BUILDING INTERNET AND MOBILE SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS
BUILDING INTERNET AND MOBILE SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS
After analyzing LonelyID statistics results during the first month of our launch, we realized that a high percentage of users who requested an account have not yet made use of it. This situation is worrying us and we think that is mainly due to the lack of knowledge that exists around the OpenID standard. Most of the websites that support OpenID use different mechanisms for registration (applying different data records, not allowing direct registration with OpenID, etc.) The diversity of formats and registration processes add extra difficulty to the use of OpenID by the users. To try to encourage a bit more the use of OpenID, we have decided to prepare and launch over the next days a serie of demonstration videos. Those videos will contain real examples of how to use LonelyID on broadly-known OpenID-enabled websites. The first video of the serie corresponds to an example of registration with LonelyID on www.dailymotion.com website.
We have just released a free version of LonelyID Mobile for iPhone for a limited time. LonelyID is an authentication system based on OpenID that allows you to avoid remembering any password. Your new password will be generated safely inside your mobile phone. The password generated on the mobile changes every minute and the previous password is no longer valid. This ensures you can access your websites without having to remember passwords and without having to worry about malware or keyloggers. If you would really like to use (or already use) an OpenID service to access your favorite websites, we encourage you to try LonelyID. Download the iphone application directly from the following URL:
Because your iPhone may contain sensitive and confidential information (especially if you are using LonelyID), you must be sure you keep your iphone protected against any loss or forgetfulness. A useful way to protect and secure access to your iPhone is using the 'Passcode lock' functionality.
According to the information published on the OpenID Foundation website there are over 9 million websites utilizing OpenID for registration and login on some portion of their websites. Within this group of websites that supports OpenID, we may also include the vast majority of the applications that we have created this year using our development platform TubeSpark. As I mentioned in previous articles, TubeSpark natively supports OpenID authentication and user registration. Our commitment and trust on OpenID allowed us to create a free OpenID service. The service is called LonelyID and uses a special authentication mechanism that goes beyond the classic user/password authentication. With LonelyID, passwords are generated randomly in the user's mobile phone (using LonelyID Mobile) with no need to exchange data with the authentication server. To learn more about LonelyID, you can visit: http://www.lonelyid.com
Finally, we renamed our software platform (which until now had no official name) with the name of TubeSpark. The vast majority of our applications and web projects are developed on TubeSpark (currently working on version 4.2) TubeSpark is a software that allows the creation of all types of cutting-edge applications for the Internet in a quick and efficient manner.
Although version 1.0 of LonelyDrops was initially intended to be used with drop-down lists on SELECT elements, here we are going to describe additional ways to manipulate the lists to get other screen presentations. In this case, we have prepared a sample with the list of countries organized by continent with links on each country.
As a web programmer in java, I spend my time compiling with maven, updating and commiting to subversion, stopping and starting the tomcat, viewing tails of logs, and a lot of executions of scripts. After programming for the iPhone I wanted to program something in Objective-C so starting from the idea of Tomcat Controller I have developed an application that can run scripts and view results in a new tab if you want. For example, you launch a tail of the log of tomcat in a new tab and without having to open new tabs you can launch and stop the tomcat.
From a user's request, we have added a new drop-down list within the LonelyDrops database.
In late summer, we closed the new version 4.2 of the set of libraries (framework) that we use to develop all our projects and applications. As big news, I would like to stress that from now on, all applications developed by Conductiva have native support for OpenID user authentication. The OpenID is an authentication standard that allows users to access a large number of websites without having to remember multiple usernames or multiple passwords. In parallel to OpenID support in all our applications, we have launched a service that operates on the OpenID standard to generate OpenID identifiers. The new service is called LonelyID. These new identifiers allow authentication through a random password generated directly on your mobile phone. So far, LonelyID supports iPhone and iPod touch devices, but we are preparing new versions for devices from other manufacturers.
A couple of weeks ago we were foretelling its release but now we can say that LonelyID service is a reality!
We’re really excited to (almost) announce LonelyID, a new form of online authentication. With it you will not need to remember passwords anymore. LonelyID is an authentication system that provides you access from any Internet-enabled computer to all those web applications compatible with OpenID in a completely secure form and with no need to remember any password by simply installing an application called LonelyID Mobile on your phone. For more info visit: www.lonelyid.com
We have now included two new lists in LonelyDrops for Spanish autonomous communities and provinces. Codes for these lists are: spain_autonomies and spain_provinces Here's an example of use combining both lists: http://www.lonelydrops.com/dp/local/example6.void
In early 2009 after analysing and comparing different options for our server hosting, we decided to migrate our dedicated servers to a new hosting.
This year, in the Campus Party 2009, we participated in the development of a software application for registering and printing of accreditation cards.
This summer we took part in a project to carry out recreational activities with gift awards in the stands of Telefonica in the Feria Internacional de Muestras de Asturias (FIDMA, International Trade Exhibition of Asturias). The action was intended to mount a series of stands where visitors to the exhibition could perform multiple game activities. For each activity, the participant got a score based on skills demonstrated during the activity. After harvesting the total score of all activities, participants were able to pick up their gifts which changed depending on the number of points obtained in the different activities. Conductiva has been responsible for developing the control software in the various activity stands and gift stands. Here we present some of the technical challenges we faced and the solutions we applied in each case.
Today I found an interesting article talking about a project called Personas created by Aaron Zinman. The project is part of an exhibition at M.I.T. Museum called Metropath(ologies). Personas project defines itself as: "(it) scours the web for information and attempts to characterize the person - to fit them to a predetermined set of categories that an algorithmic process created from a massive corpus of data. The computational process is visualized with each stage of the analysis, finally resulting in the presentation of a seemingly authoritative personal profile." As a curiosity, it catched my attention to see that the concept of conductiva, inside Persona's project, contained a great amount of significance related to our company's definition and our online profile. http://personas.media.mit.edu/personasWeb
P.D.: If you think that Persona's project is not going to change the path of humanity at all, you are probably right. In the example of conductiva, our company's definition comes in the first place probably because our website is hosted under conductiva.com. However, the project is still interesting enough to step by and see how it works.
After a frantic summer, finally we found the time to prepare the launch of a new web service so everybody can make use of it. We have been using the service in conductiva for some months in our projects and now we think it's time to present it to the public. The service is called lonelydrops and its main goal is to help people to create multi-language dropdown lists (such as lists of countries, timezones, continents, etc.). Neither databases nor special complicated configurations are needed to build these lists. The web service has been designed to be easy to use by inserting a few lines of Javascript in any html page and with no need to have a database-enabled web server. To have a better understanding of how the service works, we have prepared a website where you can find more information and see some practical examples.
We are glad to anounce a new section in our website called Labs!
In Labs section we'll publish web utilities (such as web services or applications) that have helped us on our daily work and as they are being useful to us we think they are worth sharing too. What you will find in Labs section
And soon...Over the next months the section will grow up with new services and applications.
We have included a new feedback section in our website. The main goal of this new functionality is to provide more usability to conductiva's website so visitors can now send their comments or contact us in an easier way.
This post is not available in English but you may read it in other languages: Spanish
Since the begining of this year, when we started with twitter micro-blogging as a way to publish information related to Conductiva, we found a critical problem: our daily relationship with customers and collaborators is carried out in multiple languages. Some of them speak english, others spanish and others catalan. Then, in which way could we make twitter micro-blogging (initially designed to work under one single language) compatible for multi-language support so it can be useful to all of them simultaneously without displaying messages in the wrong language? Arrived to this point, here's what we did: 1. We created three twitter account with the following aliases: conductiva, conductiva_es, conductiva_cat, for english, spanish and catalan. 2. All communications we do from twitter (not so many as this time) are inserted simultaneously in the three accounts using the proper language for each. 3. Depending on the language chosen by the person visiting our website, www.conductiva.com, the links to twitter are redirected to the account under the specific language. We thought this could be an easy way to keep all our clients and collaborators connected to twitter while displaying only those messages written in the language they selected.
After some weeks working on our website we can finally say that new Conductiva's website is ready! We have organised the website to clearly display the most interesting contents, from new products or services we're going to start offering on incoming months to some analysis of some of the projects we've been involved with during the last months.
In order to maximise compatibility with mobile phone browsing, we have prepared a mobile version of the website where all web contents are accessible in a more compressed form.
A new blog has also been created. We'll be publishing technology and project related info from there as well as info about the projects we're involved with in our daily work. We have also prepared the website to be easily linkable to Twitter, RSS feeds, ... We also want to thank Bifid for its excellent job in the graphic design of the website.
We just moved to a more convenient office. And our phone number has changed too. Please write down the new contact details: C/ Pare Gallisà, 5, 1º, 1ª - 08500 - VIC (view on map) The new phone number: +34 93 380 45 80
viddler.com has an interesting sign up confirmation message that IMHO it's great. In multiple occasions sign up confirmation messages get lost in mail server spam filters. In viddler.com have seen that this can be one of the main problems that reduces the number of sign ups on their website. They have prepared a short and simple form that allows you to resend the sign up confirmation message in case this gets lost in the middle of the road.
The website for advertising agency Targeting, www.targeting.es, contains a new section: Press Office (Sala de prensa in spanish). Conductiva's blog publisher software combined with Conductiva's newsletter software (with subscriber management and massive email delivery) have been in charge to get the work done. Both tools (blog and newsletter) have been used in several of our projects during these last months.
Since last October, we've been involved with the development and maintenance of a set of community websites (sponsored by Telefónica)
After some weeks of development, we launch the final version of a website called, www.foodtraceability.eu, sponsored by European Union as part of Trace european project. The main goal of the website is to provide you with an introduction into the world of food traceability. Different people think very differently about traceability. The website tries to respect this variety of mindsets by giving a space to each of the different viewpoints about traceability. Whatever is your particular viewpoint, the people behind TraceFood (see Who we are) are trying to make your life easier by providing easy to follow Good Traceability Practices and a standard for exchanging traceability data.
Conductiva's web content platform used for content publishing mecanism and marketing content management in winzingo website. It integrates with online game platform from Canadian company Parlay Entertainment , a world leading company in online bingos and casinos.
In one of the projects we were involved during the year 2008, we implemented a system to record online video streaming without having to install any additional software on the computer. Recording online video streamingWe set up small site (owned by Telefonica) where Valencia CF fans could record their songs of encouragement to their team to the semifinals of the Copa del Rey (Valencia CF - FC Barcelona). Fans recorded their home video via streaming and, after passing a content validation process, the video was automatically posted on the website. The best recorded videos were finally broadcast on the giant screens in the Mestalla stadium during halftime of the game.
Offline video recordingThe software was also designed to be installed on laptops (Pixman) and provide offline video recording. Around the Mestalla stadium, fans could record their videos. At the end of each day of recording, all recorded videos were automatically uploaded and published to the web server.
On the development of the website for the advertising agency Targeting, www.targeting.es, we have tried to push our Flash programming a bit further using the 3D engine called papervision 3D to recreate the three-dimensional effects over the transitions in the project list. The experience was good and we hope to repeat it again in other projects. The website has been developed entirely in Flash and its contents are fully self-managed using conductiva's content management software.
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