Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
However, as tools such as Web On a Stick are self-contained
virtualisation solutions, they really only support the basic assessment of
different software offerings by an individual. Thus, once a specifi c
solution had been identifi ed as a potential candidate the next stage was
to explore the multi-user experience/features it offered. To do this we
were able to build a development environment utilising scavenged older
hardware on which we either installed Fedora and Xampp [6], or if using
a Windows box used a VMware image of Fedora downloaded from
Thought Police VMWare Images [7] and then installed Xampp. These
solutions proved to be very robust and in many cases these same
environments were used to support the Proof of Concept phase.
One important further consideration was compatibility with Pfi zer's
standard browser, at the time Internet Explorer 6, and testing of any
related extensions. In addition before any candidate solution was
progressed to Proof of Concept, it was tested for stability, a high-level
review of the code base was performed and the activity of the open source
community was assessed. Our criteria are in line with those described by
Thornber (Chapter 22) and consider issues such as current development
status, responsiveness of the support network and general activity on the
project.
13.2.2 Research phase use-case: Status.net -
microblogging
With the explosion of Twitter [8], it was logical that some involved in
research and development in Pfi zer would start to wonder if and how
microblogging might provide a simple and convenient method to facilitate
a free-fl ow of information, updates and news across their organisational
and scientifi c networks. With this in mind we looked to explore the
opportunities of microblogging with the following technology options
considered for our fi rst microblogging experiment.
■
Twitter [8] was quickly discarded because any data posted on that site
would be open to all users on the web and hence could not be used to
share any company proprietary information.
■
Yammer [9], a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offering a Twitter-like
application for which access could be contained to employees from a
single company, was considered but rejected at this stage because of
the time that would be needed to investigate the security and costing
of this option.
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