Practical Tips for Digital Nomads, Travelers, And Everybody Else

A collection of (sometimes hard-earned) learning from travelling mostly in Asia.

Lean Economy

is a common challenge for Digital Nomads. The lifestyle itself calls for travelling, rented accommodations, restaurant meals, etc; while normal business behavior must be maintained with mobile electronic equipment, internet subscriptions, rented office space, printouts, copy & fax services, mailing, SIM cards, data backups, customer care, company accounting and auditing, company administration, tax statements; maintaining company records, contracts and agreements; etc...

Digital Nomad life is often carried out in low-cost countries so food and lodging may not be an issue. Local travel is mostly cheap, however international travelling and the necessary electronics, not to mention possible commitments back home, still carry the same huge price tags. Furthermore, remote services and work carried out by a Digital Nomad tend to be far less paid for than if you'd do the same work on-site back home. Practical Tips for Digital Nomads, Travelers, And Everybody Else.

However, quoting Tony Robbins: "The defining factor for success is never resources; it's resourcefulness"

Cheap travel

There are dozens of websites for cheap flights and I have found that prices differ very little. Note that many budget airlines only sell tickets on their own websites. The key to cheap flights for the resourceful Digital Nomad is FLEXIBILITY when it comes to schedule. Avoiding the big travelling holidays is a no-brainer - though knowing the BIG travelling holidays may be a challenge in its own right when you are in an unfamiliar country.

Try changing your departure date a few days back or forth and you may find the same (or a similar) flight substantially cheaper. If possible, try different airports for departure or arrival; it may be much cheaper - and a fun adventure experience - to e.g. fly to a smaller town and take a local bus or train to your final destination.

On the other hand... be sure to consider the end-to-end cost. A cheap flight that forces you to pay for an extra hotel night near the airport (which may be expensive also in low-cost countries) may turn out a worse alternative than paying a little extra for a more conveniently scheduled flight. Also assess the risk for delays, and your sensitivity towards such! An important delivery and a complicated travel with many legs and tight or unsecure connections may not be a good combination. A fun adventure perhaps, but with a possible additional cost of a missed delivery and an upset (ex-) client.

For hotel bookings I always use expedia.com, they seem to offer the best prices and their review system makes it easy to find good accommodation at a reasonable price. But be sure to check that there are a substantial number of reviews.

Light packing

This is obvious but still worth mentioning over and over. There are only a few items you really need to bring along. When finished packing - throw out half the stuff! Tony Robbins again: "... is never resources; it's resourcefulness". So throw out the stuff from your backpack and pack yourself full of resourcefulness! And you will be all ready to go!

Private bills back home

have a tendency to pop-up when least expected! Despite careful planning and "considering everything", that yearly payment suddenly appears out of the blue. Arrange forwarding of mail to a trusted friend or relative, and perhaps deposit an amount of money with them for unexpected expenses. Much easier than if you unexpectedly need to make an urgent international money transfer when in some forgotten corner of the jungle.

Insurance: medical, travelling, lost/stolen property etc.

This is obviously not the most fun part when planning for your Digital Nomad career, but it is worth mentioning. What happens if you get sick? What if you have a fatal accident? What if you lose all your belongings including passport, money, credit cards, laptop, etc? Not very uplifting things to consider; but if the unlikely occurs you will be far better off with a good insurance.

Retirement

May be worth considering. After all, life is short...
The Digital Nomad does not benefit from an employers provisions into a retirement fund - it is entirely up to the Digital Nomad's initiative. Private savings or any other suitable way of creating assets that will generate sufficient and recurring income once needed.

The Best Practice Guide for URLs

URLs form the basic building block of every business that has a web presence. The structure of a URL matters a lot to SEO. Here is a list of best practices that one can consider when creating a URL.

The most important advice from Google is to keep your URL structure simple and readable. The URL should include sentences and words that are logical and readable for human beings rather than confusing numbers and letters. This helps in a URL being remembered easily in case one needs to type it or refer offline.
It is advisable to make your URL in lower case letters. If you have a UR in capital letters, convert them into lower cases, an exception being when you have different pages of the same name.
To increase readability of URLs, use punctuation marks such as hyphens instead of using underscores.
Until a URL makes sense to the human brain, it can continue to have stop words such as a, an etc.
A good SEO practice is to ensure that the keywords for the page are near the front of the URL. However, it still needs to be readable and not just stuffed keywords.
It is not necessary to match your headline with that of the URL. In fact, varying the headline from the URL gives it a chance to be more concise.
It is better to use a single domain or a subdomain. The chances of a blog performing better if it is altogether on a root or one subdomain. The Rankings of such blog are also suggested to go higher.
It is a good practice to use verb stem in URLs. For instance, instead of using the term 'smearing', the term 'smear' should be used.
Avoid using overly complex URLs with multiple parameters. This can cause an issue with Googlebot since there will be too many URLs with similar content.
Ways of fixing URL issues

Google recommends these solutions to fixing URL issues.

1. Instead of using session IDs in URLs, use cookies.
2. Use a robots.txt file such as dynamic URLs or URLs generating search results to block Googlebot's access to few URLs.
3. Trim unnecessary parameters to shorten URLs
4. Add a no follow attribute to links so that dynamically future calendar pages are ceased, if you have an infinite calendar to your site
5. Broken relative links often cause hindrance.
Check your sites for such links

Is Linux or Windows VPS Hosting Right for You?

So you've decided that a virtual private server is the way to go for your business. Sweet! Control, privacy, dedicated resources, ridiculously awesome hardware.

Now that you've got that first step out of the way, it's time to make your next VPS hosting decision - what type of operating system should you go for?

You have two OS options: either Linux or Windows. They are similar in a lot of ways and cover the same basic functions, such as allowing you to store your business data, run applications and scale up your resources as needed - in a nutshell what a VPS is all about. But there are some pretty marked differences between the two as well so let's take a look in a little more detail at the pros and cons of each to help with your decision making process.

Linux VPS

You've obviously heard of open source software. Linux is the computer operating system version of that and was developed under the model of free distribution and collaboration right from the get-go. It's known for its innovation, stability and performance. Did you know that it has been adapted for more computer hardware platforms than any other operating system? (Thanks wiki).

Pros:

A cheaper alternative. Since Linux is open source, you don't have to worry about costs associated with licensing fees, or having any kind of special software to run with it.

Works seamlessly with other open source programming languages, like PHP for example, as well as open source applications.

A whole bunch of OS options such as CentOS, Debian and Ubuntu amongst others.

If you're a fan of cPanel, then you need to go with a Linux VPS.

Thanks to its SSH Access, there is less of a server load than its Windows counterpart and you get better control.

Cons:

A Linux VPS is managed via SSH which is not as easy or intuitive as the Windows interface.

So in summary, a Linux VPS is perfect for businesses that love open source, want a budget friendly option and have the tech skills on hand to manage the server.

Windows VPS

A Windows VPS runs on, well, Windows, Microsoft's proprietary OS.

Pros:

A Windows VPS environment is easier to manage if you don't have a ton of technical or IT skills in house. It boasts a more familiar GUI or graphical interface. It's really easy to use - any Windows user will feel comfortable.

If you're developing in ASP or ASP.NET, the Windows environment is all about integration and support for these scripts.

Ideal for users with a MS SQL database. It kinda makes sense that since they are from the same company they work perfectly together, right?

Lots of support from Microsoft, such as regular and seamless updates when it comes time.

Cons:

More expensive. Windows is, obviously, a commercial system owned by Microsoft, so you've got to pay them for it.

Not as strong as Linux is in terms of integration with open source programming languages.

So in summary, if your business relies heavily on Microsoft programs and software, a Windows VPS is specifically designed to work best with the Microsoft platform.

All About VPS

During the life cycle of a website, at one point or another - especially when your audience starts to grow - traditional web hosting may not be sufficient to sustain its development. During this moment, a VPS may be the best way to maintain your website stable. This type of web hosting will provide you with all of the necessary support to sustain the growth, demands, resources and solicitations needed to keep your website up and running.

It is natural that there will be some questions and doubts along the way about which hosting plan to choose. In this article, I am going to help you understand what a VPS server is, what are its advantages and limitations, and how to choose the best VPS for your website.

What is a VPS server?

VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. In order to understand what it means and how it works, first, we need to understand each of the three terms below:

Server - place where files and data stored.
Virtual - not physical; virtual environment created by software.
Private - restricted for your website's use.

Let's compare traditional Web hosting (shared) and a Dedicated server.

In shared web hosting, your website will be storing and dividing space and resources with hundreds of other websites that are also hosted on the same server.

On a dedicated server, the physical machine (server) hosts only your website. It is dedicated exclusively to you and your web page.

In this scenario it's easy to imagine that shared hosting has resource limits when compared to those of a dedicated server.

This difference will also reflect on the price of such services. A dedicated web host costs a lot more on a monthly basis than a traditional web host. That's because on a shared host, a single server is divided amongst multiple clients and costs are split between them as well, thus allowing this service to be offered to people at a lower price. Meanwhile, with a dedicated host, the cost is exclusively billed to a single client, making the costs significantly higher. With this being said, it would be great if we could have an intermediate option. One with more resources than a shared host, and not as expensive as a dedicated server. That's where VPS comes in.

Virtual servers (VPS) are "virtualized" within a single physical server and acts as a dedicated server.

It has the resources and capabilities similar to those of a private server, but with a lower threshold. The server that hosts a VPS also shares its resources with other customers, as in a shared host. However, the total number of clients sharing the server resources is much smaller

How Does A VPS Work?

The virtual server runs within a physical server, but its resources and capabilities are well defined and separated into each virtualized environment. This ensures that a site will not affect in any way, another site hosted on the same server. That's because each site has its own virtual server, with resources dedicated to the site in question.

Another interesting point is that a VPS uses its own operating system, independent of the operating system used by other customers and the physical server that hosts all other VPSs.

As mentioned earlier, the VPS server acts like a dedicated server, but in a shared environment. The big difference compared to a shared server is that the VPS user has root access (administrative) to the server, which means that you can configure and install the applications and programs you want, which would normally not be allowed on a shared server. In addition, each VPS has its own resources, thus ensuring that a virtual server will not interfere with another that is hosted on the same machine.

So, if you are looking to host your growing website, a VPS is exactly what you need; make sure you find one that fits your needs and has a fair price and also opt in for a hosting Company that provides 24h support - you might need it!