One advantage that HTML pages have over RIAs is that HTML content is readable and indexable by search engines, while content in RIAs is typically not exposed -- it's hidden from search engine crawlers and indexing systems. This inability to crawl and index RIA content is considered to be somewhat of a hindrance in the adoption of RIA technology.
That's changing.
Yesterday, Adobe announced that they are collaborating with Google and Yahoo! to roll the Adobe Flash player technology into the their respective search systems. This would allow the search engines to read and run .swf files, in turn allowing allow them to dynamically retrieve (crawl) and index information accessed via these .swf files.
According to the press release, Google has already begun to roll this ability out. Yahoo! is not far behind.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
GVU Brown Bag: Is it Friendship if One of Us is Computed and Rendered?
About 10 years ago, I had the opportunity to build an early prototype of a virtual neuroscience instructor and apply it in a classroom setting; students were able to interact with prerecorded video of a professor and ask a set of questions about the human visual processing system. Based on the questions, the system offered video responses, suggested related follow-up questions, and pointed the students to supplemental information.
A few years after that, I began looking at applying virtual characters for customer service applications. At the time, the artificial intelligence components behind these systems was pretty limited. Even some of the products rolling out onto the web used natural language processing and case-based reasoning systems that required a lot of handcrafted' hocus-pocus' to make it match up with the domain. All and all, I felt that the ratio of A-to-I work (artificial work to intelligent work) was a bit too high in these systems -- too much human involvement to make it even remotely believable or useful.
Fast forward 10 years, and Larry Hodges, formerly of Georgia Tech, now of UNC Charlotte, brings us up to speed on the field of virtual characters and sheds some light on what is really possible, and more importantly, what is really effective when trying to place these characters into "serious" situations. This talk is from from the Georgia Tech GVU brown bag series earlier this year. Larry Hodges at GVU Brown Bag 2/7/2008: Is it Friendship if One of Us is Computed and Rendered?
A few years after that, I began looking at applying virtual characters for customer service applications. At the time, the artificial intelligence components behind these systems was pretty limited. Even some of the products rolling out onto the web used natural language processing and case-based reasoning systems that required a lot of handcrafted' hocus-pocus' to make it match up with the domain. All and all, I felt that the ratio of A-to-I work (artificial work to intelligent work) was a bit too high in these systems -- too much human involvement to make it even remotely believable or useful.
Fast forward 10 years, and Larry Hodges, formerly of Georgia Tech, now of UNC Charlotte, brings us up to speed on the field of virtual characters and sheds some light on what is really possible, and more importantly, what is really effective when trying to place these characters into "serious" situations. This talk is from from the Georgia Tech GVU brown bag series earlier this year. Larry Hodges at GVU Brown Bag 2/7/2008: Is it Friendship if One of Us is Computed and Rendered?
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Who in your organization employs User Experience professionals?
Just wondering aloud about which departments in your organization employ Human Factors / Usability / User Experience?
In my experience with business organizations, "User Experience" (UE) professionals are typically brought into one of 3 organizational silos:
1) Information Technology / Product Development -- UE professionals are assimilated into development teams, are heavily focused on a single product, and those with good technology skills survive.
2) Product Management -- UE professionals contribute to the shaping of a product in early stages, but have a tough time getting support from development teams in follow up and monitoring activities. Good product managers are a UE professionals greatest ally.
3) Sales -- UE professionals are called in to support a variety of needs (such as justification behind product claims), but their tenure is short-lived.
This is gross oversimplification, as there are some blurring lines and responsibilities, but for the most part I've unfortunately seen these roles often pigeon-holed into organizational silos. This means that if the UE professional only works with one department, (s)he gets much less than half of the exposure they need within the organization. The lack of crossover severely limits the organizational insight the role requires.
Your mileage may vary. Do you agree with these categories? Are you or your UE professionals crossing organizational boundaries? If not, what can you do to hald change this?
In my experience with business organizations, "User Experience" (UE) professionals are typically brought into one of 3 organizational silos:
1) Information Technology / Product Development -- UE professionals are assimilated into development teams, are heavily focused on a single product, and those with good technology skills survive.
2) Product Management -- UE professionals contribute to the shaping of a product in early stages, but have a tough time getting support from development teams in follow up and monitoring activities. Good product managers are a UE professionals greatest ally.
3) Sales -- UE professionals are called in to support a variety of needs (such as justification behind product claims), but their tenure is short-lived.
This is gross oversimplification, as there are some blurring lines and responsibilities, but for the most part I've unfortunately seen these roles often pigeon-holed into organizational silos. This means that if the UE professional only works with one department, (s)he gets much less than half of the exposure they need within the organization. The lack of crossover severely limits the organizational insight the role requires.
Your mileage may vary. Do you agree with these categories? Are you or your UE professionals crossing organizational boundaries? If not, what can you do to hald change this?
Friday, June 13, 2008
Twitterific for the Mobile Consumer
Macworld points us to Twitterrific will tweet on the iPhone. Twitter is great for floating ideas or problems out on the ether and getting instant feedback. Now we get a potentially excellent Twitter client for the iPhone.
I left my laptop at home during a recent vacation -- it was completely displaced by my iPhone this year. There were a couple of times during the trip where I sure could have used some friendly advice from my Twitter friends -- the basic iPhone experience just didn't quite step up to the plate at those times.
So, let's imagine a highly mobile, yet weary traveler sending out a tweet from their iPhone when something goes wrong with their trip. If you were a company that wanted to support this weary traveler -- How would you go about using Twitter to monitor their issues and deliver some business value? If you could help the traveler in need, do you think this would enhance your brand and open up the door to provide other services? Food for thought.
I left my laptop at home during a recent vacation -- it was completely displaced by my iPhone this year. There were a couple of times during the trip where I sure could have used some friendly advice from my Twitter friends -- the basic iPhone experience just didn't quite step up to the plate at those times.
So, let's imagine a highly mobile, yet weary traveler sending out a tweet from their iPhone when something goes wrong with their trip. If you were a company that wanted to support this weary traveler -- How would you go about using Twitter to monitor their issues and deliver some business value? If you could help the traveler in need, do you think this would enhance your brand and open up the door to provide other services? Food for thought.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Photoshop Blending Modes
Friday, June 6, 2008
Introductory article on BlazeDS - AMF server for Adobe Flex and Air
As an alternative to using REST or SOAP with your Flex / Air apps (which have the advantage of ease and familiarity, but the disadvantage of adding an extra layer of translation on client), you may want to consider Adobe's AMF (Action Message Format). Here's a good introduction to AMF: http://www.infoq.com/articles/blazeds-intro (From Kenbo )
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Using Macromedia Flex inside JSR-168 Portals
Andrew reminds us of this post regarding Using Macromedia Flex inside JSR-168 Portals.
Article a little old, but there is not that much web info on the topic since this was written. During my first foray into Flex and Websphere Portal, I never did get the custom tag libraries to work, but maybe it's time revisit the topic.
Article a little old, but there is not that much web info on the topic since this was written. During my first foray into Flex and Websphere Portal, I never did get the custom tag libraries to work, but maybe it's time revisit the topic.
Friday, April 25, 2008
Speed up your web pages with YSlow
From the Yahoo Developer Network, YSlow is a handy Firefox/Firebug add-in for getting a grade on the performance of a web page. I had some pages that were making C's, considered the recommendations from YSlow, and now they are Grade A performers. Thanks YSlow!
Saturday, April 5, 2008
HttpWatch for IE
I'm a big fan of Firebug, especially the Net tab that provides statistics and information on browser/server communication. Not many similar tools out there from IE, but HTTPWatch comes close. The trial version is sometimes handy, but at $295 for a single license, I haven't been able to balance out cost/benefit of the full version yet.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
