Of the free tools, toys, and packages available on my site, the following recent updates are important for anyone using the subject tools: . the "Rates" tool is now v. 0.50, and no lower version should be used. Versions below 0.30 will not work with the new file format the IMF adopted (with no notice), but may seem to be working, whereas they are only repeating cached old rates; below 0.50, the tool is subject to multi-minute hangups if the IMF file's server is down (which it currently is), while the updated version will not hang past 15 seconds. [This one creates a box you can drop into any page's HTML that will give back-and-forth currency-exchange rates for selectable currencies--very customizeable.] . the Freebie package is now v. 1.05, and an upgrade is recommended for lower versions. Those below 1.01 will not capture the changed "reader reviews" file format that Amazon pulled out of its ear one fine day, and 1.05 includes some fixes since 1.01. [This one adds many thousands of apparently static, relevant, daily pages to any site, in the form of a specialist Amazon bookshop.] . the "Validate" tool is now v. 0.14, and all lower versions are deprecated. It is nominally still beta, but after a few quick post-first-release fixes, seems quite solid. [This one submits all your pages to the W3C validator, with selective blocking by subdirectory allowed.] . the "Weather" tool is at v. 0.32; no version below 0.30 will work reliably with the changed XML format from Addresses.com, the data supplier; the latest version includes some "failsafes" for data-server misbehaviors. [This one creates a weather-conditions box you can drop into any page's HTML, settable for just about anyplace in the world, and very customizeable in appearance, sizem and detail.] . the "Via" toy, being a simple thing, remains solid at its initial release v. 1.00--no upgrades needed. [It allows "hiding" any outbound link, external or internal, from SE robots.] I am hoping that Real Soon Now the "Update" toy will be released--it's a matter of making docfiles for it. (This one will automatically freshen the date/time stamp of all your site's htm/html/shtml files, with selective blocking by subdirectory allowed.) In general, it behooves anyone using any of these to stay tuned to the download page for announcements of upgrades, since several depend on factors (such as file formats supplied by a third party) over which I have no control.
In response to a rising clamor (well, somebody asked), I have made a variant of the"Freebie" package that does not use redirection, so that it can be used by anybody who cannot, or prefers not, to do redirection via an .htaccess file. The "cost" is that the URLs for the added pages are no longer as "pretty", but there is only a single PHP parm being passed, so it is no major SEO deal. Here are examples: original: http://seo-toys.com/books-plain/0521535999.html variant: http://seo-toys.com/seo-books/free1.php?asin=0521535999 The new variant has been tested on an Apache host. Its main use, though, would be for those hosted on IIS-powered servers, and I could really use a beta tester or two to verify that all the PHP works on an IIS server (it is known that some PHP calls--though I don't know all of which, do not work, or do not work the same, on IIS serves as on Apache servers). I hope and think it will work normally, but, again, I need some beta testers. The variant can be found on my site, here .
I worked (wedged?) the "Via" toy into two FAQ answers, "Do PHP links pass PR?" and "How to I make JavaScript links?" Rates and Weather.... hmmm... I need a question to answer... like... hmm... "Where can I get free content for my web page?" Something like that? <thinking> "Freebie" will hopefully soon become part of "How do I make more money from the Amazon Associates program?" "Validate" scares me. I'm worried about bringing W3C's servers to their knees. They are so bloody slow already!
You de man! Rates/Weather, and now "Know" (my personal favorite of all the toys) -- "How do I get my pages to always have fresh yet interesting or useful content without editing them one by one?" (Or something less verbose.) "Freebie" can indeed make money, but is--for SEO purposes--"How can I get a lot of relevant, no-maintenance, fresh content?" Validate--well, it operates outside "real time". My host, as I'd guess most do, offers for daily jobs the scheduling option "when we're not busy", which is typically the small hours of the morning. That ought to be OK with the w3c too, and if they're slow, hey, so long as they finish the job eventually. (And don't overlook "ReDate", for keeping file "last modified" dates current.) Meanwhile, this announcement: The "Freebie" family of packages ("Freebie", "Freebie-X" for non-Apache servers, and "Freebie-I", the "internationalized" version) have all undergone an upgrade: the base package and the non-Apache version both go from 1.05 to 1.06, while the "internationalized" version (which should soon become the mainstream form) goes from 1.10 to 1.11. If you are using any of those, please do the upgrade. It's not as if the package will crash if you don't, but you're definitely not getting the maximum advantage unless you're at the latest version. The upgrade process is largely automated, and very simple and quick.
Well, I decided that "largely automated" wasn't good enough. I today jacked the versions of each package one increment (1.07/1.12/1.07) by adding an upgrading script. Now, all you do is upload the new package files, run the upgrade script (a few seconds), and essentially that's that. There is a trifle of housekeeping--delete the old stuff on your local, then download the upgraded files, but that add maybe 3 minutes. I urgently suggest that all current users upgrade. (And, as always, I stand ready to provide whatever--even by telephone--help is wanted or needed, even to doing it all for you.)
The currency script is great. However it says: "Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /usr/www/users/owlcroft/seo-toys/currency-rates-tool/rates.php on line 363" above the currency box both on your site and when we try to install the script on ours. Any idea how to fix this please?