MapCruncher

Posted on May 16, 2006 by mfagan

MapCruncher turns static images into tiles suitable for use with Microsoft Virtual Earth (Windows Live Local), and presumably other tile-based mapping applications too. Very neat and useful, the existing hacks I’d seen to handle this on Google’s map API were relatively poor. Via VE blog.

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TechCrunch » Rumor: Yahoo Acquired Jotspot

Posted on May 10, 2006 by mfagan

TechCrunch » Rumor: Yahoo Acquired Jotspot – I don’t usually report on breaking news rumours but this one is very interesting, because Jotspot is such an amazing company/product.

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Google Data APIs Protocol

Posted on April 20, 2006 by mfagan

Google Data APIs Protocol – interesting move from Google. I (and others) have thought for a while that combining OpenSearch’s read capabilities with the Atom Publishing Protocol’s write capabilities would create a very powerful API, and that’s roughly what Google is doing here.

It’s great to see the OpenSearch support (a bit – they’re using startIndex, totalResults and itemsPerPage), but I’d like to see them using it more. Some of what they’re doing is contrary to how OpenSearch works (that’s not a problem per-say), as they’re using predefined query names such as q and max-results (and a folder for categories) rather that allowing people to use whichever they want and then specify them in an OpenSearch Description file.

In that same vein, it would be nice to see them make use of autodiscovery, as Atom, RSS, OpenSearch, and others do. Upon first inspection I would say these autodiscovered documents could be OpenSearch Descriptions, but I may be wrong about that.

One interesting thing to note is that they mention how startIndex is 1-based (which is true), and then display an example with a value of “0″. Sounds like DeWitt is right, it does need to handle 0-based numbers too; even Google is making that mistake.

DeWitt brings up some other good points as well.

Via Niall.

Update: Joe Gregorio weighs in

Update 2: Marc Canter (one of my favourite bloggers) finds this linkworthy 😉 although I’m always amazed at the spellings my name gets.

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I’m not always right

Posted on April 5, 2006 by mfagan

me, upon learning about GoTo (1998 or perhaps 1999):
This site won’t last five minutes. If anybody can game the system (pay their way to the top), the results will suck and nobody will use it.
reality:
GoTo became Overture, bought AllTheWeb and AltaVista, and got bought by Yahoo for $1.63 billion. Their business model was copied by Google, where it accounts for the vast majority of their enormous and growing revenue, and completely turned the company around. I was wrong because I hadn’t thought of the scale. When one particular company knows they can pay to get higher, the results will suck, but when every other company in the industry knows that too, economics will sort things out; it’s in their best interests to be relevant to searchers.

me, upon learning about PageRank (2000 or 2001 probably):
That’s terrible! If they only show popular sites, those sites will just get more popular and it won’t be long before no new sites ever get found by anyone.
reality:
I was partially correct, however the case of the popular becoming more popular was already occurring anyway, as people followed links. Also PageRank is just part of Google’s algorithm, which also incorporates timeliness, and it is definitely possible for newcomers to get in.

me, upon learning of Technorati (2002)
um… what’s the point? It just shows backlinks, it doesn’t even have any search, nor a “what’s popular” listing (like Daypop for instance).
reality:
One thing I forgot: people love knowing who links to them. Today Technorati does have search (of several sorts), and a whole bunch of “what’s popular” listings. They’re also the most successful (at least in terms of popularity) blog search engine, very innovative, and have spearheaded the wonderful microformats initiative, largely thanks to Tantek.

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FuzzyBlog � Blog Archive � You Know You�re too Hardcore When�

Posted on April 4, 2006 by mfagan

FuzzyBlog � Blog Archive � You Know You�re too Hardcore When� – Johnson’s posts are always the best

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worldKit 3.0 released

Posted on March 25, 2006 by mfagan

worldKit 3.0 released – congrats to Mikel. worldkit is one fantastic open source mapping api

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Google in Waterloo Photos

Posted on March 14, 2006 by mfagan

See previous post for details

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Google in Waterloo

Posted on March 14, 2006 by mfagan

So I attended Google’s event (party?) on campus today. Not really what I expected, it was essentially an event to meet Google employees and ask them questions, and there was a little talk by Roger Skubowius (of Reqwireless, now Google), then Craig Nevill-Manning of Google New York.

Quite a few people there, as expected, not to mention one or two tv crews. It was essentially a showing-and-planting-the-flag event, with few details. The former Reqwireless people were there as well as two from the Toronto office (mostly AdWords stuff), a couple from Mountain View, and several very recent hires for the new Waterloo office.

I did hear (from Google employees) that they want to expand the Waterloo office with engineers as fast as they can. It seems that wherever they are now is probably a somewhat temporary location. I’m not sure where that is, but it is in Waterloo and not in the Research and Technology Park on the north end of campus (where OpenText and others are).

Not too much to say really. The food was good, especially the giant Google cake. Maybe when I get home I’ll post some photos. Update – photos here.

Update: notes elsewhere from Adrian Dewhurst, Girl Mathie, SunShine, Dmitry, and Imprint.

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PICT0014

Posted on March 14, 2006 by mfagan

PICT0014

14-Mar-06 14:06:18

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PICT0008

Posted on March 14, 2006 by mfagan

PICT0008

14-Mar-06 13:15:33

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