OpenDNS users are great. They’re smart, funny, good-looking and kind. Did I mention they’re really smart?

Especially these four guys, who put an OpenDNS shortcut link on their site.

• Paul Stamatiou of PaulStamatiou.com
• Brian Heys of BrianHeysWrites.com
• Eric Wahlforss of Eric.Wahlforss.com
• Wayne Smallman of BlahBlahTech.com

An OpenDNS shortcut link makes it easy for the hundreds of thousands of OpenDNS users to get back to your site, time and time again. Who doesn’t want that? All you do is put a link on your site that lets people create a shortcut straight to you. From that point forward, they can type something short and easy to remember into their address bar and be taken straight to your site. Simple instructions are here.

If you like being categorized with smart, funny, good-looking, kind people, you should put a shortcut link on your site, too.

It’s been about 36 hours since we launched shortcuts to the world and we’ve already had thousands created. One of the features that hasn’t been talked about much is how you can create advanced shortcuts. I’m going to show you some of my favorites below. Feel free to share some of your personal favorites in the comments.

Taming tickets

We have a ticketing system here in the office which we use to keep track of bugs and feature requests. It’s not uncommon to hear someone in the office say: “What do you think about ticket 509?” or “Did you see my update to ticket 1294?” Being able to type “t 509″ or “t 1294″ and land directly on the ticket page saves me a ton of time.

Here’s how I set up our trac shortcut:
t http://tickets.internal.opendns.com/ticket/%s

I use it like this: t 509

Phoning my friends

I use Skype from time to time to talk to friends in foreign countries to save on the long-distance charges. I like being able to launch a phone call by just using my address bar (since I’m always using a web browser).

Here’s how it works:
call skype:%s

I use it like this: call opendns

Or, if I just want to leave a voicemail:
voicemail skype:%s?voicemail

I use it like this: voicemail opendns

Know where you’re going

Sometimes I’ll be running out of the office to visit one of our datacenters and I’ll need directions. I’ve got a shortcut called office that quickly gives me directions to any location starting from my office. This one was a bit trickier to create, and I made it using the OpenDNS shortcut bookmarklet. You can find the bookmarklet on the bottom of your shortcuts page in your account.

Here is the shortcut:
office http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&hl=en&saddr=50+Fremont,+SF,+CA&daddr=%s

And here is how I use it in my browser: office 529 Bryant, Palo Alto, CA

The future of navigation is in your fingers

Shortcuts are cool. Advanced shortcuts can be powerful. What can you make them do? What do you want them to do?

Can I have a drumroll please (or maybe a dancing banana)…

Today we give you shortcuts, marking the first time you’ve ever had control over how your address bar behaves. Shortcuts are a cool way to use a short word for a long address.

Shortcuts will change the way you navigate the Internet. Unlike keyword-based systems in the past, shortcuts are yours. You create them and you decide where they go.

Without getting technical, here are some examples of what you can do with shortcuts. You can make a shortcut for “mail” go to gmail.com, mail.yahoo.com, your webmail or anywhere else you’d like. You can make a shortcut go to a website, start an IM conversation, initiate a phone call, and more. Our goal is to help you navigate the Internet in the easiest and fastest way possible.

Here’s how to get started:

1. Make sure you are using OpenDNS.
2. Create or sign in to your account.
3. Set up your first shortcut for a common website you visit.

There are a few different ways to create shortcuts. You can create them in your account, you can create them on the OpenDNS Guide pages, and you can create them on any other Website using a bookmarklet.

We will continue adding new ways to improve your Internet experience and give your more control over your network.

Thanks for choosing OpenDNS. As always, let me know what you think!

ps, here’s the dancing banana: