One of the challenges of open source web applications are that they require users to have their own web hosting solution in place, but recently I've been noticing more open source web applications being released as Google App Engine applications. This is a great direction as it removes the barrier of having to setup one's own web servers, network access, etc. Users can download the the GAE project's source and either run it locally using the GAE SDK's own web server or use the free GAE instances that Google provides.
I've been using GAE a lot recently and have come to really like it despite some of the limitations.
Showing posts with label Web. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Web. Show all posts
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Firefox 3.5 icon with version number
Download the image here.
Firefox 3.5 is out and since those of us working on the web usually have multiple versions of the browser installed, having an icon with the version number on it makes it easier to identify the instance we're loading.
This is inspired by http://browserversionicons.com/firefox/
With the icon from Mozilla.
Instructions for running multiple instances of Firefox are here.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Google Apps for Business
I've been using Google Apps for Domains (don't confuse it with just apps I.e. Docs) and it is excellent. It is a great solution for small businesses or start-ups especially those with limited IT budgets.
Recently Google added support with Blackberry and with today's announcement that they are adding Outlook sync, the barriers to business adoption continue to fall.
Recently Google added support with Blackberry and with today's announcement that they are adding Outlook sync, the barriers to business adoption continue to fall.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
3 pixels vs 4 pixels
Doug Bowman's post on leaving Google had a quote that has gotten picked up by many bloggers as representative of what is wrong with the engineering culture:
He doesn't give much more context about this debate, but it reminded me of some of my own experiences where I got involved with almost the exact same debate. In my case, the cause of the debate was almost always because there were multiple designers. Either it was two more more designers arguing about the width or it was after a product launch that the next designer decide that the width decision should be thrown out.
What drove engineers nuts was that because decisions are so arbitrary anyone can override the design at any time. Maybe Google is on the extreme end to demand numerical metrics to back up any decision, but for most engineers it was mainly that they wanted to understand the reasoning for a change. Otherwise, engineers would spend their entire lives changing the size of borders.
"I had a recent debate over whether a border should be 3, 4 or 5 pixels wide, and was asked to prove my case."
He doesn't give much more context about this debate, but it reminded me of some of my own experiences where I got involved with almost the exact same debate. In my case, the cause of the debate was almost always because there were multiple designers. Either it was two more more designers arguing about the width or it was after a product launch that the next designer decide that the width decision should be thrown out.
What drove engineers nuts was that because decisions are so arbitrary anyone can override the design at any time. Maybe Google is on the extreme end to demand numerical metrics to back up any decision, but for most engineers it was mainly that they wanted to understand the reasoning for a change. Otherwise, engineers would spend their entire lives changing the size of borders.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
The value of Google Chrome
A friend of mine recently posted his thoughts on the "Chrome's overinflated importance". If viewed only as a web browser then it is just another entry in the various browsers that exists out there. However, I believe the true value of Chrome will be if it can change the way people and developers look at web applications.
In many ways, advancement in web development is hindered because developers and businesses have not been able to really think outside of limits imposed by the "WWW" of 10 years ago. Another way to say is that the world wants to move to using the Internet as a platform but we are still stuck on using the WWW as the platform instead.
There has been many attempts to try to break out of that mentality. The unfortunate term "Web 2.0" was one attempt (I think) although it never clearly articulated what it really meant and is now just a overused marketing term. In some ways, "Cloud" seems to be another way to break out from the mindset of "web development" to building applications on the Internet.
Chrome's importance to me is whether it can open up the developer's mind to new possibilities by providing them a tool that goes beyond building web sites and web applications. I hope that someday the "web" will move beyond being viewed as an interactive magazine or at least let the "web" be the interactive magazine while we're also using applications on the Internet.
In many ways, advancement in web development is hindered because developers and businesses have not been able to really think outside of limits imposed by the "WWW" of 10 years ago. Another way to say is that the world wants to move to using the Internet as a platform but we are still stuck on using the WWW as the platform instead.
There has been many attempts to try to break out of that mentality. The unfortunate term "Web 2.0" was one attempt (I think) although it never clearly articulated what it really meant and is now just a overused marketing term. In some ways, "Cloud" seems to be another way to break out from the mindset of "web development" to building applications on the Internet.
Chrome's importance to me is whether it can open up the developer's mind to new possibilities by providing them a tool that goes beyond building web sites and web applications. I hope that someday the "web" will move beyond being viewed as an interactive magazine or at least let the "web" be the interactive magazine while we're also using applications on the Internet.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Giving bloggers a bad name -- Arrington on Yahoo
I think a lot of bloggers take their writing seriously even if they aren't professional journalists. Just like yellow journalism can hurt the reputation of the news industry, bloggers like Michael Arrington can also give bloggers a bad name by selling sensationalism as news.
Arrington posted another entry commenting on Yahoo and once again contradicts himself. He concludes his blog post (I wouldn't go as far as crediting him with the term 'article') with
I guess it's safe for him that he doesn't actually have to provide any facts to back up his statements. He's basically saying that Jerry Yang and Sue Decker don't have any fight left in them other then fighting off Microsot and Carl Icahn. If they had no fight in them, wouldn't they just sold the company along with their principals? Arrington also implies that somehow Yahoo is hurting other people beyond employee and stockholders. Who is he talking about? Selling to Microsoft helps consumers? I can't understand the purpose of Arrington's ramblings other then him trying to make himself sound relevant and him thinking that if he can yell loud enough that people might think that he's somehow a participant or insider. I guess without any journalistic integrity he has to rely on fame in one way or another ala Paris Hilton.
I think I'll stop by a deli and ask the waiter on his thoughts about TechCrunch and quote it as fact that everyone in Silicon Valley feels what the "insider" feels.
Arrington posted another entry commenting on Yahoo and once again contradicts himself. He concludes his blog post (I wouldn't go as far as crediting him with the term 'article') with
It took me about five minutes of watching Yahoo’s top two executives talk last month to realize that they had no fight left in them. The fact that they simply gave up wouldn’t matter so much if the only people hurt by their actions were their employees and stockholders. But that just isn’t the case, and now we all have to deal with the fallout.
I guess it's safe for him that he doesn't actually have to provide any facts to back up his statements. He's basically saying that Jerry Yang and Sue Decker don't have any fight left in them other then fighting off Microsot and Carl Icahn. If they had no fight in them, wouldn't they just sold the company along with their principals? Arrington also implies that somehow Yahoo is hurting other people beyond employee and stockholders. Who is he talking about? Selling to Microsoft helps consumers? I can't understand the purpose of Arrington's ramblings other then him trying to make himself sound relevant and him thinking that if he can yell loud enough that people might think that he's somehow a participant or insider. I guess without any journalistic integrity he has to rely on fame in one way or another ala Paris Hilton.
I think I'll stop by a deli and ask the waiter on his thoughts about TechCrunch and quote it as fact that everyone in Silicon Valley feels what the "insider" feels.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Did MS help or hurt Facebook?
Microsoft paid $240 million to invest in Facebook. This is a pretty small amount for Microsoft, but since it's for less then a 2% stake in Facebook it puts a perceived value of Facebook at $15 billion. While this might make the people at Facebook feel pretty good about themselves, I wonder if this really helps them as much as it helps Microsoft. Effectively Microsoft was able to pay $240 million to prevent any other company from buying Facebook since very few company will want to spend that much money on a social networking site. This is as good as MS buying Facebook for chump change.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Yet Another Social Network
Over the past few years, social networks has been all the rage. Sites like MySpace, LinkedIn, and Facebook has garnered a lot of media attention and the term has moved into the mainstream. I don't have a problem with the term "social network", but it does tickle my funny bone when I hear people talk about how social networks are new and pioneered by the likes of sites like MySpace or Facebook. Social networks has been in existence since... well, when Man crawled out of the ocean and saw that other naked person crawling out next to him. Humans are , by nature, social creatures and we tend to like interacting with others.
What bloggers and the media really mean when they talk about "social networks" is the technical application for communication on the web. I bring this up only because it annoys me when they make sound like social networks are some brand new thing (like Web 2.0? ^^) pioneered by the likes of MySpace or Facebook and any new site is just "yet another social network." Yes, any new site is just another social network, but so is MySpace and Facebook. Pick up the phone book and there is a social network application that your great grandparent probably was already using and that is probably thousands of years removed from the first social network. Ultimately it boils down to how useful each of the site fulfill their purpose which often is for improving communication.
What bloggers and the media really mean when they talk about "social networks" is the technical application for communication on the web. I bring this up only because it annoys me when they make sound like social networks are some brand new thing (like Web 2.0? ^^) pioneered by the likes of MySpace or Facebook and any new site is just "yet another social network." Yes, any new site is just another social network, but so is MySpace and Facebook. Pick up the phone book and there is a social network application that your great grandparent probably was already using and that is probably thousands of years removed from the first social network. Ultimately it boils down to how useful each of the site fulfill their purpose which often is for improving communication.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Creating sliding DIVs
Here is a tutorial for writing a sliding divs like you see on Digg or many other sites. It was written in response to another tutorial on implementing a similar behavior.
Both articles are worth reading as it spells out clearly how to do the effect. The version on firblitz takes a more object oriented approach. In both examples, the initial call is from an inline Javascript (a href="javascript:..."). There is nothing wrong with doing this, but to have an even cleaner separation between Javascript and the HTML presentation, it's best to not have inline Javascript at all. Instead, use the event model to attach the function to the event so that that the HTML is completely clean.
Start with the following addition to firblitz's javascript code.
And the body of the html would just be:
To take it one step further, take out the inline styles. However, this introduced one problem. Javascripts is unable to access the style value directly if it is not an inline style. This is because the element's style is not the style of the CSS object that is assigned through the #id. Thus, you have to manually assign the styles to the element. This is the end result:
And the body of the html is a clean:
Both articles are worth reading as it spells out clearly how to do the effect. The version on firblitz takes a more object oriented approach. In both examples, the initial call is from an inline Javascript (a href="javascript:..."). There is nothing wrong with doing this, but to have an even cleaner separation between Javascript and the HTML presentation, it's best to not have inline Javascript at all. Instead, use the event model to attach the function to the event so that that the HTML is completely clean.
Start with the following addition to firblitz's javascript code.
function toggle() {
var sd = document.getElementById("slidediv");
if (sd.style.display == 'none') {
Slide('slidediv').down();
} else {
Slide('slidediv').up();
}
}
function init() {
// attach event listener to objects
var slidediv = document.getElementById("mydiv");
slidediv.addEventListener("click", toggle, true);
}
window.onload = init;
And the body of the html would just be:
To take it one step further, take out the inline styles. However, this introduced one problem. Javascripts is unable to access the style value directly if it is not an inline style. This is because the element's style is not the style of the CSS object that is assigned through the #id. Thus, you have to manually assign the styles to the element. This is the end result:
function toggle() {
var sd = document.getElementById("slidediv");
var styles = getComputedStyle(sd, '');
sd.style.display = styles.display;
sd.style.height = styles.height;
if (sd.style.display == 'none') {
Slide('slidediv').down();
} else {
Slide('slidediv').up();
}
}
function init() {
// attach event listener to objects
var slidediv = document.getElementById("mydiv");
slidediv.addEventListener("click", toggle, true);
}
And the body of the html is a clean:
Monday, December 11, 2006
IE7 menu location
Maybe I'm just a old fart who likes his menu to be where every other application has their menus, but IE7's menu position (underneath the address bar) drives me nuts. To change this and move it back to the top, set the follow registry key to 1 (add the DWORD value if it doesn't exists):
HKCU\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\INTERNET EXPLORER\TOOLBAR\WEBBROWSER\ITBar7Position
HKCU\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\INTERNET EXPLORER\TOOLBAR\WEBBROWSER\ITBar7Position
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Search Bombs
A typical morning often finds me getting online and checking the news and reading some blogs before I head to work. This past week, I read an blog written by Jeremy Zawodny titled "You're welcome to google on Yahoo." The entry was in response to Google's attempt to get people to not overly generalize the word "google" which got a lot of attention this week because Google blogged about it on their official site (even though the news itself is actually pretty old).
As I was listening to the radio on the way to work, the reporter started to talk about "google bombs". My first thought was that people might be trying to hack Google, but then I realize that they were talking about search engines being tricked by political campaigns to return negative attacks on opposition candidates. The tactic is that if you are X running against Y then you put up a lot of pages that speaks negatively about Y so that when users search for "Y" they would find bad things written by X. This really didn't have anything to do with Google and has a distinctly negative connotation.
It is this type of usage that I believe Google is trying to prevent against. Imagine what other companies might do if their names were being used completely out-of-context in a negative way... Although I often find that people give Google a little too much credit, in this case I actually admire that they attempted to explain their action to the public in a way to help people understand. Too often, the languages use by company when they try to justify their actions are either too full of legal speak or they just don't say anything to the public at all.
As I was listening to the radio on the way to work, the reporter started to talk about "google bombs". My first thought was that people might be trying to hack Google, but then I realize that they were talking about search engines being tricked by political campaigns to return negative attacks on opposition candidates. The tactic is that if you are X running against Y then you put up a lot of pages that speaks negatively about Y so that when users search for "Y" they would find bad things written by X. This really didn't have anything to do with Google and has a distinctly negative connotation.
It is this type of usage that I believe Google is trying to prevent against. Imagine what other companies might do if their names were being used completely out-of-context in a negative way... Although I often find that people give Google a little too much credit, in this case I actually admire that they attempted to explain their action to the public in a way to help people understand. Too often, the languages use by company when they try to justify their actions are either too full of legal speak or they just don't say anything to the public at all.
Saturday, October 7, 2006
Updated Homepage
After nearly 5 years, I finally made a major update to the homepage. Some might be wondering what the heck I'm smoking since the page looks nearly identical to the previous version and that was the intention. The changes were mostly under the covers as I dragged myself into the modern web layout world by going with a CSS table-less layout. Besides learning more about CSS layout, there are other benefits.
It was more difficult to code, however, but that could be that the original was such as simple table design.
It's good to give myself a refresher on CSS and layout. I've been looking at more advanced JavaScript such as OOP Javascript and DOM manipulation, so hopefully I'll be able to find some time to experiment some on the site soon.
- The code layout is better as the content and presentation is better seperated and there are no more inline CSS styles.
- The size of the download has been reduced by nearly 50% although I did include some YUI CSS libraries to help clean up the fonts. This brought the initial size to about the original but once the page is loaded the first time those libraries won't be downloaded again.
- The page should look consistent between IE and Mozilla. By applying a different stylesheet, the page should also render in other devices.
It was more difficult to code, however, but that could be that the original was such as simple table design.
It's good to give myself a refresher on CSS and layout. I've been looking at more advanced JavaScript such as OOP Javascript and DOM manipulation, so hopefully I'll be able to find some time to experiment some on the site soon.
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
Web 2.0?!?
The Web has gone through many cycles but there seems to have always been two main groups that influenced it's direction: engineers and publishers. The web started out as static content but it was originally a realm of the engineers who learned HTML and coded everything by hand. To publish something, you need to understand computers and possibly had to set up your own web server.
As it grew it fell into the publishers' hands as they started investing into online business. A lot of early commercial sites were simply online publications where the layout reflected that of magazines and newspapers. I wonder how much real growth in the industry happened during this time other then that the web go prettier?
The next cycle shifted back towards engineers as they transformed web sites into web applications. This is when the web really became "useful" and began to be part of our daily lives. Now the web isn't just for looking at information, it allowed us to find information. We didn't just read financial news on the web, but now we can trade stocks on the web.
I think now we might at another transition point. The web as an "application" is more the norm then a new idea. It's a proven commodity and that means the publishers are now wanting to get back on board and take over. The result is that they've coined the term "Web 2.0". Web 2.0 seems to me that it's just publishers saying that they want to be the ones putting stuff on the Web. I'm not necessarily opposed to it, but Web 2.0 has nothing to do with technology.
As it grew it fell into the publishers' hands as they started investing into online business. A lot of early commercial sites were simply online publications where the layout reflected that of magazines and newspapers. I wonder how much real growth in the industry happened during this time other then that the web go prettier?
The next cycle shifted back towards engineers as they transformed web sites into web applications. This is when the web really became "useful" and began to be part of our daily lives. Now the web isn't just for looking at information, it allowed us to find information. We didn't just read financial news on the web, but now we can trade stocks on the web.
I think now we might at another transition point. The web as an "application" is more the norm then a new idea. It's a proven commodity and that means the publishers are now wanting to get back on board and take over. The result is that they've coined the term "Web 2.0". Web 2.0 seems to me that it's just publishers saying that they want to be the ones putting stuff on the Web. I'm not necessarily opposed to it, but Web 2.0 has nothing to do with technology.
As Yahoo! rolls out their new homepage design, I've been asking various friends what their thoughts are on the new look-and-feel. The reactions has been mixed although none have been outright negative. Initially, I thought that those who didn't like the new look was because it was such a big change and change is not always welcomed. Some things aren't necessarily the best, but they work and people can get what they need out of them without much thinking.
After awhile, I started to ask myself why is it that I liked the new Yahoo homepage and while there are many different reasons, I thought that maybe one of the reason is that Yahoo homepage is beginning to be more of an "application" then an online publication.
As a software engineer, I like building applications and I'm not so inclined to build online content. One is a problem that challenges me while the other is equivalent of data entry (remember that this is from the perspective of engineers who aren't being paid to be creative writers so they are usually handed the content from "writers" and are told by non-engineers to "implement" the articles).
I guess I'm saying that I liked the web initially because it was more about programming (software engineer). Then it became more about content layout and it got boring (web developers). As the balance went back towards programming and application, it became challenging again (frontend engineers).
After awhile, I started to ask myself why is it that I liked the new Yahoo homepage and while there are many different reasons, I thought that maybe one of the reason is that Yahoo homepage is beginning to be more of an "application" then an online publication.
As a software engineer, I like building applications and I'm not so inclined to build online content. One is a problem that challenges me while the other is equivalent of data entry (remember that this is from the perspective of engineers who aren't being paid to be creative writers so they are usually handed the content from "writers" and are told by non-engineers to "implement" the articles).
I guess I'm saying that I liked the web initially because it was more about programming (software engineer). Then it became more about content layout and it got boring (web developers). As the balance went back towards programming and application, it became challenging again (frontend engineers).
Sunday, July 30, 2006
Yahoo Messenger 8.0
The new Yahoo! Messenger is out. The biggest change is its ability to load user created plug-ins. Everything besides the base functionality is a plug-in and users can create their own. I can see this really expanding the power of Y!M, but can it overcome established IM clients which offers many of the same things? Sometimes, I feel that the feature war is one the Cold War where eventually people forget the purpose and just ends up doing stuff for the sake of keeping busy and the status quo.
That's why I like Google Talk. It's not jumping into the feature war, but going after the simple but effective philosophy that has worked for UNIX for so long. I also like Trillian which allows me to talk to multiple IM providers (Yahoo, AIM, MSN), has a nicer interface then most "official" clients, and just has the features I want to use. In the long run, I feel that this is the winning strategy.
I think we can learn from the success of Trillian and to an extent Google Talk (not enough mass adoption to be called a success yet). An interesting case study might be GAIM. Here was a open-source application that was really ready to take off and become a leader in my opinion. Although the UI could've been better (I prefer Trillian's look), it was one of those "it just works" programs that could've hooked users. However, it's been stagnant in its development. 6 months goes by without any updates on its official site and each beta release takes ages. If I didn't know better, I would have thought that the project was dead and why would I use a dying application?
Update: I just want to clarify that I do realize that there is development going on with GAIM. I can check the source control and see that changes are taking place. However, even though I am a developer, this isn't my area of focus so I don't usually go looking at the change logs. I go to the web site every so often and see if there are any important changes or news. After many months of no updates, I start feeling like the project is dying which happens to most software projects since not one important change has happened that is worthy of being put on the web site. To me, none of this is a big deal. GAIM is pretty cool and if it works, I'll use it. If it doesn't, I'll look for something else.
That's why I like Google Talk. It's not jumping into the feature war, but going after the simple but effective philosophy that has worked for UNIX for so long. I also like Trillian which allows me to talk to multiple IM providers (Yahoo, AIM, MSN), has a nicer interface then most "official" clients, and just has the features I want to use. In the long run, I feel that this is the winning strategy.
I think we can learn from the success of Trillian and to an extent Google Talk (not enough mass adoption to be called a success yet). An interesting case study might be GAIM. Here was a open-source application that was really ready to take off and become a leader in my opinion. Although the UI could've been better (I prefer Trillian's look), it was one of those "it just works" programs that could've hooked users. However, it's been stagnant in its development. 6 months goes by without any updates on its official site and each beta release takes ages. If I didn't know better, I would have thought that the project was dead and why would I use a dying application?
Update: I just want to clarify that I do realize that there is development going on with GAIM. I can check the source control and see that changes are taking place. However, even though I am a developer, this isn't my area of focus so I don't usually go looking at the change logs. I go to the web site every so often and see if there are any important changes or news. After many months of no updates, I start feeling like the project is dying which happens to most software projects since not one important change has happened that is worthy of being put on the web site. To me, none of this is a big deal. GAIM is pretty cool and if it works, I'll use it. If it doesn't, I'll look for something else.
Saturday, March 4, 2006
Yahoo! UI library and Design Pattern
Although I'm a little late in writing about this, but the Yahoo Developer's Network continues to release new products to the community. The User Interface Library has been released with the BSD license to allow building modern interactive websites. In addition, Yahoo released their Design Pattern Library.
I hope things like these will help demonstrate that Yahoo is indeed a tech company.
I hope things like these will help demonstrate that Yahoo is indeed a tech company.
Thursday, December 22, 2005
Yahoo...
I took a look at my blog and realized how many recent entries have been about some new Yahoo! annoucement that I found to be interesting. Urgh... I need to branch out more! What's Google up to lately? :-)
Wordpress on Yahoo!
Following the news that Moveable Type will available on Yahoo! Web Hosting, Wordpress will now also be offfered.
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Friday, December 9, 2005
del.icio.us @ Yahoo!
As announced by the Yahoo! search team, Yahoo! have purchased social bookarking site, del.icio.us. This follows a similiar purchase of Flickr, an community photos site that really brought the concept of "tagging" into widespread use.
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