14 posts tagged “technology”

    After watching a great presentation about the technology and interaction concepts that the people at Humanized try to represent, I decided to check out their site and their philosophy. Some of the points in their philosophy overlapped with the presentation that was given by Aza Raskin. One such item in the presentation that I thought was a great rule of three to follow compares itself with Asimov's Three Laws of Robots in Raskin's Three Laws of Interfaces.

I think I'll frame these :)

    As well, their philosophy is based on several principles of interaction design, well actually all are based on interaction design and the focus on content. You can read the full details of their philosophy on their site.

1. It's not your fault.

If you're having trouble using some tool, it's not because your "not good with the technology", it's because the people in charge of the technology didn't do a good job designing the interface. Though interaction design is a hard and heavily responsible task, what should be blamed on poor design is instead blamed on incompetency.

2. Simple things should stay simple.

The analog watch is very simple to set the time. Just turn the knob. Digital watches make this task difficult.

3. Fewer choices mean fewer worries

Ensure that your users are getting the practical solution over the configurable, extensible, impractical choice.

4. Your data is sacred.

When a machine can ensure that it will never lose your data it makes interfaces much simpler to work with. No need for confirmation dialogs because anything they've done can be undone.

5. Your train of thought is sacred.

There is a multitasking myth that comes up with the way we perform tasks. In short, what we think is multitasked is actually a focused task while the other is automated in some way. Like typing while composing sentences - typing is automatic. Or driving while talking to someone - the driving is automatic. It becomes automatic as soon as it becomes a habit. One thing at a time.

6. Good interfaces create good habits.

Just like writing, typing or driving the tools and interfaces that we've used allow us to create good habits that benefit the goals we would like to accomplish. Bad habits can form from bad interfaces such as in a typical saving a document scenario - like hitting don't save when we meant to save it.

7. Modes causes misery.

When you build habits while you use good interfaces, having a mode change can break those habits or prevent them from ever building up in the first place. Good interfaces will typically have as few modes as possible.

8. It's easy to learn.

As users are accomplishing one task to the next in an application, it is important that they only have to retain a small amount of information to complete those tasks. This ensures habits to form and it maintains the sanctity of every our train of thought. The task to learn a task should be progressive in nature as it is to learn to speak.

    The web is full of applications that have a way of giving the user the ability to perform tasks according to their needs. But sometimes those needs expand outside the realm of what's available in whatever the tool allows. A common scenario for a user is to simply not get what they want, move to a different tool that does do what the user wants it to do, or provide a feature request to the developers. But let's get to the basics of what applications are initially intended for.

    Applications, which are apart of a business model that envelops the ideologies and processes that make up information technology and the people it involves, are intended to serve. Services are created so that the audiences and primary customers are satisfied with the end-product. The primary objective of the business is to ensure that the customer is happy and is being served the content in a way that is pleasing. This of course is contingent upon the fact that the user never changes his/her mind with the product. So what happens when an audience of the business wants feature X, we'll say they want the ability to share the content with their favorite social networks. So what happens?

   Well, here are your choices for sites in which you can share your content with (among others not listed here). Quite a few sites will have links to share said content to YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Digg, Twitter, Live, Slashdott, StumbleUpon. This list just keeps going. This creates a very typical and dawning problem for application developers. Given that each site will post shared content in different ways, the business chooses which sites to share with, downloads the apis and develops according to said networks.

    Not only does this create a problem for developers, it creates an even larger issue for users. My site isn't listed! Well, once sites ABC are supported the business has successfully gone outside the scope of their core business processes. The important part is the ability to create a service to manipulate, aggregate and navigate content. Networks provide a nice area of sharing content, services provide a great mashup for providing content. When services can be successfully aggregated and served as tools to users - in this example sharing content will be seemless.

    Recently, I picked up an incredibly awesome tool called Enso from Humanized. Enso is all about bringing the ease of creating, navigating and manipulating content through commands. In the old days we used commands to get tasks done. As the GUI undoubtedly made things much easier to work with, it has also made things undoubtedly difficult to work with as everyone has their own opinions and natural bias towards one method of interaction over another - as well as color schemes..etc. But the one aspect that has us seemingly removed in this cumbersome Web 2.0  world is distraction. Some call it multi-tasking, I would disagree and say that we have created a monster for distraction.

    Not to say that some distractions aren't bad, but the thought is on how applications are increasing the gaps between the tasks we want to accomplish and the content that we are dealing with. Take for instance the fact that the market is now flooded with a dozen different social networks; there are hundreds of paint tools, editors and more. The market has a way with filtering these products out with emergence - or the difference in what is the best possible yet practical solution for the major audience.

    Nevertheless, it brings an motivating perspective towards the very definition of what operating systems are supposed to do for us. When I/O operations became a habitual necessity for computing technology it was added as a standard protocol to which all operating environments follow. However, today we are at a point where the desktop's monolithic structure has created an environment where dozens of applications are added due to what the user has asked for.

    The idea of adding feature after feature is fairly common among applications as well. In addition to this, there is integration - where one product's feature must integrate or serve another product in some form. For instance, Vox uses the Flickr API to allow users to add pictures to to posts. But what happens if you don't have a Flickr account, you just want to put pictures you got from your camera. Well, not only does Vox have to integrate with Flickr, they need to handle their own picture uploading service as well. When in reality, the only service that Vox is interested in it giving users the ability to write content to their blogs.

    In search technology, we have the ability to look up any website, blog, video and picture that exists on the web. We type a query and off it goes. The web provides a very nice tool for search. But how much have we provided in the web for commands? Telling the web to do something for you isn't as easy, but it definitely could be thought along the same lines. We have had the ability to aggregate content to serve information to users; what we need now is a way to aggregate services to serve tools to users. In that manner, we can begin to bring the level in which developers are typically mounted on up to the user's perspective.

    As I said in my previous post, information technology encompasses ideas, concepts, models, and data but most importantly people. IT is the combination of connecting culture, bringing people together, assisting in knowledge distribution. There are few moments in our industry were we come upon groundbreaking technologies. While the pieces of the technology are a culmination of our greatest systems, the model that they present are what literally makes them groundbreaking. What are some of the groundbreaking technologies of our past and present?

• Portable Computer:
  Santa Monica, Ca. named GM Research. The machine which was designed and patented (US Patent No. 4,294,496) by James Murez was first delivered to The Computer Store, Santa Monica, Ca in mid 1977. It was called the Micro Star and later changed the name to The Small One.
• Cellular Phones
  The first commercial cellular network was launched in Japan by NTT in 1979. Fully automatic cellular networks were first introduced in the early to mid 1980s (the 1G generation) with the Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) system in 1981. This was followed by a boom in mobile telephone usage, particularly in Northern Europe.
• The Internet
  

  Although the basic applications and guidelines that make the Internet possible had existed for almost a decade, the network did not gain a public face until the 1990s. On August 6, 1991, CERN, which straddles the border between France and Switzerland, publicized the new World Wide Web project. The Web was invented by English scientist Tim Berners-Lee in 1989.

  An early popular web browser was ViolaWWW based upon HyperCard. It was eventually replaced in popularity by the Mosaic web browser. In 1993, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois released version 1.0 of Mosaic, and by late 1994 there was growing public interest in the previously academic/technical Internet. By 1996 usage of the word "Internet" had become commonplace, and consequently, so had its misuse as a reference to the World Wide Web.

    While there are literally a multitude of technologies we could include in this list. The three I've listed have changed the way we do business, communicate, even socialize. There are plenty of technologies within each of these categories that provide for decades of progressive innovation. Can you think of anything else that measures up?

As apart of my 'Using Modern Operating Systems' class we're going into the core pieces of operating systems. One nice thing about this class is that the next time you approach an issue with a decision of performance you can actually make a legitimate comparison between operations on a computer. For instance, the argument for using a database over straight xml files. Of course, it will depend on the application, but in most cases you will want to use a database over straight xml files if you have a lot of input and output. However, if your data has little to no changes over time, you can be sure that caching the data via xml files can be much faster in your program.

At any rate, let's take a close look at modern operating systems and what each one is actually composed of. In today's world we have a lot of options for operating systems.

Of course including server systems like Unix... etc. But basically what we have in the modern world is usable graphical user interfaces layered on top of core operating systems. If you could take a look at the real differences between say Windows XP and Windows Vista, there are very few changes being made to the core system. In Windows Vista we have what's known as Process Protection. Process protection is really centered around DRM (or digital rights management). Normally when a process starts we can inject things like threads, and perform other various functions like debugging... etc. Process Protection doesn't allow us to perform these operations.

Nevertheless, let's go back for a moment. What is an operating system?

An operating system is nothing more than a set of software routines that sits between the application program and the hardware. While we create applications for our users, the operating system handles all the hardware functions like I/O to networking. What makes an operating system able to work on any number of hardware platforms is based on the principle of black-boxing. In other words, the operating system is just a layer of abstraction interfacing with essential black box hardware layers. While the application layer communicates with the operating system on services like: user interface (shell), file management, device management, processor (or process) management, memory management, and communication services. Each service communicating with hardwarde layers to perform said actions.

* It wasn't always this easy.

The first operating systems consisted of little more than collections of device management routines that supported input and output operations. Over time, it was us (the creative programmers) that developed file management routines, and while other programmers recognized the value, incorporated them into their own programs. After a while, standards evolved and joined with the various other management routines. The same was for management routines like networking. Once the operating system incorporated this feature, it made it easier to develop and practice new evolving standards.

Windows got it's start when it put a gui on top of MS-DOS. The modern Windows is really about the applications and services running on the system, much less than about the interfacing with the hardware components. Perhaps we will see some future enhancements when it becomes a standard to interface with technologies like voice input or multitouch.

Open Source!

Guess what? What's probably the main reason why open source works? Well for one, it opens up all those sub-routine tasks that we perform on a daily basis and it allows us to improve upon them; even standardize them.

Processors

What can we look forward to? Well for starters we can finally say that whatever intelligence a computer has, it's derived from the software not the hardware. After all, a CPU, a component who's primary job is to manipulate data, can do nothing without a program to provide control. So then what defines a program?

A series of instructions that tells the computer to perform one of its basic functions: add, subtract, multiply, divide, compare, copy, start input, or start output.

Each instruction has an operation code and one or more operands. The operation code points to the function to be performed and the operands identify the memory locations (data) that are participating in the operation.

In C# terms, int x = 2 + 3; The operand here is the + (or in instruction terms ADD) and the operands are 2, 3.

The processor has 4 key components:

• ICU (instruction control unit) fetching instructions from memory.
• ALU (arithmetic and logic unit) holding or activating the computer's instruction set
• the circuits that add, subtract, multiply, divide, compare, copy, start input, start output
• Registers (temporary storage devices that hold control incormation, key data and intermediate results)
• clock (typically a seperate chip of its own to generate precisely timed electronic pulses)

While the arithmetic and logic unit executes the instruction in the instruction register, the actual instruction is fetched during instruction time and executed during execution time. Together, both steps make up a single machine cycle. This process is repeated over and over until the program is finished. The clock drives the process by generating pulses at precisely times intervals.

* These time intervals depend on the speed of the processor.

* For instance, a 1.5 gigahertz processor is driven by a 1.5 gigahertz clock that "ticks" 1.5 billion times per second or effectively executing 1.5 billion instructions per second.

Now that's a lot of processing! Imagine what you could accomplish in 1.5 billion instructions every second. Take that and compound it with every machine you own or you can come in contact with. This only re-evaluates the obvious that I tried to make clear in my post on "what is a web application?". Think about what we should be doing when we create technologies and applications more so than what we can create.

However, actual processing speed is typically less than the theoretical limit, since many instructions need more than a single machine cycle to execute. Coprocessors help this since they serve a special purpose in assisting the main processor. Like a math coprocessor for performing floating-point computations and a graphics coprocessor for manipulating graphics.

Microcode

There is a layer that exists between memory and the processor. Microcode or essentially firmware works with machine-language instructions, which subsequently translate into lower-level microinstructions before they are executed by the processor. Since microcode insulates the software from the hardware, hardware changes can be accommodated without affecting the operating system or the software. In some cases, operating system routines are actually implemented in microcode to improve efficiency.

* Introducing, the .NET Micro Framework

In our modern world of C#, we can now access core hardware components that would normally seem impossible to code to with our lovely .net language. Although the micro framework is relatively new, it opens up a lot of opportunities for coding on embedded systems even without an operating system to run on top of. It even handles interrupts like event handlers. :D

The last of this article is about input/output devices, storage and communication and linking them all together.

Input and output, access for people

Basic input devices on most computers are obviously keyboards and mouses. As each character is typed, they are stored in memory and then copied from memory the basic output device, a display screen.

* In the older days with MS-DOS, you could only store up to about 20 or 30 characters, after that the screen would stop reading your keyboard. It's similar to when you open up IE and start typing and after a few seconds of pause it puts all the characters into the textbox, some but perhaps not all.

The screen serves as a window on memory, giving the user the ability to view content. Display units traditionally relied on CRT technology but flat-panel LCD screens became popular as they continue to drop in price.

The image displayed on a screen is temporary; it fades as soon as the power is cut. Computers are obviously not limited to displaying characters, graphics, output in color and black and white can be routed to printers. Even more interesting about our printers is that we can use them to print out more than a display image like we can on our monitors. Several attempts have been made to create producable materials and real world objects with the advancing techniques with laser and ink jet printers.

A circuit pattern printed on to plastic using an ink-like substance

Manufacturing computers is a costly and time-consuming undertaking. A microprocessor fabrication plant costs $2 billion and takes two full weeks to produce one silicon-based microprocessor. Few computer enthusiasts have the resources to make their own computer chips. However, researchers are developing ways to allow anyone to become their own microprocessor fabricator. Users will simply download microchip designs from the Internet and print out a working ink-based, plastic processor on a desktop fabrication machine, similar to an ink jet printer.

More on "How printable computers will work"

Several common input media rely on magnetic properties. For example, the characters on the bottom of most checks are printed with a type of magnetic ink called MICR (magnetic ink character recognition) tha tcan be read electronically. On a magnetic strip card, the strip of magnetic tape holds such data as a customer's account number and credit limit, and is read much like sound recording tape. A smart card uses an embedded integrated circuit chip to hold data. You can see how this process can be improved (unless otherwise easily hackable :P)

Other media are read optically like standardized test forms. White paper reflects light, black spots reflect much less, and variations in the intensity of the reflected light can be converted to an electronic pattern. OCR equipment uses the same principle to read typed or even handwritten material. Bar codes, like the UPC printed on most retail items, can be scanned at a checkout station. General purpose scanners are used to convert a hard copy to a bit pattern that can be manipulated by a computer. We can translate bit patterns to represent a printed page into descrete letters even.

Modern software will use multimedia, mixing text, graphics, sound, animations, and other elements to form an integrated interactive environment. Not too long ago, such processor- and memory-intensive apps would have been impossible, but increased processing speeds and memory have made them common. Today, most computers are sold with sophisticated sound systems, advanced graphics features, and other multimedia tools, and electronic gamers often enhance their systems with special joysticks and even tactile feedback devices.

In many ways, you could say that multimedia represents the state of the information technology art.

I'd like to go into storage but I'll leave that for another post, along with communication since those can go even futher in depth. But I would like to leave off with a note on opportunities to advance our current technologies. Just remember that if it's big enough to be a common software routine, you can be sure that it will be an integral part of our every day lives in the modern systems we use today.

Until next time

- Thomas

Next week, I'm going to be taking the official Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Web-Based Client Development Certification test (Exam 70-528). I decided that over the next several days, I'll post on what's covered in the current Asp.NET 2.0 framework as well as some tips and tricks to using Visual Studio 2005 for developing web applications. Let's start out with the oh-so-overlooked question: What is a web application?

Web applications started out much simpler than they are today. Just because you can create a full web app in 5 minutes doesn't mean you shouldn't know how it used to be. Before IIS, Apache, Visual Studio and even Eclipse :P

HTTP
HTTP stands for Hypertext Transport Protocol used to transfer or convey information all around the web. While it's original intentions where to transfer documents, it was created for a standard transfer of web-documents (or documents that people could view and transfer with each other in a standard format). Simply put, a client/server technology built on top of TCP/IP.

There are two parts to HTTP. Request and Response. Wherein, the request is coming from the web browser's http handler to the server and the response is coming from the server back to the web browser's http handler. An HTTP request consists of one of 4 methods.

• GET
• POST
• PUT
• DELETE

With a web application you're more likely to only use GET and POST. WebDav is an example that uses PUT and  DELETE.

* In the older days, put and delete were used with web services.

At any rate, you'll find that in any one of these methods the request will look something like this.

GET /index.html HTTP/1.1
HOST: www.vox.com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0
Accept: text/xml,application/xml,application/xhtml+xml,text/html
Accept-Language: en-us
Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate
Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8
Keep-Alive: 300
Connection: Keep-Alive

* Essentially you have the Request line followed by Headers and Cookies.

Alright, that leaves us with the Response.

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Length: 30960 Content-Type: text/html
Content-Location: http://www.vox.com/index.htm
Last-Modified: Mon, 19 Dec 2007 23:29:34 GMT

.....

A header including the response code, cookies and any other metadata about what's being returned. And of course the actual body of the response (i.e. the data we want to receive).

Most HTTP servers back then were designed for returning just static files. When we wanted to do something more interesting, CGI came into play.

CGI  is the Common Gateway Interface. An HTTP server passes the environment off to another process. This all, of course, started out as simple shell scripts like formmail; evolving into using scripting languages like PERL and PHP.

* Interesting tidbit, PERL was created because Larry Wall got tired of doing it in C over and over. Figuring, I'll just write my own language. :P

At any rate, what's going on here when a browser sends an HTTP request to a web server?

The problems that ended up arising in CGI, even with FastCGI, was that it forked a new process for every CGI request. Meaning slow performance due to the CPU forking process (i.e. context switching) and even the communication between the web server and CGI process. Under normal loads, it really doesn't matter since you'll never notice a difference. But it doesn't work so well when you happen to have 100's of logins per second.

After the coming of Java and .NET processing making dynamic web apps were a sinch. Simply because it's one process running using thread pooling instead.

So a quick run-through on the technologies up to this point in time for creating a web application.

1. Transport Protocol (UDP/TCP/VTP/SCTP)
   
2. IP (TCP/IP)
3. HTML
4. HTTP
5. CSS
   
6. XML
7. Thread Pooling
   
8. CPU Processing
9. Port Identification
10. Web Server
11. Interpretive Server Process (CGI/Asp.NET/J2EE/PHP)
12. HTML/XHTML Rendering Engine (Web Browser)

A series of technologies that when bundled together and on top of one another, we're able to create dynamic tools and resources so that information is a) more accessible and b) simpler to use and extend.

So, the next time a Flashy New Web 2.0 application comes out just remember and ask why it was created. We're too often in our industry asking the how's and what-ifs of creating things when we need to be asking whether or not we should do something.

Until next time :D

How a six-month-old startup got bought by Google