never-ever-****-with-my.net

Just as Google releases Spreadsheets (a total non-event for serious Excel users), an interesting discussion surfaced on Slashdot.  The article links to an interesting paper by Raymond R. Panko at University of Hawai'i about what is known about spreadsheet errors.  The conclusion says:

"All in all, the research done to date in spreadsheet development presents a very disturbing picture.  Every study that has attempted to measure errors, without exception, has found them at rates that would be unacceptable in any organization.  These error rates, furthermore, are completely consistent with error rates found in other human activities.  With such high cell error rates, most large spreadsheets will have multiple errors, and even relatively small "scratch pad" spreadsheets will have a significant probability of error."

Also, the article links to the European Spreadsheet Risks Interest Group (EuSpRIG) and its collection of public reports of spreadsheet errors.

Yesterday, Google released its Web Toolkit (GWT):

"(...) a Java software development framework that makes writing AJAX applications easy.  With GWT, you can develop and debug AJAX applications in the Java language using the Java development tools of your choice.  When you deploy your application to production, the GWT compiler translates your Java application to browser-compliant JavaScript and HTML. (...)

Google Web Toolkit ships with a Java-to-JavaScript compiler and a special web browser that helps you debug your GWT applications. For details on how they work, check out the GWT product overview."

Update: running examples are available here (with source code).

Update 2006/6/6: an assortment of interesting links is available on the GWT blog.

As pointed out by André Pitié, Google Maps is now available for Western Continental Europe!  This is hot, as it was not online late last night.

In comparison to competing services, providing links in e-mails or web pages will be much easier. For instance, you could link to a street address (e.g. 1 rue de Rivoli in Paris) or to an itinerary (e.g. Downtown Paris to RMS in Reims).

Unfortunately, the level of detail varies from a country to another: querying Luxembourg street addresses is not supported yet (e.g. Place Guillaume). :-/

It should also be noted Google Earth content has been recently updated. Paris is now covered in much higher resolution than before: you could actually see the pedestrians in front of the Eiffel Tower! :-)

Sitemaps allow you to inform search engines about your web site's URLs that are available for crawling.

Google developed its own Sitemap Protocol, which can be very easily generated from Movable Type using Cameron Bulock's template. This template adds the main index page, all individual archives as well as monthly and category archive links to a sitemap.

For other search engines, I found out a SEO firm developed ROR, a search engine independent format, which can be used to generate sitemaps, but also product catalogues, etc. The format is described here. Several thousands web sites use it.

As I was not happy with the results of ROR's free sitemap generator, I thought I would adapt Cameron's Movable Type template to ROR format.

Ok, I just tried out Google's latest service: Calendar. As usual, the GUI rocks, but I was disappointed with the following:

• You need a Google Account to answer invitations;
• Invitations cannot be added to an Outlook 2003 calendar;
• A map link is displayed even when the event's location is incompatible with Maps;
• It is not interfaced with Gmail contacts;
• It looks like you cannot hide the e-mail addresses of the other guests.

Annoyances which prevent me to use the service for my alumni group events. :-/

Update 2006/4/25: Developments arose, and it looks like Google Calendar is heading fairly fast in the right direction:

• You no longer need a Google Account to answer invitations;
• Guests now have the ability to add invitations to their Outlook 2003 calendar, but their answers (Accept | Tentative | Decline) are not processed automatically--guests receive no warning their response has not been taken into account, and you end up with a useless e-mail in your Gmail inbox (a major drawback);
• The map link is always displayed, but Google Maps coverage has just broadened significantly (where street addresses are not fully supported, the trick is to list the city only);
• It looks like partial support has been implemented for Gmail contacts as guests e-mail addresses now auto-complete (still, it would be better if both services could be accessed from a single GUI);
  
• Organizers can hide their guests' e-mail addresses, but guests who add comments disclose their e-mail address without any warning (a privacy issue).

In today's European edition of the Wall Street Journal, Lee Gomes wrote an interesting column on Under the Radar's Why Web 2.0 Matters conference where start-ups presented their business plans to a panel of VCs and other judges.

"The advice came in the form of the sorts of probing questions (...) such as:

1. Is what you are doing really a company or just a feature that will end up as part of some existing product?
2. If you are trying to take on an incumbent player--Google, MySpace--do you do something 10 times better than they do?
3. If you are developing something for the Web, what is to stop spammers from ruining everything you are trying to do?"

As reported by Reuters, the existence of the previously rumored GDrive online storage service surfaced after a blogger discovered apparent notes in a presentation supposedly published by error on Google's site after its analysts presentation day last Thursday.

"With infinite storage, we can house all user files, including emails, web history, pictures, bookmarks, etc and make it accessible from anywhere (any device, any platform, etc)," the notes in the original Google presentation state.

Chief Executive Eric Schmidt in his presentation made a cryptic comment that one goal of Google was to "store 100 percent" of consumer information.

As reported by Computerworld, Gartner warns the latest version of Google Desktop poses security risks, as Google's servers may store an index of the files contained on the workstation where it is installed.

The workaround is to install the enterprise version, which lets IT administrators decide which features should be enabled or not (using GPOs).

Likewise, an enterprise version exists for the latest version of Google Toolbar (still in beta), and lets IT admins deactivate sensitive functions (i.e. PageRank display or AutoFill).