RFID In An OPEN World

How to add the CrossFitPolaris.com feed to MyWOD

Hey everyone:

Here are step by step instructions on adding the CrossFit Polaris feed into your MyWOD app.

First, you will need the link to the actual feed. For us, its 

http://crossfitpolaris.com/category/wod/feed/

Go to your MyWOD app and select the "Common" tab at the bottom:

Here, you should see all the common WODs and any custom WODs you have added. Select the "+" at the top corner.

From here, select "New Feed" to add a new feed.

This is the step where you add in a name and the link to the feed. I used "CrossFit Polaris" as the name and the link is: "http://crossfitpolaris.com/category/wod/feed/" (remove the quotes) 

http://crossfitpolaris.com/category/wod/feed/

Authentication is NOT required.

Now, the feed should appear in your list as is seen here:

To select a WOD for the day, select the CrossFit Polaris feed and you will see a list of the WODs by day.

You can add today's workout or any that you happen to have missed in the past.

Here you will see the WOD for the day you selected.

Select "Add to Completed WODs" to add this as a WOD you have completed.

Add in the date to match the workout and the scoring type (For rounds, for reps, for time, etc.) and then your score. Add in if this is a "PR" and if you did the WOD at Rx as well.

Finally, when you go back to your "My WODs" tab, you will see your WOD entered on the date you selected as shown here:

If you have any questions, please let me know!

via www.dpi.inpe.br

The 3G wars AT&T vs. Verizon

I have always had a cell phone it seems and I was definitely one of the first to get a "smartphone".  I feel that over the years, I have had a phone on all of the "major" networks, but never have I had the opportunity I had today.

While driving home for Thanksgiving, my beautiful wife agreed to drive giving me the chance to get a lot of work done.  During that time, it dawned on me that I should take this chance to see what network really was faster over time over a distance.

So, I hit areas from Columbus to Toledo to Ft Wayne, IN consistently testing Verizon's network vs. AT&T's network.  I am a long-time Verizon customer, so to say I was surprised by the outcome would be a massive understatement.

Stop One:  North Columbus

Verizon 3G:  288 down 271 Up

AT&T 3G:  2814 Down 371 Up

North of Delaware, OH:

Verizon 3G:  351 down 317 Up

AT&T 3G:  984 Down 281 Up

South of Toledo, OH:

Verizon 3G:  91 down 86 Up

AT&T Edge:  271 Down 34 Up

Just East of Indiana/Ohio border:

Verizon 3G:  72 down 71 Up

AT&T Edge:  149 Down 39 Up

OK guys and gals, these are the facts.  I haven't changed anything.

Apps/Phones Used:

Blackberry Storm

Potential excuses for slowness - Connected to corporate email server

No other apps running

Apple iPhone 3G

Potential excuses for slowness - Connected to corporate email server

No other apps running

Conclusion:

I guess if I were Verizon, they can claim that something is 3G when maybe it really isn't so fast?  I have "felt" that my phones were slow on Verizon's network (I have had 3 blackberries and a Palm Treo) and all of them felt slow, but there was no good way to benchmark the speed.  The wireless cards appear to be good and I have usually been able to pull 300KB down on them and 300 up with the rare exception I have gotten them to 700 KB/s down.

Truth in advertising:

TRUE:  Verizon's 3G coverage appears to be larger in space than AT&T's 3G coverage. (Several times above in VERY rural areas, I dropped to Edge as you can see in my results)

TRUE:  AT&T is the fastest 3G network

Questions:  What is 3G?  Most people claim Edge is "2.75G", however it appears that Edge has better download speeds than I am getting on Verizon side by side, but slower upload speeds.  I guess the answer is up to interpretation, but if you believe ads, well, then..  ummmmmmm dot dot dot, you are naive :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Step by Step - Updating iOS 4.x Beta to your device

This seems to be a general problem that people figure out by word of mouth and I couldn't find and good instructions on how to do it.  Once the 3rd person asked me (after I had to ask a friend of mine), I decided to do a little post on it.

Notes:  

To download the beta, you need to be a paid member of the Apple developer program ($99/yr)

The file you download is a DMG file (disc image), so, that's probably the most confusing part.

Go do the Developer apple site and grab the latest beta:

http://developer.apple.com

Now, once it's downloaded (it's a BIG file 500+MB), it's a DMG file, so you need to double click it (just like you were installing it).  This will mount the disc image for you.  In Finder, you should see this:

The DMG file is mounted and you see the .ipsw file, which is what you need to select from iTunes to update your iOS.

Next, open iTunes and connect your device.

Hold down the "Alt" key and click "Check for Update" This will open a finder window for you to select a file.

Select your mounted image file and the .ipsw file is inside.

Select "Update" and just wait.  iTunes will take care of the rest.

If anyone has problems with this, let me know.

My rant on the new iPhone Data Plans

I believe the term is "Indian Giver" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_giver

That is in a nutshell how I see AT&T now.  Anyone who knows me has heard about my my rants on companies doing these kinds of things.  Recently, Pei Wei took away free soda with your carry out order.  Since they essentially made the soda worthless, customers assume the cost is built into the food (which it must be because the food isn't "cheap").

There are dozens of examples of this in the corporate and retail world and there are acceptable and unacceptable ways of doing this.  

Acceptable ways of changing the rules generally mean it's clear that you are getting a "deal".  For instance, Best Buy may do a promotion of Buy one, Get One (BOGO) free and that promotion may run for a week or 2 weeks or it may run for a year depending on the circumstances.  However, it's clear that you are operating under a promotion.  This is the case with Dish TV and DirecTV and Cable where they may "give" you promotional pricing for a year or they may "give" you HBO and Showtime for 3 months.  However, in all cases it's pretty clear you are getting a promotion.

Alternatively, if your cable company was giving you 200 channels and then said hey, we are going to now give you 20 channels but we will charge you $10 less, would that be "OK"?  I am going to guess no in 90% of the situations.

If, for instance, 95% of the people are in the under 200MB range, then why change the rules?  Does anyone honestly buy that this is in the consumer's best interest?  It's kind of sad if you really do. 

When someone gives you something and then takes it away, it's crap.  I use quite a bit more data for streaming Pandora and downloading movies for the kids via iTunes. God forbid if you find yourself on the road and your kids are screaming for Spongebob.

Guess what?  If you are on board with this plan, you're in trouble.  Gone are the days of surfing You Tube.  I find myself wondering what is the point of an iPhone when you are locked down on data?  Everyone knows that the iPhone SUCKS as a phone.  It's only advantage were the great apps that use data.

Why does the iPhone suck as a phone?

High-powered CDMA signals have raised the "noise floor" for GSM receivers, meaning there is less space within the available band to send a clean signal. This sometimes results in dropped calls in areas where there is a high concentration of CDMA technology. Conversely, high-powered GSM signals have been shown to cause overloading and jamming of CDMA receivers due to CDMA’s reliance upon broadcasting across its entire available band.

The result of this little cross-broadcasting joust has led some cities to pass ordinances limiting the space between cell towers or the height they can reach, giving one technology a distinct advantage over the other.

This is the case is most of the US where CDMA has the advantage.  

So, most would ask, why does my iPhone drop calls more than my Blackberry?  Well, the iPhone grabs more data on a tower in addition to the voice.  GSM towers hold connections for about 60 users each vs. CDMA holds about 300 users each.  So, what happens on the iPhone is that when you move from tower to tower, there is a higher likelihood that you will get squeezed out when you switch towers.  Certain areas of high usage make these drops happen more often.

So, now what we have is all these people putting up with crappy voice service because it's really a mobile mini computer with an always on data connection.  Taking that away is a really bad move and it ensures the continued adoption of Android en masse.  This is really sad for me personally because I feel like a strong offering from the iPhone will make all the options better, however this change will likely slow down advancements. 

Personally, I use quite a bit of data on my e-mail for opening and looking at docs while on the go.  I have actually been iPhone-less since I left my last job and I have been on my Droid 100%.  I "have" to go to an AT&T plan though and I have a stay atleast until June, but now I am thinking I might as well stay with Verizon and just suck it up.  I have a real problem with locking you down to 2GB and the fact that people are actually "buying in" to this is really shocking.

So, here is what I am seeing:

AT&T vs. Verizon:

Data - AT&T wins

Voice - Verizon wins

Apps:  (Taking Jailbreak/Root out of the equation) For all intents and purposes, it's a wash now for apps that you would regularly use, however:

Android gives you Google Voice, Chat, Maps, etc. and it's all free.  You have to pay for decent navigation on iPhone.  Both have Skype, however you have to pay for it on iPhone now.

AT&T just killed their only advantage over Verizon. 

I was so excited for the new iPhone (really, I was - I admit it) and I was actually going to buy it.  However, literally EVERYTHING costs more on iPhone and to be quite frank, the Android experience is pretty darn good.  I just wish AT&T would get a decent Android device.  

Stupid move ma bell.  Feel free to comment away :)

Content Management and eCommerce

I feel like I have been doing Content Management for my whole life.  It actually has been a long time, but the real calculation places me just short of 1/3 of my life.  In that time, I have run the gamut in terms of "What is Content Management".  I have been through Web Content Management, Enterprise Content Management, Records Management, Catalog Management and more.  Content Management can take many forms, but I wanted to look at it a little closer and see what makes "sense".  What makes "sense" in this world of ever reducing costs is to be able to do content management better, faster and cheaper both today and in the long-run.

The first thing I look at is we need to agree that following the KISS method is of the utmost importance. (Keep It Simple Stupid).

The second thing to look at is your Information Architecture.  After realizing that Content Management needs to be easy, this is the most important in order to understand so that all of your base level pages, media types and content items can be defined.  Your solution should be able to accept new media types and the addition of pages should be simple and straight forward.  By identifying your content types and what pages they live on, new pages and new content can be easily automated.

Many people feel strongly that the creative defines the content management system, however this is one of the biggest mistakes in the field.  Since we all know the only constant in life is change, we can assume that the creative will change and in some cases change significantly.  When this happens, it is important that the content management solution doesn't need to be rebuilt.  Content types should be defined by what they are, not how they look.  Defining content in this manner is called loose definition and it allows for the best reuse of content and the most flexibility.  Most pure content sites can be handled with less than 5 content types (navigation item, media item, article item, and promotion).  CSS can and should handle the details.  Since we know the sites will change every 12-18 months, changing the out the content management system (CMS) as well makes even having a CMS questionable based on the cost to implement one.  there is no ROI in saving 500K by having a CMS if it costs you 700K to implement it every 12 months.

The next question is eCommerce.  Products are just content at the end of the day, and should they really be managed as anything other than as another content type?  The obvious answer is no.  I am amazed how often I see content and products managed by different systems.  The cost for something like this is almost unimaginable.  Now, a product may be a more strictly defined content type depending on the requirements for making attributes searchable.

“Keeping it Simple” means keeping your content simple and keeping the number of solutions simple.  If multiple solutions are in place for products and other content, it might be time to re-evaluate your solution to something like ATG (Art Technology Group) as a solution that handles all content within a single application.  Additionally, if your system has more that 10 content types, it might be time to re-evaluate your solution to see where things can be streamlined in order to not have the cost of implementation become a barrier to entry for updating your site and keeping your brand fresh.

OPEN E-Commerce

People always ask me about tying the new trends of the OPEN Brand or Social Commerce into what is reality in the technology world of E-Commerce.  I found myself sitting at the Partner conference for ATG in January this year while the ATG leadership team was talking about the future of their platform and how it was the last platform you would ever need.  This got me thinking how that would become a reality due to the cost ramifications when I know that my client’s best interests are my number one objective.  It suddenly dawned on me this week as I was working through a myriad of E-Commerce issues as it relates to a number of my Retail clients that this new world of E-Commerce should be MUCH LESS EXPENSIVE, both to build and to maintain.  Given budgets this year, this is extremely important.

The first question that comes to mind is just how can I do all things social and be where my customers are while maintaining costs?  It seems we can’t touch our core E-Commerce solutions for less than 7 figures… That, however, IS the answer.  You DON’T touch your core Commerce functionality.

Your CORE E-Commerce functionality should be these things and these things only: •    Catalog •    Checkout (Payment and Fraud) •    Inventory Management •    Fulfillment •    Back Office Integration The things I find myself being asked to change the most are things like this: •    Facebook Applications/Fan Pages •    Path to Product/Checkout •    SEO •    Personalization/Scenarios •    Search Implementations (Endeca, Google) •    Advertising Campaigns The previous items are the most common pieces that drive conversion and sales for marketing organizations.  Let’s face it, Back Office integration is more of a cost of doing business vs. something you can show true ROI on, at least in the short term. How do you DO IT? I have long been a fan of the acronym KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid).  The running norm is to try and build everything into the Core Commerce system, which generally ends with everyone being less than pleased.  Boiling the ocean is not something anyone should undertake.  An E-Commerce solution can be broken up into 3 basic layers: •    Front-End •    Commerce Enablement •    Back Office Segregating these layers allows for a scalable and organized approach to not just e-commerce, but commerce in general.  Back Office pieces such as Data Warehouse, CRM, Inventory Management, Warehouse Management, etc. are all core competencies of your business.  These areas would be managed and run as they are today, but with the new approach, there would be significantly more clarity about what needs to be done. Commerce Enablement is all about connecting these Back Office systems to your commerce system in a consistent way so that the inputs and outputs are always a known quantity.  By settling on what these inputs and outputs should be, clear lines of delineation can be drawn, simplifying your organization and minimizing your need for overhead. Clients should focus on the only exposed items of your E-Commerce system to be your catalog being available and REST APIs being available for the following things: •    Add to cart •    Remove from cart •    Check Inventory •    Checkout •    Get Confirmation These are the core functions necessary to be able to checkout a customer.  Everything else is something extra and it can generally be done for a lot less than trying to build it all into the Core Commerce system.  The separation will allow front-end applications to be built, upgraded, modified, and extended without affecting the core commerce experience.  What does that end up meaning?  Everything costs a lot less. This sounds too good to be true… There are some drawbacks to this approach.  Personalization would not be done via the core commerce platform, however there are lots of SaaS based personalization services from ATG that are available for your promotions that are significantly easier to implement into your code base. The upsides are endless… Point of Sale registers can be easily replaced by a web based system that will eliminate long and difficult closing processes and it will allow for cross sell and upsells from the register and even in the dressing room.

I like to always say that a picture is 1,000 words.  In this case, it's less than 1,000 :)

Next up..  RFID

Lots of Work, Lots of Innovation, Loving ATG

It's been a crazy last few months and we have been extremely busy working on creating a value added approach to ATG implementations that goes way beyond the standard implementation. Many times these go badly because the reality of what is possible within the Iron Triangle doesn't meet with the expectations that were present at the beginning of the project. I feel that by taking the strong foundation of a market leading product, like ATG, value added add-ons can make the product faster to implement with better scalability and allow the utilization of the entire ATG suite.

The whole idea started for me many years ago when I was at Inforte and it seemed like we consistently had to build the same content management systems over and over that were specifically tailored to a visual design. As we continued to improve our process of managing catalogs and general content, it began to occur to me that these tailored solutions were bad for our clients because in 12-18 months when they refreshed their site, we would have to do this same process again.

As I thought about how we get into this vicious cycle, it became more and more clear to me that there is and should be a slight change to the notion of gathering requirements. When we gather requirements, we always ask the client what they want. The problem is that most people, myself included, when I was a client, don't always know what they want because all of the information isn't available. A light bulb went off in my head at this point in my career that gathering requirements should be replaced by driving requirements based on architectural and design best practices. By driving requirements, we can give the client the best solution that fits within what they want to do now and will likely want to do in the future. We can measure success by seeing how much of a content and catalog management solution we need to replace in a redesign.

Many of you might think I am completely crazy at this point, but content management best practices dictate that the best way to manage content is at the asset level vs. at the page level. If we take that approach, many of the architectural and business level decisions become automatic for us and it will eliminate hundreds of hours of meetings, design and development where approaches are decided that many time do not meet the needs of the business. In the case of asset level publishing, the page just becomes another asset that doesn't lock all the elements on a page when we edit that information. Changes to content on a page can also be published separately from changes to a page's meta data and thus collisions for shared content items in publishing are eliminated.

Being at Resource Interactive has given me the opportunity to create a product add-on for the #1 eCommerce platform on the planet that will address the content management problem that every client faces. We have been working with ATG on this front for the past several months to create a reusable implementation of ATG that would take advantage of all the things ATG has done right with their product and eliminate the major things that most implementers do wrong when implementing the product. Additionally, we have been spending the past several months creating an offering around tying RI Personas into ATG's best of breed multi level personalization.

Combining the power of asset level publishing with actionable persona based personalization creates an unmatched level of flexibility and customer service for an eCommerce client.  I have never been so excited for any one project in my whole career.

Honda FCX Clarity - Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicle - Official Web Site

Top 10 Android apps vs Top 10 iPhone apps and what is missing in both

My ongoing review of Android and iPhone side by side has compelled me to look into what I think are the top apps (that I use regularly).  I figured the best way to look at this is what the top apps that I use on both phones, apps only on iPhone and apps only on Android.  I am going to exclude email and calendar for this post.  Both platforms have good, but not great functionality.

Top apps on BOTH phones:

Facebook:  This is the app I would say I am on the most outside of E-mail and Calendar.  Overall, as I have said previously, the iPhone version of the app is superior in most ways to the Android counterpart.  The design of the iPhone version is crisper and the iPhone version has chat whereas the Android version does not.

Twitter:  On the iPhone, I use Twitbird pro 2.2 which is a paid app.  On Android, I use Seesmic which is a free app.  Both have all the major Twitter functionality including trends, searches, lists, etc.  As I have said before, Android integrates twitter better into the experience by running it in the background which gives updates, etc. in your status bar without having to use push notifications.  I find push notifications annoying on the iPhone as they takeover whatever I am doing, so I have largely disabled them.

Barcode scanner for Shopping:  I used this A LOT this Christmas season and I found it absolutely a game changer.  It's so easy that my mother even uses this on her Motorola Droid.  Barcode scanner is a free app for Android and it works incredibly well.  It is fast, efficient and it find the best prices everywhere.  Red Laser is a paid app on the iPhone and isn't very good on the iPhone 3G due to the camera, however on the the 3GS, this seems to be fixed due to to the 3GS camera can focus on close up objects.

ESPN Radio app:  This is a paid app for Android and iPhone ($2.99).  You can listen live to over 16 ESPN radio stations as well as over 35 on demand podcasts and on-demand Sportscenter.  A must have for any sports fan.

Google Reader app.  Byline on iPhone is simple and elegant.  NewsRob on Android is probably the most powerful Google Reader app I could imagine.  At the end of the day though, both are great for what they do and you get your feeds efficiently.

Photoshop.  This is a free app for Android and iPhone.  This is an excellent photo editor.

Wikipedia.  I am a geek and I have a need for a plethora of useless facts at my fingertips.  This is a free app for both platforms and both apps work great.

Speedtest.  This is a free app on both and since I love to test Verizon's and AT&T's network constantly, I am a heavy user of this app :)

Amazon Mobile.  Both platforms provide an excellent app for shopping Amazon's extensive catalog. You can buy via one click purchase and all your options online are in the mobile versions.

Pandora Radio.  Pandora is a recommendation engine for music, letting listeners create radio stations based on their particular tastes. If you like AC/DC, create a station based on the Australian rockers to hear songs like "Highway to Hell," but you'll also get songs from bands with a similar sound pedigree, such as Black Sabbath.

iPhone Only apps I love:

Overall, the iPhone has A LOT more apps than Android and this list could be long, but I am focusing on apps I actually consistently use over time.  Mostly these are games as the gaming platform on the iPhone is vastly superior to Android today.

Kindle.  I love the Kindle on the iPhone.  I was amazed at how easy it was to read a book on it.  I have read several books on it and I feel it's a nice eReader.  It looks like no Kindle on Android is a victim of politics thus far due to the Nook.  These things are subject to change over time, but as of today, this is a miss for Android.

Air Mouse.  There are some alternatives on Android, but nothing is as good as Air Mouse.  This can take the place of a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse.  I find this to be a great app and I use it a lot.

Alarm.com.  I use this app every day to interact with my home alarm system.  It won't do anyone any good unless you use Alarm.com.  This is a great app though and you can set, disarm and track statuses of your alarm as well as get live video from ay camera on your network.

Civilization Revolution.  This game is based on the XBOX 360 game.  The graphics and game play are actually more usable and better on the iPhone than on the Nintendo DS and the gameplay is better than on the 360.  My wife can attest that this has been a HUGE time waster for me :)

Real Soccer 2010.  This is a great soccer game for the iPhone and while I wouldn't take it over a Wii or an XBOX version, if I were on a plane or away from home, this is a really fun game.  I find it better than the EA version.

Tiger Woods 2010 golf.  I hate touting something by Tiger right now, but this game is absolutely sick.  One could spend HOURS playing this game alone.

Quicken.  I could live without the other apps I have listed, however Quicken is something I can't live without.  I am in this app every day and its fantastic for checking in where you are financially.  The only issue I have is that I have to login daily (it doesn't save that info).

Android Only Killer apps:  iPhone has some browser versions of these apps, but those are just a stopgap because Apple won't let these apps on the iPhone.  I am not including jail broken iPhones which open the iPhone to a lot of possibilities.

Google Goggles.  Google Goggles is a visual search app.  Instead of using words, take a picture of an object with your camera phone: we attempt to recognize the object, and return relevant search results. Goggles also provides information about businesses near you by displaying their names directly in the camera preview.

Google Maps.  While iPhone comes with Google Maps, it lacks most of the reall strong features that Android's Google maps includes.  GPS Navigation, Latitude, US (only) is included which gives views of: compass arrow, scale bar, terrain layer, and more.

Google Voice.  Google Voice for Android lets you place calls and send SMS showing your Google number. Listen to voicemail and/or read transcripts from the Google Voice inbox. Google Voice account required, currently only available in the US.

PDA Net.PdaNet allows your computer to go online through the Android phone's data connection. Supports USB Tether and Bluetooth DUN. No root access needed and runs on all Android phones. Mac&PC.  Your phone does not need to be jailbroken to support this app.  Free version works on port 80, but a one time fee of $29 allows for VPN and SSL connections.

Super Nintendo Emulator.  SNesoid is an emulator for the Super Nintendo game console. It runs most games at a very much playable speed in full screen mode with sound.  It turns your Android phone into a Super Nintendo without needing to Jailbreak.  The Emulator is $3.49 on the Android market.

Talk to me.  Avoid language barriers by using a real-time speech-to-speech translator.  You speak into this app, and it translates for you into a new language.  VERY cool.

This is a problem on iPhone where sometimes apps just crash or things just "seem" slow.  You can get to the processes if you jailbreak, but Android allows this out of the box without needing to jailbreak.  While most users wouldn't use this feature, advanced users love this option.

Conclusion:  I think that the iPhone is an amazing device on the cusp of it's fourth iteration and it's obviously had a lot more put into it in terms of a developer's community and the platform as a whole.  For some reason only known to Steve Jobs, they are continuing to lock out Google.  That's like having a mall and saying no Les Wexner, I don't want any of your stores or anything you created.  That means no Limited, Victoria's Secret, Henri Bendel, Hollister, Abercrombie, Bath & Body Works, etc. You get the picture.  You could have an amazing mall, but without these stores, you are very exposed to competition.

Google is zeroing in on the weaknesses of Apple and attacking them hard.  There are only a few reasons to jailbreak your phone and all of those reasons are fixed in Android and those are: Backgrounding apps, Tethering, Google apps, Emulators for games, control over processes (killing tasks)  Apple will have to figure out these issues in the 4th generation iPhone.  Android needs to work on it's developer community and come up with an "easier" way to build apps the way Apple has with Coco.  Will it matter?  We will know by mid 2010 which I see as the year for the smartphone race to become a 2 horse race between iPhone and Android with Blackberry, Palm and Microsoft falling further behind.