Art of scalability

Hi, I found this articel that speak about Scalability principles, and guidelines and it’s really useful.

Art of scalability (1) – Scalability principles
Art of scalability (2) – Scalability guidelines part 1
Art of scalability (3) – Scalability guidelines part 2
Art of scalability (4) – Scalability guidelines part 3

With so many blogs being created every day, it’s a mystery to many bloggers how to make their blog stand out. There are many types of blogs or purposes for blogs and a certain number of tactics are applicable to just about all of them.Some companies choose to hire a blog consultant, but others like to try things internally. For those “DIY” companies and individuals interested in practical tips for marketing and optimizing a business blog, try out the following list of blog marketing and optimization tips:

<!--
google_ad_client = "pub-6234828575591860";
google_ad_slot = "7455526029";
google_ad_width = 728;
google_ad_height = 90;

1. Decide on a stand alone domain name www.myblog.com or directory of existing site www.mysite.com/blog. Sub domain is also an option blog.mysite.com. Avoid hosted services that do not allow you to use your own domain name!
2. Obtain and install customizable blog software – WordPress and Moveable Type are my favorites.
3. Customize blog look and feel templates – aka design.
4. Research keywords and develop a glossary – Keyword Discovery, WordTracker, SitePoint, SEOBook Keyword Research.
5. Optimize the blog:
   • Template optimization – RSS subscription options, social bookmark links, HTML code, Unique title tags, URLs, Sitemap
   • Add helper plugins specific to WordPress or MT
   • Create keyword rich categories (reference your keyword glossary)
6. Enable automatic trackback and ping functionality.
7. Create Feedburner Pro account and enable feed tracking.
8. Setup a Google account for Sitemap, validate and prep for future submission.
9. Identify authoritative blogs, web sites and hubs for outbound resource links and blogroll.
10. Format archived posts, related posts.
11. Enable statistics for tracking – Google Analytics, ClickTracks.
12. Submit RSS feed and Blog URL to prominent RSS and Blog directories / search engines.
13. Engage in an ongoing link building campaign.
14. If podcast or video content are available, submit to Podcast and Vlog directories.
15. Submit blog url to paid directories with categories for blogs – Yahoo, BOTW, bCentral, WOW, JoeAnt.
16. Optimize and distribute a press release announcing blog.
17. Request feedback or reviews of your blog in relevant forums, discussion threads. If you have a resourceful post that will help others, point to it.
18. Research and comment on relevant industry related blogs and blogs with significant centers of influence.
19. Post regularly. If it’s a news oriented blog, 3-5 times per day. If it’s an authoritative blog, 3-5 times per week, but each post must be unique and high value.
20. Monitor inbound links, traffic, comments and mentions of your blog – Google Alerts, Technorati, Blogpulse, Yahoo News, Ask Blogs and Feeds.
21. Always respond to comments on your blog and when you detect a mention of your blog on another blog, thank that blogger in the comments of the post.
22. Make contact with related bloggers on AND offline if possible.
23. When making blog posts always cite the source with a link and don’t be afraid to mention popular bloggers by name. Use keywords in the blog post title, in the body of the post and use anchor text when you link to previous posts you’ve made.
24. Use social networking services, forums and discussion threads to connect with other bloggers. If they like your stuff, they will link to you.
25. Remember when web sites were a new concept and the sage advice to print your web address everywhere you print your phone number? The same advice applies for your blog.

Microsoft testing prototype of Facebook-like social network

Microsoft’s TownSquare internal social network provides employees with feeds and updates about their colleagues

At the request of its SharePoint and Office product development teams, Microsoft’s Office Labs operation has created and is testing a prototype of an internal social network that can provide employees with feeds and updates about their colleagues.

Chris Pratley, general manager of Office Labs, is slated to disclose details of the prototype — called TownSquare — Thursday at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference in Boston. He spoke to Computerworld about the project, which was launched in January and has already been used by about 8,000 Microsoft employees.

With a layout that is strikingly similar to Facebook.com’s (in which Microsoft invested $240 million in October 2007), TownSquare is fueled by enterprise news feeds that use Web services to query SharePoint for public information, such as promotions and company anniversaries, about an employee.

TownSquare also notifies users when a document or file is modified. Users can customize their feeds and monitor who is receiving information about them.

In early January, Pratley’s group told 100 Microsoft employees about the network. Since then, 8,000 employees who learned of TownSquare by word of mouth have visited the network at least once, Pratley noted. About 700 use it daily.

Some Microsoft customers, which he declined to name, are testing the TownSquare network for use in their companies.

Office Labs works as a sort of advance development team that tests technology concepts suggested by employees and, as in this case, development teams. Pratley stressed that TownSquare is not a product, but a platform to test the technology concepts. By hammering out the various likes and dislikes of its users before releasing a product, “We’re trying to get version three goodness into a first release,” he added.

“We have instrumentation, so we know which things people use,” Pratley noted. “We share that with the client teams we work with. They take the knowledge about usage, so they don’t make so many mistakes in product design.”

Many third-party vendors have targeted SharePoint as the core data source for information to feed their enterprise social networking and other Enterprise 2.0 applications. Several have announced upgrades to their products or new integration with SharePoint this week at the conference.

Anecdotal evidence has shown that employees like the TownSquare tool, Pratley noted. Employees especially appreciate being able to monitor the creation and editing of documents by colleagues, he added. One employee used the network to find a sponsor within Microsoft to fund her trip to the Enterprise 2.0 Conference.

“That is the kind of information that spreads through an enterprise social network,” he said. “By posting it out there, the people interested can pick up on it, and other people can ignore it. It’s a way to keep in touch in a social way with people you work with.”

Like Facebook, TownSquare also includes a photos of users and allows them to note when they are away from their workstations, such as at a meeting or in the cafeteria for coffee.

While some employees have expressed initial surprise at all the information that Microsoft has about them in its intranet, once people see the type of information that is included in the feeds about them, “they see it’s pretty safe stuff and say OK,” Pratley said.

Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari probably get the most coverage as the browser war rages on, but folks often forget about Opera. 12 years after its debut, Opera has matured into a potent alternative to the competition, especially so with the release of Opera 9.5 today.

With Opera 9.5, Opera Software has overhauled its namesake browser with a brand new user interface, a faster rendering engine, and some innovative new features. The Opera Link service lets users synchronize bookmarks between different computers and cell phones (as long as those phones run Opera Mini), while the Quick Find feature lets users search their history for not just page titles, but also page content. On top of that, the new browser includes new fraud protection features and a download manager with BitTorrent support.

Opera 9.5 retains some of the goodies of previous versions, as well, such as built-in e-mail and RSS feed support, mouse gestures, a “speed dial” bookmark system, and a tab system with a “trash can,” from which users can fish out accidentally closed tabs.

You can grab Opera 9.5 for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and FreeBSD from this page free of charge. Detailed change logs for each version are available from this page, too.

During his keynote at TechEd for Developers 2008 in Orlando, FL this week, Bill Gates announced the release of Silverlight 2 Beta 2.

Mr. Gates referred to the release as:

Availability this week of Silverlight 2 beta 2, the latest version of Microsoft’s cross-browser, cross-platform and cross-device plug-in for delivering the next generation of .NET-based media experiences and rich interactive applications for the Web. Now available with a commercial Go Live license, Silverlight 2 beta 2 will be used to power the unprecedented online experience NBC Universal is creating for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. To help developers take full advantage of Silverlight, Microsoft also released Expression Blend 2.5 June 2008 Preview and Microsoft Silverlight Tools beta 2 for Visual Studio 2008.

One of the key aspects of this announcement for developers is the announcement of the “Go Live” license that allows creation of Silverlight applications. Details of what is new in this release includes:

• UI Framework: Beta 2 includes improvements in animation support, error handling and reporting, automation and accessibility support, keyboard input support, and general performance. This release also provides more compatibility between Silverlight and WPF.
• Rich Controls: Beta 2 includes a new templating model called Visual State Manager that allows for easier templating for controls. Other features include the introduction of TabControl, text wrapping and scrollbars for TextBox, and for DataGrid additions include Autosize, Reorder, Sort, performance increases and more. Most controls are now in the runtime instead of packaged with the application.Networking Support: Beta 2 includes improved Cross Domain support and security enhancements, upload support for WebClient, and duplex communications (“push” from server to Silverlight client).
• Rich Base Class Library: Beta 2 includes improved threading abilities, LINQ-to-JSON, ADO.NET Data Services support, better support for SOAP, and various other improvements to make networking and data handling easier.
• Deep Zoom: Beta 2 introduces a new XML-based file format for Deep Zoom image tiles, as well as a new MultiScaleTileSource that enables existing tile databases to utilize Deep Zoom. Better, event driven notification for zoom/pan state is another improvement in Silverlight 2 Beta.

The Silverlight 2 Beta 2 can be found on the Microsoft download site. Documentation for this beta is also available for download. Additional information can be found on the Silverlight web site.

I know, Steve Pavlina has done this already, but I’ve found that waking early has been one of the best things I’ve done in the last year, and I thought I’d share my tips. I just posted about my morning routine, and thought you might like to know how I get up at 4:30 a.m.

For many years, I was a late riser. I loved to sleep in. Then things changed, because I had to wake up between 6-6:30 a.m. to fix my kids’ lunches and get them ready for school. But last year, when I decided to train for my first marathon, I decided that I needed to start running in the mornings if I was to have any time left for my family.

So, I set out to make waking up early a habit. I started by getting up at 5:30 a.m., then at 5 a.m. When that became a habit, and I had to wake up at 4 a.m. or 3:30 a.m. for an early long run, it wasn’t a problem. And last November, when I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo, I decided to get up at 4 a.m. to write for at least an hour a day. Now that I completed that novel-writing goal, I don’t need to wake that early anymore, but have settled on a happy compromise of waking at 4:30 a.m. Some days, when I’m really tired (if I go to sleep late), I’ll wake at 5:00 or 5:30, but that’s still earlier than I used to wake up.

Here are my tips for becoming an early riser:

• Don’t make drastic changes. Start slowly, by waking just 15-30 minutes earlier than usual. Get used to this for a few days. Then cut back another 15 minutes. Do this gradually until you get to your goal time.
• Allow yourself to sleep earlier. You might be used to staying up late, perhaps watching TV or surfing the Internet. But if you continue this habit, while trying to get up earlier, sooner or later one is going to give. And if it is the early rising that gives, then you will crash and sleep late and have to start over. I suggest going to bed earlier, even if you don’t think you’ll sleep, and read while in bed. If you’re really tired, you just might fall asleep much sooner than you think.
• Put your alarm clock far from you bed. If it’s right next to your bed, you’ll shut it off or hit snooze. Never hit snooze. If it’s far from your bed, you have to get up out of bed to shut it off. By then, you’re up. Now you just have to stay up.
• Go out of the bedroom as soon as you shut off the alarm. Don’t allow yourself to rationalize going back to bed. Just force yourself to go out of the room. My habit is to stumble into the bathroom and go pee. By the time I’ve done that, and flushed the toilet and washed my hands and looked at my ugly mug in the mirror, I’m awake enough to face the day.
• Do not rationalize. If you allow your brain to talk you out of getting up early, you’ll never do it. Don’t make getting back in bed an option.
• Allow yourself to sleep in once in awhile. Despite what I just said in the previous point, once in awhile it’s nice to sleep in. As long as it’s not a regular thing. I do it maybe once a week or so.
• Make waking up early a reward. Yes, it might seem at first that you’re forcing yourself to do something hard, but if you make it pleasurable, soon you will look forward to waking up early. My reward used to be to make a hot cup of coffee and read a book. I’ve recently cut out coffee, but I still enjoy reading my book. Other rewards might be a tasty treat for breakfast (smoothies! yum!) or watching the sunrise, or meditating. Find something that’s pleasurable for you, and allow yourself to do it as part of your morning routine.
• Take advantage of all that extra time. Don’t wake up an hour or two early just to read your blogs, unless that’s a major goal of yours. Don’t wake up early and waste that extra time. Get a jump start on your day! I like to use that time to get a head start on preparing my kids’ lunches, on planning for the rest of the day (when I set my MITs), on exercising or meditating, and on reading. By the time 6:30 rolls around, I’ve done more than many people do the entire day.
• Enjoy the break of dawn! As much as you can, look outside (or better yet, get outside!) and watch the sky turn light. It’s beautiful. And it’s quiet and peaceful. It’s now my favorite time of day. Getting up early is a reward in itself for me.

The summer after high school, afflicted with a serious case of boredom, I would often spend my time baking away pool side, or watching Jerry Springer or Maury Show at my then girlfriend’s house. In fact, we spent so much time watching these shows, and ones like it, that I began to see patterns in the scripting of human behavior.

You would think I would use this new found skill for good, but no, this is what I discovered. When the guy on the show says he is 100% sure he is not the father, he isn’t, and when he says he is 110% sure he is not the father, he is. Go ahead and give this a try, it’s fool proof.

Now the only reasonable meaning that can be attached to this information is that I spent way too many hours watching shows that lacked both in purity and integrity. In other words, I was letting my brain rot.

Who knows if the damage is permanent, or if I am demented now. The one thing I know for sure is that I cannot get those hours of my life back, and that there is no point wasting more time by dwelling on it.

Recovering from Brain Rot
Just to be clear on the Alex Shalman definition of brain rot: It’s when you forcefully stuff too much of the wrong information into your brain, to the point where both your thinking and behavioral patterns become highly disturbed.

One day it occurred to me that if I don’t start filling my brain with positive, useful, and truly interesting information that my brain would shrivel up to the size of a raisin, and I would end up on the Springer show myself.

One of the simple concepts that got me started on this road of personal development is the idea that we can capture 20 years of a persons experience by taking a few hours to read a book about it. Why reinvent the wheel and make the same mistakes that have already been recorded in history? There are an infinite number of bigger and better things we can make mistakes at!

By continuing to do as we always have, the quality of results will be the same as always. Only when we step out of our comfort zones, and push ourselves to improve, will we gain useful new experiences, knowledge, and ideas.

11 Powerful Ways to Expand Your Mind
It’s interesting to note that expanding your mind doesn’t mean your skull is going to become larger or that your brain is going to grow. What happens is our brain becomes denser with neuronal connections, which facilitates both more memory, and speed of retrieval.

11. Reading. As I mentioned in the introduction, by reading we are able to input countless years of experience, creativity, knowledge, and wisdom into our minds in a matter of hours. One should be careful not to pollute their mind by reading the wrong information. This is why I find it important to read books written by people that have accomplished something I want, or that I admire in some way. (Ex: Zen To Done)

10. Writing. Writing expands our vocabulary, which has been shown to be directly correlated with success. Any career that involves people (that’s all of them isn’t it) is based on solid communication with a firm grasp of vocabulary and knack for self-expression.

9. Puzzles. Puzzles strengthen neuronal connections in such a way that they improve hand-eye coordination in people of all ages. Puzzles come in so many varieties that you can practice mathematics, vocabulary, memory and other bouts of critical thinking while enjoying these challenging games. [My favorite: Sudoku]

8. Mathematics. Mathematics teaches us how to think critically, and gives us access to an analytical train of thought. By thinking this way, we are more prone to having more common sense and possessing the skill of logic.

7. Painting. Painting is another great form of self-expression. No art is really ever finished, because there’s always more to be done, but it certainly can be left at great.

6. Cooking. Cooking, especially the kind where you don’t use recipes, engages all of your senses. From the smell of your ingredients, to the feel of the texture, and the sound of the sizzling, we must put everything together to achieve an amazing result with this art form.

5. Music. Music increases our sensitivity, as well as fosters a sense of emotional intelligence. If you’ve ever listened to opera in language that you don’t understand, you will be pleasantly surprised that you will not only know what’s going on, but be able to feel the emotions of the performance.

4. Poetry. Poetry can foster creativity as you paint a vivid image with your words. It’s also a great way to exercise your memory, by recollecting interesting words, as well as memorizing poems to always have with you.

3. Meditate. Meditation has an excellent way of expanding your mind from the subconscious level. It has it’s ways of digging through your mind, and bringing forth important, and often times emotionally charges memories into your conscious mind.

2. Learn a language. Learning a new langauge can be challenging, engaging and fun. Not only will you have to push the mental capacity to put together your newly learned words and phrases, but you will also have the opportunity to think in a different language.

The Number One Way To Expand Your Mind Is Through Questioning Everything. It’s certainly much easier to accept information that comes to us, instead of questioning it and being succeptable to having to think. Have you ever wondered why a flower is a certain color, why someone said they like us, where someone got a percentage from (73% of all percentages are made up), or why a certain Presidential candidate is REALLY worth our vote?

As is usually the case, asking ourselves questions, leads to more questions, and then some more. Sometimes we do get reasonable answers, but it’s important to note that the mere act of asking expands our minds and allows us to try on an infinite number of paradimgns.

A new question, brings a new outlook, which potentially changes everything we know about the world.

Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!