This piece was helpful to me. It was educational.
One of the main reasons why I entered this program is to learn more about the web technology and its languages.
A number of the terminologies Merrill used sounded and looked familiar. The rest— not really. Because before entering the program I’ve been doing nothing but logos and brochures. I had no prior knowledge, nor was I fluent in the world of web. The closest I got to has been HTML, Dreamweaver and Flash. That’s as far as I went.
I’ve never heard of AJAX, I’ve seen it, but I never used it nor touched it. Nor have I even used or know of the words like API or Screen Scraping. What does this all mean and what would it mean to me as I progress in the program. I don’t really know.
But it was good to be aware. It was good to be aware of the terminologies which I would have to learn and figure out soon in order to communicate properly.
Mashups, from what I understand, is an integration of two information. Both not necessarily have to relate to one another, nor would they have something in common. The way Merrill puts it mashups are a “web-based data integration”. He gives really good examples, as in “mapping”… How diverse or how complex a data would be, it would actually be better understood if it was mapped out. He sites literal examples like Aol’s Mapquest, Yahoo Maps and Google Maps.
Mashups are usually characterized by how their original roots are across the web and it’s sources come from outside the web. And mashups in the end are a new way of viewing, understanding and receiving information. Data becomes information that has more depth and meaning.
It was also interesting to read about he technical challenges, data integration are not suitable for machine automation or if the written data is actually correct. There’s also no protection of intellectual properties and consumer privacy.
Overall it was an interesting piece to read and very educational. But I think I’ll need more research on my own for a better understanding.
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