Chris Meistre

In my ongoing effort to learn more about Chrome extensions development, I made a Forex Exchange Rates extension.

This runs with Forex Exchange Rates as a background and provides a way for you to compare two different exchange rates with up to date information, right on your toolbar in Chrome.

I used JQuery, and the most difficult hurdle to get over was making using of JSONP for cross domain Ajax handling. I only found out that Ajax doesn’t support cross domain handling until after completing the whole project. Luckily after doing some research the fix was quite easy.

Wonderbra National Cleavage Day

Today, 26 March 2010, is National Cleavage Day in South Africa. On first glance it might look like just another excuse for men to look at boobs, but there’s more to it than that.

Every 3 minutes, another woman is being diagnosed with breast cancer throughout the world. I’m not sure of the statistics in South Africa, but in the United Stats, 1 in every 8 women has got breast cancer.

You can read more Breast Cancer Facts on http://www.cleavage.co.za/.

So, National Cleavage Day is all about celebrating what you still have. Be glad that you’re not one of the ladies that have to go through this terrible experience, and at a same time spare a thought for them today.

Bernadette and I decided to put up Cleavage.co.za as a fun website where we’ve put together some information on Cleavage Day and other Breast Cancer information. The brave ladies can also upload an image of their cleavage in support of this day.

WonderBra also has a nice competition running at the moment, check out the picture on the right hand side.

FNB released a FAQ list for Paypal SA users. I’m just highlighting a few that were important for me:

What is Paypal?

Paypal is a payment system used throughout the world. It is used to either pay for items or services or receive payment for items and services. It makes a transaction saver because it puts a system between you and your credit card.

You use your credit card, or any other bank account, to Topup your Paypal account. Using this credit you can then purchase items over the Internet without anyone ever knowing your credit card details. You can then also use Paypal’s Resolution Centre to dispute any items or receive refunds if you do not receive the items as advertised.

By using it as a Merchant, you can accept payment into your Paypal account from your clients, and then Withdraw the funds at a later stage.

FNB has a Topup and Withdraw service that is available within their Online Banking

This allowed you to either Topup your Paypal SA account from one of your FNB accounts, or Withdraw money from your Paypal SA account to one of your FNB accounts.
NOTE that it is ONLY available through FNB Online Banking.

How to you link FNB accounts to Paypal?

First off, you need a cheque, savings or transmissions account with FNB.
You also need to be registered with FNB’s Online Banking service.
Before you can link your accounts to your Paypal account, you obviously need a Paypal SA account.
Once you log into your Online Banking, you’ll see there is a link on your left hand side for Paypal under Accounts. Click this and just simply follow the prompts.

Business and/or Personal

You can use Paypal SA for either your business and/or personal use.

FNB Bank Charges

Besides your normal monthly charges on your account, FNB will also take 1.5% of the value you Topup or Withdraw. According to their website, this is calculated on the Rand equivalent of the transaction.
FNB has a Terms and Condition Document that all Paypal SA transactions must adhere to.

Complete FNB FAQ List

The complete FNB Paypal SA FAQ List

For a long time we in South Africa have struggled to get ways for people from all over the world to pay us for our products or services we sell online. I do a lot of freelance software development for people outside of South Africa, and there has always been the problem of getting paid. Not because they didn’t want to pay, but because getting money into my account has always been so damn difficult.

The most popular and safest payment system in the world is Paypal. South Africans could always register a Paypal account, link their credit card to it, and then purchase items with it. However, you could not receive money to your Paypal account.

Most of the time it was just easier handling the project through RentACoder, but that meant paying them a commission on the money I received. There have been times when I couldn’t sign up for certain affiliate systems because they only supported Paypal.

A couple of weeks ago I read about FNB deciding to launch Paypal SA. I have been waiting in anticipation. Today, Paypal SA was finally launched. A few minutes after it being official, I logged into my FNB account and linked my account to Paypal. Within a few minutes my Paypal SA account was up and running.

Now I just need people to pay money into my account

A few things worry me about this Paypal SA & FNB situation we find ourselves in. As with Eskom, Telkom, and various other monopolies we’ve seen in South Africa, having FNB with a monopoly of Paypal SA at this point in time can only lead to problems. Already FNB is running a campaign to get people to switch over to them by using this form. I have nothing against FNB, because for the most time I’ve had good service over the last 11 years, but it does make you wonder.

The official FNB Paypal Announcement

I’ve been using keyword density analysers for quite some time, but to get one that works just right has been difficult to get. I decided to create my own one with info that I’ve found through researching various aspects of keyword density.

I decided to make it available for everyone to use on http://www.keyworddensity.info. It works nicely, but I still found it a schlep to copy and paste URLs each time I want to analyse a website or article.

Out of that frustration, my new Chrome Extension for Keyword Density checking was born. It makes it easy for you to check the keyword density of any page.

Try it out!