Google AdWords Does Not (Only) Want Your Money- They Want Quality And Relevance

I am newbie to Google AdWords, and have been going through forums and their landing page help. The forum was filled with users complaining that their accounts have been suspended due to landing page (the page where the user reaches when clicking on your ad) violations etc.

I thought to myself that Google has always been about meritocracy, so how could AdWords be any different?

Google is clear on quality with emphasis on relevant and original content, transparency, and ease of navigation (link). And good scores help reduce costs for advertisers while increasing chances of better ad-placement. Quality is enforced/calculated on so many levels like limiting landing page to the domain displayed in the ad, landing page keyword relevancy scores etc. They are clear that they want to give a positive experience to the user. Also, when strict rules apply to you as an advertiser, they must be being applied to other advertisers, thus reassuring the belief that the system is in good hands.

Contrast this approach with the approach of an average business, which may short-change on quality, ethics to bring in more cash. They only see the money right now, with little foresight on the effect of this on brand reputation.

Also, Google AdWords is a stable product, meaning what they are doing works in favor of users, and thus everyone.

I Think I Have Read All The General Programming Books I Could

With all that in mind, its questionable how far you can get just by book learning. Before my first child was born, I read all the How To books, and still felt like a clueless novice.

30 Months later, when my second child was due, did I go back to the books for a refresher? No.

Instead, I relied on my personal experience, which turned out to be far more useful and reassuring to me than the thousands of pages written by experts.

-Peter Norvig in Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years

In my leisure time and time during my college and graduate school, I have read tens of books besides my textbooks. They were mostly on computer and some were assorted, ranging from psychology to The Secret. Those among you who are fond of reading can relate to that feeling of contentment and getting lost in the words. And reading adds to your knowledge too :)

This reading also helped in my technical interviews. Now, I’m training on-the-job as a Web developer and I’ve learnt some new things:

• One of the things that struck me is that there is just so much technology and knowledge out there (also see The Humble Programmer), that even if time permitted, a single person cannot aspire to know it all.
• Division of labor means that as Web worker, your role will be narrow and well-defined. Like I’m training in PHP and MySQL, and moving on to WordPress. Thus topics other than this professional skill-set would be irrelevant now.
• There is little leisure time left once you commit yourself to a job.

Thus, the conclusion and advice to fellow-bookworms would be to read up as much as you can before your job, because career would neither leave time nor choice.

I’ll end by quoting Don’t Make Me Think,

You don't need to know everything

Given the finite capacity of the human brain, [Sherlock] Holmes explains, he can't afford to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.

Some Beginner-Level PHP Code Snippets

1. Is a button clicked?
   
   HTML Code
   <form method="get">
<input type="text" name="q" /><input type="submit" name="search" value="Search" />
</form>
   
   And the PHP code to respond whenever this button by the name="search" is clicked is
   if ( ! empty($_REQUEST['search']))
    {


       }

What I Learnt On The Job Today?

These days, I am training on the job, as a Web developer at Softobiz Technologies, Punjab, India.

1. First form the logic completely, then begin coding/implementing. We are not talking about formal algorithms but to such a detail that you are confident of coding it without pausing for logic or concept.
2. (PHP) Do not include all files in config.php or a similar-purposed file- It will increase the burden unnecessarily.

I’m Personally A Little Disappointed By PHP’s Reputation

After passing out from Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar I had to choose a line. With guidance from of my best friends, I chose PHP and related technologies. (original link)

Having made that decision, I worked towards the goal of becoming a professional Web developer. God has been kind to me in providing me with the opportunities and the wisdom to recognise them. That is all fine.

But it is the reputation of PHP that bugs me. I mean Facebook runs on (modified?) PHP so it must be good. In fact, not a day passes when we trainees are given a reference of Facebook as a gold standard on how the things need to be done.

There is an unacknowledged war that goes on every day in the world of programming. It is a war between the humans and the computer scientists. It is a war between those who want simple, sloppy, flexible, human ways to write code and those who want clean, crisp, clear, correct ways to write code. It is the war between PHP and C++/Java.
—Adam Bosworth
Google

(Programming PHP)

Anyways, we are here for developing software and the nuances of languages may not be relevant for us.

you’re not here to write code; you’re here to ship products
—Joel Spolsky (link)

More important than that is the duty and commitment to job, whatever language and its strengths and weaknesses may be.