The adoption of HTML5 and its surrounding cast of powerful new features is going to be a huge boon to web users and points towards a very positive direction for the future of the web. From the smoother interfaces of canvas, local storage enabling offline modes for online email programs and the like seamlessly, online video free of dependencies like Flash, web sockets making the real time web a breeze without all the current AJAX workarounds, and so much more but I’ll save all of those for future posts….

Today I wanted to finish up and release an experiment using the HTML5 Geolocation feature (sticklers, click here), a feature allowing your web browser (with your permission of course) to share your location, enabling any current website to tailor itself right to where you are… a powerful feature for todays increasingly mobile web user.

Why is This Important?

Today this level of convenience, all the applications you use every day seamlessly knowing where you are, is unheard of for the user as well as the web developer outside of proprietary built “apps” on iPhone or Android you need to seek out and download. But little do most people know those web browsers in their pockets on those same devices can do this today, opening the playing field of a personal local experience up to the entire web… no downloads, no waiting, no device lock-in.

The Experiment

My experiment started with a simple need, in the summer I drive a Jeep to work with a soft top and I prefer to have it down as much as possible, I mean sun in Minnesota only happens for a short stint i need to suck it up. What I needed was a simple view of the current temperature, maybe a radar map to look for any rain on the map coming my direction, not a huge list. In the early summer I quickly built a one page HTML and JavaScript mashup using jQuery, HTML5 (or Google Gears as a fallback) and the Weather Underground API to build a web page that did just that, polished it up a bit (let’s call it a working prototype as of today) and hosted it on Google App Engine purely for worry free scalability to show it to you all.

Initially on load my experiment “Weather GEO” asks if I want to share my location, of course I select yes, this allows my browser to pull a location from my GPS, Wifi or internet address depending on what the device sees fit.

It passes that longitude and latitude back to my page’s JavaScript I in turn query Weather Underground for the next two forecast elements and a radar map for that longitude and latitude and display them as soon as they come back…

Pretty slick… solves a problem in a simple way, just one click from a browser bookmark, no custom proprietary “app” code to build and it will work in every browser when HTML5 is fully adopted, but currently works in the major mobile browsers, Android and iPhone, in FireFox 3.5+ and any browser that has Google Gears on the PC, Mac and Linux… thats more than enough for me.

A great example of where the web is going and how progress on open standards like this benefit everyone, give my little experiment a try here http://bctx.info/wx. Let me know how it works for you, if your device is passing your proper location and what you think in the comments. Currently I am seeing the Droid have a problem with the code and have posted to the Android Developers Google Group.

* Ok, technically Geolocation is part of the W3C Geolocation Working Group, not HTML5 but it will largely be implemented with HTML5 so it really has become part and parcel of the browser based future.

In order to get my feet wet with Google’s Chrome OS (in it’s current developer build state, Chromium OS properly) and test a real world workflow with this “web only” device I figured I’d put together a blog post with some photos courtesy my new DSLR never leaving the Chrome “browser” now grown up to an OS… let’s go.

Getting Ready

It wasn’t much of a chore to get Chromium OS up and running on my Asus Eee PC 1000HE netbook, I decided to go with @hexxeh’s build and run it directly from an SD card rather than build Chromium OS from source on my Ubuntu box for simplicity’s sake. I only had one small hiccup moving Hexxeh’s image file to the SD card in Ubuntu which was cleared up by visiting his wiki, he has instructions for loading the USB/SD card from Mac and Windows too.

Start Up

I booted from the SD card and in less than 10 seconds had a login box, wow… much quicker than my daily stand by Ubuntu Desktop and Ubuntu Netbook Remix. Currently with most Chromium OS builds the first thing you need to do is log in as an admin user and fire up your wifi before restarting and logging in as yourself with any Google account, no problems here. Once you are logged in the Chromium logo in the top left shows you the menu screen with a nice launcher, it also loads up your GMail and other Google tools for you right off the bat.

More Than Meets the Eye

The web app I use for photos on this blog is Flickr so I fired it up and popped my memory card into the card reader not knowing exactly how a “web browser” would handle that… not to my surprise but certainly to my delight a slick little content browser popped up auto mounting my card and allowing me to view the files in what else but Chrome. Using Flickr’s uploaders on Linux in general is not the prettiest endeavor but it all worked I quickly discovered the ESC key is the key to closing full screen windows and all was well.

Conclusion

I easily fired up WordPress and threw together this post of no more than a little geek and eye candy just to see how it all held together and I would say for Chrome OS’ current young vintage that things are very well. Hardware support was awesome, no tweaking for me (some of that likely is credit to Hexxeh, thanks!), the software and its all web based workflow work well for the cloud residents like me and I think the simplicity will appeal to the current desktop bound user who’s lost files, gotten burned by viruses and simply doesn’t have time to understand all the bells and whistles those boxes are now full of…

…I didn’t miss semi-transparent flying minimizing windows or things “snapping” to my screen once during the writing of this post.

Browser testing is critical to any web developer, designer… really any web professional. You need to know how your users or customers are seeing your work through the multitude of browsers and devices available to them, new ones become available every day.

About a year ago I wrote a post walking you through installing the Google Android SDK on your machine to use as a mobile web browser. This time I am doing it on Mac OS X but I might just make a Windows version too if I get a little time… let me know if you’d like to see that happen.

Let’s get started…

Get the SDK…

1. Go to the Android SDK page.
2. Download Android SDK for Mac OS X (intel)
3. Unzip it and move it to the root of your home directory.

Set it up…

1. Open Terminal, enter the following commands…

   cd ~
   nano .bash_profile
   

2. Paste this into the new file, or add it if there are existing contents.

   export PATH=${PATH}:~/android-sdk-mac/tools
   

   

3. Press “Control X” and save the file.
4. Close Terminal.

Load up an Android OS…

1. Open Terminal, enter the following command…

   android

   The Android SDK and AVD Manager will open.
   

2. Choose “Available Packages”
3. Click the arrow beside “dl-ssl.google.com…”
4. Check one or more Android Platforms, I chose Android 1.6 and 2.0 for good measure you can choose whatever versions you are targeting.
5. Click “Install Selected” and then “Install Accepted”
6. Your SDK is now complete and ready to run… Stick in your Android SDK and AVD Manager let’s make a device!

Getting your virtual Android device ready…

1. Chose “Virtual Devices”
2. Click “New…”
   
3. Give your AVD a name for this tutorial I chose “default2.0″
4. Choose one of the Android platforms you downloaded in the “Target” pulldown, I chose Android 2.0.
5. Give the SD card some value, let’s say 25mb.
6. Click “Create AVD”
7. You should return back to the home screen, click your new Android AVD’s name and press “Start”
8. Success!
   

Create an icon of sorts to launch your new emulator…

1. Open Terminal, enter the following commands…

   cd ~/Desktop/
   nano Android.command
   

2. Add this command to the new file…

   emulator -scale .7 -avd default2.0
   

   

3. Press “Control X” and save the file
4. Run this final command….

   chmod 755 Android.command
   

5. Close Terminal
6. Double click on Android.command on your desktop… Success!
   

This is a test!

Below I embedded my first Wave “Hello World… I mean Wave!”… The first of many likely… let’s see what it looks like out in public… I know many of you probably can’t see it… This is a test!

UPDATE: I believe and claimed this as the first Google Wave embed in a blog outside of the Googleplex! My claim on Twitter.

For those not in Wave yet here was a screenshot from 4pm 6/3/09.

Here we go…

(click into post to see it)

I was very excited to not just attend but be a part of Google I/O 2009, Google’s annual developer conference. A Best Buy contingent of Steve Bendt, Gary Koelling and myself as well as uber developers Curtis Thompson and Thomas Bombach made the trip and were part of the Developer Sandbox.

I/O’s Key Points

The keynotes (day 1, day 2) were both great heralding Google’s confidence in the web browser centric future (woo hoo!) powered by what is possible in HTML5, open communications and collaboration systems like the introduction Google Wave and the cloud based power plant that is Google App Engine… among so much more. The whole time they hit hard their belief that developers outside their company, like the ones in the room, are the only way all this becomes possible. They left us inspired for where the web is going and future open architectures we can share versus build ourselves allowing the user, be it the end user or developer, the portability they need… great to see that becoming a reality.

Best Buy and App Engine

Best Buy was asked to come speak about App Engine and our point of view, that we have shared many times, that it projects a strong model for the future of web development that allows the creativity of a web developer to shine through and takes huge infrastructure and scalability best practices from Google and gives them to you on a sliver platter… no pagers to carry and drastically less system set-up and runtime headaches… growing into a true platform as a service not just boxes in the cloud. The Google crew shot a few videos of us, we’ll see what was smart enough to stay off the cutting room floor!

We talked to many in the Developer Sandbox, answering the question “Best Buy? Like you mean the retailer?” more times than I could count
but once we got through that relayed the message that we are out there, experimenting, trying, showing our company what is becoming possible on the web via new methods of getting things done, notably App Engine and open APIs like our own Best Buy Remix. It’s a great time to experiment even… no especially at a large company that can easily slow down as I’ve said here before…

Google App Engine and Open APIs clearly show where the web is going, the playing field is leveled… get out there and deploy those ideas you say you have scrawled on those napkins that you say are going to revolutionize the world, the tools you need to prove it are out there right now.

…these movements only further speed up rapid evolution on the web, jump in now with two feet because it’s not slowing down any time soon. Experimenting out in front is the key no matter your size.
-Ben

By default the Google App Engine SDK doesn’t run on Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackelope)… You can fix it!

After a little searching I noticed neither posts about this issue nor a quick fix were top of the Google rankings… hoping to resolve that with this post and get all of us Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty) users up on App Engine. UPDATE: This post is now first when searching for “App Engine Ubuntu Jaunty Problem” and even “App Engine Ubuntu Jaunty” in one day, nice!

Once you download the SDK as usual and run one of your apps on a default Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty install you will see errors galore, you see Ubuntu 9.04 ships Python 2.6 and App Engine is built on Python 2.5 and they are not friendly!

Here is how I got my environment running, I will update the post if I run into further errors.

In a terminal install Python 2.5

They will coexist on the system.

sudo apt-get install python2.5

Edit dev_appserver.py in your google_appengine directory

Change the first line in dev_appserver.py…

#!/usr/bin/env python

….to…

#!/usr/bin/env python2.5

App Engine should now load and run your apps properly!

I believe this is the simplest noninvasive way to let App Engine find what it wants, Python 2.5, and let Ubuntu carry on as it likes with Python 2.6 and beyond. Here is a source on this issue, commenters have many different solutions.

Hope this post helps at least one of you,
-Ben

This post exists because I was asked to create a presentation of the high points of what I’ve discovered in my exploration of social media that could be conveyed to others just getting started looking at the space. I was asked to include why I was so interested to build my apps on my spare time (spy, retweet radar, and ConnectTweet) which are really about poking, prodding and learning about the social media conversation’s value by experimenting with it… not just technology hijinks (although that’s interesting too).

After a fair amount of brain freeze (still only partially defrosted at this point) I knew this “presentation” was largely a series of links to tools, great blog posts and examples… I quickly determined PowerPoint, the grand old corporate standard for this type of thing, could not capture or fairly represent the multifaceted and decentralized conversation around social media it dawned on me — a blog post — which by it’s nature is a containing thought, linking to others to expound upon it is open for debate [comments] just like the current malleable state of social media.

So here it is my “presentation”…

I come from the perspective that you don’t start doing something just because it’s the cool new thing – the buzzword buzzing in your peers/bosses/co-worker’s ears – rather you should see true value to your relationships, your work, your future… or simply some entertainment value. I am going to try to give you a walking tour through interesting aspects of social media channels specifically Twitter, which at it’s roots is a communication channel for short pointed messages… essentially an email message without the “blah blah” bloat and open for all to read. My goal will be to give you tools to discover why you care about participating in this channel, if in the end you just don’t see it that’s ok… forced conversation isn’t fun for anyone.

Listen first!

Your boss asked you why you aren’t on “The Web 2.0 Twitters” yet… you are itching to go out and create that Twitter account, even though I told you not to… don’t, you need to learn to listen first. [And don't worry (s)he's just asking because (s)he can't figure it out :)]

So many people go out create those shiny new empty accounts maybe add one or two friends [who don't participate] and say “it doesn’t work”, “I don’t get it” and “whats so interesting about this” here is the truth it’s not interesting or useful by itself… it’s a communication channel not a television! You need to discover interesting conversations and people and then jump in on it, your empty account is one of hundreds of thousands out there who didn’t realize discovery and a little work is a must.

Discover by Listening

Let’s find something interesting and see whats being said about it… this is where my first tool ‘spy‘ comes in but there are many others to look at too. The idea with ’spy’ is to “listen in on the social media conversation going on around you” on something you already care about for example say the name of your company…

spy on Best Buy

Now we’re going to see all sorts of interesting things being said… you feel the vibe of the public towards you today… people hate us, people love us, people post weird [really weird] things… but in that mess at least one things will get you motivated you’ll read a post and say “hey, I can fix that for him”, “hey, she needs this product to make that better” or “hey, that’s completely not true where do I find this guy!” or any of a myriad of other responses… there it happened you found a connection an interaction you want to have this is one bud of a conversation in this global decentralized chatter going on around us every day. If you are an Apple nut or are argumentative about politics, among so many other examples, your sure to not go dry on topics to listen to and converse about.

Take something you personally care and plug them into tools like Twitter Search, ‘spy‘, monitter.com or maybe check out Twellow a list of Twitterers by their interests when you do get started you’ll know who you want to listen to.

Discover by Trends

One of my personal favorites is to watch trends, not “what’s next on the internet” but what are people talking about casually right now… Google can step aside here this is the rawest view on open conversations on the web — real time conversation trends. If you take a look at the “Trending topics” or “Trends” sections on Twitter Search and ‘spy‘ respectively click on any one that interests you you see up to the second conversation on that topic from hundreds or maybe thousands of participants. Yes you are going to see bad TV shows (American Idol and your sort I am looking at you…) celebrity gossip, and a bit of spam but real time shines during national or global events if you are watching you’ll know about any national event first far before the traditional media can report on it, even full time cable news.

During events like the US National Debates or the terror in Mumbai a real powerful side conversation is being had in real time of which you are listening and can participate, I remember watching the debates on the TV with real people’s Twitter commentary scrolling on my laptop in full screen on ’spy’ totally changes the experience.

My second tool plays in this trends space, there is a concept on Twitter where you “retweet” someone’s Twitter post when you think it is important and you want more people to see it, more about retweets here. My tool retweet radar gathers all those “retweeted” messages and attempts to pull out relevant terms and plot them… this view quickly allows you to see what people think is interesting so far today and even right now, an interesting way to keep your finger on the pulse of the conversation and a fun little project.

Listen and Participate for Business

Listening as closely as possible to customers and interacting with them should be the first thing that comes to mind from a business mindset when we discuss these tools, we’ve already talked about it a bit above. You now have the unique ability to put your ear to the masses, ask them questions about your product and share in their excitement or pain using them.

In this medium some customers are turned into zealots on both positive and negative sides of the fence, they have a megaphone to speak their mind and they do. This can be good for you, they serve to keep you honest, keep a spotlight on you and spread the word of your brand and products this channel allows you to keep up a conversation with zealots and use them as a leading indicator for your decisions, maybe even including some of them in those directions.

As an example, the day a new Best Buy marketing pieces hits people’s homes the social media channels erupt in conversation both good and bad an almost immediate barometer on the impact of that offer, particularly today a get $100 off an iPhone offer hit all Best Buy RewardZone Silver customers and the social media conversation was very positive. A further example, the day RewardZone Black was accidentally emailed to millions of people, Barry Judge our CMO noticed the increased conversation on the ’spy’ in his office and quickly issued an apology through his Twitter account and his blog a first for Best Buy in both speed and openness to admit our mistake.

Best Buy and other Twin Cities companies were written up in this Pioneer Press article for our early social media efforts including blueshirts from the stores, corporate workers and even our CMO on Twitter not to mention some nice ’spy’ coverage. Outside of Best Buy using ’spy’ to watch the social media conversation in the Hub, HP has implemented ’spy’ in their internal marketing portal to help their workers keep up on the conversation around their company.

Chris Brogan and others covers ideas for business well in video and bullet point format so read on.

Participate for Yourself – Your Growth, Your Career.

Wherever and however your expertise, passion and occupation line up there are a limited number of people who do what you do, the way you do with the experiences you have… social media thrives on this fuel. People who throw out that new idea, business tip, graphic design guide, free font or nugget of web development advice are lifted up. People are eager to hear from others cross pollinate ideas and practices and generally to learn, putting yourself in this pool and being looked to for advice by this international group of “followers” can propel you to learn more, advance your skills and show you the market out there for you as a leader in your space.

I have been writing this blog for about 8 months now, polluting the internet and social media with my then poor, now slightly better, writing abilities; I progressed, I helped people, I participated in thousands of conversations with people I would have never met including many big names on the internet and getting my name out there.

Your ability to use social media, build your niche and “personal brand” as they say is nearly limitless. If you are the “best X person in the office” take it to the web, I guarantee you will learn something further and people will recognize your skills and you will be rewarded as many times as I feel I have been, your company, your industry, your world can be flattened by these barrier crossing social media connections.

I just received word from Pam Dearen at HP of some great launch news partially powered by spy.appspot.com!

Our new internal Digital Marketing Community Portal launched as planned on January 15. One of its top features is our “HP Buzz” — our custom version of your Spy app.

It’s truly exciting to see big business gravitating toward social media and empowering employees to listen fulfilling my vision for ’spy’ — it was never about the technology or the website but finding and amassing these relevant and timely social media conversations and getting them in front of people who care about them but may not yet participate in the social media space.

HP’s “Buzz” section of their internal Digital Marketing Community Portal does all of this well, the employees in this group will see a constantly refreshed and relevant view of what people are saying about HP, if they only find one actionable nugget of information from their customers via this method it would feel great to me and I am positive they will.

I really appreciate the quick and relevant work they have done here, the very kind attribution and the clear view and message that empowering employees with more direct channels to listen to and interact with their customers can only better the experience for all customers and help to shape business decisions we all make every day. Kudos to the HP Digital Marketing team for getting out there, testing and trying new avenues and listening to their customers wherever are.


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