As many a knowledgeable person will know, chaos in computer systems is not a good thing, in fact it’s probably seen as ‘El Diablo’ for most computer engineers. In a recent New Scientist, published 1st November 2008, an article described a heretical approach to computer chip design using chaotic energy oscillations. The well established view is that any chaotic activity in a computer chip will render it useless in nanoseconds as the true signal decays into random noise and ceases to be useful.
A physicist from the University of Florida however has a different view; William Ditto believes that behind the seemingly random nature of chaotic behaviour in electrical systems are a non-random series of energy oscillations which can be stimulated to stabilize that system. In the case of a computer circuit this means controlling the oscillations can allow the behaviour of a circuit to change within a nanosecond, and effectively morph into performing a completely separate task.
To keep a very long story short this has profound effects for internet search engines. Using such circuits to store data can create digital memory which is far more compact than conventional memory and also allows for search time to be reduced dramatically. A database can be searched using more processing power than can normally be achieved with standard chips. Chaotic digital memory can store data at much higher densities and retrieve it up to 8 times faster. This makes it economical as well as practical.
The consequences of this novel approach to computer chip manufacture are far reaching, and it’s still very early day. As conventional manufacturing techniques are suitable for making these surreal chips it won’t be long till we start to feel the effects of this new technology.
Posted by Dean Euden
At the start of October I whisked myself off to London for two days of Usability tester training. The course was held in North East and was run by a bunch of guys and girls known as webcredible. They have a passion for web usability and the two day course was engaging and a bit of an eye opener (also you get free ice cream in the afternoon).
Most people will know of usability testing in the web industry, but how much of an understanding people have will no doubt vary widely. In this humble testers opinion it’s about taking the process away from those in the know and letting the public (all be it a carefully vetted public) loose on a website. The issue with in house testing is prior knowledge; a developer will no doubt test his or her site but will be absorbed in the minor details and have an encyclopaedic knowledge of every function, page and ‘quirk’ the site has. What the developer is guaranteed to neglect is the user journey itself.
The aim of user testing is to make sure that the target audience for a site can achieve their goal with the minimum confusion and maximum satisfaction. Having a site with downloadable widgets, cutting edge flash content and the latest in home page styling is appropriate only when the user is likely to benefit from this, if it’s for the gratification of the client then the website is in danger of alienating those that matter the most, namely the user. A client shouldn’t loose site of this as it’s the users’ who will decide the fate of the website. Frustrated user's who can’t find what they need or take a long time getting there won’t come back and, worse still, will tell their friends not to go to the site either.
The best way to avoid this is too carry out a series of testing sessions involving a hand picked group of users who make up the target audience. Setting up such tests is a relatively straight forward once you have the right candidates and you will need nothing more than a facilitator, a quiet room and a computer. Generally speaking groups of up to 8 spread out over the course of a day (1 hour session per person) will gain you some valuable observations on how a user will relate to your site. By giving the person a series of realistic scenarios to go through the hope is any pitfalls with navigation and usability will be noticed and you can then determine a way of tweaking the site to remove them and restore a clear user pathway.
My explanation of usability is very basic and there is great deal more that needs to be considered in regards to the way you facilitate and record a testing session and also when you need to stand back and take a pinch of salt with the test subject’s opinions. The size of the project Vs the cost of usability testing must be considered also, extensive testing for a low budget project is un-sustainable and a more ‘guerrilla testing’ approach is probably more suitable.
Finally, usability isn’t about dulling down a website and making it over simplistic and un-absorbing, the site still has to sell itself in a tough market and good design is vital. If users are happy, clients are happy and inevitably we’ll all be a lot happier…how nice. Next week world peace and the answer to the credit crunch.
Posted by Dean Euden
Quality Assurance Dude
The Guardian the other week reminded me of a concept that they just don't mention in the Prince2 studies:
"Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law." *
That's not to say we haven't delivered some amazing projects in terrific time, but basically I do believe that the time a team thinks that a project is going to take, is how long it WILL take irrespective of when it is needed by or how much a shorter deadline is required.
When we commit to a deadline, we obviously undertake to deliver to that date but that doesn't always make for an easy life for clients or the best possible end product.
As Oliver Burkeman (in the Guardian) summarises:
Intuitively, it feels sensible to work out in detail what your projects involve, to break them into chunks and estimate how long each part will take. But the problem with unforeseen delays is you can't foresee them, no matter how finely detailed your planning.
Or am I just being a pessimist???
* Douglas R. Hofstadter, from Go"del, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Posted by Allie Symonds
It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything on our Blog (holiday, kids, you know how it is) and what better time for a come back than to bring to your attention the launch of the latest web browser, from non other than digital advertising monopolist Google.
I’ll get my worries out of the way first. I personally feel that Google know way too much about me already, and I question if what they make their money on is in the ‘spirit’ of what Tim Berners Lee created all those years ago (ironically earlier this year Tim recently predicted that Google will be superseded).
Why do I feel this way?
As a Gmail user they have access to my email (including attachments and embedded links) whilst they also have access to my workstation contents through Google Desktop search. They have access to my search terms through the Google Toolbar - they know what search results caught my attention as well as those that didn’t. If you blog, Google's Blogger might be what you use to share your thoughts, whilst Google Reader may be how you capture and digest what interests you.
They know what advertising works on me (through Google Adsense), and what you look at using Google Earth. If you use Google Analytics on your website they know about the visitors to your website, where they came from, how they found you, what they did, and where they left – they also (as with the above) may know a lot about that visitor, probably far more than you do.
If you use Google Docs or Picasa their spiders have access to your ‘secure’ documents and images. Google Calendar technically means they know where you are and who are with, or if you use Google talk what you are talking about :)
On the positive side Google have vastly contributed to how we experience the web – their search engine is by far the best and their desktop search tool is so much better than what comes with Windows.
You have to embrace it – you have to wholeheartedly sell your soul to the Google machine to really reap the full benefits. We all just need to realise that when we use their web mail tools or benefit from their Desktop we’re actually really paying quite a high price in terms of our data privacy for these ‘free’ services.
Now (finally you say) on to their new web browser, Chrome launched to Beta earlier today.
It’s amazing, it is by far the fastest web browser I’ve ever used, and it certainly provides a great interface, that really makes use of their intelligence of ‘you’ to make it a better place to be. They really pull the best from their massive intelligence of the web to make it better (no more trying to remember web addresses) as well as the best bits from all the existing open source browsers out there. They’ve added their own features such as ‘tabs’ to allow us to protect against flaky sites that would normally stall your whole browser.
For the web developer the good news is that existing sites seem to render very well – this is a good thing as the introduction of a new browser in to the market that has different technical demands could significantly complicate site design, whilst causing the need to ‘retro fit’ compatibility in legacy websites.
To really get under the hood of chrome and appreciate the technology – read the Google books article.
Posted by Richard Baker
This site came up on one of the search engine forums and it could be worth a look. Cuil (COOL) is a new search engine founded by a number of ex Google and IBM employees ("Cuil" is Gaelic for Knowledge (or Hazel?)). It's positioning is that allegedly, it indexes more and faster than Google and MSN in addition to understanding the content and context of a page. The model behind it attempts to gain knowledge of what a user is ‘really’ after from their searches and they intend to continue to refine this model continuously. On launch, it had indexed 121,617,892,992 web pages – really impressive for a start-up.
The layout of search results is however a real improvement on the big SE’s. For each search, there can be around 12 results per page in a magazine style layout but with the additional feature of being able to filter by category. These catagories are automatically produced – for example, searching on a keyphrase with a geographical area presents a number of alternative regions should your results not meet the mark. One of the strongest features though is a thumbnail image alongside each description – if Cuil starts to gain market share, there’s considerable scope for Search Engine Optimisers to make the most of this image space in order to maximise their click through rates.
From a few initial searches, it’s certainly comprehensive however it’s not yet a MSN or Google beater. I didn’t find the results truly relevant however the bar is set very high. Take a look and see what you think.
Posted by Chris Haresign
Last week, a beta version of Lively was launched - Googles take on Second Life. Lively is an avatar based virtual world along the lines of Second Life with the ability for users to create their own online rooms (to host their YouTube, blog, social network profile etc.). It's very early days and although the functionality, depth and visual appeal is basic, Google certainly has the budgets to make a success of it - should it wish to! As Google puts it: "It's integrated with the Internet. It's not an alternate destination. Our intention is to add to your existing life."
At first glance, the aim is to provide an alternative, fun environment to the more structured personalised homepages such as Netvibes or iGoogle (these sites let individuals assemble their favorite widgets, websites, blogs, email accounts, social networks, search engines, instant messengers, photos, videos, podcasts, and everything else they enjoy on the web - all in one place and not tied to a single PC or Mac). The concept is that we shouldn't need to go to information - it should be experienced, collated and managed through an environment that suits us. For example, as YouTube allow users to (and make it easy to) embed their chosen video within any external website or application as per the clip below.
However, should Lively take off or should Google sense that it 'could' take off, it will almost certainly become an additional inventory or advertising space for advertising and marketing. As with Second Life, having an additional presence on these sites will enhance brand awareness and with Lively, it's very likely to affect search engine rankings. For anyone with time on their hands or for any online marketeer, it could be worth a look (however don't expect a polished product though).
Posted by Chris Haresign
