So having just installed IE8 beta 2 today I thought I'd have a go at creating a Webslice for my blog...Turns out it's pretty easy, and I was even able to put a version of the Popfly mashup from my last post in my preview (added my blog's logo to make the slice a bit more visually appealing - clearly I missed my vocation as a designer). Since it uses a mashup, it has active content (e.g. javascript) so as a result I needed to use an Alternative Display Source.
For background, my first attempt below only showed the text "The things I write here..." etc. but not the Popfly mashup:
<div class="hslice" id="ronang-news-webslice"> <p class="entry-title">Ronan Geraghty's Blog</p> <div class="entry-content"> <iframe style='width:100%; height:280px' src='http://www.popfly.com/users/ronang/NewsWebSlice.small'
frameborder='no' allowtransparency='true'></iframe> <p>The things I write here represent my own opinions. I always value your feedback in the post comments, or to my
Inbox via the <a href="http://blogs.msdn.com/ronang/contact.aspx">Contact</a> link. </p> </div></div>
But, using an Alternative Display Source is pretty easy - this is all I needed to add to my site:
<div class="hslice" id="NewsWebSlice"> <p class="entry-title">RonanG's News</p> <a class="entry-content" rel="entry-content" href="http://www.popfly.com/users/ronang/NewsWebSlice.small" /> </div>
(I know what you're thinking - why isn't the alternate display source another page on my site which has the Popfly mashup embedded, but I don't have that luxury since this is an MSDN-hosted blog and I'm limited in what I can change - using another page on my blog pulls in the whole theme of my blog which is too large for the Webslice preview).
And here's what my webslice looks like:
Clicking any link opens a new tab in IE 8. There's more that could be done with controlling updates and notifications, but it's getting late, and I'm not that prolific a blogger so I'll just use the default update schedule of 24 hours for now and maybe do some more tweaking later...before I finish I just want to make one more point:
Obviously this is all backed by the RSS feed off my blog so you could justifiably say it's a bit of a contrived example - however, don't forget that the webslice is using a popfly mashup, which is active content - so clearly you can have some more compelling content within your slice.
Also I'm somewhat restricted in what content from my blog I can show in my webslice...if it's your own website and you have full control over a page's code (HTML, javascript plus ASP.NET/PHP/whatever) then you can take it to the next level - ebay's webslice being a case in point:
For example, if I had full control to write code, rather than using the RSS feed I might query my blog engine directly for recent posts which are tagged with "Developer", and show only those in my webslice - but hopefully you get the idea how easy it is to add a webslice to any site, even a blog :-)
Other examples that spring to mind would be airline seat sales, hotels with special offers, breaking news for a newspaper's online presence and so on.
For some more webslices, check out http://www.ieaddons.com/en/webslices/
Just dropped Adam Nathan's recent news Popfly gadget onto my blog, and it's extremely easy to use it for any blog that has an RSS feed...Just open his original project at http://www.popfly.com/users/Adam/Recent%20Posts and Tweak it to point it to your RSS feed of choice, then save as your own project.
Then you need to click the Share button to share it, which pops up the following UI:
Finally, click the Embed button to get the html you need to stick on your page. Here's what mine looks like:
<iframe style='width:500px; height:375px;' src='http://www.popfly.com/users/ronang/Recent%20Posts.small' frameborder='no' allowtransparency='true'></iframe>
Easy!
Great feature, new in beta 2 :-) Performance of the javascript engine has been a major focus for IE 8, and it also gives you the tools to ensure that the javascript on your site is optimised. By using the profiler you can figure out where you're spending most time.
Below is a snapshot of a profiling session run against my blog's default page, in Functions view - within this view you can sort by e.g. Count (# times called), but I particularly like the Call Tree view so you can see the cumulative top-level time then drill down from there, (second screenshot below):
I just spent a couple of weeks in Switzerland and one of the highlights was a (two-stage) cable car ride up to Les Diablerets at an altitude of 3000m. The below Deep Zoom collection consists of a partial panorama plus detail of the halfway cable car station perched on an outcrop.
At the time I didn't take a systematic approach to taking the photos (which would have allowed a full panorama), but I still think the below does a good job of conveying the views of the valley below (bottom left corner is where the first leg of the cable car ride began) and the glacier to the right-hand side.
You can zoom in to see some more detail of the cable car station - those more detailed views were taken as I travelled down in the cable car.
This is my first use of Deep Zoom and having done it once I have a much better idea of what to bear in mind when taking snaps in future to make the most of it (e.g. the cables in the below make it difficult to achieve a truly seamless look, but I'm sure glad they were there ;-))
It's really easy to put something like this together - all you need is Deep Zoom Composer, and a Silverlight Streaming account if you want to put it e.g. on your blog. Note that I exported as a collection rather than as a composition which is a static image - still pretty cool for creating panoramic images by stitching them together though.
I reckon we have some great spots in Ireland/Northern Ireland which would show up great in a collection - if you've already put a collection together, or have any suggestions, let me know!
What an exciting week this has been! Photosynth has been fully released by Microsoft Live Labs this morning.
If you’re not familiar with Photosynth, it is a cool piece of technology which takes a collection of photographs and uses them to build a 3D scene or object based on analysis of the photographs. The Photosynth site has had several videos as well as a tech preview for people to take a closer look at the technology. But now the application is released, and you can install Photosynth and create your own synths.
To view some of the synths that have already been created, visit the Explore page. Note that all synths are uploaded (and they’re quite large, so you do need a broadband Internet connection) and all synths are public, so anything you upload will be visible to everyone on the web.
The Photosynth application is downloadable here. It runs on Window XP and Vista, and will also run on Windows on a Mac, but only under Boot Camp. You can use IE or Firefox to view the synths in the browser.
How can I learn more?
Have some cool pictures and want to create a cool 3D experience? Go check it out. There’s already at least one Irish Photosynth of Kerry: http://photosynth.net/install.aspx?cid=63f4ed9a-aa31-4475-a732-6d20793ab722&vc=false It’s a gorgeous view of hills and fields around Kerry (and it clearly wasn’t taken in our recent rainy weather!). What’s next!?
For this episode of the Microsoft Ireland Podcast, I describe the new features and updates in Internet Explorer 8. IE 8 Beta 1 came out earlier this year, and we’re eagerly awaiting the next version. This podcast tells you a bit about what you can expect from both developer and consumer points of view, including new developer tools, web slices, activities, and standards compliance.
Thanks to t r y ^ d for the use of their music.
Resources for further information:
Internet Explorer Home: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/ie/ie8/default.mspx
IE Team Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/ie
Internet Explorer Developer Center on MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/ie/default.aspx
Install IE 8 Beta 1 Now: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/ie/ie8/getitnow.mspx
Now available – download the [wma] or [mp3] version.
Between TechReady in Seattle (an internal technical conference, think of it as Tech Ed for Microsoft folks) followed by holidays I've been out of the office for the last month, during which there has been many interesting happenings, including
Also of interest to be above would be the latest Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Feature Pack, including:
You can download the Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Feature Pack for August 2008 here
Last but not least, my last post on this blog sparked an interesting series of comments regarding Silverlight which I will address in a followup post - good to know people are reading!
I’ve blogged a bit before about Live Mesh and how cool it is. Up until now it has been available as a Tech Preview only in the USA, the UK, Australia and New Zealand.
Today I’m pleased to announce that Live Mesh is now available in Ireland. Ireland, along with India and Canada, joins the expanding list of countries with Live Mesh availability, as shown in this map on Virtual Earth.
If you’re not yet convinced about the Live Mesh platforms, there are some great videos on Channel 9 to help explain it. Just search for “Live Mesh”on Channel 9. The Live Mesh team also has a great blog with lots of information about the platform and its capabilities. Try it out, and definitely let me know your feedback.
I should mention that my sources say because it’s a Tech Preview, there is still a limit to how many users can be admitted to the program. But if you sign up fast, you won’t have to worry about any delays or wait lists for access to Live Mesh.
Okay, how do I sign up?
To get signed up for Live Mesh, go to http://www.mesh.com to get started.
Any online video content I can check out?
There are several video resources for further information. Check out:
For this episode of the Microsoft Ireland Podcast, I talk about some recent initiatives inside of Microsoft for PHP developers, many of which don’t get nearly the publicity they deserve. I discuss the latest release of Expression Web 2 which includes support for PHP pages, the PHP for Microsoft AJAX Library on Codeplex.com, and the sweet benefits of hosting your PHP applications on Windows Server 2008.
Expression Web 2 (free trial download): http://www.microsoft.com/expression/products/Overview.aspx?key=web
Codeplex: http://www.codeplex.com
Microsoft AJAX Library: http://www.asp.net/ajax/downloads/
PHP for Microsoft AJAX Library: http://www.codeplex.com/phpmsajax
Dave Northey’s Blog: http://blogs.technet.com/daven
Yesterday Microsoft released its .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1. It is now available for download here: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=124150. The new version of the framework includes:
This is big news, but alongside that comes another free download from the Developer Division, the .NET 3.5 Enhancements Training Kit. The Training Kit has been updated to work with Visual Studio 2008 SP1 and .NET 3.5 SP1, and includes presentations, demos and labs.
The presentations include:
The demos include:
And the hands-on labs include:
There is a ton of content in the kit, and it’s not an enormous download for all the training that is included. Check it out and let me know if you have any questions or issues with it.
The
For folks who haven't yet registered for the PDC, this week is the time to do so! If you register before August 15th, you'll save $200 on your conference ticket. This is a great deal, and the PDC will certainly sell out shortly after so get your ticket now to avoid disappointment.
If you haven't checked out the PDC site lately, check it out to see all the great sessions which are now listed there. There are sessions on Silverlight, ASP.NET, Visual Studio, VSTS, Cloud Services (lots!), Unified Communications, Live Platform, WPF, and tons more. It's going to be a great week in Los Angeles, so don't miss out.
And another new thing on their site - the social section. Follow PDC 2008 on Facebook, Twitter & Flickr. And if you're going, check out http://microsoftpdc.com/Social/Bling.aspx for some nice bling like the below for your blog to let everyone know where they can find you from October 27th - 30th.
For more information, see: http://microsoftpdc.com/Default.aspx and register for your seat today.
Curious about your website visitor statistics? Want a free solution?
Microsoft’s adCenter Analytics (formerly Project Gatineau) is currently in beta but has some excellent functionality now that you can use just by filling out the registration form here: http://advertising.microsoft.com/advertising/adcenter-analytics-registration (note: you do not need to be an adCenter customer or anything like that to check out Analytics).
I have had Analytics running on my blog for several months now and it’s pretty great. The visualizations are really nice, and I have lots of options around selecting what type of data interests me, who my visitors are and where they’re coming from, and of course what brings people to my site in the first place.
One of my favourite features of Analytics is the “Treemap Referrals View.” This is a visualization for a given timeframe which shows me the searches folks performed to find my site. I can mouse over the different blocks to get an overview of what people are searching for and what things bring the most people to my blog. In the example below which is taken from my June 2008 traffic, I can see that lots of people come to my blog for things like “silverlight” and “martha rotter.” Those I’d probably expect given that that is my name and a topic I frequently blog about. What is surprising is that someone also managed to find my blog using the search term “Dublin lightning!” :-)
I also like that I can drill down into referring websites and see how much traffic they’re bringing me, what types of people, and why they are coming to the site. For example, in the below image, I can see that exactly one person visited my blog during July from cuil.using the search for “Silverlight datagrid.” This comes from the “Inbound Referrals” functionality in Analytics.
I have used a wide variety of analytics engines on my sites over the last ten or so years, and they have become much more mature and sophisticated since I started creating websites. They also provide a lot more data and functionality and take a bit of time to get familiar with. So I’m still learning about some of the features of Analytics, but I’ll blog about them as I go and let you know what else is good and bad.
If you want more information, a great place to start is the adCenter Analytics page, which gives some overviews of features and shows screen shots and more information. That page is here: http://advertising.microsoft.com/search-advertising/adcenter-analytics
Another excellent source of information, including some feature deep dives, is the adCenter Analytics blog here: http://adcentercommunity.com/blogs/analytics/.
For this episode of the Microsoft Ireland podcast, I sat down with David Szabo. David is an Engagement Manager at Microsoft Consulting Services here in Ireland. Today he talks to us about Office Communications Server, what it is and how development with OCS works. This podcast is a bit longer than most of the other ones we’ve done so far, but it’s really worth it, as David talks about some really cool uses for Office Communications Server and even wrote some demos to showcase its features. OCS has a lot of great features developers can take advantage of, and David gives us information on how to get started.
David Szabo’s Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/dszabo/default.aspx
David’s article on Introduction to Speech Server Development: http://blogs.msdn.com/dszabo/archive/2008/07/04/microsoft-office-communications-server-2007-speech-server.aspx
David’s new blog on Speech Server and OCS Topics: http://gotspeech.net/blogs/dszabospeaks/
Chris Mayo’s blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/cmayo/
A lot of live websites have moved to Silverlight 2 beta 2, and there are some great new sites that have shown up over the last few weeks since the new version has been released.
Ryanair Destinations: I love Ryanair for many reasons, but mostly because they allow me to go to a wide variety of interesting destinations for a very low price. I have spent a lot of time using their Destinations map page to find out where places like Lamezia, Graz and Nador are. Now I get to do that in Silverlight, and not only that – they have added great new features like panning and zooming. Check it out and go book that trip to Constanta you’ve been meaning to take while you’re at it.
Line Rider: For those of you that love fun, time-killing applications online, this is a winner. Line Rider gives you a set of tool icons and lets you draw a huge landscape with all kinds of hills, ramps, jumps and whatever else you can think of. When you finish drawing, click play to send the sledder down your course until he wipes out. It’s actually really fun, and it integrates Windows Live Messenger as well which is nifty.
Carbon Grove: Interested in reducing your carbon footprint? How about planting a virtual tree as well as a real tree? This website can show you how. Carbon Grove is a slick site that has you answer ten questions and lets you choose ways to reduce your carbon contributions. One of the coolest pieces of it is how six weeks after you visit the site & answer the questions, the Internet Explorer team will plant a real tree for you – neat!
Deep Zoom Obama: Now regardless of whether you’d vote Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green Party or whoever else, everyone can agree that this is a neat display for Barack Obama. The site shows a gigapixel mosaic image of Barack, and it was built using more than 12,000 individual images of folks voting for him along with Deep Zoom and Silverlight technology. I liked this quote from someone who dug it at digg.com: “I never thought Silverlight would impress me. This is pretty cool.”
Developer Express Tools: I have met a few folks who work at Developer Express and have been really impressed by their technical depth and expertise. So it’s not surprising that I’m also impressed that DevExpress was the first group to come out with a layout management tool for Silverlight. It’s called AgLayoutControl, and it consists of a collection of layout management tools in one package. Their demo page is a nice Silverlight page and has some cool interactive demos showing how the controls work and look. Looks like a great set of really useful controls – nice job DevExpress!