I've read about systems which use the Flickr database of photos to fill in gaps in photos (http://blogs.zdnet.com/emergingtech/?p=629).
How feasible is a system like this? I was toying with the idea (not just a way of killing time but as a good addition to something I am coding) of using Flickr to get photos of a certain entity (in this case, race tracks) and reconstruct a model. My biggest concern is that there aren't enough photos of a particular track and even then, it would be difficult to tell if two photos are of the same part of the racetrack, in which case one of them may be irrelevant.
How feasible is something like this? Is it worth attempting by a sole developer?
Sounds like you're wanting to build a Photosynth style system - check out Blaise Aguera y Arcas' demo at TED back in 2007. There's a section about 4 minutes in where he builds a model of the Sagrada Família from photographs.
I say +1 for photosynth answer, its a great tool. Not sure how well you could incorporate it into your own app though.
Its definately feasable. Anything is possible. And yes, doable for a single developer, just depends how much free time you have. It would be great to see something like this integrated into Virtual Earth or Google Maps Street View. Someone who could nail some software like this could help 3D model the entire world based purely on photographs. That would be a great product and make any single developer rich and famous.
So get coding. :)
I have plenty of free time, as I am in between jobs.
One way to do it is to get an overhead view of the track layout, make a blueprint based on this model, and then get one photo of the track and mimic the track's road colour. That would be a start.
LINQ to Flickr on codeplex has a great API and would be helpful for your task.
Related
I'm starting to work with the Google Tango Tablet, hopefully to create (basic) 2D / 3D maps from scanned areas. But first I would like to read as much about the Tango (sensors / API) as I can, in order to create a plan to be as time efficient as possible.
I instantly noticed the ability to learn areas, which is a very interesting concept, nevertheless I couldn't find anything about these so called Area Description Files (ADF).
I know the ADF files can be geographically referenced, that they contain metadata and an unique UUID. Furthermore I know their basic functionalities, but that's about it.
In some parts of the modules ADF files are referred to as 'maps', in other parts they are just called 'descriptions'.
So what do these files look like? Are they already basic (GRID) (2D) maps, or are they just descriptions?
I know there are people who already extracted the ADF files, so any help would be greatly appreciated!
From Tango ADF Doco
Important: Saved area descriptions do not directly record images or
video of the location, but rather contain descriptions of images of
the environment in a very compressed form. While those descriptions
can’t be directly viewed as images, it is in principle possible to
write an algorithm that can reconstruct a viewable image. Therefore,
you must ask the user for permission before saving any of their
learned areas to the cloud or sharing areas between users to protect
the user's privacy, just as you would treat images and video.
Other than that there doesn't seem to be much info about the file internals - I use a lot of them, but I've never been compelled to look inside - curious yes, but not compelled
Without any direct info from the project Tango folks anything we provide would be merely speculation. I'm with Mark, not much compelling reason to get details. My speculation: probably contains a set of image descriptors, like SIFT, and whatever other known device settings are available, like GPS location, orientation (gravity), time(?), etc.
I got the ADF file, basically coded binaries and seems difficult to decode.
I will be happy to share the file if anyone is still interested.
Can anyone recommend a good option to translate websites into Spanish? We tried using the Google translate plugin but the translation was so rough (very inaccurate, bordering on embarrassing the company) we had to hire a company to refine the translation so that it was much more accurate which makes for an extremely inefficient process for updating the site moving forward.
We're in health insurance, so the language we're translating is very specialized in nature and needs to be accurate for our members. To make it even more complicated, the Google Translate plugin happens instantly, so the translation is live before we have a chance to refine it before users can see it. In other words, there's no way to refine the translation before you make the content visible to users in the production environment. This is a legal regulatory requirement for Covered California and the Affordable Care Act, so it has to be a top notch implementation.
Short of a proxy solution that intercepts the content before it hits the production site or a separate site coded in Spanish, I'm not sure what other solutions exist if any. Ideas? The separate site solution is also problematic because it requires a bilingual staff and it doubles the work because both environments have to mirror each other exactly at all times.
Recommendations? Ideas? Any suggestions based on experience are most welcome!
Hire developer - he will describe all you need. You will never do it by your own. If you already have - hire new one, he will know how to do it. Question is very spiciefied but any (let's take for example php) php-engine (framework) or even custom php-engine can be updated the way you want.
Preview before upload to public? Easy! Change by moderator|admin values of translations? Easy! Main thing that each sentence (or even paragraph) you will describe by your own... I don't want describe all mechanism of it - hire developer and he will do all you need. $)
I would like to know as a newbie programmer what the benefits are of using for example google search API or newest buzz API for data content gathering instead of screen scraping; obviously apart from the legal aspects.
API's are less likely to change than a screen layout.
One big downside of screen scraping is that the screen can change and break your scraper. So you end up having to continually adjust your code to match theirs, and since you don't know about changes ahead of time, you suffer downtime/outages as a result.
Also, you may be violating their TOS, and they won't like it. If you have paying customers for your service, you can find yourself between a rock and a hard place pretty quickly.
Also, if you're simulating many users, you'll produce an unanticipated drag on the servers. So using a published/permitted API would be much more efficient for you, and for the web site serving up the source material.
I am looking for some ideas on enhancing a trial-user's user experience when he uses a product for the first time. The product is aimed at a particular domain and has various features/workflows. Experienced users of the product naturally find interesting ways to combine features to get the results they want (somewhat like using an IDE from a programmer's perspective).Trial users get to use all features of the product in a limited fashion (For ex: If there is a search functionality, the trial-user might see only the top 20 results, or he may be allowed to search only a 100 times). My question is: What are the best ways to help a trial-user explore/understand the possibilities of the product in the trial period, especially in the first 20 - 60 mins before the user gives up on the product?
Edit 1: The product is a desktop app (served via JNLP, so no install required) and as pointed out in the comments, the expectations can be different in this case. That said, many webapps do take a virtual desktop form and so, all suggestions are welcome.
Check out how blinksale.com handles this. It's an invoicing app, but to prevent it from looking too empty for a new account, they show static images in places where you'd actually have content if you used the app. Makes it look less barren at first until you get your own data in.
if you can, avoid feature limiting a trial. it stops the user from experiencing what the product is ACTUALLY like. It also prevents a user from finding out if a feature actually works like they want/expect/need it to.
if you have a trial version, and you can, optimise it for first time use. focus on / highlight the features that allow the user to quickly and easily get benefits for useful output from the system.
allow users to export any data they enter into a trial system - and indicate that this is possible/easy. you don't want them to be put off from trying something because of a potential for wasted effort.
avoid users being required to do lots of configuration before using a trial. prepopulate settings based on typical/common/popular settings. you may also want to consider having default settings for different types of usage. e.g. "If you want to see what the system is like for scenario X, use configuration J. If you want to see what the system is like for use case Y, use configuration K." where J & K are collections of settings best suited to a particular type of usage.
I'll speak from personal experience while evaluating trial applications.
The most annoying trial applications are those which keep popping up nag screens or constantly reminding me that I'm using a trial. Trials which act exactly like the real product from the beginning till the end of the trial period are just awesome. Limited features are annoying, the only exception I can think of when you could use it is where you have rarely used feature which would allow people to exploit the trial (by using this "once-in-lifetime" needed feature and uninstalling). If you have for example video editing software trial which puts "trial" watermark on output, I'd uninstall it as soon as I'd notice it. In my opinion trial should seamlessly integrate into user work-flow so that once the trial ends they would think "Hey, I have been using this awesome program almost each day since I got the trial, I absolutely have to buy it." Sure some people will exploit it, but at the end you should target the group which will use your product in daily work-flow instead of one time users. Even if user "trials" it 2 times per year, he will keep coming back to your product and might even buy it after 2nd or 3rd "one-time use".
(Sorry for the wall of the text and rant)
As for how to improve the first session. I usually find my way around programs easily, but one time only pop-up/screen (or with check-box to never show it again) with videos showing off best features and intended work-flow are quite helpful. Also links to sample documents might be helpful. If your application can self-present itself (for example slide-show about the your slide-show program) you could include such document. People don't like to read long and boring help files, but if you have designer in your team, you could ask him to make a short colourful intro pdf. Also don't throw all the features at the user at the same time. Split information into simple categories and if user is interested into one specific category keep feeding him more specific information. That's why videos are so good, with 3-6 x ~3-5 minute videos you can tell a lot. Also depending how complex your program is you could include picture with information where specific things are located on the screen.
Just my personal opinion, I have never made a trial myself. Hope it helps.
An interactive walk through/lab exercise that really highlights the major and exciting offerings of your application.
Example: Yahoo mail does the same when the users opt to use new mail interface
There are so many ways you can go with this. I still can't claim to have found the best approach.
However, my plan from the beginning with my online (Silverlight) software was to give away something thousands of people will find useful and can use for free. The free version is pretty well representative of the professional product, with only a few features missing that enhance productivity (I'm working on those professional features now). And then I do have a nag popup that comes up every 5 minutes suggesting that you should buy it. That popup can be dismissed as many times as you want. I know that popup will annoy some people but I suppose that's the trade off. There is no perfect plan. But I don't think the occasional nag popup scares that many people away, especially when it can be dismissed with a single click.
I was inspired by Balsamiq Mockups, which has been hugely successful over the past couple years. My trial/nag popup way of doing things was copied almost exactly from Balsamiq. I honestly don't know if this is the ideal plan, but it has obviously worked for them. By the way, I think another reason for Balsamiq's success is that the demo doesn't have to be downloaded & installed. Since the demo is in Flash, there's a very high conversion rate of users actually trying it and becoming addicted to it.
I definitely appreciate a good interface and as a developer, I try to create them for my users. But appreciating a good interface and designing one are a different thing. I'm looking for good interfaces (such as IMHO StackOverflow, Gmail) as examples of good UI from which I can model my own UI's.
I personally think that Netflix has an excellent web UI. Responsive, easy to navigate. Not mutch CRUD going on, but I find it very comfortable.
Pretty much anything by google, really. They're all very simple and to the point, focusing on usability.
You should get yourself a copy of both Don't Make Me Think and The Non-Designer's Design Book for your base knowledge/insight.
From there, it's much easier for you to dissect and analyze the layouts you already know and like, and recreate them for your own amusement.
edit: To mitigate misunderstanding, the point I'm trying to make is that you probably don't need as many good examples of nice layouts, if you know what to look for. For example, I can be shown a thousand haute couture dresses, and I still couldn't make one myself, because I don't know what to look for.
My favorites
Stack Overflow: This is a WIKI so it's not a rep point grab. I just really love the interface on this site. Been to too many crappy Q/A sites
Google Reader
MSDN: It's gotten a ton better in recent years and is a great way to grab little esoteric details about various APIs
iStockPhoto.com it's simple, effective and handles a large amount of information and data without getting bogged down. It also doesn't get in the way of the info you are looking for.
A good user interface fulfills a specific need of its users effectively.
As an example, here is a site (translation) that I have created for finding out what food is available in the cafeterias of the University of Helsinki. The typical use case is that when a student is hungry, he needs to know what food is available in the neighborhood student cafeterias (which are cheap for students), so that he can choose where to eat and what. He knows where each of those cafeterias is, but does not know what food they have today.
That site shows all the needed information at once. Because the students typically have a couple of cafeterias where they go, they can either bookmark the page with those cafeterias selected, or save the selection as a cookie. After that they can reach their goal without any navigation on the web site.
I don't use it on a day-to-day basis, but I'm very impressed with the Perseus Project digital library.
Here's a link to a poem from Catullus' Carmina in Latin as an example of the interface. Some features that I really like:
Click on the bar near the top to jump to any poem in the work. Larger chunks of the bar represent larger sections of the work (poems, chapters, however that particular work is logically broken up by the author).
Click on a Latin word in the poem to bring up a window (be patient; it seems to take a while) with lexicon entries, user voting and statistics on the word form (i.e. what the inflection means in the context of the sentence; it can be ambiguous in Latin) and so forth.
There are a number of resources down the right column, including various English translations, notes, references, etc. Any of them can be either shown in the right column, or swapped out with whatever is in the main content area in the center.
One of my personal favs: newspond.com