Website Builders- You don’t have to know HTML to build a website!

Internet started getting popular 20 years ago, and it was hard to build up a website with cool features & shapes by oneself at that time.

Nowadays, people without programming skills might still think building a website is irrelevant to them.

However, as you may notice, it’s more and more popular to own a website yourself currently! There are WIX, Weebly (by Penn Stater), Go Daddy and so on. These are website builders, and you can easily decorate your own website yourself without any technical background.

Let’s explore website builders!

Squarespace vs Wix vs Weebly vs Jimdo - Google Trend

As we can see, the most popular website builder for now is WIX.

WIX empowers users to create their own websites in their own ways for free, without creating limits and coding. (http://www.wix.com/)

Here are some features for WIX in this video clip.

Let’s talk about the pros and cons of WIX compared to others.

PROS OF WIX

  1. Large Selection of Professional templates – Wix offers over 510 professional looking templates for you to choose from, or you could create your own custom design.  The best part about Wix’s templates is that they are already structured, formatted and pre-populated with content so you simply have to pick your favorite one, replace the pre-set content with your own.  All the templates are already user ready.
  2. Intuitive Drag & Drop interface – Wix’s website builder is simple enough to use.  Just drag and drop any elements (building blocks) you needs, such as images, slideshows, text, etc and place them wherever you want without any restrictions. There really is no limitations where you insert the elements.
  3. Support and help available everywhere – Wix has one of the strongest support infrastructure available amongst all website builders.  They have help / support buttons everywhere.  You can either click on the main help button at the top of the page, or each element that you use also has its own unique help button.  It’s nice that the help buttons are right there for you to click on without looking any further.  If you need a bit more “hand-holding”, Wix also offers you phone & email support..

CONS OF WIX

  1. Visibly large advertisements on the free version – Using Wix’s free website builder comes with noticeably large and prominent advertisement Wix logos on the side and at the bottom of the website after you publish.  All free website builders have their own advertisement credits (understandable since they’re providing services for free) but Wix’s are really quite prominent.  You will need to upgrade to remove the advertisements.
  2. Once you pick a template, you can’t change it – Although Wix has plenty of pre-made designer templates for you to choose from, once you’ve picked one to use, you can’t switch to another template.  If you do, you will have to rebuild your website.  It’s a bit annoying, so you have to make sure you love it!
  3. Not designed to manage complex e-commerce needs – If you want to build an online shop, Wix’s e-commerce tools are not advanced enough to help you fully manage your store.  But to be fair, they do have better e-commerce tools than most standard website builders, but they don’t include basic management tools such as sending out automatic confirmation emails to your customers after they pay, configure taxes and shipping costs, and just general management of orders such as marking orders as shipped or paid.

For last semester, I happened to establish some my own websites on WIX and Weebly. They are both pretty easy to use and powerful. You can build your own unique website in your own ways for free.

 

You may check them out if you are interested.

http://jasonxuxo.wix.com/showerpods

http://qishenxue-portfolio.weebly.com/

 

Therefore, will you be interested to develop your own website?

What’s your opinion about the website builders?

Reference:

http://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/wix-vs-weebly-vs-squarespace-vs-jimdo/

Which is the best smart phone? IPhone 6 Plus vs Samsung Galaxy Note 5

Nowadays, the discussion between Apple and Samsung cellphones are quite hot. Some people really love Samsung, but some people are die-hard Apple users. Therefore, let’s look at this problem critically!

If you’re looking for a phone with a large screen, the iPhone 6 Plus and Galaxy Note 5 are by far the best choices on the market right now. Both phones have gorgeous metal and glass designs, offer fast performance and long battery life, and capture excellent photos.

It’s tough to decide between the two — ultimately, it boils down to whether or not you prefer iOS or Android, and whether or not having extra features such as a stylus really matter to you.

But if your buying choice is more complicated than that, there are a few differences between the iPhone 6 Plus and Galaxy Note 5 that you may want to consider.

Both phones will cost you a decent amount of money. The iPhone 6 Plus starts at $750 off-contract, while the Note 5 starts at around $700 without a carrier subsidy.

After some research on the Internet, I found some important notes.

  • Both phones are gorgeous, but with the Note 5 you get a slightly larger screen packed into a phone that’s the same size as the iPhone 6 Plus.
  • The Note 5’s screen displays colors more vibrantly than the iPhone, but it’s not any sharper than the iPhone’s screen even though it’s a higher spec.
  • The iPhone is still much more simple to use than Samsung’s phone.
  • The Note 5’s S Pen feels natural and the multiwindow feature is useful, but Samsung’s version of Android is still too cluttered for me.
  • Both phones take excellent photos. It’s a win-win here, but, as is the case with the Note 5’s display, its camera also sometimes exaggerates color.

iPhoneNoteFront

Conclusion

To be clear, both phones are excellent and would be an ideal choice for those seeking a large-screened phone. But, if you’re really trying to choose between the two, here’s what you need to know.

The Note 5 has an amazing screen and lots of features that make multitasking easier, such as its multiwindow functionality and included S Pen stylus. Those are the two areas where it really shines over the iPhone.

The iPhone, on the other hand, is more simple and doesn’t come with any bloatware. Its software is less busy, which makes it easier to use from the moment you pick it up. It takes excellent photos, especially in low light, and the general app ecosystem is more polished. That’s important if you care about getting the best apps as soon as they launch, since many apps such as Instagram, Vine, and Periscope were all available for the iPhone before they launched on Android.

 

Will this change your mind?

Which one is your next cellphone?

 
Site used:http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-iphone-6-plus-vs-samsung-galaxy-note-5-2015-8#ixzz3kKclr0os

Venmo & Cash- Why they are getting popular?

We often face the situation about how to pay a check together, how to pay the bill and how to payback a small fee to our friend. Cash, is not that convenient as we all feel.

With the development of the technologies, we tend to bring debit/credit card instead of cash. There comes the Venmo, which is an online money transfer app. This really changes many people’s way of living, especially college students in terms of paying money to their friends.

I personally used Venmo quite often during the summer:

1.I went traveling with a bunch of friends, and helped each other pay for the travelling fee and hotel cost.

2. When I went out to have lunch & dinner with friends, sometimes the restaurant can only accept one card to pay for all 8 people.

3. I traveled with a friend during summer, I just bought air tickets for my friend together to save time and avoid conflicts.

When we need to talk about how much we should pay for each other, Venmo just solve the problem, no matter how much it is, such as $50.79, $187.84 or $ 8.44. In really life, these weird amount might cost some problems with cash.

Moreover, Venmo is so convenient that the first second that you sent out the money with several simple clicks, the second second your friends got money.

Other than that, why Venmo is so popular now?

VENMO IS EASY TO USE: First, you enter your debit card number (or credit card number, although credit card-powered payments carry a fee). The entry of the debit card number is the hardest part in the whole process. Next, you just type in the first few letters of a friend’s name in the Venmo app.

I recently sent cash to a friend by entering the first few letters of his name in the appropriate field. (See image, right.) The contact info pops up and  the user enters the amount of the payment, slides their finger across a tab at the bottom of the screen and enters a PIN or password. The transaction is processed.

Venmo 2BII

VENMO IS SUCCEEDING BECAUSE IT IS VIRAL BY DESIGN: As they grow popular, peer-to-peer payment apps enjoy the benefit of a strong network effect — as more people adopt the app, the service itself becomes more valuable (you can send money to more friends), and user growth accelerates. Once a few of someone’s contacts adopt Venmo, it’s just a matter of time before they get their friends on it, since they have an interest in getting more of their social circle to accept payments on it. After adopting Venmo, I invited many of my friends to adopt it, and  five people downloaded the app at my request.

We have not seen an app spread this quickly in our networks since the days when Facebook and Instagram became mainstream successes.

venmo screenshot android feedVenmoVenmo’s social feed

VENMO OFFERS SOCIAL FEATURES AND THE ABILITY TO ‘BILL’ FRIENDS: The app also has a social feed, which shows a stream of payments that people in your network are making to one another. While the social feed prompts mixed feelings in many users who may quickly change their setting to “private,” it tends to reinforce usage. It’s easier to remember to use an app when our friends and acquaintances seem to be constantly using it to pay one another.

And the charge feature is what really made us Venmo enthusiasts. The feature allows Venmo users to bill friends for money owed. Your contacts receive the notice of a charge within the app and via email. The feature allows users to avoid the uncomfortable experience of asking people for money face-to-face or on a phone call.

PEER-TO-PEER WILL BE THE ‘KILLER APP’ FOR MOBILE PAYMENTS: One reason why mobile payments have been slow to take off in the U.S. is that credit cards and cash already work pretty well, particularly in retail settings. Successful technologies always solve a problem, but sometimes they solve a problem that people didn’t know they had. Before using Venmo, we never really thought about the inconvenience of writing a check, or finding an ATM to withdraw cash, or asking a friend for money. But these are all hassles that Venmo helps you avoid. 

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/venmo-is-the-killer-app-that-the-mobile-payments-industry-has-been-waiting-for-2014-6#ixzz3kKZB6Nc3

So, what do you think about Venmo?

Would you like to use that?

 

 

Sites used:

http://www.businessinsider.com/venmo-is-the-killer-app-that-the-mobile-payments-industry-has-been-waiting-for-2014-6