Posts tagged Cool
Data Visualization poster – 8 tips for an effective dashboard
13 months ago
It’s been a while since I shared some new content with you. The main reason is because I’ve been extremely busy with client projects and expanding the Intelligence team at The Next View.
A couple of months ago, I gave a presentation at SAP Netherlands during the SAP Forum event. The SAP Forum (previously known as SAP World Tour) is a one-day event on which SAP presents their innovations and latest technology. I hosted a presentation on effective dashboard design and data visualization principles. Until now, I wasn’t aware of the fact that the photographers caught me in the middle of the action during the event 
Normally session attendees receive the presentation but I wanted to give them something extra. Something that would tickle and excite them even far beyond the moment of the actual presentation.
Together with some of my colleagues, we came up with the idea to create a high quality, A1 sized poster containing 8 tips on effective dashboard design. The idea was born. After many pizza sessions, different prototypes and discussions on content (could we copy Stephen Fews quote “no more pies” ?) the poster came to life. The creative brain for the design of the poster is colleague Frodo Jansen, a very talented UX and BI consultant.
At the SAP Forum venue, every attendee of my presentation received a poster and it was a great success. But we didn’t expect that it would go viral after mentioning it on social media like Facebook and Twitter. The result? We had to print over hundreds of extra copies. Customers even started sending pictures of their BI team putting the poster on their office walls or project war-rooms. A great success we never expected to become so big.
After this, I wanted to be able to spread this data visualization poster with my international followers so Frodo and I decided to translate it. Today, the English version of the Data Visualization poster is born.
Drop me a line to receive the poster digitally in high resolution or printed on hiqh quality A1 sized paper.
If you decide to put it on your office wall, I’d love to add a photo of that to my collection so make sure you’ll share it with me.
Challenge part 3: Open Xcelsius dashboards on your iPad
122 years ago
The quest for flash enabled SAP BusinessObjects dashboards on your iPad continues and today we have a new chapter. Through twitter I came up along iSwifter after I saw Mico Yuk tweeting about it.
Well, what is iSwifter?
“iSWiFTER is the industry’s first cloud-based Flash game streaming service specifically built for mobile devices including smart phones and tablets, spanning mobile platforms such as Apple’s iOS and Android. Low-cost servers in the cloud run abstraction software that intelligently converts browser-based Flash games to a form that is optimized for individual mobile devices, complete with multi-touch gesture support for game interaction, and accommodating different screen sizes. A client app connects to the gaming servers in the cloud to download streaming content live to the mobile device.”
This sounds great but I always like to test drive something myself before I get too excited.
Step 1: Download the free iPad app
itms://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iswifter/id388857173?mt=8
Step 2: Open up a web page with an Xcelsius dashboard embedded
For some dashboard examples with interactivity, you can use my webserver where I uploaded a couple of Xcelsius dashboards.
Also check out this dashboard, created by Benchmarkers.com:
This is about it.. I’d like to see your opinion on this app and if it works ok with your dashboards in terms of touch interaction, performance, scalability, etc. One final note; in the last DSLayered podcast, the SAP USA product manager for Xcelsius, Scot Leaver, told that SAP was prototyping HTML5 based Xcelsius exports so perhaps the “off the shelve” solution from SAP BusinessObjects will be available with one of the next releases of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.X.
Have fun!
Update: I’ve put a new blog online that includes a demo video.
Custom paint Parrot AR Drone at the VNSG2011
32 years ago
This week the VNSG 2011 event took place. The VNSG is the Dutch community for all SAP and BusinessObjects clients, partners and enthusiasts. Of course I had to be there so I joined the party. Since I recently switched jobs I was representing The Next View and our services. But these events are not only about keynotes and client cases, it’s also about bringing along some nice gadgets.
This year I came up with the idea of the Parrot AR Drone which can be controlled with your iPhone or iPad.
A couple of its features:
- WIFI connection with your iPhone or iPad
- Camera mounted on the quadrocopter
- Possibility for dog-fights if you own two pieces
This is how it looks like.
After it arrived at the office I gave it a indoor test flight. Because we decided to give it a custom paint job, the foam bumpers weren’t mounted during my test flight. The result? A paint trading job with one of the office walls.
After the drones arrived with their special paint job, we brought them along to the VNSG and we made a little movie clip.
The Next View – Parrot AR Drone
This sure is one of my favorite gadgets. The only down side is it’s limited battery life of approximately 15 minutes. Let’s see what we can come up with next year
Integrate your car into your online experience
22 years ago
Nowadays, we are all used to being online. It doesn’t matter if you’re at work, at home, at a restaurant or any other place. Through your laptop, tablet or smartphone you’ll be almost always online. You use these devices to check your social media apps, bank accounts, agenda, email, tasks, weather forecast, to upload your Angry Birds high score and so on. The possibilities are numerous.
Until now, your car wasn’t one of the online “devices”. Wel this is about to change. Car manufacturers are really busing hooking your car up onto the online experience. Cars will be able to use online services like we’ve never seen before. For example, you’ll be able to look up a restaurant through Google straight from your car and let you navigate towards it through a Google maps streetview interface. Or imagine that you’re in a traffic jam and a car upfront notices this and sends a “traffic jam warning” message. This way you’ll be able to receive real-time information. Next to this it can also be possible to actually connect to the car driving next to you to exchange information like your business card, points of interest, or even to share music or photo’s. Possibilities are really endless. But also for safety measures you could think of sending an alert to the emergency services if you witness a car accident or to track your stolen car.
Of course there is always a battle of the sexes between for example BMW and Audi.
This picture below shows a BMW which notices an older Audi model with technical malfunctions. The BMW calls in for help for the broken car. What a coincidence that this car happens to be an Audi.
Click the image to go to the BMW connected drive website.
At BMW, they also think that a thief would rather pick a BMW instead of a Mercedes or Audi if he could choose. I find it quite funny. With BMW connected drive, you can track your car’s location within seconds.
Audi also launched a website on which they inform you about their vision for online cars.
They still need to work on some nice video footage but the textual content is available for your reading pleasures.
Also check the following link for Google’s self-driving car:
http://www.smartplanet.com/technology/blog/thinking-tech/googles-self-driving-car/5445/
I’d say, go check it!
SAP Idea Place
02 years ago
SAP is strongly moving towards a more community and innovation driven way of product development. Recently they’ve launched SAP Idea Place.
Here you can post all your ideas about product enhancements.
For example, if you’d like to have a new chart type for SAP BO dashboards instead of a 3rd party plugin, you can request it here.
If you’d like to see some WebI enhancements you can submit them here.
The overview page for all submitted ideas for the SAP products can be found on the overview page.
This is a real great feature. It’s the first time in SAP history that the SAP community can provide input for product enhancements in such way and so close to the product management team.
I’m quite enthusiastic and posted my idea for SAP BO dashboards (aka Xcelsius, aka SAP Crystal Dashboard Design) just a minute ago..
Recent Comments