Having brewed websites for almost 12 years now, I’ve used a fair share
of tools and websites to help streamline the process. Nowadays, as a
busy freelancer and online entrepreneur, I try to stay as efficient as
I can in the web creation process. Just about every tool/website listed
here I use on at least 90% of my projects.

The Creative

1. Photoshop CS2 - Yeah, kinda obvious — I upgrade every other version usually. Used for all my imaging needs.

2. Flash CS3
- Another obvious one. Although I also use Flash for all my vector
needs as well (as opposed to buying Illustrator). Most people would
argue that Illustrator is a “must-have,” but you’d be surprised how
much you can accomplish with Flash (and of course, I speak as web
designer/developer, not a print or identity designer). I’m sure I’ll
get it someday

3. The FWA - The standard for the best Flash websites on the web. Great inspiration fuel.

4. CoolHomePages - Another website that simply databases great looking websites, all filed under various styles and types.

5. FaveUp - Not as many websites here as Cool Home Pages, but a really good directory of logos and some sites.

6. Flashloaded
- Some well-written and very cool Flash components. I particularly like
their 3DEnvironment component and have used it a few times.

7. Flashden - A stock Flash site. Great for inexpensive Flash stock.

8. iStockPhoto - The best micro-stock image website. A few bucks for some really great photos/illustrations.

9. TechCrunch - If anything significant happens in the world of tech, it will appear here. Great news coverage on startups as well.

10. Smashing Magazine - Great design “lists” including ones for well-designed sites and free quality sites.

11. FlashKit - A bit of a confusing website, but a great source for free sound clips for Flash and a few other Flash tidbits.

12. A List Apart - The best original articles for “people who make websites.” Great CSS workarounds here.

13. Kirupa
- Wonderful site if you’re a Flash rookie or veteran. Tons of
tutorials, tips, and files - plenty for other developers too (.Net,
PHP, Photoshop, etc.).

The Development

14. SciTE
- I’ve always been a handcoder for my sites, and this is my favorite,
albeit somewhat archaic, text editor. The shortcuts, file tabs, and
syntax coloring all seems to be just right. I use it for all my
HTML/CSS/PHP and most of my .Net

15. SharpDevelop
- Why pay hundreds for Visual Studio when you can get a very similar
program for free. The best open-source IDE for a .Net developer.

16. Firefox
- Besides being a more secure browser, Firefox has innumerable plugins
helpful for any website creator. There’s even one for opening an IE tab
so you can test your html all in one browser.

17. Google - Anything I ever need to know about anything, someone already has documented it, and Google will find it.

18. Google Groups
- As development questions often appear on newsgroups, this is where I
search for them, often finding answers Google’s standard engine doesn’t
find.

19. SourceForge
- Don’t reinvent the wheel. More than likely there is an open source
project that functions like you need it to, and you’ll find it here.

20. Three Monitors
- A 22-inch monitor is now around $300 and 19-inch ones are half that,
making it cheap to have a dual or triple monitor setup. Email on one,
Photoshop/Flash in another, and Editor/Browser in the middle.

21. IIS - Developing locally is the only way to go.

22. FreeTextBox - A great rich text box I use for creating CMS systems for clients.

23. PDShop
- Not a beautiful website nor cart, but it’s the best .Net cart for the
money. You won’t find a comparable one for four times as much.

The Backbone

24. NameCheap
- I’ve used my share of registrars and NameCheap is by far the best.
The administration is the most logical and simple, with no tricks or
annoyances.

25. CrystalTech
- The hosting company I highly recommend to all clients and use myself.
Competitive prices, great admin panel, and 24/7 tech support with very
knowledgable folks.

26. SQL Server Express/Management Studio - The free SQL Server database. Works great for smaller websites.

27. SmarterMail - Solid email software. Easy and comprehensive admin and a good webmail client too.

28. NewEgg - The low-cost, quick delivery shop for all computer hardware needs. Lots of reviews and product images as well.

29. MySQL GUI Tools - The best tools to manage a mySQL database.

The Support

30. Alertra
- Ever worry that your website might be down and you wouldn’t know
about it? For a few bucks a month, Alertra checks your site thru the
day and will email or SMS you if anything goes amiss. A lot of options
and worth every penny if you run your own websites.

31. Google Analytics - Free, robust analytics program that you can implement in 5 minutes. What more can you ask for?

32. SecureFX
- A $59 FTP program that’s reliable and well-designed. I’ve used many
of the free FTP tools out there, but this one just makes file transfer
easier.

33. Yahoo Site Explorer - An easy way to see how your site is doing from an SEO perspective.

34. Western Digital Passport
- I have a couple 80GB units for all my backups and large transfers. A
perfectly small size and a reliable company for data storage.

35. Yahoo Unlimited-To-Go
- How can you work without music? Especially when you can access an
insanely huge library of music for so cheap (one offer gives you two
years for $80).

36. Google Reader - You must keep up with the design/development field or else. I now have 40 newsfeeds that I scan almost daily.

The Business

37. BlinkSale
- As a solo freelancer, this makes invoicing so much easier. Sends
emails, reminders, and thank-yous. Also good as a very primitive
accounting of moneys received.

38. TradeKing - Profits from business go to investments via my online broker TradeKing. IRA options and only $5 a trade.

39. Fool Caps - This is a great research community for investment market ideas. A chunk of my yearly income is from investments.

40. PrimoPDF - I keep all my business as PDFs and PrimoPDF lets me transform docs easily to PDF.

41. White Tile Board
- Whiteboard at office stores is way overpriced. You can get a 4×8 foot
panel from Home Depot for $12 and coat your whole wall. Not only will
friends be impressed by your wall art and apparent tech savvy-ness,
it’s great for tracking projects or mapping ideas.

42. iPhone
- Along with a Bluetooth headset, this makes mobile communication and
information so much easier and quicker. I use it to read all my RSS
feeds as well.

43. Pidgin - An open source instant messenger that allows me to have all the various IM clients in one piece of software.

By John Jantsch
Founder of Duct Tape Marketing

So, you finally decided to take the blog leap. You heard all about the marketing and search benefits, so you stepped up to the plate and signed up for a TypePad, MovableType or WordPress blog softwarepackage. Now you’re a blogger.

What next? Add the 10 essential blogging tools listed below and you will be well on your way to creating and promoting a blog that is also a powerful marketing tool. I’ll explain the use of the tool and offer some suggestions, including the tools I use on my own blogs.

Feed reader

The best way to learn about blogs and blogging is to read or at least scan lots of blogs. One of the wonders of blogs is that you can have every new post from every blog you want to read delivered to your desktop or to online location so you can easily read and scan the posts of many blogs in a very short time. Newsgater is a good online choice and also has a version that integrates with Microsoft Outlook. I use a free
online service know as Bloglines.

Subscriber center

You need to make it easy for your blog visitors to subscribe to your blog’s RSS feed – so they can read your blog in their favorite feed reader. The best way to do this is to go to FeedBurner and burn your own RSS feed there and use the tools they provide to set up automatic subscriber links. That way people who want to use Bloglines, Google Reader, MyYahoo or Pluck can click on one button to subscribe. Tech types can figure this out on their own but the buttons make it easy for anyone to figure out. You might also look at a free add-on called AddThis. It creates a one button subscribe feature.

Side note – subscribe to each of these yourself and you will force some blog spiders (a search engine’s robot that patrols the web for new content) to visit your site.

Email subscription option

A lot of people will never get the whole feed thing, but everyone gets email. Create a way for people to subscribe by giving you their email address – they will simply receive your blog posts like an email
message. FeedBurner offers this service for free. FeedBlitz is another option or, if you already have an autoresponder email list service, they may offer this service. AWeber offers this and helps me integrate
these blog email subscribers into my other mailing lists.

Blog and RSS directories

There are hundreds of blog and RSS directories, and getting listed in many can be a good thing. I use a piece of software called RSS Submit, but you can also visit Robin Goode’s frequently updated list and submit your blog and feed by hand.

Hint: subscribe to the RSS feed he offers and you will be notified when new directories are added.

Ping service

Pinging is a term used for letting the various blog and RSS directories know when you have posted new content. Again, FeedBurner offers this as an automatic option called PingShot and you should activate it. PingGoat and Ping O Matic are other options, but they require that you visit and update your record each time you post new content.

Bookmark manager

As you surf around the web or hop from blog to blog, you may find sites that you want to point out to your readers. Online bookmark managers allow you to bookmark and categorize web and blog pages as you collect them and are a great tool for managing all of the stuff you find on the web. I use del.icio.us but BlinkList does a fine job as well.

Blog stats

I like to track a few key stats in real time because it shows what other blogs might be linking to you or posting about your blog. A lot of people just like to track this kind of thing for fun and frequently visit sites like Technorati. I like to track it for networking opportunities. I use a tool called MyBlogLog because it allows me to see where traffic is coming from but also tracks what links on my blog visitors are clicking on. It’s amazing how this data can help you write more effectively.

Desktop posting

With most blog software you must go online and post using a set of tools provided by the blog software. Many bloggers like to use a desktop application to create and submit their posts as it gives them some extra tools and allows them to more easily integrate content and files on their computer.

I use w.blogger but also like Performancing, with the Firefox extention, Windows Live Writer and ecto (mac folks).

Tell a friend script

My blog software has a feature that allows a reader to click, link and send the post to a friend. This tactic brings me lots of readers. You might try looking here for some simple scripts that do that same.

Republish feed headlines

The ability to republish your blog posts on other web page, sites you own or sites of strategic partners is a great way to expose folks to your blog content. One more time, we turn to FeedBurner for a painless way
to republish your blog post to any web page you choose with something they call BuzzBoost.

About the Author:

John Jantsch is a veteran marketing coach, award winning blogger and author of Duct Tape Marketing: The World’s Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide published by Thomas Nelson.

He is the creator of the Duct Tape Marketing small business marketing system. You can find more information by visiting http://www.ducttapemarketing.com.

But look under the hood, and there are a bunch of hidden (and some
not-so-secret) tips and tricks available that will crank Firefox up and
pimp your browser. Make it faster, cooler, more efficient. Get to be a Jedi master with the following cool Firefox tricks.

1) More screen space. Make your icons small. Go to View - Toolbars - Customize and check the “Use small icons” box.

2) Smart keywords.
If there’s a search you use a lot (let’s say IMDB.com’s people search),
this is an awesome tool that not many people use. Right-click on the
search box, select “Add a Keyword for this search”, give the keyword a
name and an easy-to-type and easy-to-remember shortcut name (let’s say
“actor”) and save it. Now, when you want to do an actor search, go to
Firefox’s address bar, type “actor” and the name of the actor and press
return. Instant search! You can do this with any search box.

3) Keyboard shortcuts. This is where you become a
real Jedi. It just takes a little while to learn these, but once you
do, your browsing will be super fast. Here are some of the most common
(and my personal favs):

• Spacebar (page down)
• Shift-Spacebar (page up)
• Ctrl+F (find)
• Alt-N (find next)
• Ctrl+D (bookmark page)
• Ctrl+T (new tab)
• Ctrl+K (go to search box)
• Ctrl+L (go to address bar)
• Ctrl+= (increase text size)
• Ctrl+- (decrease text size)
• Ctrl-W (close tab)
• F5 (reload)
• Alt-Home (go to home page)

4) Auto-complete. This is
another keyboard shortcut, but it’s not commonly known and very useful.
Go to the address bar (Control-L) and type the name of the site without
the “www” or the “.com”. Let’s say “google”. Then press Control-Enter,
and it will automatically fill in the “www” and the “.com” and take you
there - like magic! For .net addresses, press Shift-Enter, and for .org
addresses, press Control-Shift-Enter.

5) Tab navigation. Instead of using the mouse to select different tabs that you have open, use the keyboard. Here are the shortcuts:

• Ctrl+Tab (rotate forward among tabs)
• Ctrl+Shft+Tab (rotate to the previous tab)
• Ctrl+1-9 (choose a number to jump to a specific tab)

6) Mouse shortcuts. Sometimes you’re already using
your mouse and it’s easier to use a mouse shortcut than to go back to
the keyboard. Master these cool ones:

• Middle click on link (opens in new tab)
• Shift-scroll down (previous page)
• Shift-scroll up (next page)
• Ctrl-scroll up (decrease text size)
• Ctrl-scroll down (increase text size)
• Middle click on a tab (closes tab)

7) Delete items from address bar history.
Firefox’s ability to automatically show previous URLs you’ve visited,
as you type, in the address bar’s drop-down history menu is very cool.
But sometimes you just don’t want those URLs to show up (I won’t ask
why). Go to the address bar (Ctrl-L), start typing an address, and the
drop-down menu will appear with the URLs of pages you’ve visited with
those letters in them. Use the down-arrow to go down to an address you
want to delete, and press the Delete key to make it disappear.

User chrome.
If you really want to trick out your Firefox, you’ll want to create a
UserChrome.css file and customize your browser. It’s a bit complicated
to get into here, but check out this tutorial.

9) Create a user.js file. Another way to customize
Firefox, creating a user.js file can really speed up your browsing.
You’ll need to create a text file named user.js in your profile folder
(see this to find out where the profile folder is) and see this example user.js file that you can modify. Created by techlifeweb.com, this example explains some of the things you can do in its comments.

10) about:config. The true power user’s tool,
about.config isn’t something to mess with if you don’t know what a
setting does. You can get to the main configuration screen by putting
about:config in the browser’s address bar. See Mozillazine’s about:config tips and screenshots.

11) Add a keyword for a bookmark. Go to your
bookmarks much faster by giving them keywords. Right-click the bookmark
and then select Properties. Put a short keyword in the keyword field,
save it, and now you can type that keyword in the address bar and it
will go to that bookmark.

12) Speed up Firefox. If you have a broadband
connection (and most of us do), you can use pipelining to speed up your
page loads. This allows Firefox to load multiple things on a page at
once, instead of one at a time (by default, it’s optimized for dialup
connections). Here’s how:

• Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Type
  “network.http” in the filter field, and change the following settings
  (double-click on them to change them):
• Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
• Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
• Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to a number like 30. This will allow it to make 30 requests at once.
• Also, right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it
  “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is
  the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it
  receives.

13) Limit RAM usage. If Firefox takes up too much
memory on your computer, you can limit the amount of RAM it is allowed
to us. Again, go to about:config, filter “browser.cache” and select
“browser.cache.disk.capacity”. It’s set to 50000, but you can lower it,
depending on how much memory you have. Try 15000 if you have between
512MB and 1GB ram.

14) Reduce RAM usage further for when Firefox is minimized.
This setting will move Firefox to your hard drive when you minimize it,
taking up much less memory. And there is no noticeable difference in
speed when you restore Firefox, so it’s definitely worth a go. Again,
go to about:config, right-click anywhere and select New-> Boolean.
Name it “config.trim_on_minimize” and set it to TRUE. You have to
restart Firefox for these settings to take effect.

15) Move or remove the close tab button. Do you
accidentally click on the close button of Firefox’s tabs? You can move
them or remove them, again through about:config. Edit the preference
for “browser.tabs.closeButtons”. Here are the meanings of each value:

• 0: Display a close button on the active tab only
• 1:(Default) Display close buttons on all tabs
• 2:Don’t display any close buttons
• 3:Display a single close button at the end of the tab bar (Firefox 1.x behavior)

2. Brand Spanking New (www.brandspankingnew.net/archive/2006/12/hohoho.htm)

3. Greyscale (www.e-lusion.com/design/greyscale/)

4. Drunky Love (http://www.el73.be/drunkey-love/downloads)

5. Strawbee (www.strawbee.com)

6. N Design (www.ndesign-studio.com)

7. Sweetie (www.sweetie.sublink.ca/)

8.Fast Icons (www.fasticon.com/freeware/

9. ASP NET Icons (www.aspneticons.com/)

10. Two Tone Icons (www.2pt3.com/news/twotone-icons-for-free/)

11. Website Icons www.websiteicons.com/tab/FREE_Pixel_icons

12. Pinvoke (www.pinvoke.com/)

13. BS-Markup (www.bs-markup.de/iconsets)

14. Glyph Lab (www.glyphlab.com/)

15. Website Icons (www.websiteicons.net)  
  
16. Spheres Icons (http://mouserunner.com/Spheres_ColoCons1_Free_Icons.html)

17. Exploding Boy (http://www.exploding-boy.com/2005/09/13/explodingboy-pixel-icons/

18. Bitcons (http://somerandomdude.net/srd-projects/bitcons/)

19. Beauticons (http://www.beauticons.com.ar/icons.html)

20. Icon Kits (http://iconkits.com/signup/)

21. Yellow Icons (http://yellowicon.com/downloads/)

22. Studio Twenty Eight (http://www.studiotwentyeight.com/icons.htm)

23. Vista Icons (Vista Icons)

24. Icon Base (http://www.iconbase.com/)

25. Yegor Gilyov (http://yegor.gilyov.com/free/

Fonts, Stock Photos, Patterns, some Textures and Inspiring sites do not
require Photoshop. Also, always check the compatibility of the plug-in
with your software; Don’t download Photoshop CS3 brushes when you’re
using Photoshop 7. The other way around (Photoshop 7 plug-in using in
Photoshop CS3) can be possible.

If you think that there’s a top-source missing from the list, share
it with us by posting them in the comments. The sites listed here offer
their services for free and are placed in random order.

Fonts

The standard fonts on a PC are really boring and just created to
read. You want fonts that just look nice on your artwork. Download
fonts from the following sites to give your text a nice look.
To install, place the downloaded TTF-file (or other Font-file extensions) in the Fonts folder on your PC. This can be found in C:\WINDOWS\Fonts.

• Dafont Personal Favorite
  Great website, huge amount of fonts. Excellent details on each font. Ordering by name or category. Also check the top 100.
• Exljbris
  Free quality font foundry. Has only 7 fonts atm, but their beautiful.
• 1001 Free Fonts
  Name of the website is self-explaining. Ordering by name or category.
• Ace Free Fonts
  Huge collection of fonts. Ordering on name or category.
• Die Gestalten
  A couple of experimental display fonts.
• Fonts 500
  The web’s top 500 fonts.
• Urban Fonts Personal Favorite
  Great
  website, huge amount of fonts. Excellent details on each font. Ordering
  by name or category. Also check the top 100 and favorites.
• DDfont
  Listing fonts that have been collected from around the web.
• Font Freak
  Freeware, shareware and commercial font site.
• Fonts For Flash
  Website that has some freebies fonts. Created for Flash, but can be used in Photoshop.
• Simply The Best
  Nice website with huge amount of fonts. Ordering by name or category.
• Abstract Fonts Personal Favorite
  Great website, huge amount of fonts. Excellent details on each font. Ordering by name or category.
• Grunge Fonts
  This archive specializes in Grunge fonts. Website does contain a lot of advertations.
• 007 Fonts
  Hundreds of Freeware and Shareware fonts. Order alphabetical.
• Font Files
  Nice colletion of fonts. Order alphabetical.
• Font Garden
  Archive of fonts and dingbats. Especially look at the handwriting fonts. Order alphabetical.
• Font Village
  Nice collection of fonts. Website does contain a lot of advertations.
• Fontreactor
  Perfect site to download fonts. Nice preview font system. All fonts are sorted by alphabetical order and by themes.
• Fonts101
  Another website with a huge amount of fonts. Browse by category.
• Acid Fonts
  Good website with big collection of fonts. Browsing by name or category.
• All-free-fonts
  Small collection of fonts. Alphabetical ordering.
• Dingbat Depot
  Not an archive for fonts, but for dingbats. Ordering by name or category.
• Lotsa Fonts
  Nice amount of fonts. Website does contain a lot of advertations.
• Sharkshock
  Big collection of famous company fonts.
• FontFace
  FontFace
  is always adding fonts to this archive. Unlike many other sites,
  FontFace does not exist to be a massive archive of every font available.
• Fontasy
  German website with fonts. Order alphabetical at bottom of the page.
• TypeNow
  Big collection of famous fonts from bands, tv programs, games etc.
• PsyOps
  A couple of fonts
• ShowFont
  Big collection of fonts. Heavy pageload because of the thumbnails on the left.
• Fontz
  Nice website. Ordering by name or category.

Photoshop Brushes

One of my favorite tools in Photoshop has to be the brush tool.
Download brushes from the following sites to make your artwork look
better.
To install, place the downloaded ABR-file in the correct Presets folder of Photoshop. With default install-settings, this folder can be found in C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop\Presets\Brushes.

• VBrush
  Old site with Photoshop 7 brushes. Still worth mentioning.
• Appendixsquared
  Website with a couple of brushes. Brushes will work on Photoshop CS2 or higher.
• Brusheezy Personal Favorite
  Great website with a huge amount of brushes. Easy browsing and nice previews.
• In Obscuro
  Another site with Photoshop 7 brushes. Still has some nice brushes in the collection.
• DaviantART Personal Favorite
  Great website with a huge amount of brushes, created and submitted by other designers. All kinds of styles.

Photoshop Textures

If you want a little bit more depth or relief in your images, than
textures can help you out. Take note that Textures can also be images
which you must add to your photoshop file, instead of it being a
plug-in.

• TextureWarehouse
  Free, High Resolution Textures to Designers and 3D Artist. Textures are updated frequently.
• Amazing Textures
  Texture
  library, with hundreds of free textures to download, high-resolution
  textures, images, backgrounds, wallpapers and texture maps.
• TextureKing Personal Favorite
  Great website containing loads of high resolution textures. Browsing in categories.
• In Texture
  Here you will find a free texture to suit every need, with a wide range
  of surface, mapping, bump mapping and skinning illustrations to name
  but a few.
• Mayang
  Texture library has over 3400 free to download, free to use, high-resolution textures.
• Texture Archive
  Nice website with good patterns. Nice previews available.
• Image*After
  Next to a great stock-photo archive, this website also has a nice amount of texture images.
• AppendixSquared
  Small website where you can download a couple of texture packs.
• Grunge Textures
  Growing collection of quality images ready for you to download. All of our images are high resolution JPG’s.
• DaviantART
  Great website with a huge amount of textures, created and submitted by other designers. All kinds of styles.

Patterns

Patterns can be used to give a nice pattern on an image. Make sure you use them wisely; They can make your artwork beautiful.

• Brusheezy
  Next to their archive of brushes, this website also lists nice patterns.
• DaviantART
  Great website with a huge amount of patterns, created and submitted by other designers. All kinds of styles.

Not much more over here since I don’t use patterns much, but you can create patterns yourself.

Photoshop Plug-ins

Plug-ins can change the way that Photoshop works for you. Filters,
automated actions etc. can make life a little bit easier. Make sure you
install the plug-in in the right directory.

• About Personal Favorite
  This website contains a lot of plug-ins. You just have to check it out youselve.
• Free Photoshop
  Pretty old website (2003), listing plug-ins for Photoshop.
• Adobe Photoshop Exchange Personal Favorite
  Official exchange website from Adobe for Photoshop. Registration required.
• Angelfire Filterz
  Another old website containing a couple of Photoshop filters. No previews.
• Photo-plugins
  Nice website listing many photoshop plugins. Previews available.
• RedField Plugins
  This site contains a couple of plugins. Some are really nice to use. Previews available.
• The Plugin Site
  Small collection of very effective plugins can be found here.
• Telegraphics
  Another small collection of plugins. Type of plugin can be different.

Free Stock Photos

Stock Photo sites contain a lot of high resolution pictures by
people around the world. You can use them in your artwork, but some
pictures are copyrighted or CC‘d.

• MorgueFile
  A
  place to keep post production materials for use of reference, an
  inactive job file. This morgue file contains free high resolution
  digital stock photography for either corporate or public use.
• Image*After
  Image*After
  is a large online free photo collection. You can download and use any
  image from our site and use it in your own work, either personal or
  commercial.
• Stock.xchng Personal Favorite
  Whether
  you just want to browse our huge image gallery or want to share your
  personal photos with others, this is the site for you. Registration
  needed.
• PhotoGen
  The Photogen free stock photo gallery is constantly being updated with new photos and images.
• Flickr Creative Commons Personal Favorite
  One of the great Web 2.0 website with a huge amount of high resolution photos taken by users all over the globe.
• Stockvault
  Nice looking website containing lots of stock photos. Browsing by category, newest and popular.
• FreePhotosBank
  Medium size website with a couple of very nice stock photos.
• DesignPacks
  Small website where you can download category type photos in one archive.
• Free Pixels
  Another nice website with stock photos. Browsing like forum-style category types.
• Every Stock Photo
  Website collecting all kinds of stock photos around the net.

There are a lot of stock-photo websites out there, but I found these worth mentioning.

Photoshop Tutorial sites

The best way to learn Photoshop is following tutorials to learn from
others. Improve your skills by doing new tutorials each time.

• PSLover
  Big archive containing listing many tutorials from other websites.
• Good-Tutorials Personal Favorite
  Great website containing many links to photoshop tutorials.
• Tutorial Outpost
  Another big archive listing many photoshop tutorials.
• Photoshop 101
  Small website with links to photoshop tutorials. Updated weekly.
• Lombergar Personal Favorite
  This site has a couple of self-made video tutorials for Photoshop. Watch and learn.
• Effectica
  Nice forum with a good photoshop tutorial community.
• Photoshop Lab
  Website with good Photoshop tutorials. Has great explanations.
• Photoshop Cafe
  Small website with tutorials. Categories: FX, Text, Photo, Texture, Web and Misc.
• Marcofolio Personal Favorite
  Also on this site are a couple of nice tutorials listed.
• Team Photoshop
  Nice teamwebsite with a couple of Photoshop tutorials.
• Total Tutorials
  Huge website collecting all different kinds of tutorials on the web.
• Fresh Tutorials
  Another website containing lists of tutorials submitted by other websites.
• EZPhotoshop
  Great website with new tutorials, so keep a close watch on this one. Pretty darn slow website though.

Inspiring sites

To get a little design-spark, let yourself be inspired by the following sites.

• Smashing Magazine
  Smashing Magazine delivers useful and innovative information for web-designers and web-developers. Especially take a look at this post.
• Worth1000
  Don’t let the design of the website fool you. It has photoshop contests with real nice entries.
• Web Designer Wall Personal Favorite
  Web Designer Wall is created by the same person who made N.Design Studio.
  This site serves as a public blog where design ideas are posted,
  tutorials, and talk about modern web design trends. Also take your time
  to read Photoshop Secret Shortcuts.
• Go Media Personal Favorite
  Absolute must see website. Don’t forget to check out the Go Mediazine, the blog from Go Media.
• deviantART
  The
  largest art community of the world. Get inspired by looking at what
  other people made. Huge collection and different kinds of art.
• Deziner Folio
  Great blog about all kinds of designing stuff.
• The Best Designs
  The Best Designs recognizes the best Flash and CSS web sites from around the world.
• Tutorial Blog
  Another blog containing design articles from around the world.
• Brand Nu
  Take a quick look at the work of artist Radim Malinic to get some nice new ideas.
• Veerle’s Blog
  Great blog with nice articles about design from a co-designer living in Belgium. Absolute worth looking.
• CGTalk
  Forum with different kinds of artists, both 2d and 3d. Some of those artists are real professionals.
• Marcofolio Personal Favorite
  Yes,
  this site can give you some creativity sparks too. With posts like this
  I’m sure you’ll get a whole lot of nice new ideas on what to design.

Posted by Marcofolio

If you came here to learn about elementary PHP 4 or basic PHP 5, this is for you. Enjoy!

PHP 101 (part 1): Down the Rabbit Hole [July 17, 2004]
An introduction to PHP’s variables and operators.

PHP 101 (part 2): Calling All Operators [July 18, 2004]
The rest of the PHP operators (there are many), and simple form processing.

PHP 101 (PART 3): Looping the Loop [July 19, 2004]
Basic control structures explained.

PHP 101 (PART 4): The Food Factor [July 20, 2004]
Arrays, PHP array functions, and what it all means.

PHP 101 (PART 5): Rank and File [July 21, 2004]
Everything you’re ever likely to need to know about dealing with external files from a PHP script.

PHP 101 (PART 6): Functionally Yours [July 28, 2004]
All about functions, arguments, passing by reference, globals and scope.

PHP 101 (PART 7): The Bear Necessities [August 07, 2004]
A gentle introduction to object oriented programming in PHP 4 and PHP 5.

PHP 101 (PART 8): Databases and Other Animals [August 31, 2004]
All about connecting to a MySQL database from PHP, using the mysql or mysqli extensions.

PHP 101 (PART 9): SQLite My Fire! [September 16, 2004]
Introducing another database: SQLite.

PHP 101 (part 10): A Session In The Cookie Jar [October 3, 2004]
Sessions and cookies – how to keep track of visitors to your site.

PHP 101 (part 11): Sinfully Simple [October 3, 2004]
An introduction to PHP’s easiest method for dealing with XML.

PHP 101 (part 12): Bugging Out [January 30, 2005]
Basic error handling.

PHP 101 (part 13): The Trashman Cometh [February 27, 2005]
A primer in basic security.

PHP 101 (part 14): Going to the Polls [March 8, 2005]
Putting the pieces together – a first Web application.

PHP 101 (part 15): No News is Good News [June 4, 2005]
Creating a simple RSS news aggregator.

by Vikram Vaswani 

Open a blank document in Notepad and type the following:

Listing 1.1 – form.php

Save this file as form.php.

Here we have set up a simple form that will pass submitted information onto the file login.php.

Step 2)

Now open a second blank document in Notepad and enter the following:

Listing 2.1 – login.php

Save this file as login.php.

Notice the php script comes before even the <html>
tags. This ensures that the php is executed before the page gets
rendered, so if the credentials were wrong the offender cannot see
anything protected.

Basically here we tell the browser to start a session to store
usernames and passwords in. We then set up an array called passwords
which contains a list of usernames and respective passwords, from Harry
to Jack.

The next part of the script checks inequality between the submitted
credentials and the known credentials. The exclamation mark means “Does not equal”. If the credentials are indeed false/incorrect the script will display the message “Please enter your username and password.” One the users screen. The exit; function stops the script from continuing as soon as incorrect details are given.

The following section of the script checks for equality inequality
between the submitted credentials and the known credentials. The double
equals checks for equality, whereas a single equals assigns a value to
a variable. If the credentials are correct the script displays “Login successful!” on the users screen. Then a session is started called “auth_username”.
This allows the browser to remember whether or not a user is logged in,
which means that they will not have to login again on a different page.

The final part of the php covers all other eventualities and displays “Login incorrect, please try again.” to the user.

The rest of the page is shown below, between the <html> tags. The message between the <body> tags will not be visible unless the user is logged in.

Step 3)

You have pretty much finished creating a php secure login, but to
illustrate the functionality of sessions, you may want to continue
through Step 3.

Open your third document in notepad and type the following:

Listing 3.1 – auth.inc

auth.inc stores the information related to your
session. You could type the above in every document, but it would
become cumbersome and annoying. By including it using php you only need
type it once and pull it in using the include function, as shown below.

The final script, protected.php, will be an arbitrary page that you wish to secure.

Listing 3.2 – protected.php

This script simply includes auth.inc at the
very beginning. The placement of the script is essential to allowing
the script to function properly. This will run the script typed in Listing 3.1, and will verify the credentials of the user. If they are legitimate the page will continue, displaying everything between the <body> tags, otherwise it will terminate, displaying only “You must be logged in to view this page.”

If you want to protect any further pages you simply need to add the include function at the very top of every page.

P.S. This script is not intended for protection of highly confidential documents, but rather for client extranets etc.

Download the tutorial files.

Image Effect: Simulates a whole bunch of image effects! The script allows you to add bevels with individual glowing, shading and shining to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

curl.js
Image Effect: Simulates a page curl image effect! The script allows you to add curls with individual paperback color, shadow opacity and size to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

reflex.js
Image Effect: Simulates a Cover Flow^™ image effect! The script allows you to add individual borders, tiltings and reflections to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

edge.js
Image Effect: Simulates masked image edges! The script allows you to add individual masks (inc. inbuilt mask) to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension but zero or more external mask images!

corner.js
Image Effect: Simulates a whole bunch of image effects! The script allows you to add individual corners, shadings and shadows to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

glossy.js
Image Effect: Simulates a glossy shaded and beveled button look! The script allows you to add individual corners, shadings and shadows to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

instant.js
Image Effect: Simulates an instant picture look including tilt! The script allows you to add individual colors, tiltings and shadows to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

slided.js
Image Effect: Simulates a slide frame look including gradients! The script allows you to add individual colors, shadings and shadows to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

filmed.js
Image Effect: Simulates a film strip look including reflection! The script allows you to add individual colors, shining and shadows to images on your webpages. Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource!

loupe.js
Image Effect: Simulates an authentic looking magnifying glass! The script allows you to add a loupe for magnifying (inc. start viewpoint) to an image on your webpage. Requires no plugin/extension but one external resource image!

CVI-lab
Showcase: This WYSIWYG application was made in order to get a fast impression of the available CVI effects and their illustration qualities! Requires no plugin/extension or any other external resource! Play around and have fun.

Posted by Christian Effenberger