Mixed Pics – Changing Times

My gal and I often each take pictures of the same event, and despite the fact that my camera is way bigger than hers, she often gets a number of great shots that I missed. Or was in. Whichever.

Since photography is largely about storytelling for me, which is another way of saying I’ll always be a journalist at heart, mixing our sets together is often useful to complete the narrative. Getting pictures in order would be a snap if our camera’s time/date settings were synched, but that’s something we often think of after the fact. Continue reading

Critical Exposure : Picture Equality Auction & Reception

This evening I volunteered to do event photography for Critical Exposure, a DC based non-profit that puts cameras in the hands of schoolkids to they can tell their stories. I had a great time — the people were every bit as interesting as the photographs up for bid, many of which were by Pulitzer prize wining photographers and the like. Click on the mosaic to see the Flickr set. – Ernest Continue reading

WebReference.Com: The CMS Articles

In 2009 I was working on a number of Drupal, Joomla!, and WordPress sites simultaneously, when Webreference.com asked me if I wanted to write a CMS column for them. I always forget how much work columns are, trying to find something new to talk about each month, and after five columns I decided that actually building websites was a whole lot easier than writing about it.

The columns are still up on the site though, and though time has passed, I found them still to be pretty much dead on.

Rare Conservation / Rare Planet

Who is RARE Conservation?

RARE Conservation is a conservation group that works from the local level up rather than from the national or enterprise level down. Though Rare’s effort is directed at community-based change, rather than attempting to work directly with communities, Rare offers local individuals educational opportunities and supports their efforts to increase local awareness and engagement with ecological issues through “Pride Campaigns,” which use applied social science solutions to address conservation issues. Continue reading

Google Analytics Certification

Google Analytics Certification

First Steps

  • Updated: Introduction to Google Analytics: What you’ll learn | Watch presentation

    What I learned that I didn’t know. The GA code embedded in each page sends a javascript request for an invisible gif to the google servers, and uses a “first party cookie” which is a cookie served up from the site you’re currently browsing, rather than a “third party” site that’s linked to the page you’re on, such as an advertiser. As such, first party cookies are much less likely to be blocked. Google offers a lot of data anonymity, keeping even it’s own analysts from accessing data without the client’s permission. I’m sure they mean that…but I’m taking it with a grain of salt. Google allows such skepticism, letting you elect “do not share my Google Analytics data,” though this keeps Google from adding the anonomized site’s data into other sites data to provide benchmarking.
  • Interface Navigation: What you’ll learn | Watch presentation Shows how to select an account from one of several and work with profiles for each account. The Report Interface and Dashboard sections are pretty well known, but users may not know that reports can be added or deleted from them, which is handy. Data exports are pretty much a no brainer, but I’d never thought to send them by email on regular schedule, also handy. It’s in developing reports that we move beyond the casual user, allowing data on eCommerce, ROI and other non-obvious metrics.
  • Updated: Installing the Google Analytics Tracking Code: What you’ll learn | Watch presentation The insertion of tracking code is straightforward for anyone who has added code to a webpage, but the promise of later material to deal with multiple domains and subdomains whet’s my appetite for what comes later.

Interpreting Reports

Links / References