The magic of blogging; the pleasure of writing – Personal communications: the underground of blogs

Frederick Giasson

Blogging bring me an unexpected thing. This is the possibility to correspond with really interesting persons. I’m not talking of meeting people on chat system or contact websites. No no no; I’m talking of the old way of correspondence, like 10 or 15 years ago when one of the only services available was emails: the reflected writing, not the writing on the fly.

What I have underestimated is that when a person blog, he’ll share is view of world; his passions; a hobby; his life, etc. If a blogger write about a specific thing, it’s because that he have joy by writing on it, otherwise he would not do it. If a person read his posts, it’s probably because he shares the same view of the world; the same passions; the same hobby or lived the same things. Otherwise, he would not read it. This specific situation is the catalyst of future conversions. They will try too deepening the subjects, off the blog, by email. Then you just enter in the underground of blogs. However, you need to take in count that this situation will only happen with the will of the read; if he initiates the conversion. If the conversation is initiated then things will emerge from them. Then new idea will be written by the bloggers for future readers, etc, etc, etc. You see the cycle? Is this not so beautiful? This is just a way to humans to search for new ideas and concepts in conversations; but in this case, with the help of a new technology.

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New version of MSN Search – Some cool innovations in the engine

Frederick Giasson


New version of MSN Search
Some cool innovations in the engine

Microsoft just released the new version of MSN search. I was using the beta version since some months. I’m really impressed by the work they done. They started from scratch and do this in 2 or 3 years (don’t remember the exact numbers). His look and options make him look like Google; but he is not. One of the main features of a search is that you have the power of how you want to perform your search. All indexed links are composed of 3 new characteristics: the update frequency, the popularity and the accuracy of the match. You have many more power on the result you’ll get. The one I particularly like is the popularity tag. The problem with Google is that most of the time you always have the same 10 or 20 first results; always on the same sites. If you want an obscure website, you need to scroll 500 pages. But with the popularity tag, you can put it at 0 and you’ll have all the obscure sites you want. This search flexibility is the real innovation for this type of search engine. It gives more power in the users’ hands. How can you change them? Click on the “search builder” then click on the “results ranking” tab and you’ll got it. There are also other cool features like the integration of Encarta entries in your search results.

A new feature that is not essential but is so cool is the RSS search feature. You can build a query like this:

http://search.msn.com/news/results.aspx?q=SEARCHTAG&;format=rss

SEARCHTAG is the search query string. Replace it by “moleskine”, put it in your RSS reader and check the result.

Finally there are many other cool things. You just have to play with it and read the help section. It’s sure that it’s not ease to change your searching habits but I just tell you to try it for some searches, and after some you?ll know if you like it or not.

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To my RSS feed subscribed readers

Frederick Giasson


To my RSS feed subscribed readers

This is a little post at the attention of my few RSS feed subscribed readers. It’s only to let you know that I signed up for a feedburner account. Why? Because it gives me a permanent feed address. What it mean? It’s mean that if I change the feed’s address of my blog I’ll be able to update it without my readers knowing it. It’s a more than important feature in my case because I’ll go to India in half a year and I don’t want to lose any of you. The situation is that “Fred On Something”(the Radio version) will be frozen for about 6 months at that time (I can’t blog with Radio on the road without my laptop). So what I’ll probably do is to put my posts on another place (then update the feed on feedburner) and come back to Radio after the trip. It’s what I think I’ll do (but I have the time to change my idea if I find another possibility). However, does anybody have another idea to help me resolve my future problem?

There is the feedburner link: http://feeds.feedburner.com/FredOnSomething

Please update your feed readers ๐Ÿ™‚

Introduction to XML concepts – A way to share knowledge and information

Frederick Giasson


Introduction to XML concepts
A way to share knowledge and information

This is a small post on the concept behind XML. This is a non technical article that can be read by anybody interesting in information sharing technologies.

What is XML? It’s a language used to organize information. Any written information can be organized with XML. It can be a documents or an article; it can be a database, etc. The whole concept resides in the fact that XML detach the content of a document with the way to display it on a specific support (on a screen or a printer for example). Then information and information display become two completely separated things. XML is a portability system for data, independent of the display system. This is the equivalent of Java for data description.

By this fact, the exchanges of data between two completely different systems become really ease. The source of information doesn’t need to care of the way the destination will display the information. They only need to care about the way they will ship the information; how they will package it to be understandable by the destination. This concept of information sharing language is used by many systems to communicate one between the other.

We’ll take Amazon as an example. There are 4 agents that share information in the system. There is the client that will buy products on Amazon. There is Amazon, the seller, who needs to buy stock at his supplier. Then the supplier needs to buy his stock to the editors. All these agents need to communicate with information of all kinds. Many types of systems, using different technologies, are implicated in the process of a single transaction. We need to be sure that the destination agent will see the same thing that you see and have the same information. Without a technology like XML it would be virtually impossible to be sure of this fact. But with it, you simply don’t care of the information’s display and you only develop a DTD (Document Type Definition) with the other agents you interact with.

Another example that you use everyday if you are reading this post is RSS feeds. They are XML documents generated by software that need to share some type of information. All RSS feeds have the same DTD. Then when you receive the information, you can display it the way you wish the view it. You can display it on your MyMSN homepage, in your browser. You also can display it on a stand alone feed reader like Omea Reader or FeedDemon.

Finally the main and only concept of XML is really simple and can be written in a single sentence: XML detach the content with his display. This simple sentence of 7 words had changed the way system communicate one between the other.

On Analog Blog reactions

Frederick Giasson


On Analog Blog reactions

I got some good feedbacks [1][2][3][4]; I got some critics [1][2]; but all are constructive. It’s exactly why I love blogging: it stimulate communications and debates. This post has one purpose: clarify my previous post on Analog Blog.

What I described is a way to link thoughts, ideas and information together. I tried to use the blog concept with papers notes (notebooks, journal, diary; anything that is made of paper) and writing to know if the concepts can be used for this purpose. So, using Moleskines to do my demonstration was a fantasy, nothing much.

If you think that the idea is crazy then it’s your choice and I respect it. But try to tell this to an archivist or an historian. I also can give you a challenge: try to find a specific information in your university courses notes. I personally have over 1500 handwritten sheets, containing many type of information, in around 30 file cabinets. It’s virtually impossible to find anything in a reasonable time without any classification system (and I’m not talking of my 2500 printed sheets of all kinds). I recently talked with a guy that done a master in history. He had a fantastic archiving system to class his reading and to easily recover information in his sources. It was far more crazy that this little “analog blog” system. Was he crazy? Certainly not; it was more than essential for his work.

Yeah computers revolutionize the way we work today. Personal computers are one of the most famous inventions of the 20e century. Personally I never used my laptop in a course. It just doesn’t do the job for me. When I looked at my fellows with their laptops, I never saw them using it for the course but to chat and read forums posts.

I also want to answer to this blogger (thank for your post, it was relevant)

“This strikes me as obviously silly. A blog is, and to be a blog pretty much has to be, a hypertext document displayed on a computer with an internet connection.

The connection is the key to a blog, allowing you to surf away from the blog using its links, and then to surf away from those links, using theirs. The possibility of a non–self–referential, chaotic surf. When you write, however creatively, in a notebook, what you have is — a notebook. Repeat: a notebook. Not a blog. A notebook. Lots of paper? Writing? Hard covers? No USB port? Ah yes, that’ll be a notebook.”

Who say that a link, is necessary an HTML hyperlink on internet? A link is basically a relation between two things. It can be two websites, but it can also be two trains’ stations, two ideas, two people and two airports. All these associations are links. There are systems in place to use these links. It can be a social network, an airport fly system or the internet. Why do I need an internet connection to surf from link to link? Blog is nothing much then a way to display information. The links and the information contained in them are supported by other technologies, mostly derived from XML. A blog is nothing more than this… a way to present information. It’s dull doesn’t it? But the concept of blog, not the electronic implementation we know today, is really more then this. I’ll refer you to this post; read the linked article and you’ll understand a little more on what I want to say about blog’s concept. You need to see distinction between Blogs and the concept of Blogs; they are two things.

It was a little clarification on the purpose of my Analog Blog post.