Learning2.0 : Journey to about2findout.com

Google has a translation page, where you can translate sentences and web pages between many languages. It is automatic translation that is about 70% accurate I would say, and will in the other cases return wrong or funny results. Machine translation is still not at a point where it can reliably translate texts, but it can provide enough to get the gist of the text, and it helps translators out because the base translation is done, you just need to correct.

So I have experimented with the Google AJAX Language API today. You can find more information and a sample on the following links:

http://code.google.com/apis/ajaxlanguage/documentation/
http://code.google.com/apis/ajaxlanguage/documentation/reference.html#LangContentType
http://www.google.com/uds/samples/language/translate.html

I was able based on this documentation to create a page where the original text of a question in in the left column, and the automatic translation in the right. An administrator can then verify and correct the new language, and save that question as a draft. As I'm using the Ajax calls, all is implemented in pure javascript on the browser itself, so I don't need any server-side calls or an API license, as it is the client that will request the translation to Google.

An what about the first results? Well, it is not perfect, but it does save a lot of time translating as especially the answer options are usually correct (they are short). The longer the question, the more trouble the automatic translation has to make a correct grammatical sentence out of it.
But first results are promising. I still need to work on it further, but I don't plan to make this a general tool on the site as I fear it will generate a lot of poorly translated questions. I prefer to keep it as a productivity tool to help real flesh and blood administrators to speed up the translation work.

Labels: asp.net, google, google language, machine translation

One of the things you do when you buy a new computer is clean up your old mess before you migrate everything, and move to new applications. So I'm also taking the opportunity to switch to a new reader to follow all the blogs, Flickr photo's and other RSS streams on the might Internet. I used to use the build-in reader on my mail client Thunderbird. But I wanted to switch to a web-based reader, that I can access from everywhere and has a nice and easy overview of what's new or unread.

So I made a choice between Blogliner and Google Reader. Blogliner is the oldest of the two and still very popular. Google Reader is more recent and had a bad start with bad reviews in the beginning, but after some upgrade earlier this year many people are happy with it. I also decided for Google Reader, because of the better interface (Google interface is just Google, but Blogliner's is really last century.) So far it is a joy to follow my feeds via Google, it integrates well with my browser's feed subscription capabilities, you can mark a post as unread, give it a star, add tags (or labels as Google names them), etc. And it's quite fast. Besides, both Ralph and Geert are using it, so who am I to doubt my friends? :-) The downside that I see is that once again I'm using another Google service. They now know what I search for (Google Search), what's in my agenda (Google Agenda), what I read (Google Reader), what I blog (Blogger), who reads my blog (Feedburner), how my web site is doing (Google Analytics), what's on my computer (Google Desktop), my home financials (Google Docs), and I just today paid them 50 euro for advertisements (Google AdWords)...

Labels: blogliner, google, google reader, RSS

So what is Google up to? Nobody seems to know. They just announced a wikipedia-competitor (Knol). They are building their own routers and servers, invest in renewable energy, make a 3D web based on pictures they take on the streets of cities, release an offline version of their Google Docs suite soon, will create a Google Sites product that replaces the simple Google Page Editor, etc etc. They are trying to find out what you should do tomorrow and what job you should have (Online Educa speaker comment: so what's new, sounds much like my wife today), etc.

This is a funny and old movie on the fiction merger of Google and Amazon to create the ultimate media company:

http://epic.makingithappen.co.uk/

Labels: google

A lot of web2.0 sites try to make some money from advertising. Flickr for example shows some advertisement to regular accounts, and not to their paying pro account members. Popular sites actually can make quite some money this way. Most web2.0 applications are loosing money.

I want to spend up to 1000 euro of my own money in this about2findout.com experiment, that's why I am largely using free tools. As an experiment, I've added Google adds on my blog and the 6C-learning.org site. It is actually a quite simple process and it works very well.

• Sign up online for a Google AdSense account for your site. You need to accept the conditions (for example you have to promise not to click on your own adds). It takes a few days for Google to review your application and then you can configure the adds. Reasons for declining your application might be an under construction site, not in a supported language, inappropriate, etc.
• On the Google Adsense pages, you can create the HTLM code you need for your site. There are some tutorials on how to select the best kind of adds (links, banners, search pages), where to place them on your pages and in what colors. The HTML code includes your AdSense key. I've chosen for the classical banner with text adds (AdSense for content)
• Copy the HTML code into your web pages on the appropriate place(s). The first days you might get 'public' adds that don't generate revenue. But soon your banners will show adds based on the content of your site.
• On the AdSense pages, you can see your revenue and various other reports on clickthroughts. You are payed for people clicking on the adds and per thousand impressions.
• If you generate more than 100$ of revenue, you can ask for payout. As a one-time setup I've configured my bank account information for payout. As a verification mechanism, Google will put a small amount on your account.

I'm not in it for the money, which is a good thing because in my first month I generated 5.25$ :-). It doesn't even come close to cover my monthly hosting fee for the site. So maybe at the end of next year I can have my first payout. For adds to generate substantial revenue obviously you need the necessary eyeballs for your site. But as an experiment I have to say the Google AdSense service works very well. (As it should being Google's main source of income.)

Similar services are available from Microsoft and Yahoo.

DECISION: about2findout.com will have a limited number of AdSense panels to (hopefully) cover basic costs such as hosting fees.

Labels: adsense, google

Google is rapidly expanding its empire (just today I heard it purchases jotspot.com, a wiki application). One of the previously acquired companies was writely.com, which is now available in the online word processor and spreadsheets application at http://docs.google.com. All you need is a free google account to start working.

The functionality of both the spreadsheet program and word processor are basic : text, formatting, images, etc. But the great benefit is you can access your documents from anywhere and don't need to worry about the right version of the document or where you stored it. The latest version is always on line, accessible via any browser. You can import/export to a variety of file formats such as MS Office and OpenOffice. I'm currently using it to store my blog preparations, the financials of the about2findout.com project and as a notepad for anything interesting I read or see in the field of learning.

But the advantages go beyond: online applications allow for easy collaboration. You can invite friends and collegues to co-author or view your online documents, leave their comments and even work in real-time on the same document while chatting or talking (Google talk) to eachother! I used this feature once to prepare a questionnaire. It also maintains a version history that you can rollback to.

Technically, the applications showcase some AJAX such as dialog boxes, popups, etc.
I haven't explored all possibilities yet of the tool, but I'm sold already. O yeah: another web2.0 thingy: it's in 'beta'. All web2.0 sites seem to be in perpetual beta. The other option is to keep delaying your products until the complete package is good enough I guess (yes MS, I'm talking about you!)

Labels: google