Web 2.0 Vegetables
By roystahl | May 7, 2008
There were some ideas worth harvesting at the 2.0 expo. Some of the demos of Flex using actionscript 3.0 where very good. One that I really liked included a network topography and zoom window on the size that was very classy. I had thought of this before for Plangarden, but now that I have seen it work effectively, I am very excited about how it can help gardeners navigate their gardens.
Also in the ripe vegetable catagory was some applications that integrated flash/databases and video. Here you could see where Web 2.0 was going and some future success stories.
I was able to dig up some dirt on a few companies that are potential partners for vegetable gardening plans and designs. Real solutions that will help gardeners get the most out of an online applicaiton. But for now we will need to look at one plant at a time and make sure we pick the right ones to partners with.
Topics: Vegetable Software News | No Comments »
Sorting vegetables from weeds at Web 2.0 expo
By roystahl | April 29, 2008
Trade shows are filled with eye-candy and slick pitches. The trick is to sort through the marketing hype and get to what is real. What makes Web 2.0 expo also unique is most of these companies haven’t been around for more than a few years at best and many launched at the show. MANY will not be there next year.
Weeds:
Microsoft Silverlight is still a weed. If you are into video and cute stuff. Develop with a team of designers and programmer, then it might be a beautiful tomato for you, but for RIA it is a weed. I hack for a development environment. A weak set of back-end hooks into a real database.
Intel Mash Maker - What a sad weed Intel is growing. It is a browser plug in - first barrier to entry is when you have to download a plug-in. Next it only works in Firefox. I know of some browser limiations what would make what they are doing near impossible in IE, when I asked a few probing questions, I got dirt thrown at me. I brought up some logistical issues (You could use the plug-in to cover-up website ads) and was told that “Users aren’t suppose to do that” Hmm Intel might have to learn the hard way that users will do what they want, not what they are suppose to.
… To be continued … If you want to see more of what I thought of web 2.0 expo, you will need to say tuned. I might pull up some more weeds. I might disclose my garden picks for ripe vegetables.
Topics: Vegetable Software News | No Comments »
Plangarden at Web 2.0 Expo
By roystahl | April 28, 2008
Last week I went to Web 2.0 Expo. Very different than a gardening show. Although at the end, some people looked like vegetables.
It was great to see some of the companies that I work with and looked into APIs that I will consider in the future.
When the show started I went to Adobe to see what they were doing with Flash. It was disapointing since they had only a partner booth. They were showing off how their products were used by other and I am sure people that help them pay for the booth were allowed to demo their use of Adobe in their booth. There was no large presence of Adobe demos of their tools and technology. Fortunately for them, Microsoft and Silverlight were equally poor. Silverlight is on the way up, but even at the end of summer they are going to be a few steps behind Adobe. I heard from the floor that people are impressed with thier video, but I am looking ad the RIA abilities which are very weak from Silverlight and spread between two programs.
Of course as a gardener, I went through the show row by row harvesting only the information that was ripe. I will have more to write about this show through out this week as I continue to work on the code and reflect on the Web 2.0 expo.
Topics: Vegetable Software News | No Comments »
Plangarden 2.0 alpha code in the wild
By roystahl | March 26, 2008
Finally it was time to stop talking and start showing people all the great improvements that are in Plangarden 2.0.
While still not feature complete, what is there is pretty solid and getting better now by the day. From here out the pace of developing actionscript code will hit break-neck speeds. The nice thing about putting it out in the wild is it gets it out of its protective sand-box and lets some of the kinks get worked out.
Everytime I go back and have to use the old software, I cringe. I am happy with the new product and the direction it has taken. From the first set of feedback, it looks like other are too. Today printing made it to the next level with all the new abilities hitting on all cylinders. There was also more traction on the web 2.0 features and they are starting to take off too.
Topics: ActionScript 3 | No Comments »
Vegetable garden site goes web 2.0
By roystahl | March 16, 2008
Plangarden.com has always been geared toward being a web 2.0 site. The vegetable garden software and data is online and the Googles map mash-up allows gardeners to see neighboring gardens.
Now there are the more distinctive Web 2.0 features which allows users to comment and rate gardens. Along with that you can create a “Watch list” and see when fellow gardeners are planting tomatoes, brocolli or other garden favorites. You might also learn some garden secrets that are specific to your location.
More and more people are turning toward vegetable gardens at home. There are many reasons to do this, rising fuel costs makes shipping in vegetables expensive, safety scares of eccoli in spinach and salads, and of course my favorite - Great taste and super fresh vegetable and herbs.
Now Plangarden allows people to start gardening and to learn from the people around them. There is no better experience than local experience in gardening. What might work in Chicago may not be a good idea in Austin. Even San Francisco and Half Moon Bay that are 30 miles appart have different growning concerns for vegetable gardens.
Already people are enjoying the new web 2.0 features in Plangarden.
Topics: Vegetable Software News | No Comments »
