Cheapest royalty free images

One of the simplest methods to add interest and color to your web site is to add images. They’re attention grabbing. However getting hold of the right image for the subject matter at hand can prove tricky. Just pulling images off Google can be sketchy as most are copyrighted and I wouldn’t recommend anyone who is creating a professional site follow this route.

So where does that leave you? You need an image of the Grand Canyon, but you don’t have time to get over there – you’re a busy web developer remember where time is money. Besides your camera skill might be up to the task.

This is where stock image libraries can save the day.  For under a dollar in most cases you can bag some great images. You pay more as the image size increases but for most web work you can get away with using the smallest size images.  I’ve used a few libraries such as iStockimages.com, Shutterstock and Dreamstime.com  - I’ve found lately that I lean to using Dreamstime more than anyone else as they seem the cheapest, and I can normally grab the image I’m looking for. If not then I’ll head over to one of the other two.

WordPress hosting on a budget

If you’re looking to step-up your blogging by going for your own privately owned domain with wordpress installed then I’d recommend going with Hostgator  for a cheap option.  They have a one click installer for WordPress which makes it a breeze to get up and running.

1. Buy a domain – I lean towards goDaddy or Namecheap
2. Buy a hostgator package (As a Brucie bonus you can use a hostgator discount code - goldplate25 if you’re too tired to click the link!)
3. Setup your site on hostgator and note nameservers
4. Install wordpress on hostgator
5. Go back to domain provider and update nameservers to one provided in step 3

You really could be up and running within ten minutes if you type fast enough. Actually it might take a while for the site to be truely up and running due to the site propagation thingy.

 

How to stop firefox stuttering when scrolling

Ever had that annoying stuttering effect in Firefox when you’re either scrolling down the page? Or scrolling through code in firebug when you’re peering into what’s under the hood of the web page you’re developing? It doesn’t tend to happen initially when you boot up Firefox but starts to creep in after a while, especially if you have a number of tabs open.

It really is a pain in the ass at it interrupts your flow when you’re concentrating on the code – it’s like someone poking you every 5-10 seconds, well, lightly poking maybe. Blowing in your ear might be a better comparison. No, like someone flicking the light on and off. Just enough to get your attention but not enough to stop you doing whatever it is you’re doing.

Help stopping scrolling glitches in Firefox

This is how I put an end to the misery of scrolling lock ups in Firefox on my browser – version 10.0.2

1. Open up a new tab in Firefox
2. type about:config into the url address bar
3. Scroll down through the preference names until you find browser.sessionstore.interval
4. Double click this entry and type 60000 in the input box.
5. Click OK
6. Restart Firefox

Why 60000? Well that’s 60,000 milliseconds – which is equivalent to 60 seconds.

This worked for me so hopefully it’ll work for you too.