News
Embed Google Earth Into Any Map On Your Website!
Thursday, May 29th, 2008 | API, Mashup, News, visual effects | No Comments
Now you can embed Google Earth into your website or even any pre-existing Google Maps using their recently updated API. With just a simple line of Javascript you can take any existing map and make it 3D using the parameters already in place, thus over-laying your map markers onto the actual satellite view of the area.
This is a pretty cool new feature, imagine someone mapping out all the disc golf courses in the US, then when you select one from the large map, it goes into a google earth view letting you actually SEE the course itself. A very nice addition to the Google API library.
To incorporate it into your site, either go to the Google Earth API page, or the Google Maps API site. Either one will explain how to properly embed the service into you page/application.
OpenSolaris and OpenBlueDragon Both Released!
Tuesday, May 6th, 2008 | Business, News | No Comments
Ok, well Open Blue Dragon officially was released 3 days ago, but who’s counting…. it’s the first freely available, enterprise level JAVA CFML server released under the GPLv3 open source project. They plan to release a pre-configured version for both VMWare and Amazon’s EC2’s service, however in the meantime you can head on over to their download page and grab the actual source files, the J2EE WAR distribution, or a pre-reconfigured jetty instance (easy install). There’s also already an instructional video on how to install it on your mac in their forums. Released by New Atlanta, this is a big move to keep Cold Fusion developers from having to learn a new language (let the flame war/hate mail begin)… although the way that they’re releasing it is pretty-cool. It’s designed to run seamlessly with even the ’soon to be released’ Windows Server 2008 ensuring those wanting to switch over to becoming a .net shop/provider, now don’t have to give up any cold fusion apps that might be in place. By the way, Blue Dragon is used to help host power-social-networking site myspace.com…. so this isn’t your small-time server engine.
Also released (today though), was the long awaited, much talked about Open Solaris enterprise server as well. Easily integrated with virtualization software like VMWare or VirtualBox or even installed by itself via the live-cd, you can find all the various methods of download on their site as well as you have the opportunity to get an official cd sent to you via mail (if you act fast that is). They do admit to leaving out a few install options that are present in the current Solaris 11 update, however they claim that might change in the near future. What they did not leave out of this release were the best parts (in my opinion) - The ZFS file system, DTrace as well as their patented Solaris Containers which make virtualization a breeze. I think they skipped out on the SPARC integration but last I checked I didn’t have any type of mainframes lying around here, so the versions provided work great on my machine!
It’s been a big week for open-source releases of once expensive server software. I get the feeling this can only make things harder for companies like Microsoft, who still haven’t released the latest Microsoft Server 2008 from beta yet, to compete when similar enterprise level resources are available at no cost. It’s only due time until they go open-source as well…. although I’d say it’d still be a few more years.
Unleash The Power Of Encyclopedia Britannica For Free!
Sunday, April 20th, 2008 | Books, News, RSS | No Comments
Pretty much everyone’s who has grown up in the United States and is at least 10 years old knows what the Encyclopedia Brittanica is. In fact, the older you are, the more familiar you probably are with the collection. Any type of research, especially if it took place while in elementary school, would usually start by rummaging through the library of books to find sources for your work. Even now, this 250 year old company still offers their yearly updated 32 volume set (with free shipping for only $1395!) and the digitized DVD/CD version (for a lesser $39.99, probably because it doesn’t involve shipping 90 pounds worth of books) via their website. Topics covered in the collection are written by leading experts in their field, including Nobel Peace Prize winners and authors with equally impressive backgrounds. For the last two centuries, Encyclopedia Britannica was the quinnesential source for knowledge for just about any topic….That is of course, until the arrival of wikipedia.
Now, searching wikipedia for definitions, articles, etc.. has taken the place that once was held by the shelf of encyclopedias that could be found at every single school and library. This put the publishing company up against a monsterous rival. How do you compete with something that is completely free? Books, DVD’s, enticing accomplished writers to submit articles all cost money, and Chris Anderson’s “Free” plan wouldn’t help them ensure a 2009 version of the series would be released, but they knew that something had to change.
What ended up changing was…… you guessed it…. their website. They’ve gone all web 2.0 on us. Now you can embed a variety of widgets, all via RSS feeds, into your own site ranging from specific topics of interest as well as neat little feeds that give you a Daily Quiz, Quote of the Day, Featured Contributer, Featured Media, On This Day In History, and much more. Specific topics and articles can be pulled from their massive online archives by signing up to a free new service they’re now calling WebShare. Using this service you can not only reference one of the premier authorities in subject matter directly on your website, but also interact with the company if you require something that isn’t already offered.
They’re giving fun, useful widgets away to the public for free, then are providing resources to authors, webmasters, and bloggers alike with hopes of enticing their readers to sign up for the online service.
For instance, If I was writing an article on one of our past presidents, I could pull a sample snippet from the massive presidential section of the Encyclopedia to accompany my article:
Users wanting more would then have the ability to sign up to learn everything there is to know about the man via Britannica’s subscription online version of their encyclopedia. Unlike wikipedia, you would know that the information you were reading was authentic, not to mention the fact that it would include more media/resources than your average wikipedia page.
Go checkout Britannica’s new website, as I said, they’ve revamped it to incorporate Flash, RSS feeds, widgets, and even now have an official Twitter account. So for all you twitter folks, feel free to add www.twitter.com/EBWebShare and tweet with some books from your childhood.
HP’s Upline File Storage Service Now Downline
Sunday, April 20th, 2008 | News, Tools, Utilities, WebApps | No Comments
Well, apparently HP’s foray into the online storage market via a service appropriately named “Upline” has been rather short-lived. If you try to log-in or even attempt to create a new account you are greeted with a simple: “The HP Upline Service is temporarily unavailable” graphic (as pictured above). Also temporarily down is their online customer service “Chat” feature.
Going to the main website - www.upline.com would not make you think anything was wrong with the service, as there is no mention of it until you either click buy now or try to log in. I’m sure that only adds to the frustration of anyone who was using it as a backup service, especially if they find themselves desperately needing to perform any type of operating system re-install.
WebWorkerDaily reports that an email from HP was sent out two days ago stating that, “we fully anticipate that suspension of the Upline Service will be temporary and short in duration, and will notify you when the Upline Service is operational again.”
I am going to have to share their commentary on this one in saying that just how soon the service will be re-activated seems to be up to anyones guess.
As per my recent posting on this recent addition to the file-sharing service market, HP was attempting to enter a market already saturated with not only old CDN (Content Delivery Network) competitors, but also a gaggle of brand new ventures taking advantage of the recent “Cloud-Computing” trend.
No news yet on why the service is down, but it should serve as a lesson that it’s better to offer a product that is dependable than rush out a beta version with hopes of keeping up with the competition.
Cloud Based Service Applications - Google App Engine, Amazon Web Services, And More
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008 | Beta, Business, Marketing, New Beginnings, News, Tools, WebApps | No Comments
Hewlett-Packard just officially announced the release of HP Upline, an online storage service that serves as both a personal back-up source as well as a way to share files with friends. Not only that but it starts at only $4.99/month for unlimited data transfer & storage, making it ridiculously affordable compared to alternative large-scale backup methods. This announcement comes shortly after the successful launch of two similar services, Sugarsync and DropBox. The apparent need for a one-stop service provider that allows for data-backup, file-sharing, and cross-platform syncing has finally hit Enterprise level it seems. SugarSync service boasts the ability to synch not only your mac and pc, but also any mobile device that you may have as well. On top of that it would serve as a backup for your files should something happen to your equipment. The demand for the service was so high (their 45 day Free Trial may have something to do with it) that it actually crashed their service two days ago, resulting in a blog posting from their CEO Gibu Thomas explaining the situation and their progress towards fixing it. DropBox is currently still in a closed beta, but utilizes Amazon’s “cloud” based S3 service to do the same thing as what HP’s Upline is promoting - a virtualized synch/backup service that works on all platforms as well as can be used to share files with friends.
Speaking of Amazon, who so far has been the undeniable leader in Web Services, they too experienced a similar outage when their S3 service suddenly went down for a few hours a few weeks ago - leaving developers stranded as the entire purpose of using this service was to replace the need for any localized storage of data. The difference was that no one from Amazon has come forward to apologize or even acknowledge the error officially, the only mention was via a tech support representative after their forums were flooded with a battery of irate users reporting the error and asking why there wasn’t some sort of monitoring software/services in place (good question). Apparently Amazon either didn’t know about the outage, or simply didn’t send out some form of communication letting them know of the problem.
For a company to tout themselves as the replacement to purchasing/maintaining localized hardware to service enterprise level applications, this type of outage is simply unacceptable in my mind. Then the lack of response regarding the issue becomes an added slap in the face. Their complete lack of communication with the developers who relied on them was well documented across the web via the blogsphere but I sadly did not find it anywhere in the press. Why should it have been you might be asking? After all, it’s just some web-service. Their cloud services are currently being used to house large ammounts of critical data in applications that range from credit card processing portals to health-care based applications used in hospitals. Three hours of down-time with no explanation, warning, or even corporate outreach could have been catastrophic, even deadly. A great explanation of the incident can be found in a ZDNET article written by Michael Krisman where he even points out one worried developers plea, “But what do I tell my clients?” For a different perspective, I suggest you check-out what Bob Lozano had to say about the early-morning incident in his Appistry Blog (which also has a few other great articles on cloud/cluster based services if you’re interested in learning more about the service). S3 being down for any amount of time crippled a few companies who relied on it for data management…. and if you read the forums posts on Amazon’s site you can see the wide range of firms/industries who were helpless until the issue was resolved.
Since then there still hasn’t been any news from Amazon other than a small message explaining that the problem has been fixed. That doesn’t give me much confidence in the reliability of their other services, particularly their just recently announced launch of “Elastic IPs - Static IPs for Dynamic Cloud Computing,” This recent development would mean that you could not only use their virtualization/cloud services to store, manage, and transfer your database driven info but could also host the application that uses it through them as well. Throw in their Fulfillment Services and you have yourself a fully operational virtual company! An interesting thought was brought up on Brian “Krow” Aker’s blog (one of the smart ones who had a hand mysql + slashdot “back in the day”) comparing what I used to have running on a beat-up developement box in college and all these new offerings:
LAMP ->
Linux -> EC2
Mysql/Memcached -> S3/SimpleDB/Queue
Apache/Asterisk -> HTTP/Mechanical Turk
PHP/Perl/Python -> REST
Not to mention Google also has been aiming at getting in on a piece of the action. At last night’s Campfire One Google announced that they are now offering hosting for enterprise level web applications via a new tool called App Engine. Rumor is they also are partnering up with Salesforce (who have their own Appexchange service) in the upcoming week as well. Currently Google is giving away access/hosting for FREE to a limited 10,000 developers . I was lucky enough to snag an invitation, and although I have only had a few brief moments to tinker around with the site, it looks extremely promising at first glance. It currently only supports the Python language, however they are working on adding additional platforms soon-enough (i.e Ruby on Rails, or at least I hope seeing how it would be a perfect back-end for a cloud-based application of this magnitude).
According to their Google App Blog - the development environment provided is based off of how they themselves manage all the services/data, just rolled up into a more scalable (as in down-scale) commodity that they could then sell. This includes being powered by Bigtable and GFS - two services that have enabled Google’s search engines to run as fast as they do while parsing through petabytes of data to find you whatever it is you are searching for.
Soon the days of having to beg VC’s for startup capital to fund server farms will be replaced by virtualized data-flow…. I can tell you this much at least, all of these services give you the tools necessary to build whatever application you think might be the “Golden Ticket” - And It’d be a lot easier to get that $400 Million in funding by letting your potential investors actually use the product you want them to buy into. You then are selling them on the experience itself, leaving you free from having to dress in a suit to show off some slides of just how the experience “might look like.” And we all know that death by powerpoint is never a fun experience……
Search
Find A New Job:
Other Places You Can Find Me:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
