How To's

Recently I decided to update all the software on my home machine. When it came time to update my browser I downloaded the latest version of firefox and installed it. Then during startup firefox looked for updates for all the add-ons installed. It found a few so I updated them all and moved on. When I opened Firefox everything seemed to be working fine until I clicked on an email address. Instead of my Outlook 2010 opening a new message and adding the email address to the recipient field, a new window opened asking for my Gmail username and password. Since Outlook has always been set as my default email program in firefox, I was a bit confused as to how this happened.

To troubleshoot the problem I first I went into my Firefox settings to make sure Outlook was set as the default mail client. To do so I navigated to the Firefox options by clicking Tools, Options. Next I clicked the Applications tab and scrolled down to “mailto”. In the drop down make sure Outlook is selected. Outlook was in fact already selected as the default mail client so there had to be something else interfering.

Scratching my head I began poking around, and thankfully after a while I was able to find a fix to the problem. Turns out the new Google toolbar actually has a setting that overrides the Firefox settings. To fix the problem right click on your Google toolbar and click on Google Toolbar Options. Next, uncheck the box that says “Use Gmail for Mail To Links”. Close the options box and give it a try. Now when you click on a email address Outlook will open instead of Gmail!

Magento eCommerce is a beast of its own, and enabling it to be most efficient can require some tweaks that are not widely known that we would like to share with you. Below are two easy steps that will not only speed up your website, but increase its efficiency on your dedicated server.

Turn Magento Caching on (do not use while developing)
   1. Login to your Magento Admin
   2. go to System -> Cache Management
   3. in the dropdown box, choose “enable” and tick all the boxes, then save settings.

Compile Magento
   1. Login to your Magento Admin
   2. go to System -> Tools -> Compilation

Always remember that speed depends on many variables, if your site exists on a shared server, then you may want to think about upgrading to a dedicated machine. If you’re troubleshooting your live site, always be sure to test the impact of every step you take, then proceed accordingly. If you’re in search of hiring someone to do this for you, contact us!

Have you ever made any modifications to your Magento eCommerce store, then notice that the items you just added are not showing up? If so, you need to know how to properly flush, or clear the cache. By following the instructions below your items will instantly appear to your live website.

Magento keeps its cache in /var/cache located inside the Magento installation directory. So, for example, if your Magento is installed in your main public_html folder, the cache will be in public_html/var/cache.

   1. To clear the cache, simply delete everything from the /var/cache directory and then reload your website in your browser.

   2. If you need to go a step further and clear all sessions, you can also delete everything from the /var/session folder within your Magento installation directory.

When developing your store, you need to be able to see the changes you have implemented each time you load the page. In order to do this, you should refresh Magento's caching system. To do this follow these simple steps.

   1. Select System->Cache Management from the Magento Administration Panel

   2. Select Refresh from the All Cache Drop Down List.

   3. Save changes.

Just recently I upgraded to an iPhone 4, which also meant I had to upgrade all my iPhone applications. Being an avid Twitter user, I decided to test my new phone by uploading a picture to TwitPic using the iPhone Twitter application. When I went to view my photo, it was linking to a page on the yfrog website! Since I already had a TwitPic account I began to winder how can I stop this from happening? Yfrog pretty much took over my phone without my permission! After poking around a bit, I was able to find a fix.

1.    Open your Twitter iPhone application.
2.    Click the settings box. (The box with 3 dots located in the bottom right corner.)

3.    Scroll to the very bottom below all of your lists, then click on “Accounts & Settings”.

4.    You should now be on the Accounts page. Now click “Settings” located in the bottom left corner.

5.    Click “Services”.

6.    Select “Image Service”.

7.    This is where you can select the image service you prefer. JVF Consulting prefers to use TwitPic.

8.    Once you have selected the service you wish to use click “Services” to save your selection.

There you have it, you can now upload your images directly to the image service you prefer!

If you have you ever tried setting up the mailto function within Firefox for Google apps, then you know what a pain it could be. This article will walk you through how to setup the mailto shortcut for your Google Apps domain within FireFox 3.6.8 on Windows 7. This means that by clicking on any "mailto" links it will automatically open and compose a new email in your Gmail account.

1. Open up FireFox 3.6.8 and paste in the following into the address bar:

about:config

2. Click "I'll be careful, I promise" when the warning appears

3. Copy and paste the following three values into the "Filter" field, one at a time and make sure they are set to “true”. If not, double click the value to change it:

• gecko.handlerService.allowRegisterFromDifferentHost
• network.protocol-handler.expose.mailto
• network.protocol-handler.external.mailto

4. Update the following script to have your domain within the URL and on the label for the new “mailto” application handler. Paste it into the address bar within FireFox, hit Enter and then click the “Add Application” button when the small notification appears:

javascript:window.navigator.registerProtocolHandler('mailto','https://mail.google.com/a/yourdomain.com/mail/?extsrc=mailto&url=%s','Google Apps - Your Domain')

5. Next get into the Applications settings section within the options menu item by going to Tools -> Options:

6. Navigate to the Applications tab, scroll down to the “mailto” entry, select you’re the “Google Apps – Your Domain” entry you created and then click “OK”.