Flickr has 42 million photos with geotags–information called metadata that records the location where a photo was taken–and now it’s trying to let users get more out of them.
At the Web 2.0 Summit Friday, Flickr co-founder Stewart Butterfield plans to demonstrate two new features, which are scheduled to debut in coming weeks. First is a revamped Flickr map page, an interface that lets people look at the photos taken at a specific location. Next is a new “places” feature that lets people explore specific geographic sites–a catalog of more than 70,000 so far.
For a look at the new pages, you can look at a gallery of Flickr screenshots posted by CNET.
The changes bring some refinement to the current world of geotagging, which is not for the faint of heart. (Though my experience has been a lot smoother once I got the time zone issue straightened out.)
Flickr’s current map interface presents users with a map dotted with pink circles; a number in each circle indicates how many photos tagged with that location have been recently uploaded to Flickr. The new maps interface replaces those circles with the descriptive tags commonly used to label regional photos.
For example, some areas are likely to show tags with geographic descriptions such as “London.” Others could get event-based tags that show a spurt in popularity, such as the San Francisco Bay to Breakers race, Butterfield said. Not too many words fit on a map of the world, but users can click a button to bring up a fresh supply.
“The current user interface is slow and confusing. People don’t get the idea of a paging through photos in this kind of user interface,” Butterfield said.
So far the tag interface appears at the global map level, but Flickr will gradually spread it to more local views, said Dan Catt, a Flickr engineer who works on the mapping technology.
The places pages offer a pre-packaged view of thousands of locations. Clicking on a link on the maps page can take a user to the nearby place page, sifted to show the tag on which the user clicked. The page itself shows recent and interesting photos taken at the site, featured photographers who have photographed the region often, and popular and recent tags that lead to a new category of photos for that area.
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The Eclipse Foundation will make available Monday Eclipse RAP (Rich Ajax Platform) 1.0, an AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) server for building and deploying rich Internet applications.
Leveraging the Eclipse component model that based on the OSGi (Open Services Gateway initiative) standard, RAP 1.0 is suited for enterprises and enables development of component-based applications that can integrate with existing systems. RAP 1.0 is freely downloadable.
With RAP, developers can build AJAX applications “completely in Java,” said Jochen Krause, project leader for RAP at Innoopract.
“The benefit is many developers know [how] to write Java code,” he said. “If you look at enterprise IT, you find very few people that are seasoned in JavaScript.”
“Our key strength is we can use the Eclipse component model,” deploying plug-ins to extend applications, said Krause.
Featured in RAP 1.0 is the ability to build RIA or Eclipse RCP (Rich Client Platform) applications from the same Java code base. Also included are Java development tools and frameworks for building AJAX applications that support user interfaces, complex widgets, and data-binding.
RAP’s ease of use was cited by one early user.
“RAP is very easy if you have skills in Eclipse/RCP technology. Even if you have developed Java desktop applications, RAP has a lot of similar concepts,” said Roberto Sanchez Custodio, CEO of Autonomind, which has used RAP for developing a public Web application.
Using RAP, though, has had its trials. Using Milestone 2, there were typical issues such as API changes, bugs and poor documentation. But most of these problems have been solved now, Custodio said. There also have been some features missing that other Java Web frameworks have, such as a visual graphical editor for Windows, he said.
Custodio also said he thinks RAP is too oriented to Eclipse/RCP developers instead of Java Web developers.
RAP differs from another AJAX project at Eclipse, the AJAX Toolkit Framework (ATF), in that ATF features an IDE for tooling while RAP is a server-based runtime for AJAX applications, Krause said.
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Giving into user demand, the networking site LinkedIn will soon start letting its users post photos with their personal profiles.
LinkedIn has long resisted photos, seeing itself as a site for professional networking and job-seeking and desiring to set itself apart from social-oriented hangouts like News Corp.’s MySpace and Facebook. In addition, LinkedIn didn’t want to open potential employers to discrimination complaints.
But Adam Nash, LinkedIn’s senior director of products, said photos remain one of the most requested features, and the site will start allowing them this Friday — with limits.
Users will be able to post only one photograph, and a head shot is highly recommended. Nash said the feature isn’t meant for posting photos from afterwork gatherings but for helping users recognize former colleagues and classmates. Although party shots are discouraged, there are no current plans to ban them.
LinkedIn also will allow a user to turn off photos completely when viewing other profiles — useful for human resources employees searching the site for potential recruits but fearful that a photo might compromise anti-discrimination policies.
Users also can control who can see their photos — their closest connections, everyone or in between — and they won’t be pressured to post one. Photo-less profiles won’t have an empty box seen at many other sites to remind visitors that a photo is missing.
“We did have to put some significant thought into how to introduce photos in a professional context, while still accommodating needs,” Nash said.
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