A useful presentation on using tests as documentation
Python specific, but has some good general information and principles. Check it out http://www.python.org/pycon/2006/papers/2/pycon06_agiledoc.pdf
Archive for April, 2006
April 25, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
Another Social Marketing Stock Listing App
As said in my post about Google Finance, expect more stock related web apps… Have a look at StockTickr, a similar idea to SocialPicks, but not as nicely presented. You can add your own watchlist and see other user’s watchlists.
April 25, 2006 | 2 comments | View Post
RE/MAX Pinnacle up and running
We have launched a new OfficeStream site for RE/MAX Pinnacle. Looks like they are doing well with 31 listings already live on the site.
Have a look at http://www.remax-pinnacle.co.za/
April 25, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
Google Finance and Stock Picks
Recently Google launched Google Finance. Already the comparisons, pros and cons etc. of Google Finance vs. competitors like Yahoo and others have begun being debated. A good summary can be found on Search Engine Watch.
But Google lauches it applications with a fundamentally different approach to Yahoo and the rest. Google adds as much value as possible as quickly as possible and worries about revenue streams later whereas Yahoo (and other big portals) traditionally have needed a viable business plan with revenue streams (usually includiong paid content) before proceeding with large scale projects.
As such, Google Finance already has a powerful API and it will be a short time before we see loads of mash-ups with Google finance. Already an exciting prospect has been launched – Social Picks, described as:
“SocialPicks enables stock investors at all levels to exchange market research, recommend stock picks, and get new investment ideas. You can become an influential analyst and impact peers’ decisions with your powerful analysis & performance!”
I personally prefer the Google presentation to the other offerings – their graphing in particular is incredible.
April 24, 2006 | 2 comments | View Post
RE/MAX of New Zealand Goes live
We have published the new website for RE/MAX of New Zealand. It sports a handy AJAX enabled search getting the orginal 3 steps down to just 2.
See also the listing image display which is powered by the LightBox script library whcih uses the ProtoType Framework and Script.aculo.us.
April 24, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
New WWW Site
I have decided that content is king and have opted to use a WordPress blog for the new White Wall Web site. It will be organized into categories with blog entries for each of our products, service and consulting focuses.
I hope you enjoy it!
April 24, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
Make it work. Make it work fast.
Recently we began optimizing code in one of our projetcs because certain queries where taking 30 mins to run and the server was getting seriously nailed (there was a pile of data to search).
Andy Duncan, an ex-Thoughtworker and good friend has been consulting to White Wall Web for the past three months and helping our team to improve approaches and practices. One of the mantras that Andy D has brought to White Wall Web is “Make it work. Make it work fast.” This means first getting the application to do what is needs to do (meet acceptance criteria, pass automated tests) and then make it work fast (code and database optimisation).
This article by Russ Olsen is a great summary of some of the code considerations.
I plan to do a podcast with Andy in the near future describing how we attacked our particular speed issue on this project, so watch this space.
April 21, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
AJAX and webservers
AJAX is increasingly popular for building web applications and is a central component of the web 2.0 phenomenon. Many of the new google applications including GMail, Google Calendar, Google Reader and Google Maps use AJAX components to create their excellent usability. Other new widely used applications like Flickr, del.icio.us and Digg also use AJAX to create the end user appeal. From an end user and an innovation perspective AJAX has done incredible things for the web and AJAX applications are here to stay. Undoubtably, if built properly, the code used by AJAX apps is scalable. But the question that is being debated widely is “what impact does an AJAX app with a high number of concurrent users have on a web server?”
I found a well rounded summary of this debate by Dion Hinchcliffe and I agree with his conclusion which is that users will ultimately hammer the servers, not Ajax. If you are building AJAX apps this a vital debate to understand because it also has implications for the way in which you will code your presentation layer. The problem (for a webserver) around AJAX is unpredictability of the load not neccessarily the additional volume. Hinchcliffe uses the example of asynchronous calls made to the database everytime the mouse is moved. This may be a killer end user function, but will nail your webserver if you have a high number of users…
Check out the full article.
April 21, 2006 | 0 comments | View Post
