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| Articles -------------------- Design/Development
Can a pan create an award-winning meal without the chef? Can a scalpel perform surgery without a skilled surgeon to lead it? Can a paintbrush create a work of art without the artist? These tools and test automation are only as good as those who use them. In this week's column, Linda Hayes debunks the popular idea that streamlining through test automation will mean certain termination for employees. Linda explains that test automation can actually equate to becoming an indispensable team member.
by Linda Hayes
Design/Development
With the advent of the Internet and online publishing, the notion has arisen that access to the world’s research publications could be made available to one and all for free, presumably by shifting the costs to other places in the value chain and disintermediating publishers, a circumstance called Open Access (OA) publishing. While there are many hopes embedded in this view (lower costs, wider access, etc.), it appears more likely that Open Access will come about not through a revolution in the world of legacy publishing, but through upstart media built with the innate characteristics of the Internet in mind. An unanticipated outcome of this situation will be that the overall cost of research publications will rise, though the costs will be borne by different players, primarily authors and their proxies.
by Joseph J. Esposito
Content, Information and Knowledge Management
Aegis has replaced Carat Interactive with a new brand Diffiniti, which combined with Carat Digital, makes Aegis the largest online media planning and buying group in the UK.
Content, Information and Knowledge Management
For those hearing about Contribute for the first time, it's a tool that lets even the least tech-savvy person in your organization edit your intranet or Web site with ease. An administrator sets up editable areas in pages, so that users can only change certain things like headlines and articles. Then users open the pages and update them as if they were working in a word processor.
Most of the changes to this version revolve around enterprise functionality, such as the new review and approval system. The first versions of Contribute were for small teams or individuals, so they didn't need an automated approval process, but bigger teams need a strict workflow. Administrators can now create ordered workflows and specify who can make pages live and who can only edit pages. After Contribute users have finished updating their pages, they can send a notification for a manager to check them and make them live. The managers can send the pages back for revisions if necessary.
Content, Information and Knowledge Management
Looking for a truly easy content management system? The newly released Conviveon SiteConnect Server 6.0 has so much functionality, it's hard to know what to describe first. Besides making it simple for any user in an organization to update site content, it works across multiple sites within an organization, and has new shopping cart abilities that work within the content management engine.
The beauty of SiteConnect Server is how easy it makes content management. The developers know that many content management systems fail because they're too difficult or cumbersome for the end users, and that if a program is even a little bit technical, people will avoid using it. That's why their tool feels intuitive and natural, and works through a common Web browser on any platform. Simply log in and, when you surf your pages, you'll see editing options below editable text.
Usability
The website is becoming a less prominent locus of experience as people use search engines to bring up answers to their current questions. How can sites cope with masses of freeloaders?
by Jakob Nielsen.
Usability
Users will often overlook the actual location of information or products if another website area seems like the perfect place to look. Cross-references and clear labels alleviate this problem.
by Jakob Nielsen
Learning/Training
Tool selection often comes down to finding the right combination, rather than just one perfect tool.
Learning/Training
This paper discusses the globalization of e–learning, changes in languages as an effect of distance technologies and the lingua franca of modern times, English, and its effects on other languages. Hybrid languages such as Spanglish (Spanish English) and Swenglish (Swedish English) emerges as an effect of the increasing interaction between non–English languages and the dominant English language. The need for speed and efficiency in communication and the adaptation to new technology changes language dramatically as is observed in chat and SMS–mediated communication. The complexity of modern human communication is discussed with a historical perspective — the old modes of communication can now be used via Internet but this transfer changes their characteristics.
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