Tag: ANALYSIS

Google has just introduced a new product, and this time it's a PC application (with a browser-based UI). It's called Google Refine, and it solves a problem that is enormous for some people: it lets you take massive sets of "messy data" and massage them into shape so that they're uniform, make sense, and can be statistically analyzed. The video after the jump shows a very good example, which is ...

When I first glanced at System Nucleus, I thought it might wind up being just another system reporting tool, spilling details about my system to a text file for posterity. In fact, that's barely the tip of the iceberg -- System Nucleus features a number of useful tools for Windows troubleshooting, tweaking, and maintenance. One of my favorite components is the backup & recovery tool, which ...

One of Google's biggest strengths is its ability to make predictions based on data. If you're a developer with a bunch of data, and you want to harness the freakishly-accurate predictive powers of Google, there's now an API for that. Google's Prediction API analyzes patterns in your data to do things like generating product recommendations, sorting email, routing messages, or identifying ...

I spend a lot of time during the work week removing malware from customers' computers. So whenever I happen upon a new malware cleanup app, I make it a point to put it through the paces. Better tools make my job easier, after all. Today I'm checking out Norton Power Eraser -- a free, portable malware cleanup tool from the folks at Symantec. I had tried to test earlier beta versions of NPE, but ...

The European Commission responded earlier today to the petition submitted by the 'Gang of Six' web browsers seeking "any of a myriad of small changes" to alert users of the 7 browser choices not initially displayed on Microsoft's new European Browser Choice update dialog. In an email to CNet writer Stephen Shankland, EC spokeswoman Amelia Torres writes: "The elements of the Choice Screen were ...

Six of the twelve browsers chosen to be a part of the EU "Browser Choice Screen" petitioned the European Commission on Thursday, asking politely -- very politely -- that the Commissioners "consider any of the following suggestions which could be easily and quickly implemented and would allow users to exercise choice." "Ok, seriously? Already? WTF!", was my immediate reaction. Browserchoice.eu ...

I'm not a fan of software patents, and I'm particularly not a fan of companies who use them as a business model. While the concept of patenting software makes sense, in practice it is a complete mess. I was therefore saddened to learn that Quintura, an otherwise interesting search startup, has devolved into using a patent for their visual search technology as a revenue stream by going after other ...

I almost (not quite, but almost) feel bad for Adobe right now. Apple has been unceremoniously dumping on Flash in a big way since the iPad announcement, and all Adobe can do is claim they don't ship known-buggy Flash releases and announce how much better Flash will perform on Macs when Flash 10.1 is released. Flash still has critical mass adoption among traditional computing devices (desktops and ...

A new mobile metrics company called GroundTruth has just posted a statistic on their blog showing that well over half (61%) of mobile online page views are to social networking sites. While anecdotally I've noticed that most of the people I see pecking away at their phone's keyboard are doing so on Facebook or Twitter, GroundTruth is including a number of lesser-known social networking sites in ...

You're probably aware of the insurance company Geico due to their ubiquitous quirky TV commercials featuring the Geico gecko. Some of their commercials are actually pretty funny, which I think is a good way to go about advertising. Now the company has added a page to their website where you can download audio clips from their commercials as ringtones. This seems like a blatant attempt to "go ...

In a flurry of interesting (if you're into social networking) statistics, pie charts and graphs, RJMetrics has just published its latest Twitter data and user analysis. If social media or Twitter isn't your thing, here are the vital statistics: by the end of 2009, Twitter had 75 million user accounts -- of those, only 17% actually sent a tweet. The delicious stats go on! About 80% of Twitter ...

The story of how NewsGator attempted to corner the market on consumer RSS has taken another strange turn. In an interview with Steven Hodson published on Hodson's Shooting at Bubbles site, Bradbury admits that he is no longer employed by NewsGator, but has retained the full rights to his popular FeedDemon RSS reader. NewsGator continues to offer FeedDemon, and the application is still ...

URL shorteners, while convenient, are bad for the web. They hide the true destination that they are pointing to, giving bad guys yet another tool in their arsenal, while conditioning web users to blindly trust the links they are clicking on. Further, as the debacle with tr.im showed us, URL shortening services aren't necessarily permanent. It's no coincidence that the rise in popularity of URL ...

Need to find out where all the lost hours spent in front of your computer screen are going? Download ManicTime, a free tracking application for Windows and you'll have a pretty good idea after a few days. Once installed, ManicTime sits in your system tray and monitors your active window. Times are automatically recorded, and blocks can be tagged to help you keep tabs on what type of work you ...

Pear Analytics asks on their website, "Have you measured the impact of social media on your brand?" Apparently that's what they do. And they've been busily analyzing what goes on over at Twitter. The super shocking results: just over 40% of tweets qualify as "pointless babble." Following in second place are "conversational" updates, at 37.5%. Their findings are based on 2,000 tweets. Surely ...