tap the pull-down menu to display the available wake words for your device. At the time of this article, the available choices are Alexa, Amazon, Echo, and Computer.
  • Tap the “SAVE” button to save your selection.
  • The app will tell you when your changes have been saved.
  • Use your new wake word to wake up Alexa on your Amazon device.

Options for name include  Alexa, Computer, Amazon, Echo and Computer.

Thursday 6 April 2017

how to automate capture leads in salesforce [ partial answer, but the closest you'll get ]

Here was my dilemma, the need to automate the submission of a SalesForce web to lead form.
Seems simple  right ? But this is for a well known national brand with a highly precious design team.

There were 2 sorts of official answer out there including the salesforce forums.

1. just use the salesforce web to lead form html and restyle it
2. it cant be done - script automation / security errors

Here's the reason why salesforce doesn't want you to automate the submission of the form using javascript - hackability! Basically nasty values can be sent through javascript and denial of service attacks / cracking attacks can happen. Your innocent website could be used by someone to inject and spoil your precious salesforce org.

OK, so given the impossibility factor, I took on the challenge and built the code on my server to act as a gateway. This way I can now send a lead to salesforce using javascript without the need for any design changes or costly use of SalesForce API. My gateway service can also translate values from the website to SalesForce.

Here's how the salesforce lead gateway works

SalesForce Lead Gateway - Javascript and PHP
SalesForce Lead Gateway

So, now the leads come through without having to modify any of the original website
contact mark@hopgood.eu to do this on your website.

Thursday 30 March 2017

Windows 10 - how to reduce size of Datastore.edb example script and screenshots

Windows 10 - how to reduce size of Datastore.edb

ANSWER: defrag the database using esentutl.exe

Here's what I did

open up cmd as administrator
(click windows start and type cmd, right click command prompt and choose run as administrator)

Then in commmand prompt, which should already be at C:\Windows\system32>
type

esentutl /d C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStore.edb

Here's the output from the program

C:\WINDOWS\system32>esentutl /d C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStore.edb

Extensible Storage Engine Utilities for Microsoft(R) Windows(R)
Version 10.0
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Initiating DEFRAGMENTATION mode...
            Database: C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStore.edb

                  Defragmentation Status (% complete)

          0    10   20   30   40   50   60   70   80   90  100
          |----|----|----|----|----|----|----|----|----|----|
          ...................................................


Moving '.\TEMPDFRG18068.EDB' to 'C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStore.edb'... DONE!

Moving '.\TEMPDFRG18068.jfm' to 'C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStore.jfm'... DONE!

Note:
  It is recommended that you immediately perform a full backup
  of this database. If you restore a backup made before the
  defragmentation, the database will be rolled back to the state
  it was in at the time of that backup.

Operation completed successfully in 10.797 seconds.


C:\WINDOWS\system32>


Now i have an extra 1024MB free - makes the difference on windows10!

Monday 30 January 2017

how to create a floating draggable iframe ontop of a web page

As a business consultant working with websites and business systems I get asked to enhance existing sites on a regular basis.

Here's a challenge I was given. In a CRM system, I was asked to display a message if a lead was a potential duplicate.

http://jsfiddle.net/marknhopgood/62q1ux30/5/

The above was my prototype pop up showing BBC weather in an iframe.

You can add using the following html only...

<style>
#draggable-element {
  left: 100px;
  top: 50px;
  width:270px;
  height:240px;
  background-color:#fefefe;
  display: none;
  color:white;
  border-radius: 10px;
  padding:17px;
   box-shadow: 5px 5px 10px 2px #888888;
  cursor:move;
  position:absolute;
  xposition:relative; /* important (all position that's not `static`) */

}
</style>



<div id="draggable-element"></div>
myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest


<script>

var selected = null, // Object of the element to be moved
    x_pos = 0, y_pos = 0, // Stores x & y coordinates of the mouse pointer
    x_elem = 0, y_elem = 0; // Stores top, left values (edge) of the element

// Will be called when user starts dragging an element
function _drag_init(elem) {
    // Store the object of the element which needs to be moved
    selected = elem;
    x_elem = x_pos - selected.offsetLeft;
    y_elem = y_pos - selected.offsetTop;
}

// Will be called when user dragging an element
function _move_elem(e) {
    x_pos = document.all ? window.event.clientX : e.pageX;
    y_pos = document.all ? window.event.clientY : e.pageY;
    if (selected !== null) {
        selected.style.left = (x_pos - x_elem) + 'px';
        selected.style.top = (y_pos - y_elem) + 'px';
    }
}

// Destroy the object when we are done
function _destroy() {
    selected = null;
}

// Bind the functions...
document.getElementById('draggable-element').onmousedown = function () {
    _drag_init(this);
    return false;
};

//load in advance
document.getElementById('draggable-element').innerHTML = '<iframe  src="http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/tn13" scrolling="no" style="height: 240px; border: 0px none; width: 255px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 8px;">  </iframe>';


function showall(){
var myPop = document.getElementById('draggable-element');
myPop.style.display = 'block';
}

setTimeout(function(){ showall(); }, 1000);


document.onmousemove = _move_elem;
document.onmouseup = _destroy;
</script>


============== BELOW IS THE CODE - view source to check =================

myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest myTest END

Tuesday 29 November 2016

How to arrange a funeral and get help with paying for it [ANSWERED]

If a close friend or relative has died, then arranging a funeral may be your responsibility.


A funeral is a get together following a friend or relative's death.

See also - what to do if you discover a friend or relative has died.

The dead person's wishes. You don't have to legally adhere to this, however the person who has died may have left instructions on what to do following a person's death. More importantly it may be appropriate to consult with the nearest living relatives and closest friends for advice on what the dead person (deceased may have wanted).

Comitting to 'what they would have wanted' depends on a range of factors, including practicality, budget and desires of remaining relatives.

The local health authority will arrange for a simple funeral if none is organised. This may be an alternative if there is no budget, or you would rather spend the budget on a celebration or something else.

Arranging a funeral
Typically a funeral director will work with you. There is a National Association of Funeral Directors - NAFD and a Society of Allied Independent Funeral Directors - SAIF, In addition, some local authorities also run their own funeral services in conjunction with a local firm of funeral directors.

You can arrange everything yourself - the Natural Death Centre or Cemeteries and Cremation department of the local authority of the deceased can help.

An example on getting help with payment would be through the council - here's Sevenoaks District Council's advice on this.

http://www.sevenoaks.gov.uk/services/housing/deaths-funerals-and-cremations/welfare-funerals

Associated costs
If you arrange a funeral with a funeral director, you are required to pay. Make sure you get a price list up front. Ask for an itemised quote if not offered one. If you want to compare costs, either approach another firm or get someone else or a friend to do this. One approach is to state your budget and see what services are available.

Parts of the funeral.
Consider 3 parts to your funeral.
1. caring for the deceased's body - how will the body be formally laid to rest.
2. a formal service might involve a religious venue to allow family members to grieve
3. an informal party or wake that would allow friends or distant relatives to attend and celebrate - if this is at the weekend or the evening it may allow others to join in that wouldn't have otherwise had the chance.

Here's information from the citizens advice bureau
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/relationships/death-and-wills/funeral-services/arranging-a-funeral/


Services provided by funeral directors

A basic funeral is likely to include:
  • a plain, lined coffin
  • transport of the body of the person who has died to the funeral director's premises, usually up to ten miles from wherever the death occurred
  • the care of the person who has died until the funeral. This will include washing and dressing the person who has died and laying the body out, but will not include embalming
  • providing a hearse to take the body to the nearest crematorium or burial ground
  • providing the necessary people to carry the coffin
  • making all other necessary arrangements, for example, getting the required forms.
Other services funeral directors could provide, or which you may want to sort out elsewhere are:
  • flowers
  • a more expensive coffin and fittings
  • press notices
  • a medical certificate required for cremation, and any doctor's fees for signing this
  • an organist
  • fees for religious services
  • a burial or crematorium fee. The burial fee will usually include the costs of preparing the grave
  • extra cars
  • embalming
  • extra services by the funeral director, for example, use of the Chapel of Rest, transport from the mortuary, or special viewing arrangements
  • the cost of journeys of more than ten miles to the funeral director's premises
  • a memorial
  • catering arrangements
  • stationery.

Signing a contract

You may need to sign a contract with the funeral director. Make sure you read it carefully and ask the funeral director about anything you don’t understand.

Paying for the funeral

Some funeral directors might ask for a deposit before making the funeral arrangements.  
You may be offered a discount to pay for the funeral before or soon after it takes place. If you know the money will be released at a later date to cover the cost, you might want to consider a bank loan or overdraft to pay early.
Money may be released later, if the person who has died made arrangements to pay for their funeral through an insurance or other policy, or if money is released after their estate has been dealt with.  
If there is a legal claim for negligence against someone for the death, the cost of the funeral can be claimed as compensation.
Otherwise, you may agree payment by instalment, or pay after the legal process of dealing with the person’s estate has been settled.  

Next steps

Other useful information

National Association of Funeral Directors

618 Warwick Road
Solihull
West Midlands
B91 1AA
Tel: 0845 230 1343
Fax: 0121 711 1351
E-mail: info@nafd.org.uk
Website: www.nafd.org.uk

National Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors

3 Bullfields
Sawbridgeworth
Hertfordshire
CM21 9DB
Tel: 0845 230 6777
Fax: 01279 726300
E-mail: info@saif.org.uk
Website: www.saif.org.uk

Natural Death Centre

In The Hill House
Watley Lane
Twyford
Winchester
SO21 1QX
Tel: 0871 288 2098
E-mail: contact@naturaldeath.org.uk
Website: www.naturaldeath.org.uk

Funeral Directors Register

You can search for funeral directors on the Funeral Directors Register - a service run by the National Federation of Funeral Directors.