Category: Blogging

Thomas likes to blog, but whenever he tries something new, he gets into trouble. How can he install a new Wordpress plugin? How can he share a post on Medium? Will it hurt his SEO if he duplicates content on several blogging platforms?

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What is the time in WordPress? How to change the WordPress time-zone?

Thomas is writing lots of articles that he wants to have published at different times. But, when he sets an article to be published at 12.00, it is often published one hour later. How come? What time system does WordPress run with?

Thomas once tried to help someone to have an article published at exactly 00.00 on New Year’s Eve, wishing everyone a happy new year. But, it turned into a major bummer, because the article was published at 23.00 instead. What caused this? How can Thomas make sure it will not happen again?

Fix the time zone of your WordPress installation

Thomas has found a way to solve this problem once and for all. To do so, he goes to Settings and chooses General in the WordPress menu. Under General Settings he can find an option which is called “Time Zone.”

The WordPress time zone

Above you can see a picture showing what this is like. First, you can see that the time zone is set to UTC +0, and beneath you an see what this actually means when it comes to the time of the given WordPress installation.

If Thomas lives in a country which is UTC +1 and Thomas sets an article to be released at 12.00, it will be released at 13.00 in his local time, because WordPress will publish it at 12.00 UTC +0 time. The easiest way to fix the trouble is by changing the time zone so that it will reflect the time zone you are in!

Thomas is a bit confused, but at least he understands how it works. He will not fail again if he tries to publish something at exactly 00.00 on New Year’s Eve, that is for sure!

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How to schedule a WordPress post?

Have you written a WordPress post that you would like to publish another time and another date? Is there a way to publish a WordPress post at a special time?

Thomas likes to do a lot of work before he is going on holiday and before the weekends. Now he would like to write some blog posts that are to be published during the Christmas holiday, but he doesn’t want to actually work during the Christmas holiday. So, how can he schedule blog posts using WordPress to that it will publish the articles during the holiday?

Schedule posts with WordPress

Thomas was very happy to notice that publishing WordPress posts at a given time and a date was very easy, at least as he found out how and where to do so.

How is it done?

When Thomas has finished writing the actual article, he goes to the “Publish” box on the right side of the blog post itself. You can see it on the picture beneath.

publish wordpress

If you see the picture above, you can see the arrow pointing at the “publish” text. It is set to immediately at the moment, but if you press edit, you can easily set the time and date for the article to be published.

If you want to have the article published on December 24th at 18.00, it will look like this.

The post is set to be published on December 24th at 18.00
The post is set to be published on December 24th at 18.00

Now all Thomas has to do is to press the Schedule button (earlier Publish was written, but since the article is set to be published in the future, the text has now changed to schedule).

That is how easy it is to schedule an article for a future release in WordPress! And, since Thomas uses SteemPress to publish his article to Steemit, this will also help him out schedule articles for future release on Steemit!

 

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What is the ideal thumnbail size for YouTube videos?

Thomas has uploaded quite a lot of videos to YouTube, but he hasn’t thought much about the look of the thumbnails. But, after thinking about it, the look of the thumbnail is actually very important.

If the thumbnail looks bad, nobody will actually watch the video. But, if it looks good and inviting, people will start watching the video!

But, what is the ideal thumbnail size for a YouTube video?

ideal youtube thumbnail size

Thomas didn’t have to search a lot before finding the answer.

The ideal YouTube thumbnail size

The ideal size is 1280 x 720 pixels. It might be smaller, but the best is if it has this size!

Thomas is already producing some new thumbnails for his video, hoping that it will help his videos get more attention and more viewers on YouTube!

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How to find the size of folder using FTP?

Thomas just got a warning from his web-host telling him that he is soon out of disk space. Now he wants to find some large files using FTP and delete them to free up some space. But, how can he check the size of the different folders using FTP?

Thomas has been using FileZilla for a long time to fix with his FTP matters. But, he doesn’t find a function in Filezilla that will easily tell him the size of one or more folders, so he is trying another praised FTP software instead, WinSCP.

Thomas finds the size of directions using FTP

After installing WinSCP, Thomas easily imports all his FTP connections from FileZilla. This is something WinSCP automatically does for him, making it easy and quick. He then connects to the server and finds some directories.

Thomas selects the interesting files and directions, right clicks and selects Properties
Thomas selects the interesting files and directions, right clicks and selects Properties

After selecting the directions and files, he clicks Properties. Once this is done, he needs to click Calculate. He has to wait for a couple of minutes for the calculations to be done, but once it is finished, he gets to see the exact size of all the files and directions selected.

Thomas clicks calculate, and soon he gets to see the size of the selected directions and files.
Thomas clicks calculate, and soon he gets to see the size of the selected directions and files.

Thomas has found the problem, and he can now delete unnecessary files making both him and his web-host happy!

Thomas hopes these short instructions will help you find the size of folders and directions via FTP as well.

Should you have a question or a comment, use the form beneath!

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Can I access Steemit RSS feeds?

Thomas wants to include a widget in his WordPress blog showing his latest Steemit posts. He has earlier managed to do this on Medium, but is there a way to include a Steemit RSS feed on his blog?

Thomas has been looking for a method for this quite some time, but he has only read about a tool that hasn’t been working for months, and thus, it hasn’t been any good option available. But, then, in the middle of October 2018, he suddenly discovered a tool that is working and that will let him access his Steemit RSS feed, which again makes it possible to show his latest posts on Steemit on other sites. He can also use the tool to access other people’s and user’s RSS feeds, making it even easier to see the latest blog posts on Steemit from his favorite writers.

Thomas has found a way to include his Steemit feed in his WordPress blog
Thomas has found a way to include his Steemit feed in his WordPress blog

Thomas finds his Steemit RSS feed

To get access to his RSS feed, Thomas has to visit www.steemrss.com. It is very important to include the “www” if not, the page isn’t working. There are two sorts of feeds you can access using this tool.

  • “www.steemrss.com/@<username>/feed”
    This will show Thomas what is going on in the feed of username.
  • “www.steemrss.com/@<username>/blog”
    This will show Thomas the latest posts from username.
  • “www.steemrss.com/new/ethereum”
    This will show Thomas the latest posts in the category Ethereum.

This tool is working perfectly, and Thomas is really happy. And if you visit www.thethomasstories.com, you can see the widget in his sidebar showing the latest posts Thomas has made on Steemit.

Thomas is very thankful to @philipkoon for creating the tool, and of course to @doriitamar for contributing to the work!

 

 

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How to take a screenvideo of your computer activity?

Thomas has often made screenshots showing pictures of his computer screen with the PrtScr (Print Screen) button. But, is there a way for Thomas to make a screen video, that is, record a video showing his continuous activities on the computer which he can later broadcast on portals like YouTube?

If you follow The Thomas Stories on YouTube, you have probably seen that Thomas often create explainer videos and tutorials. But, sometimes it would be better to actually record what Thomas does on his computer instead of just posting screenshots and other pictures. How can it be done?

screencast your computer

Record your computer activity (create a screen video)

Unfortunately, there is no super-easy way to create a video of your computer activity that can be recorded and used for other purposes. There is no button you can press, and then automatically the recording will start.

In order to record the activity on your computer, you will need a third-party application, and Thomas has found one that he loves – Screencast o Matic.

This is a super-easy application that will let him record his monitor activity. He can record the full screen, or he can choose only to record a smaller window of the screen. He can use a microphone to record his voice while recording, or he can only record the activity on the screen. If he wants to, he can even record his own face and place it in the corner of the screen, so people can both see Thomas’ face, and his computer activity at the same time.

There is a free version of Screencast O Matic, but since it includes a watermark, Thomas purchased the Deluxe plan which only cost him 1,5USD per month.

Thomas can now record his computer monitor activity

Thomas can now record what he is doing on his computer, and it makes it much easier for him to create tutorials and explainer videos in which he shows what he is actually doing to solve different problems!

 

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How to give a tip to someone on Steemit?

Thomas just read an article on Steemit that he really liked, and now he would like to bless the author with an extra tip.

The truth is, Thomas has already given the article an upvote. But, since he only has 50 SP it doesn’t even bless the author with 0,01 USD. So, what can Thomas do to bless the author with an extra tip in addition to his upvote?

There are a few ways in which it can be done.

Tip an author of an article on Steemit
How to give tip to an author on Steemit? – Pixabay

Giving someone a tip on Steemit

Thomas first tried to use a voting bot to upvote the article of the author. But, the money was returned, since voting bots will only let you pay for upvotes on your own articles. What is the solution then?

Manually transfer funds to the author

You can visit your very own wallet, and then click the arrow next to Steem or Steem Dollar. You can then pick transfer. Set the amount you want to send, type the name of the author, and write a message saying thank you for the article or something like that. It can look like this.

Manually transfer a tip to an author on Steemit
Manually transfer a tip to an author on Steemit

Use the TipU bot to send a tip

There is another method, and it is a really handy one. There is a voting bot named TipU, and with this, you can both pay for an upvote on your own articles, but also send a tip to other authors you like.

It works in a similar way as the transfer above, only this time you send the funds to @tipu, and in the memo, you include the URL of the article you want to bless.

Sending a tip to @adonisabril for his latest article on Steemit
Sending a tip to @adonisabril for his latest article on Steemit

Now it will take a few moments, and soon the article will receive an upvote from @tipu. Not only will it receive an upvote, but TipU will also add a comment since it has been sent as a blessing. In this case, the comment from Tipu to the article looked like this.

tip from thomasstories

Thomas has just sent his first tip on Steemit, and he is happy that he could support the work of a great author like this one. Maybe he will tip more authors in the future, and maybe he will receive a tip from someone who might like this or some other article in the future? Who knows!

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Why does the Dollar value of upvotes change after the vote has been made?

Thomas is a big Steemit fan, but for a while, he had a hard time understanding one thing… why does the value of an upvote change after the vote has been made?

upvote value
After seven days, the value of your post will never change again!

Thomas is sometimes using voting-bots to give his articles more attention and a higher income. But, it was once when he paid for an upvote that he suddenly noticed that the upvote was worth 2,5 USD at first, and then the next time he watched, the value was only 2,40 USD. What happened? Why did the value of the upvote suddenly change?

Since then Thomas has also experienced the value change to a higher value. What is going on?

Thomas theory on the matter

There are for sure people in the Steemit community that knows this much better than Thomas but based on his studies, this is what you should know.

  1. The value can only change during the first 7 days (before payout). After that, the value will be stuck and never change again.
  2. The value of an upvote is based on the Steem price. In other words, if you get an upvote worth 2,5USD, but then the price of Steem drops within the coming minutes, hours, days, this will also impact the value of the upvote you received.

This is the answer Thomas gives to himself on this question. Have you asked the same question? Do you have the same answer, or do you have another answer to the same question?

Thank you for reading!

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How to create my own Powtoon template?

Thomas is using Powtoon to create videos and explainers for YouTube. He is quite fond of the tool, and he uses it frequently. But, he has been looking for a way to create his very own template for a long time.

When Thomas creates a YouTube video, he often includes his “traditional” intro. And, once he is finished explaining whatever he wants to, he often includes a last screen showing information about his website, and a reminder to follow him on YouTube. But, Thomas is sad that he has to create all these “permanent” sites over and over again. He spent some time looking for a way to create a template or a standard slide that can easily be added to any new movie, but he didn’t find one. But, then he suddenly bumped into the function!

Thomas finds out how to create standard slides/templates with Powtoon!

It was almost by a coincidence that Thomas discovered how he could save slides, and thus have a list of popular slides he uses frequently, which he can easily add to any Powtoon presentation he decides to create.

This is how it is done!

Create the Powtoon slide you want to save

Once it has been created, click the three dots in the right corner of the slide. Here you can decide to duplicate it, add a slide below, and then – Save this slide to ‘My Scenes’. This is what you have been looking for.

Save your favorite slides with Powtoon
Save your favorite slides with Powtoon

Now it is saved, and the next time you want to use it, simply click ‘Scenes’ in the right corner of Powtoon, and select the saved slide from ‘My Scenes.‘ It wasn’t that hard, was it? So now you can start saving your favorite scenes/slides and use them as templates, and easily add them to any new presentation you decide to create using Powtoon!

Find your saved Powtoon scenes and use them quickly
Find your saved Powtoon scenes and use them quickly

Are you happy? Thomas is very happy, and now he is even more eager to create new explainer-videos using Powtoon!

If you have tried this and it worked, please write a comment to say thanks. Should you have a question, write it down and Thomas will do his best to help you out!

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How to clean up a .CSV file by splitting data into columns?

Thomas just downloaded a list from Bittrex showing him his latest trades on the platform. It is a CSV file. But, as he opens the file it is a complete mess. All the data is stored in one single column, making it impossible to read and get the overview he wanted to get.

Thomas doesn’t like the CSV file, and wonders if there is an easy way to make sure that the data is divided into different columns. Or is CSV a completely useless format? Since so many people use it, there has got to be a way to create order in the mess.

How can Thomas create order in this messy CSV file?
How can Thomas create order in this messy CSV file?

Thomas finds a way to fix the mess in the CSV file

After looking around and trying different methods, Thomas has found one he is satisfied with and that he likes. It is quite easy. Want to find out how Thomas cleans up the mess in the CSV file? Take a look at the video beneath, or read the further instructions beneath the video.

  • First of all, Thomas creates a brand new Microsoft Excel file.
  • He then clicks the Data text in the Menu and chooses From Text.
  • He finds the CSV file he is interested in and opens it.
  • Now he has to set the import settings.
  • The data in the CSV file is mostly separated by comma or semi-colon. Find out which is used in your file, and set this to be the divider in the import settings.
  • He then sets text-qualifier to NONE.
  • After this, he clicks Finish and OK, and the data from the CSV file has been beautifully imported to his excel file.

If you had trouble following the steps above, watch the video to see it step-by-step!

Hopefully, you will be able to enjoy the data from your CSV file just like Thomas is at the moment.

Should you have trouble or maybe a question, please write a comment, and Thomas will do his uttermost to help you out!