Being a webmaster, you’ve got your hands full, and I should know; I’m obviously one myself. So, anytime I come across applications to make the job easier, especially web applications, I’m quick to try them out and promote their greatness.
In this article we have a social network popularity scanner, a ‘people’ scanner with real-time statistics (somewhat different than an analytical scan), a community based web application set for your business or website and more.
whos.amung.us
“Our little widget brings you stats like no one else. It’s no surprise that over 17 billion widgets have been served within our first year, and climbing fast! If you run a website, blog or a social network, this is a tool you need.”
“Once you add our widget code to your pages, it immediately begins working for you. The widget will display the number of people currently browsing your website. This is not a page counter, think of it as a ‘people’ counter. Clicking on the widget brings you to a detailed real time stats pages, which shows:”
- A list of pages people are currently reading. Beside each page the number of people on that page. Popular pages are near the top of the list. A list of recent readers and the pages they were or are on is also available.
- We know you can’t monitor the widget 24/7, so we do that for you. Easily check how many people were simultaneously on your site, down to the hour.
- Finally, no stats page is complete without knowing where people come from. Our maps pinpoint the location for every one of your readers — live, right down to their city!
View the whos.amung.us widget selection. There is only 5, but they all are aesthetically pleasing and would seemingly be non-obtrusive to display on your blog/website.
Get Satisfaction
“Welcome to the place where questions really are frequently asked. Get Satisfaction brings customers and company employees together to make things better for everyone. Great answers and ideas can come from anywhere; we just do our part to get them to the people who can do something about it.”
“Part feedback system, part community engine, completely different than anything you’ve had a chance to test with your customers. 14,000 companies. Thousands of employees participating in conversations. Millions of users. What gives?”
“Build a Community Engine One Piece at a Time.”
This web application is not completely free, but I had to include it due to the originality and overall quality. Also, they do offer EVERYONE the ability to create a 100% free support community; You just won’t have the bells and whistles.
View the Get Satisfaction pricing plans to coordinate your strategy.
By the way, this web application is marketed as a way to assist your customers with their questions, tech support, whatever you may have. However, that doesn’t mean you have to use the web application for that sole purpose. Thinking outside the box with this application could be incredibly helpful for you and your website.
I didn’t include a screenshot, because one, two or even three screenshots just wouldn’t get the overall message of the web application across. So, I suggest you take a look at the Get Satisfaction Widgets page
Style Chart
“Style Chart is an innovative technology that allows you to easily embed sophisticated and dynamic charts in your Web site. This Guide provides an introduction to all the features of Style Chart, as well as a complete language reference.”
“The Web has evolved into a powerful means of disseminating information, and is now the first place people look for answers. With Web feed and streaming technologies making the Web ever more dynamic, users have come to expect information that is consistently up-to-date, accurate, and comprehensible.”
“The constant challenge facing Web designers is how to convey complex information in this fluid environment. Charts and graphs are by far the most effective means of transmitting information to human readers, but static charts produced by traditional desktop charting tools become rapidly obsolete in the Web environment.”
“The imperative for dynamic data representation has spurred the growth of Web-based charting software. However, current Web-charting products have proven incapable of handling large data sets, and lack the sophisticated operations demanded by serious data presentation tasks. Web designers who need to graphically present complex and dynamic information have been left stranded with inadequate tools.”
“Style Chart is the first Web-charting technology to genuinely address serious charting needs, by generating real-time dynamic charts from datasets of any size. With JavaScript access to a powerful and robust charting engine, Style Chart gives you a level of control over chart design that is not possible with any other charting tool. Style Chart’s flexible deployment options allow you to embed chart scripts directly into your Web page, or host scripts on the Style Chart server and access them via simple image URL.”
McAfee Website Advisor
“With SiteAdvisor software installed, your browser will look a little different than before. We add small site rating icons to your search results as well as a browser button and optional search box. Together, these alert you to potentially risky sites and help you find safer alternatives.”
“These site ratings are based on tests conducted by McAfee using an army of computers that look for all kinds of threats (detailed below). The result is a guide to Web safety.”
“The SiteAdvisor technology is free, easy to install and even easier to use. And it doesn’t collect any personally identifiable information.”
Okay, now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, let me tell you about the part of the website advisor that McAfee barely promotes at all: The web application version. You could consider this the stripped down, easily accessibly, readily available reference to assure all of your website visitors that your website, your website’s affiliates, and your content is safe. With spyware, virii, trojans and the sort being released every second to infect millions of computers on the internet, giving your website visitors a bit of comfort as they surf through your website’s links is anything but a bad idea.
The only enigma of it all is why McAfee doesn’t even mention this version of its software on their main website index. With that said, there is no ‘official’ or ‘cool’ looking image to show how whitehat you are. You’re a creative bunch though, and I’m sure you can find a way to incorporate your own graphical design.
You can view JungleJar’s results here. We are okay if you’re the anxious type.
Social Scan
“Webmaster tool for checking a website link popularity among well known social sites.”
So, this web application is incredibly useful in its conceptual design, but I think the developers should have pushed it as a beta. For some of the social networks you receive no data at all when there should be, and when inserting your URL to actually begin the scan, adding http:// or www. makes the difference between relatively accurate numbers and relatively useless statistics. Just keep this in mind as you use the web application, and you should be able to harvest a bit of valuable data. I’m sure the developers will address these issues, and the web application absolutely deserves a place in this article.
Aw, this was a really quality post. In theory I’d like to write like this too – taking time and real effort to make a good article… but what can I say… I procrastinate alot and never seem to get something done
Hey, I found this article while searching for help with JavaScript. I have recently switched browsers from Google Chrome to Microsoft IE 6. After the change I seem to have a issue with loading JavaScript. Every time I go on a site that requires Javascript, my browser freezes and I get a “runtime error javascript.JSException: Unknown name”. I cannot seem to find out how to fix it. Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks
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