Roland Tanglao's Weblog

Amazing example of how we (the software industry) make sh*tty software (in this case car rental web apps) and how we have no digital identity. Dick (and the rest of the sxip folks), Boris, Phil, Doc and Identity Woman are on the case at the Internet Identity Workshop 2006 though so at least the digital identity problem will be solved (eventually).

From Intention Economy Hell: Renting a Car - a photoset on Flickr.:

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A real-world use case that serves as a fine example for both Identity and Intention Economy discussions.

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ajaxWrite is u*ly but it is faster and appears to work as well as Writely. I must be tired but I can't break it using the nested lists and the Roland and Troy test. Troy, I know you can break this!

From www.ajaxwrite.com.:

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The look, feel, and functionality of Microsoft Word, in a completely web-based AJAX platform. Try ajaxWrite today, and experience first-hand how AJAX applications are changing the way the web works, and redefining the software industry.

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Awesome! I look forward to all Web 2.0 apps using cookie-less Ajax login code.

From 2006, the year HTTP authentication broke - the weblog of Lucas Gonze.:

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A few months ago a fellow named Jean-Michel Hiver posted that you could in fact do a clean and modern log-in browser interface using only AJAX methods. He didn't provide any code or much other information, but he did provide a few hints to show how it was possible to write code. I took about 45 minutes to trace his steps and verify that it was true, and it did indeed seem to be possible.

It was one of those HOLY SH*T moments. 100% of user-friendly browser apps use cookies for authentication rather than HTTP, despite the potentially huge advantage of HTTP. If Jean-Michel's point is correct, and it almost certainly is, almost all new browser apps will end up incorporating the new style.

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Traditional doesn't mean bad though (and props to Mark Evans, Matthew Ingram, Michael McDerment, and Stuart MacDonald for taking the time to organize this; I know how hard this is to do in 12 months like we do for Northern Voice let alone 3 months like they are doing). I really enjoyed the "traditional" part of the Northern Voice blogging conference (why? just two of many reasons: Nancy White and Julie Leung) in Vancouver both in 2005 and in 2006. But I gotta admit, after helping organize unconferences like Northern Voice Moosecamp 2006 and BarCamp Amsterdam, as well as more traditional conferences like Northern Voice and the Open Source Content Management System and Blog Tool Summit, my sympathies are with the unconferences.

A plea for somebody in Toronto: organize a Bar Camp Toronto (should be easy given the success of TorCamp and DemoCamp4, maybe call it CanadaCamp and encourage people from Vancouver and the East Coast to converge in Toronto; I wish I had time to help organize this but other than throwing out crazy ideas I don't!) before or after the Toronto Web 2.0 conference at a place with lots of rooms, central location and good WiFi and convince some West Coast people like the following to lead sessions (the following short list off the top of my head shows omits many cool folks apologies in advance):

• Boris Mann - one my Bryght partners - could lead sessions on starting and running an open source company, open source product development and evangelism since he is Drupal evangelist #1 in my book. Boris could also be a session leader on Jabber, VoIP and web application platforms.
• Avi Bryant and Andrew Catton of Dabble DB could lead a session on Smalltalk and why it's relevant to Web 2.0 as well as why doing things differently makes sense
• Dave Sifry (not a Vancouverite person yay!) could do a leadership "hack" session - the one at Moosecamp was fantastic from what I could tell
• Paul Kedrosky (a sometime Vancouverite) could talk about On why you may not need Venture Capital for your startup, just do it with your own money!
• Alexandra Samuel on what tech companies can learn from non profits and activist organizations.
• Dick Hardt or one of his sxip folks could lead a session on Identity 2.0 what it is, why we need it. Dick also knows a tonne about running an open source startup!

From Stuart MacDonald | eBusiness and Marketing Geek.:

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Our Web 2.0 Toronto Conference date and location are set. Mark May 8 and 9, 2006 at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto in your calendar. The keynotes and panels are shaping up nicely, and we will have a site up by mid-March with all the details.

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It seems like only yesterday that I first started using Writely. In fact it was back in early October 2005, five months ago. Since then it's become my default cross platform way to create rich documents collaboratively despite its bugs like the fact that it can't pass the "Roland and Troy nested list test" (but then no web writing app does!). Congrats to the Writely folks.

To the fine folks at Google a few humble pleas: Please don't pull a Blogger. Keep adding features such as fixing the aforementioned nested list bug. Keep Writely competitive unlike Blogger. And finally consider picking up Dabble DB as your spreadsheet web app.

From Google? Yep, Google! .:

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Writely is now part of Google!

Yes, we've been acquired by Google, and we're really excited about this for many, many reasons. But I can hear you saying, "I don't care why YOU'RE excited - I want to know how this change will impact ME!"

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LATER: It was not the Writely folks, it was Christoph Janz of CalendarHub.

The Writely folks (thanks!) left a comment on my Writely doesn't read Word docs post. Yes you can create NEW Writely documents from Word documents but you can't insert Word documents into EXISTING Writely docs. I am sure that's an oversight that will soon be corrected!

Sorry I tried but couldn't find a way to load Word documents from Writely! Is this my bad or has this feature not been turned on yet? Help!

From Writely Embraces the OpenDocument Movement.:

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Writely users can upload documents into Writely from Microsoft Word and Sun Microsystems' OpenOffice.org, as well as save the documents back into either of those formats

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