NoSQL: Comparing the Different Solutions - ReadWriteCloud. Adrian Cockcroft, a cloud architect at Netflix, is running a series of posts looking at how different NoSQL databases handle common cloud computing tasks. All the usual disclaimers apply: SQL is good for some things, and different scenarios call for different NoSQL solutions. No one solution is necessarily "better" overall. However, as Cockcroft writes "We need a basis for comparison across them, so that we understand the differences in behavior. " Cockcroft created an example use case and is asking different NoSQL database developers to explain how their databases handle availability zones, partitioning between zones, appending items to lists, handling silent data corruption, and backup and restore.
A TV based device calls the API to add a movie to its favorites list (like the Netflix instant queue, but I have simplified the concept here), then reads back the entire list to ensure it is showing the current state. Facebook & The Semantic Web. This week we've been exploring the emergence of the Semantic Web among companies like Best Buy and Google. It's all thanks to RDFa, code that is inserted into the HTML of web pages to add extra meaning. The increasing usage of RDFa was one of the main themes at the recent Semantic Technology conference in San Francisco. There is perhaps no better example than Facebook's use of RDFa. We chatted to Facebook open standards evangelist David Recordon to find out more. In April this year, Facebook announced a large-scale new platform called the Open Graph.
The stated goal of the Open Graph protocol was to enable publishers to "integrate [their] Web pages into the social graph. " Essentially, each web page can now become an 'object' in Facebook's social graph (which is Facebook's term for how people connect to each other in its network). The Open Graph in a Nutshell The Open Graph is a wide-ranging platform which includes features such as 'Like' buttons and publisher plug-ins. Open Graph Issues. People in Tech: Andraz Tori, CTO/Co-Founder of Zemanta. Zemanta is a an interesting European startup that is applying semantic technologies to blogging. Sarah Perez covered the company's launch in March. One can think of Zemanta as an auto-complete function for blogging. As you are typing up a new post, Zemanta's browser plugin fetches related content - images, articles, videos, links - and provides a simple and friendly UI for inserting the related content into your blog.
We caught up with Andraz Tori, CTO and co-founder of Zemanta, at the SemTech conference at San Jose last week for an interview. Just because Zemanta's product looks simple does not mean that it is not sophisticated. Beneath the product's UI there is a powerful semantic analysis engine that matches content to Zemanta's web index. The elements of their technology include clustering, natural language processing, dynamic ontologies - the full spectrum of semantic web tech that well-publicized companies like Powerset, Freebase, and Hakia are known for. It's fun. "The Internet of Things is Already Here" - Dispatches From Internetome. Internetome, the U.K.'s first full day conference dedicated to the Internet of Things was held on Nov 10 in London. In front of a full attendance, with representatives from academia, government, and enterprise, a wide range of speakers illustrated the promise and the challenges of the complex systems based on smart sensor networks.
The Economist magazine featured in its current issue a special report on Smart Systems, underlining how rich, and important these ICT solutions have become, and how they will in the future sustain value added services for a wide set of vertical application areas. Guest author David Orban is the Chairman of Humanity+, an organization dedicated to promoting understanding, interest, and participation in fields of emerging innovation. "We do not know how these tiny chips will transform our lives, and that is the beauty of it. " John Woodget, Global Director for the Telecommunications sector, Intel Next on stage was myself. View more presentations from David Orban. How Best Buy is Using The Semantic Web. Yesterday we wrote about the increasing usage of Semantic Web technologies by large commercial companies like Facebook, Google and Best Buy. The Semantic Web is a Web of added meaning, which ultimately enables smarter and more personalized web apps to be built.
In this post we explore how a leading U.S. retailer, Best Buy, is using a Semantic Web markup language called RDFa to add semantics to its webpages. This is not just an academic exercise for Best Buy. As we will see, semantic technology has already led to increased traffic and better service to its customers. We spoke to Jay Myers, Lead Web Development Engineer at BestBuy.com, to find out how. ReadWriteWeb's Guide to The Semantic Web: Myers told us that the primary goal of using semantic technologies was to increase the visibility of its products and services. The process of adding RDFa to Best Buy's webpages began two years ago, when the company began to look for ways to get more visibility to its stores on the Web. Tim Berners-Lee Says the Time for the Semantic Web is Now. In an hour long interview posted today about the Semantic Web, W3C Director Tim Berners-Lee says all the pieces are in place to move full steam ahead and realize the potential of a world of structured, machine readable data.
Available as a part of the Talking with Talis semantic web podcast series, the interview (listen here) is summarized on interviewer Paul Miller's new ZDNet blog dedicated to the semantic web. A full transcript is available here. It's an important conversation and a good introduction to what the semantic web is. Also notable is the way that Berners-Lee sees Semantics and Data Portability as very related.
My standard explanation of the value of the Semantic Web is this: Once our software is capable of deriving meaning from web pages it looks at for us, then there's a whole lot of work that will already be done, allowing our human, creative minds to reach new heights. In the interview with Miller, however, Berners-Lee emphasized that it's not just about web pages. The State of Linked Data in 2010. In May last year we wrote about the state of Linked Data, an official W3C project that aims to connect separate data sets on the Web.
Linked Data is a subset of the wider Semantic Web movement, in which data on the Web is encoded with meaning using technologies such as RDF and OWL. The ultimate vision is that the Web will become much more structured, which opens up many possibilities for "smarter" Web applications. At this stage last year, we noted that Linked Data was ramping up fast - evidenced by the increasing number of data sets on the Web as at March 2009. Fast forward a year and the Linked Data "cloud" has continued to expand. In this post we look at some of the developments in Linked Data over the past year. Governments Get on Board The most high-profile usage of Linked Data over the past year has come from two governments: the United States and United Kingdom. The U.S. was first to open up some of its non-personal data for use by developers, with the May 2009 launch of Data.gov.
What Happens When You Deactivate Your Facebook Account. Facebook is a big part of millions and millions of peoples' lives, but what happens when you pull the plug? Last night I met a man who walked to the edge of the cliff and nearly deactivated his Facebook account. He took a screenshot of what he saw after clicking the "deactivate my account" link on his account page - and it is pretty far-out. That man considered quitting Facebook because it was having an adverse emotional impact on him and I'll spare him and his contacts from posting the screenshot he shared with me. I have posted below though a shot of the screen I saw when I clicked that button myself. Can you believe that? Apparently my wife's good friend and one of my co-workers are really going to miss me if I leave, though. Admittedly, this is also kind of funny at the same time.
This is just loaded with obnoxiousness. Just below the text box where departing users are asked to provide further explanation why they are leaving is a button you can click to select this option: Top 10 Mobile Trends of 2010, Part 1: Design & Development. In a little under 3 weeks time, we will host our second unconference: the ReadWriteWeb Mobile Summit. It's a 1-day event at the lovely Computer History Museum, in Mountain View, California. In preparation for the RWW Mobile Summit, we're going to outline the 10 leading trends of the Mobile Web in a 3-part series of posts. We'll delve more into these trends with you at the Summit, because our unconferences are all about audience participation. In this, the first post, we'll outline 3 important design and development issues for the Mobile Web.
Register now to discuss these and other topics at our unconference. The RWW Mobile Summit is being held on Friday 7 May, directly after the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco (2-6 May). Native App and/or Browser Based? Just as businesses in the PC-based Web spent years in the 90's wondering if a desktop app or web browser based service was the best choice, in 2010 the same question applies to mobile phone applications.
Privacy Emerging Wireless Standards.