Web Development

The highlight of this system is a clear separation of the cube computation engine and the query serving engine of this OLAP system. Another newness is the use of a key value store, Voldemort, to fetch the results of queries. Contrary to conventional designs where the cube computation engine and the query serving infra are coupled tightly, Avatara chooses to separate these two aspects. The offline batch engine is based on Hadoop. A set of MapReduce jobs transform the data into cubes. These cubes are then bulk loaded into the key value store for fast online access. The batch processing pipeline consists of three phases: preprocessing, projections and joins and cubification. Each of these phases is a collection of MapReduce jobs and carried out executed sequentially. After data is preprocessed in the first phase a star schema is modeled in the second phase. The engine projects and joins the fields from the fact and dimension tables and writes the output to a temp location. The third phase is when the cubification happens. This phase generates a number of small cubes as MOLAP blobs (multidimensional array) containing dimensions and measures. The storage format is optimized such that the query engine can retrieve this data in a single disk fetch. When clients issue queries it is intercepted by the online query engine component. The engine reads data from the key value store. The query engine models a SQL like syntax and supports operations such as select, where and group by along with some math operations. Since the system is built to keep query response times very low it disallows joins from being performed online. The discussion section (3.4) of the paper best summarizes the design trade offs. Worth inlining verbatim – Avatara provides ?exibility in terms of where cube materialization can happen: operations such as sum, average, order, or limit can be performed of?ine or online. With more of?ine aggregation, online queries will be faster, but naturally less ?exible. For example, after a developer speci?es the granularity of a time dimension to be at the “week” level in the of?ine phase, future online aggregations can only happen at equal or coarser levels such as “weeks” or “months”. For WVMP, partial materialization happens of?ine to roll up pro?le visits into a weekly aggregation level; the remaining materialization happens online because the cubes are small. This also enables us to introduce new query patterns by selecting a different set of dimensions without recomputing any cubes. Link to the paper.

This past week 6 new mashups were added to our mashup directory and 6 different APIs were used to build them. Some of the newer or less frequently seen APIs include PriceSpin and Primal. The most often used APIs this week are foursquare, Google Maps and PriceSpin. And the most commonly used types of APIs were Mapping (1 APIs, 2 mashups), Music (1 APIs, 1 mashups) and Shopping (1 APIs, 1 mashups). The list below shows which APIs were used by which mashups: Echo Nest used in Bluth Radio foursquare used in HangoutLater Google Maps used in Companies Near Me, GeoGuessr Instagram used in Worldcam PriceSpin used in ShopSmart Brazil Primal used in ShopSmart Brazil Mashups of the day:And each day there is one mashup selected to be Mashup of the Day. Here are last week’s winners: Bluth Radio Companies Near Me GeoGuessr HangoutLater ShopSmart Brazil Worldcam Sponsored by

"...you can search for a notable person in current events and not only see the top news results from across the web, but also a visual carousel which allows you to explore important and timely topics related to the specific person you're searching for."

No designer can ignore the call of the mobile. Mobile is the wave of the future and there is a tremendous surge in website designs that cater exclusively to the mobile. But separate mobile websites cannot stand firm against the onslaught of dozens of new mobile devices. Designers need to create designs that display attractively on PCs, laptops, smartphones, tablets, phabelts, web-enabled TVs, netbooks and several other niche devices. Responsive web design is the only sane alternative when you need to design for such a bewildering array of screen sizes. While all are not convinced that responsive web design is the future, the responsive way of design has gained a vast support among web designers all over the world. But many of us end up using responsive designing simply to solve the problem of different screen layouts – this clears the way for mediocre designs that offer a low-quality... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

Welcome to YUI Weekly, the weekly roundup of news and announcements from the YUI team and community. If you have any interesting demos or links you’d like to share, feel free to leave a comment below. Today we reach the Sprint 7 Feature Complete milestone, which is just fancy terminology for the last day that new feature pull requests can be merged into the next release of YUI. The next milestone on the current development cycle is the Commit Freeze Pull Request Deadline next Tuesday PM. So if you have anything for inclusion into the June 4th release of YUI, you only have a few days left! Yeti v0.2.23 was released this week to increases stability in IE and fix a few bugs. Check out the release announcement for more details. Also, Yogi saw a version bump this week (diff) to lock in version dependencies. Upgrade with npm install -g yeti yogi. YUI core team members Reid (@reid), Eric (@ericf), Caridy (@caridy), and Tilo (@tilomitra) will be attending JSConf.us and CSSConf next week. So say hi if you are in the area! In this week’s Open Roundtable (notes, YouTube) we introduced one of our new summer interns, Patrick Jameson (@patjameson). Welcome Pat! We discussed Contributing.md, SWF deprecation, speaker deadlines for upcoming conferences (JSconf.eu and HTML5DevConf), stale pull requests, and tickets that are up for grabs. Discussions this week on the contributor mailing list included a proposal to deprecate SWFs, a clarification on Feature Complete, a proposal for migration of the forums to Google Groups, and more. Recent additions to the Gallery include: Affix – Inspired by Bootstrap Affix. ScrollSpy – Inspired by Bootstrap ScrollSpy. Task – A utility for simplifying the use of promises by making them behave as synchronous code. Updated modules in this week’s Gallery build include: affix, dd-momentum-plugin, debounce, io-utils, scrollspy, and task. Links of the Week (thanks to JavaScript Weekly) GIF.js Writing Testable JavaScript Chrome’s requestAutocomplete() Fluent APIs and Method Chaining … and more

Lambda Labs to debut Facial Recognition API for Google Glass. Will we finally see the release of the Pinterest API? Plus: National Crime Victimization Survey Data is now available in open data format for developers and 9 new APIs. Lamba Labs To Launch Facial Recognition API for Glass Lamba Labs is likely to announce a Facial Recognition API for Google Glass in week’s time. The API will allow you to identify faces in the crowd along with storing the history of faces that it encountered. Lamba Labs has in all probability used parts of its Face API to implement this extension to Google Glass. The API is however likely to face a hurdle when it comes to privacy, specifically because Facial Recognition without an users permission was one of the questions asked in a recent Congressional inquiry against Google Glass. Lambda Labs says that they might provide users the ability to opt-out. Is a Pinterest API On The Cards? The Pinterest API is one of the most viewed API Profiles on our side. While the API is not available, developer interest into getting API access to Pinterest, that is a virtual pinboard of your interests, is very high. We have seen an instance of the API documentation appear in the past and a new TechCrunch report a similar sighting. The newly launched Developer site contains information on existing document and new pin types that it recently introduced. API News You Shouldn’t Miss BJS Releases API of National Crime Victimization Survey Data Down with file attachments! Hail to the Google Docs API update Rallyverse, a platform that helps brands spread authentic content, releases API Netflix Founder & Greenplum Exec Join Looker 9 New APIs Today we had 9 new APIs added to our API directory including a livestock show information service, a custom content marketing feeds service, a time zone converter tool, a litecoin information service, a sydney shopping center information service and a fleet tracking system. Below are more details on each of these new APIs. Arizona National Livestock Show API: The Arizona National Livestock Show (ANLS) website provides information about the show and its events to the general public. The ANLS seeks to preserve western heritage while promoting livestock and agricultural practices. Users can retrieve information on ANLS events, history, and sponsors programmatically via SOAP API. Crosspollinate Content Marketing API: Crosspollinate builds technologies and products designed to support people in an interconnected and interdependent world. The Crosspollinate Content Marketing API provides the ability for clients to programmatically access trending content from multiple web sources on any keyword/subject. The API supports multiple keyword combinations and delivers content in RSS/ATOM format. Directional Star TimeZone Converter API: Australian IT consulting firm Directional Star provides developers with a tool to automate conversion between time zones. The Directional Star TimeZone Converter API provides a RESTful interface and returns JSON formatted responses. The API allows unlimited usage and requires no authentication or login. LTC-Data API: LTC-Data provides basic litecoin mining data to developers. The LTC API allows users to incorporate the litecoin information into applications using REST calls and returning JSON. The API can make calls to get the current network hashrate, seconds-per-block, current block, block difficulty, next block difficulty, and addresses to hash at. No account is required for use, and use is free. Macarthur Square API: Macarthur Square is a major retail destination in south-west Sydney. Visitors can shop for clothing, housewares, sporting goods, and groceries. The shopping center also offers restaurants and entertainment facilities. The Macarthur Square SOAP API allows developers to interact with the website programmatically. It can be used to retrieve, submit, and delete feedback; get information on stores and events; check gift card balances; and s

The ever elusive Pinterest API made news once again this week when its documentation briefly appeared on the Pinterest developer site. Here at ProgrammableWeb, the Pinterest API profile is our most viewed page showing that developers are itching for more information. While the official API hasn’t been released, we’ve still seen a number of mashups that take advantage of Pinterest’s functionality. Below we highlight a few of them. Pingram – Pingram allows users to search through Instagram photos using a Pinterest like interface. APIs used include: Pinterest, Instagram. More at our Pingram profile. Mapinterest – Mapinterest links Pinterest, Instagram and YouTube with Facebook Places. You follow people on Twitter, on Facebook you follow your friends, on Pinterest you follow topics and on Mapinterest you follow places. APIs used include: Twitter, Pinterest, GoogleMaps, Facebook. More at our Mapinterest profile. in1.com – In1 is a social aggregation, discovery and sharing platform that combines feeds from multiple social networks. In provides content discover, one-click sharing and single channel promotion for brands. APIs used include: YouTube, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Instagram, GooglePlus, FacebookSocialPlugins, FacebookRealtimeUpdates, FacebookGraph, Facebook. More at our In1 profile. Sponsored byRelated ProgrammableWeb Resources Pinterest API Profile, 6 mashups

TippingCircle, a social payments platform, has announced the launch of a brand new hybrid API that allows developers to integrate the TippingCircle platform into web, mobile and desktop applications. Image Credit: TippingCircle TippingCircle makes it possible for users to make person-to-person payments, group payments and set up social fundraising via PayPal and social networks including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. Users of the TippingCircle platform are able to create their own social payments profile which makes it easy to send and receive payments and helps create a fun and interactive payment experience. TippingCircle Founder James Davis, is quoted in the press release as saying: “We’ve designed it so when a tip is sent, the user can include a message about the event that draws attention to the fun time they spent together, as opposed to the money exchange itself. Users can also view one another’s profiles to see past tips and reminisce on the exciting night they had or lookup tipping buckets to support a cause their friend is passionate about.” The new TippingCircle API is a hybrid API that uses both OAuth and simple authentication based on the endpoint. API endpoints include sign up, get user, get buckets, and get transactions. Developers that would like to use the TippingCircle API need to submit details about their application and receive usage approval from TippingCircle. For more information, visit the official TippingCircle website. Sponsored by

We first brought news of Postmaster a few months ago. Since then, the Postmaster API has gained new customers and Postmaster has raised significant capital from eager investors. Along with its recent success, Postmaster announced its first major shipping partner to use the Postmaster API for its services. Lone Star Overnight (LSO) white labels the Postmaster portal for access to its entire suite of features. Jesse Lovelace, Postmaster CEO, commented: “Our partnership with Lone Star Overnight is a win-win for everyone involved….Postmaster will gain access to a wealth of shipping data instantly for even greater route optimization – not only for LSO customers, but for all Postmaster merchants. Additionally, this is the first simple and truly cross-carrier portal on the market for the public, solving some inherent issues that result from how siloed the carriers have traditionally been from one another.” The new funding from a slew of ambitious investors will be dedicated to a deeper development team who will focus on more integration with carrier partners. Although the Postmaster API gives merchants and ecommerce developers access to a rich data set of shipping information, Postermaster understands its value will greatly expand as it further partners with carriers. Shipping, particularly through shipping APIs, have experienced massive disruption and innovation over the past few years. With the likes of Google and eBay leading investments in shipping-focused startups, expect more development and investment in the Web 2.0 shipping space. Postmaster offers its own take on the industry’s direction and could be the go to source for shipping transparency. Sponsored byRelated ProgrammableWeb Resources Postmaster API Profile

Whether we like it or not, social media is a powerful marketing tool, and what people are saying about a brand or business can have a noticeable effect; good or bad. What would be really beneficial, is if businesses could be notified immediately whenever their product or brand was mentioned on a social media platform or elsewhere on the web, allowing them to act accordingly. Enter Mention. It’s created to do exactly that – allow users to follow mentions online. Mention also provides the Mention API that allows developers to integrate this functionality with other applications. Mention’s features allow users to monitor anything that is published about their business or brand on social networks, news sites, forums, blogs or any web page, in up to 42 different languages. Users receive live alerts via email or push notifications, and can share these alerts with other users or assign tasks to team members where necessary. Mentions that are classified as more important, can be flagged according to factors such as the influence and authority of a source, or recent interactions a user has had with that source. In addition, Mention provides a statistics and data export tool that provides an overview of a user’s mentions according to a specific time period, a source or the language used, and also allows users to create PDFs or export the data in CSV format. The Mention API includes example methods such as managing accounts, retrieving mentions and sharing and managing alerts. Requests should be done using a POST method, and responses are currently in JSON only. Developers who want to access the Mention data can get more information and documentation on the website. Sponsored byRelated ProgrammableWeb Resources Mention API Profile