Rants about Software

Building for [Mobile or Web] or [Web and Mobile]

2011-01-12T13:49:00.000-08:00

Just started to look into HTML5 and how it plays into our plans for app development and what a jungle out there. Take for instance and read some of the comments on http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/11/html5-mobile-apps.html and be careful not to be sidetracked like I did when you read about all those great apps people build for both web and mobile.
What do you do as an app developer. Do you start building for Web or Mobile first or do you get ambitious and target both at the same time with something like Responsive Web Design: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/01/12/guidelines-for-responsive-web-design/
Can you at all be sure that you have the same audience on both Platforms or should it really should it be different functionality?
For now we are using two different development environments (and teams) and we are targeting slightly different audiences with our mobile/pad app than with the full blown web app, but I'm still chasing the good example of how to do one app for multiple platforms and audiences.

Review of EaSynth ForeUI

2010-02-14T22:41:00.000-08:00

As a follow up to last weeks posting on prototypes and mockups I'm reviewing EaSynth's ForeUI UI Prototyping Tool (www.foreui.com).
getting started is easy and you can quickly get a mockup up going. I like that in the trial version you can use all the advanced features including saving/load your work. This helps evaluate the true value of the tool.
The UI of the tool is pretty intuitive with the central components library always visible and a toolbar at the top for common operations. Components are dragged in from the palette but no ability to stencil multiple components with the mouse. When editing a properties panel shows up and allow you to adjust individual setting on the component.- I had a hard time getting the panel to be pinned down though.
The toolbar lacks cross component functions like grouping and alignment, I kept searching for grouping and 'bring to front' on the toolbar or in the menus until I found it on the components properties palette.
A very nice feature is the ability to extend with new components and share you own customized components with other users (like google sketchup). I'm always weary about if a tool has all the components I need down the road and this definitely helps me feel sure about that.
Components can be pre-poulated easily with data and you can skin the whole prototype with a hand drawn, wireframe, XP, win7 or MaxOS look and feel.
ForeUI has a nice pagination concept although it's hidden at the bottom of the UI and the dialog box keep showing up partly outside the screen.
ForeUI appears robust (it never crashed on me) but show signs of being young (e.g. the properties panel and page dialog behave differently as the latter can be placed outside the main window like Photoshop but the first can't).
ForeUI also has a quite advanced action concept that can create interactivity in the mockups during simulation. The actions can be designed in details with events on individual components and there is the ability to models loops and conditions in a visual programming language so that pretty advanced simulations can be performed.
Once you have made prototype there is plenty of options for export to image, PDF and interactive DHTML with the ability to do simulation.

Pros
Easy to get started
Flexible (e.g. Ability to bring in additional components from other users)
Advanced interaction

Cons
Too little help. e.g. lacks a quick tutorial a'la Google's Sketchup tool and detailed ref guide aon action functionality.
Action functionality is comprehensive but then also harder to get started width
collaboration

Conclusion
ForeUI is definitely a tool I would consider for prototyping. It has the ease of use for quick mockup generations as some of the lighter tools out there and also include the ability to extend it and do complex interactive prototypes should you need to do so.

(disclousure: I participated in the FourUI Free License giveaway for bloggers)

Fast prototypes and mockups

2010-02-11T01:03:00.000-08:00

This week I found myself in need of doing some fast prototypes. We had set the ambition that we wanted to do a new webapp for a project in 7 days. Obviously that requires things to go fast but we still needed to do some prototyping. Previously I had used Balsamiq Mockups (http://www.balsamiq.com) back when they first launched, so I gave it a run with the desktop (Adobe Air) based version. Still same great functionality and above all easy to get the first mockups done. I really like they sketchy style that lets you focus on functionality and the ease with which you can add sample data into the components.
After a while though when I got into the more complex screens of the prototype I found myself i need of a more expressive tool. I reverted to Google searching for alternatives and guess what showed up. Good old Powerpoint. A good example is : http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/interactive or the 10 minute intro http://www.krisjordan.com/2008/09/07/10-minute-mock-prototyping-tips-for-powerpoint/. On MSDN there is a little bit older intro : http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/archive/2006/02/20/535444.aspx There is also some great templates out there and I ended up trying out : http://www.istartedsomething.com/20071018/powerpoint-prototype-toolkit-01/ which somewhat simple and limited in terms of the number of controls. Powerpoint gives you the flexibility, but is also harder to get started quickly as you need to setup basic controls and master slides.
I’d probably be continuing w. powerpoint for now, but when writing this blog I researched a little more and others before me have created better reviews. take a look at a pretty extensive list from Dan Harrelson from Adaptive Path http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2009/03/24/rapid-prototyping-tools/ and good pointers can also be found on Henrik Olsens blog http://www.guuui.com. The latter led me to http://www.foreui.com which I’ll be trying out in the near future. Stay tuned

youcalc apps for Google AdWords

2009-02-12T21:35:00.000-08:00

Two free youcalc analytics apps for Google AdWords have been published to the youcalc app gallery.

Google AdWords Campaign Summary provides a pie chart overview of overall metrics on all your campaigns. Allows you to keep track of how your AdWords spending is distributed across campaigns, and monitors if your impressions and click goals are met.

Google AdWords Top Campaigns keeps track of which campaigns have the best CPC and CTR. Also spots if your campaigns are fully utilizing your expense budget, allowing you to identify opportunities for overall improvement of campaign impact (see the app live right below).

Both apps run standalone or as gadgets inside iGoogle, where they can form a super dashboard for AdWords (see example below).

When you enter your Adwords user credential inside an app, the credentials are sent directly to the Google AdWords API - neither your login nor your AdWords data is stored on the youcalc servers.

Click here and start analyzing on your AdWords data now!

Look out for more AdWords PPC apps on here soon.

Trackle

2009-02-12T21:34:00.001-08:00

I just started using trackle. I's a nifty service that can alert you about things happening around th web related o you in various ways. Over the coming period I will see if it can replace my rather intensive use of google alerts.

Money and Politics

2008-07-02T03:55:00.000-07:00

Today, the US Senate voted against the energy bill (S.3044 – Consumer-First Energy Act of 2008 ).

According to Reuters, “the energy package would revoke $17 billion in tax breaks extended to big oil companies like Exxon Mobil Corp and slap a 25 percent windfall profits tax on firms that don’t invest in new energy sources.” MAPLight.org’s research team revealed that oil producers gave an average of $134,821 to each of the 43 senators that voted no and an average of $37,373 to each of the 51 senators that voted yes. (See Methodology below)

The 6 Republicans that broke with their party by voting yes got an average of $64,362 from oil producers, a stark contrast to the average of $134,719 given to each of the 41 Republicans that voted no.

Two Democrats broke with their party by voting no, Majority Leader Harry Reid - (NV)* and Mary Landrieu (LA). Senator Landrieu received $304,450 from the oil producers, while Reid received $38,350. Landrieu’s total is the second highest received by Senate Democrats (after Clinton), and the 6th highest overall.

Clinton, Obama and McCain did not vote on the bill

Performance Management

2007-09-11T11:19:00.000-07:00

Performance management beginning (or maybe I'm slow) to get a lot of attention. Lots of new startups are entering the space and all the BI players have changed their messaging around.

Enterprise Mashups

2007-02-12T23:03:00.000-08:00

It looks like Enterprise Mashup is catching on. Yahoo with their pipes, IBM with QEDWiki and twinsoft are all startring to push this form of technology along with the folks at my old company Kapow Technologies.

Salesforce.com Buying spree?

2006-09-20T22:32:00.000-07:00

» Who will Salesforce.com buy next?

» Salesforce.com enters search engine marketing space...

» Salesforce.com seizes Sendia for SaaS, CRM mobility

Interesting to see Salesforce has started buying functionality

Web 2.0 Workgroup - A network of Web 2.0 resources

2006-09-20T22:27:00.000-07:00

Web 2.0 Workgroup - A network of Web 2.0 resources

Mashup Hype

2006-09-14T06:57:00.000-07:00

Interesting to see that salesforce.com also has started to use mashup as a concept in their marketing of new capabilities (http://blogs.zdnet.com/web2explorer/index.php?p=271). I predict that soon we will see any piece of software that combines multiple components being labels a mashup. This will seriously deflate the concept and ruin the opportunity for real mashups to flourish.

Finally Blogging

2006-09-14T03:29:00.000-07:00

Hi
I've finally come around to start blogging. Lets see if I can come up with stuff that is worth reading. My primary interest these days are all kinds of software that help companies become successful - Stay tuned.