Introducing Flickr Search Tagging!
It’s a little utility that enables a couple of things:
- Let’s you to propose tags for images that don’t belong to you on Flickr. Contributing tags if you want to help describe the image is often not possible, unless: you’re the owner, you’re a contact of the owner, or the person has allowed very permissive tagging rights.
- Keeps your search queries around the tagging area. Queries are valuable, because you as a user took the time to contribute that text at some point. Now you can leverage that same text when you want to tag an image.
- Tag your images with the proposed tags, or delete the proposed tags.
If this sounds novel and useful, it is :) Or at least, that’s what I’m trying to prove in my thesis.
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I’m trying to wrap my head around all of the information I’m reading about image search. Search, retrieval, information, data, all of these terms are loaded, and used differently depending on whether I’m reading an HCI paper, a text analysis paper, or a blog post about search engine optimisation (SEO).
In hopes of simplifying things, I’ve settled on a human-centred, conceptual definition of search:
Search refers to the process of a user developing a need, defining a query, retrieving information, viewing result(s), providing feedback, and refinements of those steps.
The end result does not have to be finding a single result. Occasionally, other steps in the search process, such as seeing a result set, can satisfy the users need. For example, if the need was to gain information (”What does a ‘87 Oldsmobile Toronado FE3 look like?”) rather than find a specific image (”I need a picture of a black ‘84 Cutty!”), viewing the result set may be enough.
Figure 1 is an illustrates the definition of search, in the human and interface context.
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To be perfectly honest, I was admittied into my Masters program with zero funding. In retrospect, starting a two year+ project with no guaranteed income wasn’t the greatest idea, for a variety of reasons.
First, every semester I hope/pray to get a Graduate Teaching Assistant job, which luckily gets easier and easier as I accumulate “seniority points.”
Second, no funding means no specified project, which means freedom to choose any research topic I please, as long as my (very lenient/forgiving) advisor is OK with it. Well, it’s been about eight months since I’ve come back from India all ready to start researching, and only two days ago did I actually settle on a topic.
Eight months is a long time to pay tuition, and follow dead ends with literature reviews. Also, those months are expensive if you waste your time on partying, girls, video games, Union involvement, student government, keggers, new housemates, motorcycles, trips to Mississippi, Vancouver, Ottawa, and so on. Well .. maybe it wasn’t a complete waste, per se :)
Finally, I’ve settled on a topic that I’m truly interested in.
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This is information about design patterns that can be used in the design of user interfaces. The patterns I’m particularly concerned with deal with the look, feel, and behaviour of modern interface elements, such as those found in browsing “the Web.”
Patterns are often employed in object oriented software development and engineering, much more so than user interface design. I believe that by applying patterns at the user interface layout and design level, employing a “top-down” approach, we can avoid some situations where deep-system code decisions impede usability of the resulting user interface.
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Note: Paper presented as part of graduate course CIS*6650 (Winter 2007) to Dr. Qusay Mahmoud at the University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario.
Abstract
This paper addresses issues of Denial of Service (DoS) for Web Services. Architecture of Web Services is described in context of being doubly susceptible to denials of service (DoS), and contrasted against other models of delivering software. The impact on the client-publisher relationship is discussed, given the impact of loss of functionality during DoS. Solutions involving performance testing and connection security are proposed.
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Note: This presentation and bibliography was delivered as part of a graduate course in Object Oriented Design (Fall 2006) to Dr. Bill Gardner, at the University of Guelph. Ajax was pretty cutting edge in 2006. :)
AJAX is a new term, but it referes to a collection of technologies that have been complete since around 2004. It’s use has been popularized through the groundbreaking work of Microsoft, Google, and smaller firms such as AdaptivePath, who coined the term. AJAX adds the capability of getting new data from a server once a web page has been generated, in hopes of reducing screen refresh, lowering bandwidth utilization; additionally, developers hope to increase user interactivity of web based applications to the level of a regular desktop application. All of this has come at a cost though, including increased complexity, reduced accessibility, and new security threats.
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| Tuesday, May 20th, 2008