Solutions for API’s
As there are more and more new-fandangled Web-based products released on to the market, one of the things I’ve noticed (yah, me and probably everyone else on the planet), is that they feature the ability for other developers to write their own applications on top of them.
This is typically accomplished using an API. In today’s world, more often than not, it’s a URL-based API. A developer says, “get me this content, based on these parameters” and the service provides an according response in either text or XML or whatever format.
I came across a new company today called Post App. The premise is quite smart (based on what you can tell from a terribly simple home page, and an e-mail sign-up form), in that it’s catering to the set that may want to write their own applications, but don’t necessarily have the know-how to do so.
This is important for a couple of reasons, that I see.
- Developers who write the API’s are probably smarter than most of the developers charged with building solutions on top of those API’s
- Business stakeholder’s are looking for solutions that get built quick (whan don’t they want this), and work really damn well
- Users that are aware of this “Web 2.0″ thing are always on to trying to find that next cool service — that next 30 boxes, or that next Flickr.
I’ve signed-up for their private beta, so I’m hoping that I get invited in. I’d love to see what this is all about, because I’m really into the idea of making the creation of customized Web services on top of existing API’s much easier for a larger set of folks. There are tons of ideas floating around out there that are useful.
The tricky part that Post App faces is opening the service up to a level that’s comparable to actually writing the stuff from scratch. Yes, this seems easy in principle. However, as a hack PHP developer who has entertained and researched the idea of using freeware apps / code that already exist to “try” and get something done “faster”, I know that it’s more often than not, a better choice to write your own application from the ground up.
So, that being said, I’m interested to check it out, as see what the reaction is from developers.
Best Error Message Ever
Adam Trachtenberg has a post on his blog about the best Outlook error message ever. I can top that with this one I got yesterday while installing the new Windows Live! Messenger update.
I love Microsoft.
Welcome to Flasche Gedanken
Flasche Gedanken, welcome and thanks for the link! Good luck on your blog, and thanks for reading!
FeedDemon Rocks
I love FeedDemon. I would not be able to get by day to day without it. They have just released 2.0 beta 4 and it is awesome — I recommend checking it out, and making the purchase if necessary. It’s insanely faster than some of the other betas, and adds some really nice features and changes to the look and feel of the feed layouts, which make them easier to read.
Great job, Nick. This coupled with my trusty Newsgator subscription kicks major ass.
Overly Impressed
I am overly impressed with the piece of software that I am using to write this post, which is called MarsEdit. Here’s a screenshot.
Doesn’t look like much, but the developers really did something VERY cool. When you first start up the app, it asks you for the name and URL of your blog. OK, so I type in “Write That Down” and “http://www.writethatdown/”. I say to myself, “there’s gotta be additional settings that I have to provide in order for this thing to work.” So, I go and write up a test post and click the “Send to Weblog” button — I’m still thinking at this point, it’s going to ask me for the service I use, but nope — just asks for a username and password. It auto-sensed what blogging service I use, and connected to it. Cool!
I don’t know why that impressed me so much, but it did. Cool app, guys. I’m seriously thinking about investing the $25 USD at the end of my trial (aka, $1,000.00 CDN) to keep using it. We’ll see how things go over the next few weeks.
If you have a blog / Mac, I’d suggest looking into MarsEdit. It doesn’t only work with Typepad, but a slew of other blogging services as well.
