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August 31, 2011#

Development: Tasting Popcorn

Popcorn.JS Demonstration

This is a tech blog by OpenBrolly’s Project Director, David Sim.

We keep an eye out for technologies that would interest our clients and Popcorn.JS turns out to be one that has particular potential.

Among other things, it provides a framework for synchronising video with web content. Some scenarios might help you visualise this:

  • A screen agency creates a video promoting key residential properties in its region. As the video runs links appear next to the video which, when clicked, takes the site visitor to a pre-prepared MovieSite(TM) web brochure for the property currently being shown on the video.
  • A travel destination creates a video which shows top attractions. Next to the video there are links to additional information, a list of nearby accommodation providers and a map of where the attraction is.
  • A training company’s video is complemented by direct links to the page in the printed manual, or to a quick “test yourself” quiz. In addition that part of the video could be favourited so the user can jump back to it later.

Video in itself is a powerful tool. Complementing it with maps, web links, text descriptions and any other web based content ramps it up from both a marketing and training perspective.

See a demo at Anchored Web (although at the time of writing their server was struggling to serve the video – not a weakness of Popcorn.JS)!

Contact david.sim@openbrolly.com if you have ideas for using the technology or want to know more about the potential.

March 16, 2011#

Reaching for the Cloud

Cloud

OpenBrolly prides itself at being at the pragmatic leading edge of technology. That doesn’t mean jumping on every technological bandwagon; rather we are aware of upcoming changes in technology and help our clients understand the implications and take advantage of them where there’s a positive business benefit.

We operate high-availability web sites, portals and services on behalf of our clients, accessed by hundreds of thousands of end users every day. Our services have sophisticated processing capability and we store terabytes of images and videos.

Our clients’ businesses are evolving: new ways of working, increased collaboration and data sharing, more mobile, more visual use of information and more in-depth reporting. Overall usage of the services we provide continues to grow rapidly.

We are therefore evolving our server and data storage platform to enable us to grow with our clients and offer new ways of working.

All core MovieSite, TouristSite and other similar services will be delivered from the Amazon Cloud. In short, this is an incredibly flexible platform that enables us to allocate more data storage, processing power and bandwidth within minutes. Next week one of our clients will be launching a major competition which will generate significant volumes of web traffic and require the storage of large amounts of data. Using a cloud computing platform means that we will be able to bring a new server online just for the duration of the competition, tailored to the needs of our client.

Our existing data will be hosted within the EU – in Dublin – meaning there are no new data protection implications for our existing clients. However, we can now offer service delivery on other sites, including US East Coast, US West Coast, Singapore and Tokyo.

Security and safety of data remains key: all servers are firewalled against intrusion. All data is copied to a second data repository with multiple versions – then backed up again to our own, non-cloud servers. Finally, there’s off-line storage. You can never be too paranoid about data security.

Working with our clients is exciting: moving to the cloud is another way in which we’re continuing to innovate to move forward with them. If you have any questions, please contact David Sim at david.sim@openbrolly.com or on 01309 638077 (+44 1309 638077).

 

January 27, 2011#

New Events Module Released

Events Module

OpenBrolly has released a new, updated events module which can be linked to MovieSite and TouristSite.

The module allows users of your website (or Intranet) to add information about upcoming events. They can be categorised, mapped and can span multiple days or recur multiple times. All events can be edited and / or removed by an administrator, or require a pre-approval process before publication. Once an event is submitted your website users can amend the details of the event at any time – for example to add additional dates or change prices.

The events module is designed specifically to allow public submission of event information but for an organisation to retain control over its publication. Most similar systems require an administrator to rekey information.

Once in the system events can be published on any website. The listings are available as a WordPress plugin and can also be supplied as an iCal feed for import into Outlook or  Google Calendar.

For further details contact david.sim@openbrolly.com.

January 26, 2011#

A Venue At The Cannes Film Festival

Villa3

Cannes Venue, co-sponsored by OpenBrolly, is available again in 2011 during the Cannes Film Festival.

Offering an exclusive place to meet or host a business lunch, Cannes Venue is a villa located within 30 minutes walk of the Palais des Festivals. Limited accommodation opportunities are also available.

For more information about the venue, please see the Cannes Venue web site.

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