It's that time of year... the Great Backyard Bird Count, organized by the Audubon Society, the Cornell Institute of Ornithology, and Bird Studies Canada. And that means that it's also time for the Great Backyard Plone Count, this weekend Friday through Monday.
Because
many Plone sites are intranets behind firewalls, they can't
be located by crawling the web. This is a chance for developers, site
owners, and users to stand up and be counted. It's a non-scientific,
totally voluntary effort for self-reporting Plone-based web portals. If
your input from February 2013-14 is still current, you're already done.
That said, the input form on the Google Docs spreadsheet is open. Anyone can submit sightings of Plone in the wild. The form will stay open until midnight Monday 16 February. If you have bulk data and the form is awkard to use, kindly contact me and we'll do some behind-the-scenes sharing or cutting-and-pasting. I'll
be doing some mining of Delicious and other social bookmarking services
this month and posting them as well.
Although
there's significant bias in a survey like this, the real value comes
from tracking trends over time. This is the seventh annual Backyard
Plone Count (since 2009)
and as the number of yearly data points increase, we'll better be able
to extrapolate from the observations. It's not that we're getting an
absolute count of Plone market penetrations (just like the GBBC isn't
counting individual birds), it's just that we're getting a repeatable
sampling by the community. It is as much a measure of community
involvement as it is a metric of the actual number of Plone sites out
there.
So get out there and spot some Plone sites -- and while you're at it, spend a little time counting birds at your feeder.
Thanks in advance!
Showing posts with label Great Backyard Bird Count. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Great Backyard Bird Count. Show all posts
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Thursday, February 16, 2012
4th Annual Great Backyard Plone Count
For the fourth year running it's time for the Great Backyard Bird Count (Plone-driven, btw) and the Great Backyard Plone Count. While the bird count is a collaborative bird-watching effort by the Audubon Society, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and Bird Studies Canada, the Plone count is a voluntary effort to collect data on the world-wide distribution of Plone-powered sites. In homage to the GBBC, the Plone count is held the same weekend, which this year is Friday 17 through Monday 20 February.
Because many Plone sites are intranets behind firewalls, they can't be located by crawling the web. This is a chance for developers, site owners, and users to stand up and be counted. It's a non-scientific, totally voluntary effort for self-reporting Plone-based web portals. Last year's results are posted at this Google Docs spreadsheet. If your input from February 2011 is still current, you're already done.
That said, the input form on the Google Docs spreadsheet is now open. Anyone can submit sightings of Plone in the wild. I'll be doing some mining of Delicious and other social bookmarking services this weekend and posting them as well.
Although there's significant bias in a survey like this, the real value comes from tracking trends over time. This is the fourth annual Backyard Plone Count (2009, 2010, 2011) and as the number of yearly data points increase, we'll better be able to extrapolate from the observations. It's not that we're getting an absolute count of Plone market penetrations (just like the GBBC isn't counting individual birds), it's just that we're getting a repeatable sampling by the community. It is as more a measure of community involvement than it is a metric of the actual number of Plone sites out there.
So get out there and spot some Plone sites -- and while you're at it, spend a little time counting birds at your feeder.
Thanks in advance!
Because many Plone sites are intranets behind firewalls, they can't be located by crawling the web. This is a chance for developers, site owners, and users to stand up and be counted. It's a non-scientific, totally voluntary effort for self-reporting Plone-based web portals. Last year's results are posted at this Google Docs spreadsheet. If your input from February 2011 is still current, you're already done.
That said, the input form on the Google Docs spreadsheet is now open. Anyone can submit sightings of Plone in the wild. I'll be doing some mining of Delicious and other social bookmarking services this weekend and posting them as well.
Although there's significant bias in a survey like this, the real value comes from tracking trends over time. This is the fourth annual Backyard Plone Count (2009, 2010, 2011) and as the number of yearly data points increase, we'll better be able to extrapolate from the observations. It's not that we're getting an absolute count of Plone market penetrations (just like the GBBC isn't counting individual birds), it's just that we're getting a repeatable sampling by the community. It is as more a measure of community involvement than it is a metric of the actual number of Plone sites out there.
So get out there and spot some Plone sites -- and while you're at it, spend a little time counting birds at your feeder.
Thanks in advance!
Friday, February 18, 2011
The Great Backyard Plone Count -- 2011
So the Great Backyard Plone Count for 2011 is officially off and running. Things didn't exactly start out as smoothly as I'd hoped -- got a call from the nurse at my parents' assisted living facility around 7:00 this evening. Turns out Mom had a 3-alarm gusher of a nosebleed that couldn't be controlled. While she got an ambulance ride to Presbyterian, I drove over to the hospital. To make a long story short, everyone was incredibly helpful and after some cauterization and a very strange inflatable gauze packing up the schnoz, we actually got Mom tucked back into her own bed by midnight.
Of course, that means I didn't get out copies of last year's "sightings" to their owners in time to verify that the sites are still active. It also means that I'm only now turning on the data entry form.
Even with that hiccup right at the start, if you'd like to participate, especially in getting credit for hidden or obscure Plone sites, this is your chance. Use the form below to enter information about Plone sites you are aware of, especially intranet sites that are behind firewalls. In those cases a URL is not necessary, but a site name and description would be particularly helpful. Names and personal information (e-mail, etc.) are only for internal statistical and QA use and will not be used beyond this study. The live form can also be found at:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=0AjB6ixF2SsaScHktWlJpYnBXTVpWRnJzMWhoaEU4WWc&hl=en#gid=0
The form will be open for data entry until midnight Monday the 21st. Thanks in advance. If you'd like a look at last year's data, check out the Google Docs summary sheet.
As an aside, get your binoculars out and spend 15 minutes (or more) counting the birds in your own backyard. Then submit your observations to become part of an enormous citizen-scientist ornithological study.
Of course, that means I didn't get out copies of last year's "sightings" to their owners in time to verify that the sites are still active. It also means that I'm only now turning on the data entry form.
Even with that hiccup right at the start, if you'd like to participate, especially in getting credit for hidden or obscure Plone sites, this is your chance. Use the form below to enter information about Plone sites you are aware of, especially intranet sites that are behind firewalls. In those cases a URL is not necessary, but a site name and description would be particularly helpful. Names and personal information (e-mail, etc.) are only for internal statistical and QA use and will not be used beyond this study. The live form can also be found at:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=0AjB6ixF2SsaScHktWlJpYnBXTVpWRnJzMWhoaEU4WWc&hl=en#gid=0
The form will be open for data entry until midnight Monday the 21st. Thanks in advance. If you'd like a look at last year's data, check out the Google Docs summary sheet.
As an aside, get your binoculars out and spend 15 minutes (or more) counting the birds in your own backyard. Then submit your observations to become part of an enormous citizen-scientist ornithological study.
Monday, February 8, 2010
How to ID Plone Sites
The Great Backyard Plone Count kicks off at the cusp of midnight this Friday 12 February, just like its ornithological counterpart, the Great Backyard Bird Count. The bird watchers have it easy, only dealing with North America and the fact that few birds can be seen by the dark of night. But Plone sites "fly" 24x7 and Plone watchers are scattered worldwide. (Darryl Dixon of New Zealand wins the prize for being the first from that timezone to submit a "siting" last year from the easternmost timezone that participated.)
The result is that as Thursday turns to Friday in say Kiritimati, the earliest timezone, it will be midnight Wed-Thurs in Honolulu, 3:00 AM Thursday in Albuquerque, and 10:00 AM Thursday in London. (Tip o' the hat to The Fixed Time World Clock.) So we'll open up the online submission form at 3:00 AM MST Thursday 11 February and close it down at 3:00 AM MST Tuesday 15 February. That way every timezone gets the full window of opportunity, even if it adds 24 hours to the worldwide event. Plone.org shows visitors from Fiji and New Zealand (Suva and Auckland are +13 UTC), as well as New Caledonia (Noumea is +11 UTC), so we want to give everyone an opportunity to participate fully.
Last week I posted a GBPC Prezi presentation but noted that it was stripped out of Planet Plone and other feeds. If you care, take a look at http://prezi.com/jahnf2owdk9y/. Also, while on the subject of Prezi, I created a reusable Prezi for Plone in general, embedded at the end of this post. Maurizio Delmonte has already translated it into Italian and it looks like Naotaka Hotta is working on a Japanese version.
Meanwhile, Nate Aune and I have been having a discussion about how one can identify Plone sites. Of course, the obvious ways are to look for that nice "Plone Powered" colophon and the generator tag (<meta name = "Plone - http://plone.org" >). Another effective way to ID Plone sites is to tag them in Delicious (thanks again, Sam). Just make sure that your Plone sites are tagged with the phrase "plone-site" and they'll turn up when we search http://delicious.com/search?p=plone-site. Right now there are 1932 sites tagged in this manner. If you haven't tagged your site(s), do so now and next weekend's data mining will sweep them up.
In untagged sites that are highly customized or have a static front end, we may have to rely on other features for identification. Lukasz developed Plone data-mining scripts (http://www.llakomy.com/articles/plone-websites-in-uk) for the UK. Builtwith is using a proprietary algorithm and some sort of sampling to track trends in web technologies (they also seem to be missing some obvious high-profile Plone sites, so I'm not too confident in their statistics). Last year when I discussed this, there was a comment from Andreas Jung via Matt Hamilton that is germane. They suggest that "/manage_copyright" is a useful method exposed by Zope 2 sites. I'd love to see what other techniques people can come up with.
Especially for firewalled Plone sites deep behind proxy servers, the only way we'll ever be able to count your contribution is for you as a site developer, user, or owner to self-report. Whatever way you identify Plone sites, take a moment next weekend to tag them in Delicious (if they're public) and submit new or confirm your previous year's sitings (active links to the tools will be Tweeted and published in this blog starting the 12th). Get out there and count some birds, too.
.
The result is that as Thursday turns to Friday in say Kiritimati, the earliest timezone, it will be midnight Wed-Thurs in Honolulu, 3:00 AM Thursday in Albuquerque, and 10:00 AM Thursday in London. (Tip o' the hat to The Fixed Time World Clock.) So we'll open up the online submission form at 3:00 AM MST Thursday 11 February and close it down at 3:00 AM MST Tuesday 15 February. That way every timezone gets the full window of opportunity, even if it adds 24 hours to the worldwide event. Plone.org shows visitors from Fiji and New Zealand (Suva and Auckland are +13 UTC), as well as New Caledonia (Noumea is +11 UTC), so we want to give everyone an opportunity to participate fully.
Last week I posted a GBPC Prezi presentation but noted that it was stripped out of Planet Plone and other feeds. If you care, take a look at http://prezi.com/jahnf2owdk9y/. Also, while on the subject of Prezi, I created a reusable Prezi for Plone in general, embedded at the end of this post. Maurizio Delmonte has already translated it into Italian and it looks like Naotaka Hotta is working on a Japanese version.
Meanwhile, Nate Aune and I have been having a discussion about how one can identify Plone sites. Of course, the obvious ways are to look for that nice "Plone Powered" colophon and the generator tag (<meta name = "Plone - http://plone.org" >). Another effective way to ID Plone sites is to tag them in Delicious (thanks again, Sam). Just make sure that your Plone sites are tagged with the phrase "plone-site" and they'll turn up when we search http://delicious.com/search?p=plone-site. Right now there are 1932 sites tagged in this manner. If you haven't tagged your site(s), do so now and next weekend's data mining will sweep them up.
In untagged sites that are highly customized or have a static front end, we may have to rely on other features for identification. Lukasz developed Plone data-mining scripts (http://www.llakomy.com/articles/plone-websites-in-uk) for the UK. Builtwith is using a proprietary algorithm and some sort of sampling to track trends in web technologies (they also seem to be missing some obvious high-profile Plone sites, so I'm not too confident in their statistics). Last year when I discussed this, there was a comment from Andreas Jung via Matt Hamilton that is germane. They suggest that "/manage_copyright" is a useful method exposed by Zope 2 sites. I'd love to see what other techniques people can come up with.
Especially for firewalled Plone sites deep behind proxy servers, the only way we'll ever be able to count your contribution is for you as a site developer, user, or owner to self-report. Whatever way you identify Plone sites, take a moment next weekend to tag them in Delicious (if they're public) and submit new or confirm your previous year's sitings (active links to the tools will be Tweeted and published in this blog starting the 12th). Get out there and count some birds, too.
.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
CMS PageRanks
Alexander Limi pointed out in a tweet back in late December that Plone.org was one of only 148 websites with a Google pagerank of 9 or higher. Interestingly, only WordPress and Mambo of other CMS make it onto the list.
That said, some pseudo-pagerank estimators include Joomla and Drupal in the pagerank 9 levels. At the same time, sites such as Alfresco.com and Interwoven.com have only a PR of 7, while Vignette.com (OpenText) has an 8. Fatwire.com drags in with a 6.
Oracle and some other big names turn up, but probably due to their mainline software, not necessarily their CMS. Microsoft.com has a PR of 9 but their SharePoint site only pulls in a 7. Oracle's WebCenter Suite scores a 6.
Like Amazon sales ranks, the data is dynamic along several axes: when and which Google data center is being queried. iWebTools shows 33 different data centers where for Drupal.org most list a PR of 0 at the moment even while Plone.org rocks on with a 9. This may be a measure of a CMS's search engine optimization more than anything else, in which case Plone is one of the leaders.
_______________
In closing I'd like to mention that one of my favorite Plone sites, the Great Backyard Bird Count, shows this year's event scheduled for February 12-15, 2010. Get your binoculars out!
And that means that the Great Backyard Plone Count is on for that same 96-hour period. Stand by for details, including instructions on CMS spotting. Tip o' the hat to Seth Gottlieb at content here for publicizing last year's event.
That said, some pseudo-pagerank estimators include Joomla and Drupal in the pagerank 9 levels. At the same time, sites such as Alfresco.com and Interwoven.com have only a PR of 7, while Vignette.com (OpenText) has an 8. Fatwire.com drags in with a 6.
Oracle and some other big names turn up, but probably due to their mainline software, not necessarily their CMS. Microsoft.com has a PR of 9 but their SharePoint site only pulls in a 7. Oracle's WebCenter Suite scores a 6.
Like Amazon sales ranks, the data is dynamic along several axes: when and which Google data center is being queried. iWebTools shows 33 different data centers where for Drupal.org most list a PR of 0 at the moment even while Plone.org rocks on with a 9. This may be a measure of a CMS's search engine optimization more than anything else, in which case Plone is one of the leaders.
_______________
In closing I'd like to mention that one of my favorite Plone sites, the Great Backyard Bird Count, shows this year's event scheduled for February 12-15, 2010. Get your binoculars out!
And that means that the Great Backyard Plone Count is on for that same 96-hour period. Stand by for details, including instructions on CMS spotting. Tip o' the hat to Seth Gottlieb at content here for publicizing last year's event.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
The Great Backyard Plone Count
Sorry to have overslept on this one: The Great Backyard Bird Count is underway this weekend. You've got until the 18th of February to spend at least 15 minutes somewhere counting the greatest number of each given bird species that you see at any one time. Then enter your results at the website.
What's this got to do with Plone? Well, straight off, GBBC's website is powered by Plone. Once again Plone is empowering the not-for-profits.
Secondly, it occurs to me that this might be a useful approach for surveying Plone sites. Lakomy's automated survey for the UK and Plone.net's listing are fascinating in their own right, but there are gaps. Lakomy doesn't distinguish between live and derelict sites; Plone.net relies on self-submission and (understandably) cherry picks the best sites to showcase Plone's capabilities.
A Great Backyard Plone Count could actually provide useful information on the number of active Plone sites, ownership, activity level, geographical distribution, and so on. I'll have to give this some more thought so that the design is correct, the process repeatable, and the results understandable.
Meanwhile, get out those binoculars and start counting birds....
What's this got to do with Plone? Well, straight off, GBBC's website is powered by Plone. Once again Plone is empowering the not-for-profits.
Secondly, it occurs to me that this might be a useful approach for surveying Plone sites. Lakomy's automated survey for the UK and Plone.net's listing are fascinating in their own right, but there are gaps. Lakomy doesn't distinguish between live and derelict sites; Plone.net relies on self-submission and (understandably) cherry picks the best sites to showcase Plone's capabilities.
A Great Backyard Plone Count could actually provide useful information on the number of active Plone sites, ownership, activity level, geographical distribution, and so on. I'll have to give this some more thought so that the design is correct, the process repeatable, and the results understandable.
Meanwhile, get out those binoculars and start counting birds....
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