RealTown Instant Messenger

December 7, 2007

Overview

RealTown is now running an Instant Messaging (IM) server to help RealTown members communicate with each other. The server is built upon the popular open-source XMPP (aka "Jabber") protocol used by popular IM's such as GoogleTalk and AOL Instant Messenger.

Connecting to the RealTown IM Service

To connect to the RealTown IM Server, you will need a Jabber-compatible IM client. Unfortunately, we do not have our own IM client (yet) but plan on developing one to provide seamless integration into the RealTown website (more on this below).

Fortunately, there are plenty of excellent free Jabber clients available on the web to choose from. My current favorite is Spark, developed by Ignite RealTime. You can download it here.

To connect with Spark (or your favorite Jabber-compatible IM client), enter in your RealTown Username and Password and specify "realtown.com" for the server. If you don't have a RealTown username, you can sign up for free at http://www.realtown.com/signup.

What Next?

When you first log in, your "roster" (aka "buddy list") will be empty. Feel free to add me if you wish. In Spark, click Contacts > Add Contact, enter "hector" for the username and click Add. If you are using a different Jabber client, your instructions may be different.

RealTown Integration

As mentioned earlier, the RealTown IM server is connected directly to the RealTown Members database, effectively allowing all RealTown members to log in with their existing credentials.

However, our plans for the near future include total integration with the RealTown website.

Our first project is to build an install-free web-based IM client. That means you will be able to log in directly to your chat client without having to download a separate program. A web-based client will be the core of the rest of our plans for total RealTown integration. Most of the integration will involve the RealTown Profile, allowing visitors to IM you directly.

For example, here is my online status icon:

If the icon is green, then I am "online". If it's yellow, then I'm marked as "away". If it's gray, then I am "offline."

If you have any questions or suggestions for RealTown implementation, please let me know.

View more entries tagged with: Realtown, Instant Messaging, Realtown Profile, Chat

New Comment Manager

October 6, 2007

Today we released a much-needed Comment Manager that allows for quick viewing and moderating of your blog's comments.

To manage your comments, click the "Comments" link under the "Manage" section in your Blog Manager.

The Comment Manager allows you to view all of the comments that have been posted to your Blog all on one page. The comments are ordered in reverse chronological order so the newest comments will always appear on top.

The Comment Manager will allow you to delete unwanted comments and approve new comments if you have comment moderation turned on.

The Comment Manager also provides a section to view all of the comments that you have written (including comments you have written on other Blogs at RealTown). This allows you to easily keep track of which blog entries you have participated on without the need to subscribe.

The Comment Manager was released early in an effort to provide you with basic comment moderation abilities directly from your Blog Manager while we continue to add additional features. Future plans for the Comment Manager include a reply feature and direct comment editing.

If you have any suggestions for the Comment Manager or have any questions, please let me know.

View more entries tagged with: Realtown Blogs, Realtown, Blogs, New Features, Comments, Comment Moderation

RealTown Blogs BETA

September 11, 2007

We have been heavily focused on improving your blogging experience with RealTown and have developed an entirely new public interface for you and your visitors.

We value and respect your opinions as professional bloggers and look forward to hearing your responses. Please read this entire document before responding as it may answer some of your concerns about the changes.

The biggest change to RealTown Blogs is its location on the Web. In order to increase the overall Search Engine Optimization (SEO) value of RealTown Blogs (and every blog within it), we have decided to migrate the entire public side of RealTown Blogs to the RealTown.com real estate portal. In other words, your Blog's web address will change from http://[username].realtownblogs.com to http://www.realtown.com/[username]/blog.

Before any panic sets in, please let me explain why we are doing this and how it will affect your blog.

As many of you may already know, the RealTown.com real estate site is becoming one of the most popular and respected sources for real estate information on the Web. With over 62,000 members, we believe that your Blog, if placed under the "Blogs" tab on RealTown.com, will benefit greatly from RealTown's success. In return, RealTown.com will also benefit from having your Blog under its domain. As far as SEO is concerned, it's a win-win situation.

We understand that many of you have well-respected and established Blogs at your current web address. When the new RealTown Blogs goes live and your Blog's web address changes, your current Blog web address will remain active and automatically redirect visitors to the new address. We will use a 301 redirect to inform Google and other search engines that your Blog has permanently moved to the new location. All of your entries, stickies, categories, and settings will be migrated in the transition. Your Blog will simply have a new home with a stronger foundation and will benefit from all of the features currently in place at RealTown.com.

To preview the beta version of the new RealTown Blogs, visit http://beta.realtown.com/blogs

We have also created a new default template for all of the Blogs on RealTown.com. At release, there will be two template modes to choose from: RealTown and Custom. Currently, all RealTown Blogs are using a "custom" template. As current RealTown Blogs members, your custom template will remain active. However, the RealTown template is considered by us to be very powerful and is designed to fit nicely in the Blogs tab of RealTown.com. You can decide to switch to the RealTown template at any time (this option will be available within your Blog Manager).

For the purposes of this beta test only, each Blog is temporarily set to use the RealTown template. This is to help you preview your Blog with the RealTown template and get a feel for its new features. To preview your blog with the new RealTown template, visit http://beta.realtown.com/[username]/blog and replace [username] with your RealTown Username.

For those of you who would like to see what your custom template would look like under the new web address, you can append "?template=custom" to the end of the web address, such as http://beta.realtown.com/[username]/blog?template=custom

Please remember that on the day of the official launch, your Blog will automatically be set to use your custom template and will appear identical to its current form. If you wish to switch to using the new RealTown template, you will need to log in to your Blog Manager and change this setting under Templates.

Here's a brief summary of some of the new features found in the new RealTown Blogs.

New Features

Fully maintained templates

• The default template has been changed to a totally new "RealTown" template that sits nicely in the Blogs tab of RealTown.com.
  
• The custom templates are still available as an option for those who want total control over their blog's appearance. (Updated 9/13/2007)
  
• SEO is maintained by RealTown on all templates, including custom templates. (Updated 9/13/2007)
  • SEO is automatically handled with intelligent META tags and proper HTML syntax. For example, each Category page will consist of META keywords based on the most popular tags of the entries within the category.
    
• Any changes made to the default template (bug fixes, style changes, etc) affect all blogs using the template, meaning every blog using it will always have the latest version.

Starred Entries

• When viewing any entry on anyone's Blog, you can now "star" the entry to save it for later viewing. Currently, the "star" feature is only available on the Blogs using the RealTown Template. Additionally, you must be logged in to use the "star" feature.
  
• You can view all of your starred entries by clicking the "My Starred Entries" link on the left-hand side-panel or by visiting http://beta.realtown.com/blogs/starred
• You can view who has starred a particular entry by appending "/stars" to the entry's web address.

Comments

• Comments can now be posted as "private" and will be hidden from other visitors. Only the blog owner will be able to see the comment.
• Visitors can now choose to subscribe to your entries when they submit a comment. Each new comment that is posted to the entry will send an email to all of the subscribers to notify them of the new comment.
• (Added 9/13/2007) Comments written by the blog owner (which are usually responses to visitor comments) are automatically assigned the CSS class "commentByOwner". You can use this CSS class in your own custom template to make your own comments stand out. The RealTown template uses this class to automatically make your comments appear with a light orange background.

We appreciate your feedback and look forward to your responses. Update: 9/13/2007
Thank you all for your excellent feedback. We have implemented most of the changes that were requested. Please continue sharing your ideas on how to make RealTown Blogs the best Blogging platform for Real Estate Professionals.

View more entries tagged with: Realtown Blogs, Realtown, Blogs, New Features, Seo, Blog Template

Redirecting Your Blog to RealTown.com with 301

September 11, 2007

In the near future, RealTownBlogs.com will begin redirecting visitors to the new RealTown Blogs hosted by RealTown.com. In order to keep our members from losing any SEO rankings or searchability, we will be using a 301 Header Redirect.

What is a Header Redirect?
When your web browser communicates with web servers, it uses "headers" to pass data back and forth in the background. Usually headers will contain things like:

• Which page was requested.
• When the page was last updated.
• Who owns the page (the web server).

Headers can also contain instructions for your browser. In the case of RealTownBlogs.com, we will be pointing your browsers to the new RealTown Blogs location at RealTown.com. Most browsers will have no problem following this instruction because they understand that the world wide web is an ever-evolving place. Sometimes, pages move, and that's what Header Redirects are for.

What is a 301 Header Redirect?
Headers Redirects can also provide information your browser as to why the page was moved. I won't go through the complete list here, but the code 301 means the page has permanently moved to a new location.

Why is a 301 Header Redirect important?
Search engines such as Google and MSN use Header Redirect codes to help them index their pages. When their web-crawling bots visit RealTown Blogs, they will receive a 301 Header Redriect to the new web address. The 301 tells them to update their records, and that the content has moved. It's the best way of guaranteeing that search engines will still be able to find you.

For more information as to why we're initiating this 301 Header Redirect, please visit http://beta.realtown.com/hector/blog/blog-development/realtown-blogs-beta

View more entries tagged with: Headers, Redirect, Realtown Blogs, Realtown, Blogs, New Features

Posting A Video to my Blog

June 19, 2007

This video was automatically posted to my blog via the File Uploads page of the RealTown Blogs Manager. So far it seems to work great in Internet Explorer (except for the security message that popped up asking me to confirm my trust of the "Windows Media Player Core by Microsoft"). It's still being worked on for FireFox but we are almost there. I think the problem with this video in FireFox is not the HTML, but rather the video compression codec used on the video file itself. I'll have to test this out with other videos to see confirm this.

We eventually want to upgrade this to a powerful little Flash video player. Although not everyone has Flash, it's still common enough to allow the majority of our visitors to view the movie. Plus, we can use the simple HTML-based player above for those without Flash.

View more entries tagged with: None

Hector's Guide to RSS

May 18, 2007

Learn all about RSS and what it means to you with these frequently asked questions and answers. These questions are ordered by popularity, with the most common question on top.

What is RSS?
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. If it really was “really simple”, you probably wouldn’t be reading this guide. But hey, I didn’t name it.

RSS, in a nutshell, is a widely used method of delivering the latest website updates directly to you without cluttering your email inbox.

Why do I need RSS?
No one really needs RSS, per se. But used wisely, RSS can help save you time while also making you look cool among your coworkers. But to help demonstrate why RSS feeds are better than a chimpanzee in a barrel, I’ll use the newspaper analogy.

Let’s say you like reading the local newspaper. There are currently several ways to get your newspaper on a daily basis. You can get off your rump and walk down to the nearest coffee shop and sit down with the daily news, or you can have the newspaper (and potentially your coffee, too) delivered daily by an underpaid 13-year old (also known as a "paperboy"). Both of these methods are completely valid and surprisingly legal. But which method is better?

If you were to choose the first method, then that means you have to do the required work. You have to get up off your rump. You have to walk to the coffee shop. You have to find the newspaper stand and select the copy immediately under the very top copy. But you know there will be days when you don’t have time, or you don’t feel like walking, or you paid some 13-year old to bring you your coffee (negating the real need to hit up the coffee shop). So you may not get every single newspaper. You may miss a day or two or ten. Maybe after a month you realize you can live perfectly fine without reading about the weather right outside your door.

But if you had your newspaper delivered, every day, on time (usually) by the same 13-year old that you conveniently “forget” to tip, then you won’t miss a day or two or ten. You’ll get your newspaper and read about the weather whether you want to or not.

That 13-year old kid is the RSS feed (minus the pimples). But if all he did was deliver a newspaper and some luke-warm coffee, it wouldn’t be all that big of a deal. But let’s say this kid says “Hey, not only can I deliver you your newspaper and luke-warm coffee, but I can also pick up all your favorite magazine subscriptions and bring those, too, for no extra charge. Whadda ya say?” You’d probably think the kid is nuts, but nevertheless take him up on his offer. So now he brings you your newspaper, Time magazine, NewsWeek, People, Bop and whatever it is you decide you want him to deliver. Now THAT is why you want an RSS feed (or an underpaid 13-year old kid).

Once you configure your RSS reader to deliver the feeds that you want to read, you can launch your reader and browse through all of the latest updates from all of your favorite websites from within a single application without having to visit each one of those websites separately. It’s like getting all of your favorite magazines delivered to your door without having to go to each magazine stand separately every single day.

How do I use an RSS feed?
You’ll need an RSS reader to read your RSS feeds. It can come in the form of an application (such as SharpReader: http://www.sharpreader.com) or as a tool on a website (such as MyRealTown http://www.realtown.com/myrealtown). You add your selected feeds (given out by the website) and the reader will download all the latest news from the websites and display them to you. Most readers will give you a preview pane of sorts that will allow you to preview the content from the website within the reader itself. But at minimum you’ll at least be given the titles of the feed items.

How does RSS work?
RSS is built using XML (eXtensible Markup Language). It contains information about the feed, such as the title of the feed and which website it belongs to. It also contains the latest website updates in the form of items. An RSS feed can have as many items as it wants, but its up to the RSS reader to determine how many it will show to you (most of them will show all of the available items). Each item has information about it like the title and a URL. Optionally, the item can contain a description, the full contents of the news item, and the date of the item.

So, again, why RSS? Aren’t there other ways to subscribe to a website?
The old-school method of subscribing to a website was to subscribe by email. Any time the website made a change, you were sent an email with the change and a link to view the change. This sounds neat until you’re subscribed to several websites and begin getting flooded with emails. Also, this method can be difficult for the website to maintain. They would have to keep a database of email addresses of their subscribers, and know which page(s) they subscribed to, and also be able to unsubscribe them on command. Plus, they have to validate email addresses, be prepared for bounce-backs and auto-responders, and keep their email servers in top-notch shape to send notifications to hundreds of thousands of subscribers for each and every website change.

RSS puts the subscriber in total control over the subscription. To subscribe, just add the feed to your RSS reader. To check for updates, simply launch your RSS reader. To unsubscribe, remove the feed from your RSS reader. At no time do you ever have to provide your email address, or “submit” for a subscription, or “submit” to be removed from the subscriptions list. This also makes it much easier for the website to maintain because they don’t have to push out update notifications because update notifications are only sent on demand of the subscriber (by launching their RSS reader).

I don’t like RSS. It’s too hard to pronounce. Are there any alternatives to RSS?
Yes, there are other (and often superior) alternatives to RSS such as ATOM and most RSS readers will also support other formats. However, RSS is still the most widely used syndication format and usually provides all the syndication functionality we need.

View more entries tagged with: Rss, Xml, My Realtown, Realtown, Syndication, News, Updates

Email Your Blog with File Attachments

October 9, 2006

View more entries tagged with: Realtown Blogs, Blogging, Blogs, Features, Email, Updates

Multiple Author Feature

October 5, 2006

I'm excited about a new feature Hector has added to RealTownBlogs that enables multiple authors to contribute to someone's blog. The levels of permissions are controlled by the blog author.

I'm making this entry on Hector's blog from within my blog. Very cool.

We're exploring different applications of this functionality. Large brokerage offices and assign authorship to various department heads.

Please Comment below if you have other applications in mind.

John Reilly

 

View more entries tagged with: Multiple Authors

New Default Template

September 28, 2006

The default template for new members of RealTown Blogs has been updated to match the sleek new look/feel of RealTown Blogs. My blog is currently using the new default template.

New members will have this template selected by default, while existing members can select this one from the Choose Template page in their Blog Manager.

This new template shows off some of the key features of our customizable templating, including a customizable comment layout and special links like "Email this entry" (try the one below). Click on any one of my entries that have comments to see how the comments are laid out, complete with comment author avatars and details about the comment.

View more entries tagged with: Realtown Blogs, Blogging, Blogs, Features, Templates

Trip to Denver, Colorado

September 25, 2006

Why on Earth would you ever go to Colorado? It's so COLD there!
My fiance Stephanie was sent out there for two weeks to help train in the new corporate office of Corporate Express. Considering the company paid for her hotel, rental car and gas, I took this opportunity to visit her for the weekend. She's scheduled to return to San Diego this Friday.

So what did y'all do there?
I arrived in Colorado friday evening after catching a few planes (with a pit-stop in Phoenix for a Grande White Mocha from Starbucks). We mostly just hung out and drove around the town.

Saturday was the fun-filled day. We first peeled our eyes open at the early hours of 9:00 am (ok ok so we slept in a little!) and drove south for about 45 minutes to Garden of the Gods. This place was neat! There are various hiking paths around these awesome red mini-mountains and cool cafe just up the hill. The best part about this place is that it's free, so you'll often see people with their pets just walking around and enjoying the outdoors. We snagged a lot of pictures of this beautiful place.

So you drove 45 minutes to see a bunch of rocks?
Yes!! That place was awesome! But while we were there, we snagged up some brochures for some more touristy stuff in the area, and then went to eat in a cute little historic town called Old Colorado City. Four blocks of their tiny downtown is actually preserved in the old original style and there are lot of cool little local shops including a chocolate factory. We had lunch at a tiny little cafe that only served breakfast and lunch -- and it was GOOD!

So, food and dirt... I'm still not impressed! I have that in my own backyard!
Yea, well your backyard probably doesn't have Pike's Peak, a nearby mountain that you can drive up for some fun in the snow! I also heard there's a train you can take to the top... maybe I'll have to try that next time because the road was blocked off to cars after about 7 miles. But we did get to see a very nice lake named Crystal Lake. You don't get to see much of this type of stuff in San Diego, although Lake Murray is pretty cool.
What else did you do? Tell me more!!
Dinner back in Aurora (near Denver) was "most excellent". We ate at Ted's, where they feature Bison in about the majority of their entrees. The cool thing about Bison is that it has 1/3 the fat and double the protein of beef -- or maybe it's the other way around? Well it's supposed to be really good for you, plus it's tasty! I opted for the bison meatloaf and Stephanie had a bison burger.

Sunday was a bit more relaxing. We went to downton Denver around noon and walked along their huge downtown mall. We ended up having lunch at this one Cuban restaurant (I can't remember the name...) and it was SO good! We started off with Cuban ceviche with plantane chips, with a mango mojito :)  For entrees, I had their giant scallop meal, and Stephanie had bass. We tried to get the waiter to roll us back to the car but he said he's not allowed to leave the premises during his shift, so we just walked with our stuffed bellies like normal people.
More Pics

View more entries tagged with: Denver, Trips, Vacation, Snow

Email Your Blog

September 12, 2006

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Blog Team Appreciation Lunch

September 1, 2006

BlogTeam Appreciation Lunch

Many thanks to our RealTown Blog members who showed their appreciation to the Blog Team here at InternetCrusade today. We had "Gourment Pizza" from RoundTable and even had enough to feed the entire InternetCrusade staff! What a treat!

View more entries tagged with: Blogteam, Realtown Blogs, Blogging, Appreciation

RealTown Blogs Wish List

August 22, 2006

RealTown Blogs is always expanding with new features, updates, and tools to help any blogger (especially real estate bloggers) get their thoughts and ideas to the web. Here is what we have planned for the future of RealTown Blogs.

• "Friends List" review
• Ability to post to your blog via email
• System notifications about comments/authors/entries upon logging in
• More templates (ongoing)
• Instant Messenger (already working, just needs to be stylized a la RealTown)
• "Blog Manager" redesign (ongoing)
• Featured Entries
• Paid Premium Features
• User Ads (requires Paid Premium Features)
• Image handling (gallery, better upload tool, etc.)
• "Search My Blog" ability
• Multiple Authors

Be sure to bookmark this entry as I'll be updating it as we continue to update RealTown Blogs.

View more entries tagged with: Realtown Blogs, Blogging, Blogs, Wishlist, Features

I'm A Gemini And I Love
Multi-Author Functionality

August 12, 2006

 Thanks, Hector! My stars were totally unaligned without a multi-user function. Two heads (or more) are always better than one! We'll take this baby for a drive and see what happens...

View more entries tagged with: None

Being a Member of the BlogTeam

August 3, 2006

Being a member of the BlogTeam is no trivial role. An honor, some say.  Complex issues regarding the welfare of thousands of RTBloggers arise in our frequent meetings.  We lay the groundwork for new features and we set the standard for all blogging sites available.  Simply put, the BlogTeam is our life and we strive to make it a success.

View more entries tagged with: Blogteam, Innovation

Hooray!!!

August 3, 2006

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Featured Entries

June 30, 2006

Testing out Featured Entries.

If a member is "Featured" or "Super-Featured", BlogTeam will automatically be added to their mailing list.

I have temporarily made myself a "Featured" member to try this out... :)

View more entries tagged with: Blogs, Featured, Blogteam

JavaScript is Back!

June 20, 2006

JavaScript has been re-enabled on RealTown Blogs for all of our Members. Now you can add things like custom stat counters and other useful tools to your Blog!

Of course, in order to protect our Members, we will be keeping an eye out for malicious JavaScript entries.

View more entries tagged with: Javascript, Blogs, Blogging, Realtownblogs, Security, Realtown

Categories Vs. Tags

June 15, 2006

As you may have noticed, we have just implemented tags here on RealTown Blogs. We already had an existing category system that was fairly powerful, with features like cross-posting between multiple categories and sticky entries. So what's the point of tags if we already can organize our posts by category?

In my mind, tags and categories are not the same thing, although they both serve the same purpose. They both are used to organize your entries. The difference, though, is dependent on how you use them.

Categories here on RealTown Blogs are, in my mind, very structural. They are like the limbs of your Blog. Tags, however, are more like the characteristics of the limbs. Some limbs are similar, like your hands and feet both have nails on the end, but to keep things organized we'll separate them as hands and feet.

When it comes to your entries, you can "describe" your entry using tags, but then "place" the entry as a whole into a category.

Another big distinction between categories and tags is that categories are always used in the URL of your entry, while tags are not.

Examples of Categories Vs. Tags:

Categories: Computers, Art, Design, Music
Tags: Windows XP, Photoshop, Michealangelo, Web Design, Funny Songs

Generally, categories are much more general in scope, but they don't have to be. And tags seem to be more detailed, but they don't have to be.

So with the power to add both categories and tags to your Blog, it's best for you to come up with your own thoughts on how to use them effectively on your Blog.

View more entries tagged with: Blogs, Blogging, Realtownblogs, Categories Vs Tags, Categories, Tags

Tags

June 15, 2006

Tags can now be added to your Blog! You can now add up to 10 tags to each entry from the Edit Entry or Add New Entry screen of the Blog Manager. Just separate your tags with a comma and you're good to go!

To make your tags appear alongside your Blog entry, just add None to your template. Couldn't be easier! Just make sure that you place None somewhere between and in the template since tags are associated with each entry (just like <%Title%> is).

I suggest adding this complete line directly after the ... section of your template:

If you have any trouble modifying your template, you can always reselect your template to get the updated version with None already in there.

View more entries tagged with: None