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I talked about it in my previous blog posts. I worked on it during the last two months. Then the new Talk Digger website is released. |
I will call this version Beta 2.0. In fact, I would call it the Beta 1.0 considering that the first version of Talk Digger was in reality an Alpha one. Everything is new: the underlying system, the interface, the design, the RSS feed, etc. Why do I re-programmed/re-designed everything? Because I wanted to get rid of the first mistakes I have done in the previous version; I wanted to design it in such a way that it would be a good base to extend it in a new type of service (that I will develop in the next months).
So, what is new in this version?
1. I designed a more traditional search engine layout. This one is much simpler than the previous one. I wanted to make Talk Digger simple (but not simpler!). I tried to make it more intuitive for new users.
2. Much more results are displayed by Talk Digger (between 10 to 20 depending on the search engine).
3. Some new search engines: Google Blog and Yahoo!
4. I added a really great feature to the system (thanks to Tom Sherman for the idea): the PageRank of each returned results by Talk Digger is displayed beside the title of the items. This is really great because it gives trustable information about each result: what is its popularity and credibility on the Internet.
5. New options have been added to the system. Now you can specify the maximum number of results you want to view per search engine. You can sort the results with the most recent entries first or with the highest PageRank first.
6. I created a hotkeys system that helps users with the usability and navigation of the website.
7. The tracking RSS feed system is now formatted using RSS 1.0 instead of RSS 2.0. I briefly explained why in that previous post.
8. All the duplicated results (the same article returned by two different search engines) are deleted (only one will be displayed). You also have the option to exclude results with the same domain name as the searched URL’s.
9. It works on IE/FireFox/Safari/Opera on both PC and MAC. The entire website is XHTML1.0 Strict and CSS validated.
10. A new slogan: “You talk, we dig!” (thanks to Bora Ung)
I also created a “Tour” section that show how Talk Digger works:
- Dig for a conversation
- Automatically track a conversation with a RSS feed
- Change your options
- Use hotkeys
- Use the bookmarklet
What is the near future of Talk Digger?
During the next month, I will work improving Talk Digger with the feedbacks from users; but I will also check the possibility to broadcast the TD results in RDF and/or OWL. That way, other services would be able to gather and understand the computed results returned by Talk Digger and being able to do want they want with the information (a first step into the semantic web…). I am currently designing the RDF Schemas (and the OWL ontology) that will describe the Talk Digger results. However I am not sure that I will open such a service right now (considering the network infrastructure it would need and my current lack of money).
In fact, it would be the first step to test Talk Digger as a Semantic Web service. The next phase of its development will go even further in that direction (it’s the goal).
What is The future of Talk Digger?
Two lines of research: (1) semantic web and (2) semantic analysis/management of web documents.
So, this is what is happening right now with Talk Digger.
Do not hesitate to contact me is you have any questions, comments or suggestions about that new version of Talk Digger: it is always greatly appreciated.
I would like to thank Tom Sherman, Jeff Nolan and Matthew Hurst for their comments and suggestions about this new version of Talk Digger. I would also like to thank Suzanne Morel at Les Graphoides for this totally new graphical design and the time she spent working, re-working and re-re-working on the graphics as my mind changed.
I hope you like this new Talk Digger version and find it as useful as I.
Technorati: Talkdigger | conversation | social | web2.0 | rss | semantic | web | Technorati | Bloglines | icerocket | feedster | icerocket | blogdigger | google | yahoo | msnsearch |
John
December 12, 2005 — 6:41 pm
Fred,
This looks great!! Good work!! Can’t wait to see what’s next!!
Fred
December 13, 2005 — 9:18 am
Hi John!
Thanks for these kind words! Happy to see that you like that new version.
Salutations,
Fred
Hugh
December 13, 2005 — 9:52 am
Fred, Talkdigger’s new version is even better than the first. It’s very fast and easy, and it looks good too. You must have put a ton of work into it. Thanks from a regular user. Hugh
Simon Sanschagrin
December 13, 2005 — 10:36 am
Hi Fred,
Congratulations for your totally new version of Talkdigger.com. The design is great and I like the search engine layout.
Salutations
Simon
Amit Agarwal
December 13, 2005 — 11:36 pm
The RSS feature is simply amazing.
I had earlier subscribed to multiple feeds from Technorati, Yahoo and other blog search engines.
Thank you TalkDigger, they are all in the Trash Bin now.
Fred
December 14, 2005 — 12:04 pm
Hi,
Thanks to you all for these kind words. It is really appreciated and help me to continue in that direction. I am really happy to read comments here and other posts on the Blogsphere; people seem to like the service and even more: finding it useful (it is the most important, isn’t?).
In fact, the first version was somewhat… bizzard(?)… but I think that with this new version and this new design, people really seem to understand what Talk Digger is all about and how it can help them searching the Internet.
Thanks!
Salutations,
Fred
guoshuang
December 17, 2005 — 12:27 pm
talk digger is great.but something bug at new window bookmarlet.
u now new win bookmarklet is:
javascript:q=escape(location.href);if(q)window.open(‘http://www.talkdigger.com/index.php?surl=’+q);
but this will return “object window” in original browser window.
u should modified it to:
javascript:(function(){q=escape(location.href);if(q)window.open(‘http://www.talkdigger.com/index.php?surl=’+q);})();
Tired of using void to catch return values? If you put the statement (function(){…})() around your code it is encapsulated so you automatically catch all return values. The (function(){…}) part creates a nameless function. The () part runs it.
Fred
December 17, 2005 — 12:52 pm
Hi guoshuang,
Really good point! Thanks for that modification, I just changed it on the bookmarklet page, thanks!
Salutations,
Fred