Serval ProjectTag Archives

Google – can it compete with Facebook? Or anyone besides search engines?

Image via Wikipedia

Farhad Manjoo has this article running atm : Google+ had a chance to compete with Facebook. Not anymore. – Slate Magazine.

It got me thinking. Look, i love Google+. It is the same rush of intense gratitude for a service I had when first using Facebook, before it becoame so big and monstrous (all things to all people works for some, not me, and that’s ok). Google+ combines that with the integration of its other services. Wonderful. And blessed shock, for once, the interface is good. Not great, but good. Damning with faint praise.

I have written often on how, from a developer pov (and a user who wants so much to embrace their products), their UI is woeful, and they could benefit hugely from feedback from both developers and users there. I have an iPhone4. My husband has the Samsung Galaxy 2. I look at it, and admire it, but I wouldn’t swap for the world, and he is NOT enjoying Android – but I can see how much the iOS would suit him. I have tried living in Android world, I have had Android handsets, and always gone back to iOS. And I WANT to live in a Googleverse. But Apple UI beats them hands down – and I know of others working in Android who regretfully feel the same way. (Often they are people who care about UI and the user experience too).

But being a developer in Android, I know how hard it is to get Google to take feedback. By hard, I mean damn impossible. They are like a black box – feedback goes in, their own ideas come out. And we at the Serval Project want to work with them – they have teams working on similar ideas to us in mesh networking.It has been interesting at the IEEE 802 PLenary how many people say the same thing about Google being hard to connect to, to work with. And that is a pity. Because we get technical genius that misses the need – Wave, Buzz. They brush it off as learning, and integrate useful bits. But that is expensive, and alienates users. The more they do that, the more cynical people are about their products, and the further behind they are.

So in reading Farhad’s article, I so want to disagree with him, I really do. But he is probably right, because Google hasn’t learned that lesson yet.

But if you ever are Google – let’s talk.

Bits Blog: Google+ Isn’t Going Anywhere (bits.blogs.nytimes.com)
“There’s nothing to do on Google+, and every time someone figures out a possible use for it, Google…” (stoweboyd.com)
Why we shouldn’t be so quick to write Google+ off (gigaom.com)
The War Between Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple (npr.org)

timelady

November 11, 2011

Android, Apple, Google, IEEE, iPad/iPhone, Serval, Social Networks

0 comments

Android, Apple, Facebook, Farhad Manjoo, Google, IOS (Apple), Serval Project, Slate

What has been going on in Serval land?

Well, one of the biggest things happening atm, on a purely personal level, has been putting in a proposal to the Shuttleworth Foundation for funding of my deep involvement with IEEE processes, on behalf of Serval. I am doing this as part of a scholarship that will enable me to get my PhD, and (hopefully) have huge benefits for Serval. As my cofounder, and general driving force/brains trust says on HIS blog :

Serval is going to Atlanta

Well, Romana (co-founder of Serval Project) is. And that is because she will be representing the Serval Project’s interests at the IEEE 802 plenary meeting there in just a couple of weeks (November 2011).

Romana will be putting forward use cases that reveal deficiencies in the current 802.11 family of WiFi standards for mesh and ad-hoc communications.

If all goes well, we may have the opportunity to input into a process of looking to address these issues, which is tremendously exciting for us.

via Enabling Communications, Anywhere, Anytime.

IEEE, Serval, Serval Project

The lure of Ada

Image via Wikipedia

Ada was my second programming language. I had used Basic on CP/M to do many things, pushing my Amstrad CPC 6128 well beyond its comfort zone. I went on to PCs, and finally ended up at Flinders University (the observant reader has noticed The Serval Project is based there, yes, it is a homecoming to be there). At the time, Java was still regarded as ‘new’ (oh, so many years ago). SO we did a modified version of ADA 83 – not even the modern, Object Oriented ADA of today, but an older, and still more simplified version. Verbose as anything, I actually quite LIKED this language. Though i would have preferred Java, to be honest. But it got me curious – ADA is such an odd name. And I discovered, pre Wikipedia, what ADA was named after.

Yes, ADA is an American Defence language, but it is named after the first programmer ever – Lady Ada Augusta Lovelace , only legitimate child of Lord Byron, that cad and poet.

A great and gifted mathematician, she contributed a set of notes containing an algorithm for Charles Babbage‘s Differential Engine – regarded as the first computer. Should it have been built, these notes would have been run as the first program.

As a woman doing work in an industry i utterly love, that inspires me, and delights me daily, how can i not admire her? Like many of us, a working mother, she managed to combine her passion and her intellect with a family – no easy task at any point, but in her time, almost unheard of! So, i take time out to honour her memory, and be inspired by her, and all the wonderful talented women out there working in our amazing industry, and to hope many more join!

Ada Lovelace Day 2011 has begun! (thefword.org.uk)
iTWire – Every cellphone a Serval phone in five year, developer claims (servalproject.org)

timelady

October 7, 2011

Blogging, Events, History, Internet Technology, Science Knowledge

0 comments

ADA, Amstrad CPC, Flinders UNiversity, java, Lord Byron, Programming, Serval, Serval Project, Wikipedia

Photos and Update from Nigeria

A blog post from my cofounder and personal visionary at The Serval Project, Dr Paul Gardner-Stephen….

Photos and Update from Nigeria – and introduction to Rhizome | Enabling Communications, Anywhere, Anytime.

Serval, Serval Project

And over at my other home…

As i am now working on this amazing project, expect cross linking. Here is a picture of me ‘flying’ in my wheelchair. I love a good optical illusion, especially one with me in it!

The Serval Project » Levitation potential….