Kudo's: I've been using Bloglines lately as my news aggregator. It's not perfect but it's the best solution I've tried so far.
Work in the enterprise market can be a bit of a shocker.
I learnt most of what I know from communities of programmers and IA's on the web. A lot of information is being shared. So when I started working in the enterprise application market a year ago, I hoped for something similar.
Nope. It is extremely hard to find the kind of down-to-earth information that is available in the open source world for enterprise applications like, say, SAP. Nobody's sharing. No mailing lists on SAP, and I have yet to see a blog that discusses SAP. A search for blog+SAP yields almost nothing of relevance, except for SAP's own blogs (not very good).
SAP itself does make an effort to make information available, but obviously, there's always an angle there.
My SAP link of the day: iViewstudio.com. In the SAP Portals world, a portal consists of little iViews (like iframes) that contain functionality (things like change your address, search a database, view reports, ...) iViewstudio lists the various iviews available from SAP and from other vendors. Look at the screenshots to get an idea - below is a small example of an iView.
Open Source Business Conference 2004: how to make dough with open source. Nice.
kuro5hin.org || Notes Toward a Moderation Economy: "Whether you call it Mojo, Karma, "Standing," or something else, all content rating feedback systems have some sort of currency. While there are many different ways of acquiring and spending such capital, nobody seems to have implemented an economy varied enough to be robust. And this is the key to building a system which can be stable in the long term." (via EiM)
Taxonomy is a boundary object
In short: designers talking about taxonomies, or business people talking about objects is a good thing, even though they may seem rather uninformed about it to us (you) experts.
(You social science folk, please correct me if I strayed too far from common wisdom here)
Boundary Object: "Artifacts, Documents and perhaps even vocabulary that can help people from different communities build a shared understanding. Boundary objects will be interpreted differently by the different communinities, and it is an acknowledgement and discussion of these differences that enables a shared understanding to be formed." (from the enTWIne project)
In 1988, Susan Leigh Star [1] introduced the term boundary object to describe information that is used in different ways by different communities of practice [2].
Boundary objects have interesting properties (from Brian Marick):
- If x is a boundary object, people from different communities of practice can use it as a common point of reference for conversations. They can all agree they're talking about x.
- But the different people are not actually talking about the same thing. They attach different meanings to x.
- Despite different interpretations, boundary objects serve as a means of translation.
- Boundary objects are plastic enough to adapt to changing needs. And change theydo, as communities of practice cooperate. Boundary objects are working arrangements, adjusted as needed. They are not imposed by one community, norby appeal to outside standards.
A goal is often used as a boundary object. "Finish this project successfully" is a boundary project in software development. It means different things to different communities of practice, but it is plastic enough to get everyone working together.
The term "taxonomy" is another boundary object. It is used differently by different communities of practice (designers, project managers, librarians, IA's).
What Star teaches us is that the fact that we all understand this term differently is not a problem. The boundary object serves to bring different communities of practice together.
So next time someone from a separate community of practice uses a term or talks about something in a rather naive or uninformed way (from your perspective), don't roll your eyes. Realize that this may be a boundary object, and boundary objects make it possible for you two to communicate at all. They also make it possible for different communities of practice to effectively work together.
Notes:
[1] Susan Leigh Star introduced the term "boundary object" in "The structure of ill-structured solutions: heterogeneous problemsolving, boundary objects and distributed artificial intelligence." She also wrote Sorting Things Out - Classification and Its Consequences, a thrilling classic in classification literature (sample chapters). I never realized she was the same person - she's now my official hero.
[2] A community of practice is a group of people who do a certain type of work, talk to each other about their work, and derive some measure of their identity from that work. Programmers are a community of practice. IA's are another. (Brian Marick wrote a great paper, boundary objects (PDF)).
Finally: Info-Eyes: An Online Information Community for the Visually Impaired (via Handheld Librarian).
Papers and Technical Reports from HCIL - yummie reading lists for when work is slow via Tanya.
I'm still number 1 in Google for "amazon marketing", but the link is broken. Curious how Google will deal with this: the post exists now under a different URL. Will they find it?
The faceted classification mailing list is rocking lately. A lot of the stuff on there is way over my head, but you may be interested in it.
Faceted Classification bibliography
William Denton created Putting Facets on the Web: An Annotated Bibliography: a classified, annotated bibliography about how to design faceted classification systems and make them usable on the World Wide Web.
(Yes, the facet goodness is back on!)
Comment spammers
I have been spared the invasion of the comment spammers because my weblog was offline this summer.
But to pre-empt them, now that comments are back, I installed Blacklist. I then did a Google query on blacklist.txt, and pasted the first few results in my blacklist, thereby updating my list before the spammers even hit me.
Here's my list, compiled out of various sources (I don't think sharing these would help the spammers, would it?) It certainly feels goood. I'd be up for an option in blacklist that automatically gets other people's lists.
Blogging again
I'm blogging again. If you ever need to move MT to a new server and accidentally lock yourself out of your old installation, check out MT Medic. It's a cgi script you FTP into your MT directory, and it lets you recover your password and do more stuff. Nice.
I have probably broken all my old URL's doing this. Too bad. I hope next time I'm moving server most CMS's will automatically generate mod_rewrite files to catch changed URL's, or do something similar. I can't be bothered to spend the day it would take me to figure it out.
I'm stopping the blogging thing for a while
And I'll miss it.
I am moving poorbuthappy.com to a new server. I have managed to make the colombia section work, with all its functionality and mod_rewrite crazyness. I haven't been able to install MT. I also haven't been able to figure out a good way to port my data. So what you're looking at now is a static site (that's why the comments are gone). If anyone tells you installing MT is easy, please politely kick them in the balls for me.
Help: I am moving my
Help: I am moving my MT blog to a different server. I uploaded all the files to the new server, including the DB files (I wasn't using mysql).
Turns out my new server doesn't have DB_File installed, so I'll have to use mysql. How can I get the data from my old MT installation (which is in a DB database) into a mysql database? All tips are welcome!
I'm looking for articles and
I'm looking for articles and tips about how to run an open source software project.
I put Google Adsense on
I put Google Adsense on Easy Topic Maps two weeks ago. There have been 1,324 impressions and 40 clickthroughs (about 3 by myself), which gives an impressive average clickthrough rate of 3.0% (I'm not supposed to say that) and made me $11.59. Not bad at all. Other people have reported clickthrough rates of 4%, revenues of $100 in a day for a popular blog. Of course, not everybody thinks it's cool.
I'm not sure I'll leave it on there, but if you have some very focused and clean (Google declines 'offensive' sites, probably based on a crawl) sites, why not?
So I'm nr. 1 for
So I'm nr. 1 for Google Search: amazon marketing. And I got the day off tomorrow!
Ben Hammersley's Dangerous Precedent: Echo...echo...alright
Ben Hammersley's Dangerous Precedent: Echo...echo...alright enough already: "given a complete Echo spec, the launch of a new product could gut a lesser rival's customer base in a matter of hours."
Scott Mcloud has a new
Scott Mcloud has a new online comic featuring micropayments (it's .25c).
Expressions - a visual blogging
Expressions - a visual blogging system: "Expressions is a hosted visual blogging system that makes it easy for anyone to create and maintain their very own photo or visual blog." Cool.
Tia project goes live!
Four months of hard volunteer work, eight languages, a wiki, a mailing list and a fantastic worldwide team. Whey!.
Dave Winer: "I make shitty
Dave Winer: "I make shitty software and I write shitty specs, but for all that shittyness, they're amazingly popular and somewhat useful."
If you are on a
If you are on a technical writing project, are there any systems that let you centralize and organize preferred terms, telephone numbers and such so that you can manage these things?
Solving Mobile Challenges with Psychology-driven
Solving Mobile Challenges with Psychology-driven IA: I was going to say: "bullshit!" (that title!), but then came this and I was hooked: "Instead of telling the deleted user, 'You were deleted by Sharon,' its message reads: 'Don't bother with Sharon.' (These messages are, of course, adapted to the local culture.)"
ongoing ? Google Adsense (if
ongoing · Google Adsense (if the page doesn't show up, change the encoding to Cyrillic (Windows). To change the encoding, go to View > Encoding in IE6, Win)
"RFC 1, "Host Software", issued
"RFC 1, "Host Software", issued thirty years ago on April 7, 1969 outlined some thoughts and initial experiments. It was a modest and entirely forgettable memo, but it has significance because it was part of a broad initiative whose impact is still with us today." (RFC stands for request for comments. I was wondering about that.)
Interact Lab: Papers (via Vanderwal)
Interact Lab: Papers (via Vanderwal) has papers on:
- Pervasive Environments and Ubiquitous Computing
- Shared Interaction Spaces
- Playing and Learning
- Tangibles & Virtual Environments
- Collaborative Learning
- Theory & Conceptual Frameworks
- Technology Mediated Communication
- Interactive Art
Stack up on printer paper.
Lessons in syntax design. I
Lessons in syntax design. I could have used this last year :)
I am shopping for a
I am shopping for a digital videocamera. Can I efficiently edit digital video on my laptop of 350 Megs RAM and 500 Mhz? Should I buy a videocamera with less pixels instead of more? I don't really want to buy a new computer.
From the new ads on
From the new ads on Easytopicmaps, I came across Data Advantage Group. Any experiences with this anyone?
Ben Hammersley.com - Sporting Gent's
Ben Hammersley.com - Sporting Gent's guide to the Semantic Web Kinda cool presentation.
Ben Hammersley.com: "The answer to
Ben Hammersley.com: "The answer to the problem of false metadata is, in fact, more metadata."
The new Google ads on
The new Google ads on Easy Topic Maps are showing up now. Have a look and see for yourself what you think about their relevancy.
So I got in at
So I got in at work (9.00), filled my 1.5 liter bottle of water, it's 10.30 and it's empty. I've found that filling it up completely works better: if I fill it only halfway I drink half as much (I don't take more refill trips). I am also getting off the train one station earlier and then walking to work (20 mins). Same in the evenings.
Me and the Credit Card
Me and the Credit Card Company Call Center guy:
Me: I have this 29$ charge on my bill for not paying on time. But I never received the previous bill.
CCCCC guy: Just a moment please.
12 minutes of happy music. I hang in there.
CCCCC guy: This is what happened: long explanation of how it's really my fault.
Me: OK. I do think $29 is a bit steep. If you could remove that charge that would be great. If not, I'd like to cancel this card now.
Pause.
CCCCC guy: Well, we can do that as a one time courtesy. Long explanation of how it really was my fault.
Me: Thanks.
I'm learning.
Jon's Radio: "What open source
Jon's Radio: "What open source projects often lack is not the engine, but the steering wheel." So true.
Even though I have a
Even though I have a computer with the basic system requirements, Six Degrees slows my system down to an unusable crawl after I install it. And there's no way to turn it off: if I tell it to be inactive it still eats up memory. This is the second time this happens - I don't think it's a coincidence. And I'm pissed off: I want this software. I need it. But it wastes my time every time I try to use it (and that for a program that calls itself "timefreeing technology"). Arg.
I wait for the day
I wait for the day when bloggers stop linking to articles about blogging on the NYTimes, and the NYTimes starts linking to blog posts.
Ubiquity PR and the search for the final IA tool
Information architects have long felt left out by the software development tool makers. Companies like Rational (recently purchased by IBM) base their tools on a process that is optimized for complex software development but doesn't really address the needs of information architects. We end up using a variety of tools like Word, Excell or Visio that are just generic enough to be frustrating. Keeping large and complex deliverables up to date is a challenge: make a change in the content inventory and you also need to update the sitemap. And why can't the sitemap be automatically generated from the content inventory? And exported as, say, a requirements document?
The search for the all encompassing tool is nicely illustrated by this case study. It describes how an information architect team at Razorfish used GoLive to manage their deliverables. From the article: "[...] documents tend to end up separate and independent from one another. They are often owned by different people, reside in different locations, and are created in different formats. It is not uncommon that, by the end of a project, updating something as simple as a navigation label requires updating half a dozen documents or more".
This dream goes beyond providing a central tool to manage information architecture deliverables. IBM has been working on a modelling methodology and toolset called OVID that will let you model everything (from audience analysis to use cases to interface widgets) in a UML-like visual language. When you are done modelling, click a button and a prototype of the software gets automatically generated - or that's the dream, anyway. It is the ultimate abstraction, bringing with it all the complications abstractions bring to software development. Still, the dream is hard to resist, so we keep looking for tools focussed on information architects' needs.
Enter Ubiquity RP. I interviewed Victor Hsu at Axure software, who are developing a tool that provides a central modelling and documentation environment for information architects called Ubiquity RP. Ubiquity lets you document requirements from user needs to wireframes, and automatically exports documentation and prototypes.
Ubiquity is based around a 5 step process.
In the last step you can generate a specification document and a working prototype.
Q: Who are you targeting with this product?
Victor Hsu: Our target users are people who are responsible for the functional design of web applications. Their responsibiities includes understanding user and stakeholder needs, defining how a system will be used, designing the visual interfaces, and communicating the design to clients, users, stakeholders, and development. To put it in terms of work product, we are targeting users who create prototypes, functional specifications, or proposals for web applications.
Q: Small companies?
We are finding that both small and large companies are interested in Ubiquity RP. The types of companies we are targeting include companies with internal IT organizations developing intranets and extranets, web design and development consulting firms, and web application product companies.
Q: Information architects?
Many of our target users have Information Architect titles, but others are Business Analaysts, Project Managers, Product Managers, Developers, and Consultants.
Q: Why did you develop it?
From a very grand perspective... We are after the Holy Grail of software development, the ability to create complete applications through code reuse and code automation without programming. We believe that for this to be achieved, it has to start with strong information architecture.
From a more practical perspective... We began developing the solution to help resolve many of the inefficiencies and frustrations that development faces when functional requirements are poorly defined or communicated. We quickly realized that there was an equivalently urgent need to better elicit and communicate requirements to users and stakeholders. Since we were unable to find a good solution to these problems, we saw an opportunity to create a tool that would make it possible to elicit and communicate quality functional requirements more efficiently and to make that process repeatable.
Q: What is the development roadmap for the product like?
Our first product is Ubiquity RP, "real-time prototypes, specifications, and proposals." The next release of the Standard Edition of Ubiquity RP is scheduled for Q2 2003. It will include enhancements to the diagramming and drawing functionality. The tools available in the Standard Edition will be Site Flow (currently Sitemap), Wireframe (currently Page Design), and Generate Specification and Prototype. This is intended for users who are primarily interested in prototyping.
The Professional Edition will be released shortly after in Q3 2003. This edition is designed for users who will be creating specifications or proposals in addition to prototypes. It will include all the tools in the Standard Edition plus Vision, Needs, potentially Use Cases, and enhanced features in Site Flow and Wireframe. We intend to do one release of each edition per year.
In addition, an Enterprise Edition is expected to be introduced in 2005 which will provide a more collaborative environment for teams to work together on a centralized design. Future product lines that we are considering include a product for managing the requirements that are produced from Ubiquity RP, and a product that leverages the designs from Ubiquity RP to lay the groundwork for development.
Q: What is your background? You mention information architects on your site - are you involved in that community?
My background has been primarily along the lines of project management and software development. In each role, I have assumed some information architect responsibilites and have worked closely with product managers and designers to produce specifications and prototypes. I am not currently as active in the IA community as I would like to be.
My involvement with the IA community thus far includes joining and beginning to contribute to several mailing lists for IA professionals. I have also been in contact with several thought leaders in the community who have been very supportive of our efforts. We are investigating opportunities for Axure to become more involved with the IA community. I was particulary interested in the concept of building a knowledge base of information architecture resources maintained by the community that is suggested on the Asilomar Institute for Information Architecture website (www.aifia.org).
Q: I tried the product, and I like the general idea. But I am worried I won't be able to also keep using my current tools. What are the plans for making the product work nice within my toolset? Or is it meant to be the only product I use?
We chose to develop our own suite of tools rather than try to integrate several existing tools for many reasons. Primarily, the tools on the market were not treating the designs (site flow diagrams and wireframes) as web application design data. For example, a rectangle in a Visio diagram labeled "Page 1" is a rectangle with a label. In Ubiquity, a page element in a diagram is a page object with specific data associated with it including a wireframe representation and user-defined page attributes.
In addition, it was particulary important to us to tightly integrate needs, siteflow, wireframes, etc. such that we could implement traceability in the future. I'm excited to see the day when a user can see an automatically generated diagram tracing needs to use cases to site flow to ui elements and eventually to code! I don't think use of our tools will replace the use of the Visio's and Dreamweaver's of the world for designing web applications. Each has it's strengths and weaknesses. But we are going to do our best to consolidate the strengths into our tools.
Down the road, we see potential integrations with diagramming tools like Visio, HTML tools like Dreamweaver, analyst tools like Rose, requirements management tools like Requisite Pro and DOORS, and development tools like Visual Studio and WebSphere Studio Application Developer.
Q: I always like tools like this to be customizable as much as possible. Do you plan some kind of scripting environment, where I can script importing or exporting and such? How about the stencils ('libraries')? Can I create my own? Can I share them? Are there plans for functionality like that? Any other plans for letting users customize the app to their needs?
The document format for Ubiquity RP is entirely XML based so a user with an understanding of the schema would be able to script pretty much anything they wanted to manipulate the document. We are planning some changes to the format so we are not recommending that any users do this at this time, but it will certainly be an option in the future.We would like to develop the framework such that custom tools built by 3rd parties can be added to the suite. A person could build their own Needs Manager and plug it into Ubiquity RP for example.
Customizable stencils are slated for the next release. You will be able to create your own. There are also plans to allow users to share stencils as well as elements in what we are calling the repository, which contains reusable diagram or wireframe elements.
For example, if you have designed a stock ticker that you would like to reuse across multiple pages or designs you will be able to do so.
Along the lines of a central knowledge base of IA resources, I would love to see a central repository of Ubiquity RP stencils and design elements that our users could share.
Q: Are there examples of real life projects (not just showcases) being done with Ubiquity? If so, what are the lessons learnt that might guide future development?
Several companies have already used or are using Ubiquity RP for real life projects. We have learned that the application can be used for several different purposes and that users value different aspects of the product.
For example, one IT organization primarily uses the prototyping aspects to quickly validate the requirements for the numerous development requests that they receive from other departments. On the other hand, a consulting company that is using Ubiquity RP values the documentation produced for the purpose of presenting high level proposals to potential clients.
This has impacted our plan for packaging and developing the product. The Standard Edition will be focused on prototyping. A common request for enhancing the prototyping capabilities has been to enhance the diagramming functionality for both the Sitemap and Workflow tools which we are addressing in the next release. The Professional Edition will be focused on creating proposals and specifications in addition to the prototypes. This places a greater emphasis on the types of documents and the formatting of the documents that Ubiquity RP can produce.
Q: Why 'Ubiquity'?
Ubiquity is a play on the word "ubiquitous", meaning existing everywhere. We want our solutions to be accessible, usable, and effective for anyone that is responsible for designing a web application whether they are amateurs or experts, technical or non-technical, in small or in large organizations.
I know you didn't ask, but RP stands for Real-time Prototyping. We very much want to accelerate the process of prototyping to make multiple iterations of prototyping prior to development more feasible for time and budget constrained projects.
Q: On the website it says "If you are interested in guiding future development, please email us at contactus@axure.com." - how does that work?
When people contact us expressing interest in guiding development, it opens up a dialogue to begin discussing their needs, our plans, and how we can make them meet.
Some inquirers have asked for specific features to be added to the next release and others have a greater interest in discussing our long-term goals and mission. Having that on our website has given us the opportunity to speak with people who see the potential in our solution and are excited to see it grow. We've been very happy with the response we've received.
Q: So, did you develop the axure site using ubiquity?
Yes we did! The tricky part was trying to design Ubiquity with Ubiquity :)
If you want to try out Ubiquity, you can download a 30 day trial version for free.
Storing Hierarchical Data in a
Storing Hierarchical Data in a Database explains why the standard (and fairly elegant) way of doing this (just give each element a parentid element and you're done) is inefficient and slow for large datasets. Via Urbansheep (a Russian blog).
From email conversations with various
From email conversations with various people, it seems that getting mod_rewrite to work on Apache on a Windows box is near impossible if you are not endowed with special sysadmin powers. Which means that if you want to develop rewrite code locally, you need a linux box or something. Can someone please tell me this is not true? I refuse to believe. I am not such a techie that I want to get linux box in my little NYC appartment - let alone learn to administer it. I really just want to do rewrite code, and I don't particularly want to do it on my live server.
For once I want to
For once I want to see ads but they don't show. I opened a Google Adsense account for Easy Topic Maps to see how targeted the ads would be for such a specific site. (If you search for topicmaps for example you do get pretty targeted ads on Google). No ads showing up yet though. Will wait.