NULL object errors using jQuery JavaScript library

While using jQuery JavaScript library with other JavaScript libraries e.g. scriptaculous or dojo etc. you might experience NULL object errors.

I was using Dynamic JavaScript Ad Rotator Slideshow script with my WordPress BLOG and WordPress theme I am using uses jQuery. I was getting “null” is null or not an object error whenever I was enabling my Dynamic Ad Rotator script. Here is a screen shot of the error.

And here is the code throwing the error -

jQuery().ready(function(){

    $(’#pingbacks’).hide();

    $(’#pingback’).click(function(){

        $(this).siblings(’#pingbacks’).slideToggle(’slow’);

    });

});

Most of the times the error was just because of the conflict, jQuery uses $ as a shortcut for “jQuery”. You can override that default by calling jQuery.noConflict() at any point after jQuery and the other library have both loaded. For example:

When you use more than one libraries with jQuery which use $ sign for selection of code block, use following script.

jQuery.noConflict();
// instead of $ use jQuery as
jQuery(document).ready(
function(){
});

This will remove the conflict between different libraries.

So the final code I ended up using is -

jQuery.noConflict();

jQuery().ready(function(){

    jQuery(’#pingbacks’).hide();

    jQuery(’#pingback’).click(function(){

        jQuery(this).siblings(’#pingbacks’).slideToggle(’slow’);

    });

});

And you dont need to use jQuery.noConflict(); if you are replacing $ with jQuery. That will be done by the script automatically.

Tips for using Twitter and not getting overwhelmed

About a week ago at work one of my coworkers saw the Twitter window at my desk. And he asked me “what do you use twitter for, I have tried this about an year ago, but it seemed just another way of fooling around and wasting time. And not to mention the distraction it brings to your desk.”

Well I gave him an honest answer and I am going to share with you what I told him -I do find twitter overwhelming in the beginning. And I used to spend a lot of my time reading tweets and participating in open discussions. Though I was spending a lot of my time on twitter, I would still not say it was a time waste. If you are following the right people and know the right tools, you can accumulate a lot of knowledge and can use twitter to expand your business by developing relationships.

e.g. If you are a startup blogger and you know nothing about online marketing, I would suggest you go to http://twitter.grader.com/search here you can search other users specialized in your niche and can interact with them directly, so you can search for online marketing in our case. Most of the times users on twitter are very helpful and knowledgeable.

@problogger, @shoemoney, @mashable are some of the users that I have been following even before I started blogging.

I’ve also found that Twitter isn’t something you can explain, and it’s not something you can understand until you’ve used it for at least a few days. You have to use it to get it.

Follow a very Moderate approach

When I first started using Twitter I’d wake up in the morning and try to read through all the tweets, or at least scan them. Then I’d try to keep up periodically throughout the day. It was stressful. And i was falling back on a lot of other important tasks.

So remember DO NOT TRY TO KEEP UP

Twitter will be there for you and you can login anytime to find all the useful tweets, don’t sit there refreshing your screen to wait for more tweets, you can use twitter search (http://search.twitter.com/) to go through all the tweets that you have missed at any time of the day.

Follow people that you can learn from

Don’t follow people simply because they follow you back. Also by following a lot of people you will fed with a lot of not so useful information which defeats the very purpose of you using Twitter, unless you have some other good reason.

Don’t be on Twitter all the time

Personally I always had hard time concentrating on other tasks if my twitter window is open. So like I said, I close it most of the time and open it a few times a day to see what’s going on. And to market my BLOG links or any other affiliations that make sense to me.

There should be a Full Stop on your tweets

Make sure you don’t tweet whole day long. Your followers might get annoyed and might stop following you. Tweet only about something that makes sense.

Reduce the number of feeds and emails.

If you use Twitter regularly, you can probably reduce your need for RSS (my favorite blogs are on Twitter anyways), email (you can DM people), IM, news sites, and so on. It’s nice to consolidate, as long as you use it intelligently. This will help in saving a lot of time by replacing a lot of stuff with twitter.

Twitter is a wonderful tool if used right. Wish you all the best for your tweets. Please leave any further comments or suggestions about using Twitter effectively and not wasting a whole lot of time while tweeting.

Follow me on Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/coolwebdev

Motivational phrases for startup blogger’s

When I first started blogging, my main idea behind blogging was to gather information and keep myself up to date with the info for efficiently making my regular work decisions and to be on top of emerging technologies for professional development. I have subscribed to a number of RSS feeds and I was a regular gold member and reader of number of tech blogs.

While following this habit my passion grew and I started my own blog to share my ideas and information gathered from my day to day work. I was getting around 200 hits a day at that time.

That is when a friend of mine suggested me to try making some money out of my blog. I have tried since then and it took me some time to start earning some amount of money. I would like to add here that first and foremost purpose of this BLOG is still to share accurate info and to help other techies for no cost involved.

Back to making money -

I know its very easy to give up initially and I have experienced this myself. A lot of blogger’s step in the blogging world thinking of making easy bucks. But slowly they began to realize that its not an easy job and requires a lot of hard work and patience, and on top of all a very knowledgeable and a very smart head above your shoulders.

Well I am sharing some of the motivational phrases that I have used for being energetic and motivational all the time. If you are a start up blogger I will suggest you print them out and hang them on a wall somewhere in your home office or behind your computer.

These phrases will always remind you to of the perseverance required for running a successful BLOG. And some of these phrases come from very successful blogger’s who are earning more then six figures. And always remember one thing - Always treat people as people, You will meet Internet personalities and famous people over your life span, but never undermine yourself. And treat all as people you meet everyday.

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

“Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.”

“Yesterday’s failures are today’s seeds that must be diligently planted to be able to abundantly harvest tomorrow’s successes.”

“Don’t let the opinions of the average man sway you. Dream, and he thinks you’re crazy. Succeed, and he thinks you’re lucky. Acquire wealth, and he thinks you’re greedy. Pay no attention. He simply doesn’t understand.”

“Never Give Up”

“If you can make something for a little less than your competition, and sell it for a little more, then you’re doing OK.”

“Choose to blog about something that you can see yourself still blogging about in 3-4 years - it takes that long to build a successful blog.”

“You have to earn their trust, before you can make a successful sale.”

“you are enough”. You are enough to become a millionaire, you are enough to have an attractive partner, you are enough to fulfill your dreams. You don’t need to keep adding things to yourself, you need to take away the things that hold you back such as doubt, fear and limiting beliefs. You are enough to do [insert anything here].

“Follow your passion”

“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase. Just take the first step.”

Online web consulting jobs that you should approach with caution

First time web consultants make a big mistake of accepting every job that come there way. I have made this mistake and there are good chances that every newbie experience the same.

Sometimes, however, the jobs we take end up costing us instead of giving us profits.  What we intended as another step in our career only becomes a lesson we shouldn’t have learned the hard way.  How do we identify these problematic jobs and what can we do about them?

Poorly paid Jobs

These are the jobs that are often advertised on craigslist or other listing directories. These jobs try to compensate for the low pay with promises of “exposure” or a percentage of the profits.  They also make excuses, which include the following:

• they’re just starting out as a company;
• web workers in developing countries charge at that low rate and you have to compete with them;
• and your pay will be increased over time (although this claim is vague and not indicated in the contract).

Even if a low paying job were legitimate, accepting it has disadvantages.  This job will take hours away from your work week, hours that could be better spent on boosting your marketing efforts to get the well-paying jobs.  Plus, it will lower your average hourly income overall.  Ideally, you should be increasing your rates as the years go by and not the other way around.

The job you can not learn from

As a new consultant it is very important for you to jump into newer areas at least initially. You don’t want to do the same job every time. More exposure will help you overtime and will result in better revenues.

Take this kind of job only if you’re low on cash or if you plan to outsource or delegate it, otherwise, you won’t be getting much else apart from the money.

The Audition Job.

You know those jobs where you have to “audition” by doing a design mock up or a draft and if your client likes it, they’ll pay you.  If not, well, that’s too bad.  While it’s true that not all people who ask for spec work are out to scam you, it’s not the best way to conduct business - both for the freelancer and the client.

The “Easy” Job.

Some jobs seems simple enough when you look at your client’s initial specifications, but once you get deep into the project you realize how big the scope actually is.

It’s hard to identify this kind of job at first.  What usually gives it away is when your client tells you “It’s easy!” or “It will only take 10 minutes of your time!”  Think about it, if the job were really easy, shouldn’t they be able to do it themselves?

With all of the above being said

Based on my own experience I must say that be professional and stick to a pre planned and approved project plan. While its normal in software / web development to be bit flexible here and there, be very strict to you approach after 1 or 2 revisions have been made.

You should be putting more energy and time in getting new work rather then working on stuff that is hanging on since last year and you are not getting paid for that. The most important thing is - Learn to say "NO".

I know most new consultants don’t use the word "NO" as they are scared of loosing there clients, but trust me saying "NO" will help both you and the client in the long run.

And at last All the Best and you are always welcome to comment or email me in case you need help.

Writing your wordpress BLOG articles remotely using XML-RPC (Using Windows Live Writer with your wordpress BLOG)

BLOG articles can be written remotely using XML-RPC interface for Wordpress. It is a web service used by several blogging engines and platforms as a standard API for writing blog articles remotely.

Why should you use a desktop blogging client in the first place?

Well most of the bloggers (including myself) have a really tight schedule and are working alongside full time jobs, desktop blogging clients can work offline without an Internet connection, so we can create, edit, categorize BLOG  articles and then when you get online at home it’ll be automatically synced to your WordPress.

And another reason is because Windows Live Writer is a regular Windows program as opposed to something inside your web browser they’re able to do some pretty neat things with the interface and provide a good experience for blogging.

How to enable XML-RPC on your wordpress BLOG -

1. Login as Admin to your wordpress BLOG.
2. Click on Settings.
3. Click on Writing under Settings Menu.
4. Click on the check box named XML-RPC [Enable the WordPress, Movable Type, MetaWeblog and Blogger XML-RPC publishing protocols.]
5. Save the settings.

If you are using Windows Live Writer, while setting it up, you need to provide the URL to your BLOG as - Your_Wordpress_Blog_URL/xmlrpc.php and your admin username / password for authentication. And you will be good to go for writing BLOG articles offline and can upload or sync as and when you get an Internet connection. You can download Windows Live Writer by clicking here.

A number of “Blogging desktop client” applications used for writing posts offline usually access the blog using this XML-RPC API. Some of the commonly used applications for writing posts remotely are - Windows Live Writer, Zoundry, ScribeFire and BLOGDESK. ScribeFire is a Firefox plug-in. Zoundry is pretty good too, but it is vulnerable to hacking attack, as it can not recognize a bogus certificate if you are using SSL for your site.

I personally use Windows Live Writer and its working well for me so far. Happy Blogging :)

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