Website For You

Yahoo is both a search engine and a directory. By submitting your site to Yahoo's human-edited directory, you may have a better chance of being found by purely spider-driven engines (such as Google). It's best to figure out exactly where your site or content may fit in the Yahoo structure before submitting willy-nilly to anything that has the word "submit" in it. Expect a "reasonable delay" when using any of these site submission options.

There are eight submission options with Yahoo; I'm going to briefly go over them one by one:

- free site submission
- free mobile site submission
- free media content submission
- Yahoo search index submission
- sponsored search
- product submission
- travel submission
- Yahoo directory submit
- Yahoo standard submission

Navigate to the CompletePlanet.com home page, and you'll see the standard search query bar right in the middle of the page. Below that, you have a wide variety of topics from which to choose - this is a good place to start if you have a really good idea of where your particular search query is headed. Let's look at both options and see what happens.

My search for clouds using the standard search bar returned 187 "related databases." Your CompletePlanet results are a bit different than searching for the word "clouds" in a less focused search portal; instead of your search results page being full of links to a whole bunch of Web sites, CompletePlanet uses its technology called Deep Query Manager instead to search databases. Your results, therefore, are made up of various Deep Web databases.

My search for clouds using the topic database worked a bit differently. I chose the topic science in order to initially narrow down my search, then I decided to explore Meterology. At this point, CompletePlanet only returned one result for my intial search query of clouds, but it was a pretty good one - it turned out to be the Australian government's Greenhouse and Climate change page. I think that for me, I prefer narrowing down my topic from the get-go in CompletePlanet, since I felt the results were more targeted and relevant; however, I believe that it's completely your own personal preference.

At the bottom of every search result, you'll see little colored squares indicated how relevant your result is to your original search query; the highest score is four squares, so the more squares, the better. Next to that you'll see the size of that particular file and the date it was "harvested", rather, when CompletePlanet spidered that page.

CompletePlanet Advanced Search

CompletePlanet Advanced Search is pretty standard; you get the option to search by title, keyword, description, date, etc. I would also highly recommend that you take a quick look at CompletePlanet Search Help - it's a great introduction to what you can really do with CompletePlanet.

Why Should I Use CompletePlanet?

First of all, it's extremely easy to use, and even more simple to narrow down searches without a lot of complicated search syntax or search operators. Secondly, CompletePlanet is searching the Invisible Web; so your results overall are of a higher standard (since they are in academic, government, military, etc. databases) than if you searched for the same item in a general search engine. Thirdly, I really like how CompletePlanet's list of topics is right on the front page - it makes it easy to narrow down or broaden your search; plus, I just enjoy seeing what's out there in topics I wouldn't ordinarily be searching within. I highly recommend CompletePlanet as a great tool with which to search the Deep Web.

Wordle is a toy for generating 'word clouds' from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.

Wordle is being used in interesting ways to provide compelling summaries of political speeches, blog posts, twitter feed, news articles and more, but there are additional educational uses worth considering.

A few ideas:

1. Convert a sonnet or Shakespearean play; or children's book (Dr. Seuss anyone?);2. Paste the contents of an online discussion to coalesce the main ideas;3. Combine student 'Who Are You?' introductions, or 'SuperheroTraits' to develop a class composite;4. Condense survey data by dumping content of questionnaire responses into the Wordle engine;5. Combine news articles or RSS feeds on a given topic;6. Turn an essay into a poster;7. Combine blog posts over time into a simplified represetation or use it to compare the ideas of competing ideas;8. Use font, colour and arrangement strategies to appropriately represent content;9. Automate the creation of word poetry;10. As an introduction to a unit or course, combine key words; themes; curriculum expectations to provide learners with a visual overview of content;11. Convert nutritional content of one's weekly diet or of a group's menu preferences;12. Condense a Wikipedia article into it's essence;13. Paste the results of a Google search (Can you guess the keywords I used?);14. Convert social bookmark tags;15. Enter keywords from weekly weather reports to obtain a seasonal picture;16. Distill song lyrics like "Stairway to Heaven";17. Find out what you've been up to by summarizing To-Do lists;18. Represent the results of a brainstorming session or the minutes of a meeting visually;19. Show "Today in History" stories in a new way;20. Convert past or current email messages into a composite of your correspondence;

Syncplicity backs up all your files, keeps them synced and up-to-date across all your computers and computers of people you’ve shared them with, allows you and your friends to access them online (even if your computers are turned off), and can even sync them with Facebook and Google Docs.

Syncplicity was founded with a simple vision: Your computer should empower you, not slow you down. They goal is to create a new way of managing files to liberate people from worrying about how and where their data is stored. With Syncplicity, you don’t have to be a file techie. Sharing, backing up, and synchronizing files is automatic and intuitive, so you can get down to the important stuff and use your computer in fun, creative and useful ways.

The company is led by a strong and dynamic team with substantial experience in creating and delivering solid and innovative products to the market.

It's important to know that Syncplicity is still in Beta right now but it works awesome and I can't wait for them to officially launch which should be very soon. I would be wise with how much you store with them until they launch but keep your eyes open and see for yourself how good they are. Then make a decision for yourself.

It takes just a few minutes to create a great looking mobile version of your web site.

Mippin is an easy way to get your favorite web content on your mobile phone. Whether you want to follow breaking news or tech updates, from big publishers or tiny blogs, Mippin brings them all seamlessly together in the perfect format for your phone

Mippin is the fastest and easiest way to get your favorite web content on your mobile phone. Whether you want to follow breaking news or tech updates, from big publishers or tiny blogs, Mippin brings them all seamlessly together in the perfect format for your phone. You can quickly search and browse, see what others are reading and share your own discoveries. And Mippin is smart: it remembers exactly what you like and delivers automatic one-click updates.
Just type mippin.com into your mobile browser and see just how quick and easy the web becomes.

With tens of thousands of mobile-perfect sites in one place, Mippin's breadth of content provides the perfect context for your messages.

The central aim of Plant Cultures is to convey the richness and complexity of links between Britain and South Asia, through the story of plants and people. It is aimed at anyone interested in understanding the world around them.

Why South Asia

Britain and the Indian subcontinent have had an immense impact on each other, from the early traders and travelers of the 17th century, to the East India Company and British Empire, and then to independence and population movements in the 20th century. Much of this story is intimately bound up with plants, whether as trade commodities, food, or as subjects for artistic and religious expression.

It’s relationship that continues to be important today. British Asian communities form over 4% of the population of England and Wales, and over 25% of the population of cities such as Leicester. Asian food, medicine, religion, music and film have all had a big impact between Europe and Asia is rising up the political agenda. Everybody benefits from understanding more about these changes.

What does the website do?

The Plant Cultures project covers both the historical and contemporary aspects of Britain and South Asia. Some topics will be familiar – the British Empire, Asian cooking and mehndi (henna painting). Some will be less familiar to many – the ancient traditions of South Asian art and medicine, or the role of sacred plants such as holy basil.

The plant Cultures website brings together a wide range of resources: historic images from museums and libraries, well researched information, contributions from members of the public, and carefully chosen links to other web resources.

The website is supported by an extensive outreach programme, in Bradford, Leicester, Liverpool and London, and by garden trails and activities in a wide range of locations.

Funding

Plant Cultures is funded by Culture Online, a Deparment of Culture, Media and Sports initiatives that aims to enable more people, both school children and adults, to engage in culture in a variety of new ways.

What next?

The website launched in its full
Form in February 2005
To Keep up-to date with development in Plant Cultures, you can sign up and get free news letter.