Pivot Tables

PIvot Table

You may be asking yourself why I have a picture of turn table on my blog. Well, 'turn' is analogous to 'pivot' and hence, 'Pivot Table'. Plus, searching for a pretty 'pivot table' was just not happening.

Only recently, I'd say within the past couple of years, have I noticed that when i want to export a spreadsheet, I had 2 options. The first was to export as a table, and the second was to export as a pivot table. Now, I had never heard of a pivot table nor knew what it did. And since no one had ever asked me to utilize it for anything, I had thought that maybe it was a legacy table, left over from the relics of non-GUI based software interfaces.

Then at my last job interview, the interviewer asks me if I knew how to use a pivot table! Wow, someone is asking me about this ancient technology left over from the days of the Great Pyramids! I was excited. I had to answer honestly and declined that I knew anything about pivot tables, but I said I was willing to learn. All interviewers love hearing about wanting to overcome your shortcomings. As I started working, I only utilized the standard tables. I was never asked again about the pivot table or was ever taught how to use it. But they would send out weekly statistics to the team. The information was overwhelming. We always thought to ourselves, 'how do they have the time to run all these reports and number?'

So one day, I'm sitting in our Database Management course and the pivot tables comes up again. Huh, this is interesting, we're gonna talk about pivot tables. Maybe we're taking a stroll down memory lane like in our Software Development course when we talked about the Turing Machine. Boy was I wrong, the pivot table isn't old and it is definitely not outdate. Not only was I wrong about how old it was, I was also wrong about the power behind it. I suddenly had an epiphany about my team leads as work. They were using pivot tables to run all those statics! And it didn't take them all day, using a pivot table allowed them to do it in minutes! I was flabbergasted, for lack of a better word.

Pivot tables are an extension of the standard spreadsheet that is capable of displaying the summarization of the data sets contained within the spreadsheet. The name comes from the ability to pivot the different data sets on the summary table and it's power seems to be limitless. Well, I may be overselling at this point. I've only used it for a couple of days now but the hidden potential isn't lost upon me. You can learn more from Oreilly.

Net Neutrality: What does it mean for you?

Net Neutrality

Do you love the way your smartphone comes bundled with a data plan (most of the time it's mandatory) and text message plan? Do you love the way you can choose your different movie and sports bundles through your cable provider? Great! Well, corporate America has once again graced us with their familiar business model of bundling packages. This sounds like a good idea to begin with. You only pay for the amount of internet you use. Why is this bad? This is where it gets a little more complicated and for the end user Joe Schmoe, a lot more scarier. The telecommunications companies want to have a tiered internet. The more you pay, the faster your connection. This doesn't apply only to the end users, it also applies to the corporations and companies that want to get that information to us. The more the companies pay, the faster their information is sent to us. Its a two way street, with the bandwidth connection going as fast as the slowest connection speed. So you could have blazing T3 lines, but since you requested information from a small Mom & Pop shop running dial-up speed, you'll be sitting and waiting and waiting and waiting.

Not only are the connection speeds tiered, there is preferential treatment for their own content. The telco's may slow down or completely block content or services provided by their competitors. Now that we've ended racial segregation, lets start with internet segregation. I digress. Let's say Comcast and Google have entered an agreement that bars either from using anybody else's service. How would it feel to not be able to use Google search just because you're not on a Comcast connection?

Where do the bundles come in? Let's say you want a sports bundle, you could purchase and pay an extra fee on top of your basic cable costs. What about different search engines? There could be a bundle for that. And family orientated programming? I'm sure they'd create a bundle for that. And how fast do you want these bundles to be delivered? I'm sure they'd be happy to take more of your money to send content to you a smidge quicker. What's at stake here is the freedom to access any and all content, regardless of content provider or service provider, all at the same speed.

The internet was an even playing field (I'm speaking in past tense as if it has already happened, somehow, corporate America always wins) to all players. Small startups could easily start a site and promote their company and products. The cost of entry was relatively low. WIth tiered pricing, businesses would have to compete at the top tier to be competitive. To play at those levels, you have to be a big dog. Already established corporations and companies have no problem, it's the little guys that get stepped on. The rich get richer while the poor get poorer. Nothing would exacerbate this more than the proposed tiered internet. The big dogs continue to control the market while at the same time, eliminating any smaller competition from gaining ground.

If this post seems biased, it's probably because you work for one of the telco companies. Show your support for Net Neutrality and spread the word by visiting Save The Internet.

iPhone Web Development Resources For The Noob

iPhone

As a new developer, it can be a daunting task to create something from nothing. What is available in terms of documentation, resources, and examples? Probably the most important question; where does one start? There a many resources that are available online, but one must remember that the landscape changes frequently and not all online resources update to reflect the changes. Here is a list of resources to get one started...

This first one is provides a general overview of elements to be mindful of when developing web content. 12 Things to get you started

The WebKit framework is what Apple's iPhone Safari web browser is based upon. As such. it's probably a good idea to know how it works. Apologies for being Mr. Obvious. Anyways, a Webkit tutorial should get you on your way.

Sometimes it helps to belong to a community of developers. They can provide much needed guidance and assistance when one comes to a mental block in trying to figure out how to get something to work correctly. iPhoneWebDev has a iPhoneWebDev Google Groups page with an active user base where one can ask questions and toss ideas around.

If you've been around web development, you may have heard of Web Monkey. This is an excellent site for reference and provides many tutorials. iUI is an excellent way to provide a very Apple-like user interface to web applications and one of Web Monkey's iUI tutorials takes you through the process.

Cascading Style Sheets were your friend in web development and they will continue to be your friend in mobile web development. Tutorial Hero is here to save the day with their CSS tutorial.

And because the iPhone has 2 modes, portrait and landscape, one must adapt our pages accordingly. What better place to go and get information than straight from the horses mouth, er, or Apple's Viewportpage.

A good link to have handy is Apple's iPhone Dev Center where one can get the latest updates, builds, and development information.

Good luck! You'll need it.