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Intel Releases Mashups for the Masses

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the applying-data-to-the-situation-for-the-win dept.

News_and_info writes "Intel has released an online tool called Mash Maker with the intent of allowing anyone to create mashups. They offer some training on how to use it, but the tool is fairly easy to use out of the gate. I see it more as a rudimentary semantic browser. From the article: 'Mashups have still not really penetrated the mainstream. My mother is not using mashup sites, and she is definitely not creating them. Even if there was a mashup out there that did exactly what she wanted, the chances are that she wouldn't know it existed, and would be confused by it if she tried to use it ... With Mash Maker, mashups are part of the normal browsing experience. As you browse the web, the Mash Maker toolbar displays buttons representing mashups that Mash Maker thinks you might want to apply to your current page.'"

45 of 180 comments (clear)

  1. more info in the summary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    what is a mashup for those of us who dont subscribe to all this web2.0 nonsense?

    1. Re:more info in the summary by Simulant · · Score: 4, Funny

      Not sure... Last month I thought it was sort of a remix using multiple songs. Something must have happened while I was on vacation.

    2. Re:more info in the summary by Gnavpot · · Score: 2, Informative

      it's web 3.0, actually:
      http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=00048144-10D2-1C70-84A9809EC588EF21 [sciam.com]
      http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/12614/01/Semantic_Web_Revisted.pdf [soton.ac.uk]

      Actually, the word "mashup" does not exist on any of those pages. But at least we now know that "mashup" has something to do with the semantic web.
    3. Re:more info in the summary by xouumalperxe · · Score: 4, Informative

      Short version: Site A has a service, and an API to access that service. Site B has another service with its own API. Some guy comes in, grabs the two services and mashes them up into one piece. Wikipedia has an article on the subject, and suggests mapping Craiglist listings on a Google Maps map as an example of a mashup.

      REALLY Short version: Imagine the stuff you do with the standard *NIX toolchain and pipes. Now apply the concept to the web.

    4. Re:more info in the summary by fractoid · · Score: 4, Insightful

      So... it's web services. The same thing that was tried and never really took off over the last few years, but now it's got a pukesomely 'trend-enabled' new moniker and so it's news again? Sometimes I hate the internet.

      --
      Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
    5. Re:more info in the summary by gowen · · Score: 2, Funny

      Don't you understand?

      Now it has A CATCHIER BUZZWORD-SOUNDING NAME!

      World domination in 9...8...7...

      --
      Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
  2. What's REALLY needed by Colin+Smith · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Is to wire the balls of whoever thought up the word "mashup" to the mains supply and to shock them until they repent and take it back.

    --
    Deleted
    1. Re:What's REALLY needed by springbox · · Score: 5, Funny

      That didn't work for "podcast" ..

    2. Re:What's REALLY needed by GreyPoopon · · Score: 4, Funny

      Is to wire the balls of whoever thought up the word "mashup" to the mains supply and to shock them until they repent and take it back.

      Don't tase me, bro!
      --

      GreyPoopon
      --
      Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?

  3. What's a "mashup"? by HateBreeder · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Besides, you'd expect something like this (Software Research) from Microsoft or Google... But Intel?!

    --
    Sigs are for the weak.
    1. Re:What's a "mashup"? by 427_ci_505 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Web technology flexibility amazes me. Now we can boil it, mash it, stick it in a stew...etc.

    2. Re:What's a "mashup"? by crush · · Score: 4, Informative
      you'd expect something like this (Software Research) from Microsoft

      The dude behind this (Rob Ennals) worked for SCO after training in a lab funded by Microsoft. http://berkeley.intel-research.net/rennals/

    3. Re:What's a "mashup"? by Wiseman1024 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Intel does a lot of research. They've researched video codecs, face recognition, complex optimizers, and similar technologies in the past. Their goal is to generate demand for faster processors, though it's more honourably done (research of useful technologies) than the usual (fill the next version of Windows with shit).

      --
      I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
  4. Abusable? by rancher+dan+3 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This seems like it's ripe for abuse by people trying to drive web traffic to their sites. If the signal to noise ratio doesn't get out of hand almost instantly, I'll be surprised.

  5. Joyous Day! by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow! Now I can have Dictionary.com give me definitions of the names of all the streets in my town via Google Maps. Just what I need!

  6. Mashups are... by Dr.+Stavros · · Score: 5, Informative

    Karma-whoring Wikipedia-link explanation of mashups. Thanks!

    1. Re:Mashups are... by ystar · · Score: 3, Funny

      You don't need wikipedia to whore karma this time. Imagine reading two or more websites at once, maybe even with some ajaxy instant messaging stuff, all kind of mixed together.

      This is useful because you don't get excess cheeto dust in your keyboard by having to type in multiple URLs.

    2. Re:Mashups are... by glwtta · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That's what I love about Wikipedia - often you don't even need to read most of the text, just the quality of writing tells you everything you need to know.

      "a Mashup is used in order to make a certain source of information exponentially more useful", translation: "complete bullshit; a nearly nonsensical term made up by some 14 year-old with a hard-on for MySpace".

      I sure hope these Mashups will be all Web 2.0, and lets not forget to crowdsource some folksonomies, too.

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    3. Re:Mashups are... by martinX · · Score: 3, Funny

      You need this:
      http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20070909.html

      --
      When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
  7. The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by Chonine · · Score: 5, Interesting

    More power to those out there that edit wikis religiously, blog daily, use and create mashups, get their news through an RSS reader, can name their favorite 10 podcasts, share their Google calendars with their friends, have a FlickR and Delicious account, use 100 firefox plugins, and have an application-loaded Facebook among their many social networking sites - these can be some great tools with great utility to people.

    But for some reason, this newfangled web doesn't seem to appeal to me, my friends, or anyone I know. I'm a Computer Science Masters student, and my friends work in industry. Am I backwards? Antiquated? Should I be mashing it up? I do it like I have for years - an xterm, an email app, an IM app, and a tabbed-to-the-hilt browser.

    1. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by Blackknight · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Sounds like most of the people I know. I think web 2.0 appeals to a younger crowd, seems to be mostly teenagers on those sites.

    2. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by sarahbau · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Same with me. I hadn't even heard of a mashup before. I had to look it up to find out what this news post was talking about. I really don't understand the point of most of this Web 2.0 stuff, but some people seem to like it.

    3. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by grommit · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Just keep doing your own thing. There's always going to be people that want to be a part of the "Next Big Thing" and are more than willing to bash the rest of us over the head with how great it is. Personally I, much like you, prefer a few simple apps that get minor refinements from time to time and just get my work done while MashRails and RubyUps and so on burn brightly for a few months only to be replaced by the "Next Big Thing."

    4. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by Myopic · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yeah I agree. I have my CS degree and I love my internet, but I came of web-age in 1997, 8 and 9, so I like email and web pages more than the techs that have come out to replace them.

      Social networking sites are starting to grow on me, but only a tiny bit. I do love podcasts, because ever since I was a child I thought TV with commercials, no pause/record/playback, and on someone else's schedule was folly. Some people call them podcasts, I just call them radio: now I listen to my radio/tv from a menu (the menu on my iPod) instead of from a guide (the TV Guide).

      RSS feeds are pretty sweet but frankly not sweet enough for me to go out and discover on my own, so I appreciate ones that come to me for free (specifically, Firefox's RSS news link). My calendar hangs on my wall, and I find that more convenient than any computer calendar I've ever found, but that's probably because I'm a simple guy and don't need to schedule more than a couple things on any given day, at most. I can understand the benefit of a Google Calendar to people who are very busy and need to coordinate with lots of other people. Also, for egoists.

      Same with Flickr. I love my digicam but I don't have much of a compulsion to show my pics to the rest of the world. They're on my own site, they're not hidden or anything, but I don't need to share them actively.

      I never got into chat either. I've used it as a tool and it's okay, but I much prefer email because it is non-live. I like audio chat when it works with something else I'm doing. For instance, when I play card games online (I like euchre), I can audio chat with the other participants, and that improves the experience.

      Web 2.0 stuff is pretty compelling. Google Maps is the bomb (true that, double true). I appreciate the more complex and compelling interfaces offered on the web today. There was a time in 2000, 2001 and thereabouts where companies were putting all kinds of applications on the web, but the web wasn't up to the task, so we were all doing things on the web that we should have been doing on desktop apps. Now things are a lot better. My bank's website has animated windows that fade in and out and overlap, and it's an interface just about as compelling as any desktop app I've used.

      This is trite and perhaps obvious, but one thing the internet is fantastically perfect for is... porn. My god, what if we all still had to go out and walk to a porno theatre to see stag films? That would be terrible.

    5. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by klenwell · · Score: 5, Insightful

      But for some reason, this newfangled web doesn't seem to appeal to me, my friends, or anyone I know.

      I hear you. I actually had an idea the other day that I thought would be perfect for Yahoo Pipes. The thing was, the web page that was the source for the key data to be mashed-up, though a classic HTML data table, didn't offer an RSS feed. And Pipes doesn't seem to offer even the most basic page scraping utility. (If it does, I couldn't find it.)

      After playing around with Yahoo Pipes for a half-hour trying to make it work, I realized that with my knowledge of PHP, I could do this just as easily on my own. And have much more control over the process and end product.

      The conclusion I came to: anyone who is capable of imaginatively using these tools is probably more than capable of just rolling their own mashup using open-source scripting tools. I don't imagine most ordinary users are going to be able to create anything more inventive than a regurgitated RSS feed.

      Please correct me if I'm wrong. Anyone have any interesting examples of something produced with this kind of pre-packaged mashup tool?

      --
      Innovation makes enemies of all those who prospered under the old regime... -- Machiavelli
    6. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by geekgirlandrea · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Same here (well, I use RSS). I still use a pretty minimalist fvwm config to run Firefox, xterm and emacs, and that's about it. I just don't get how most of this "Web 2.0" stuff is supposed to different from, you know, hypertext like we were all doing in about 1995.

    7. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by krbvroc1 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You know, I could probably visit any retirement home in the world and roll up a bunch of old people who will tell you that computers are useless and stupid. Would that parallel help back up your argument? I don't think its really a fair comparison. The issue here is not technology versus a non-technology generation. It is an evolution of companies trying to package what used to require more thought/skill/programming/configuration into something that is a simple tool for the masses. It a layer of abstraction that seems to be more hype than anything. The problem with a lot of this stuff is that by adding extra layers of abstraction the users of the technology forget/never learn what is really going on behind the scenes.
    8. Re:The "2.0" ness escapes more than newbies. by morcego · · Score: 2, Insightful

      But for some reason, this newfangled web doesn't seem to appeal to me, my friends, or anyone I know. I'm a Computer Science Masters student, and my friends work in industry. Am I backwards? Antiquated? Should I be mashing it up? I do it like I have for years - an xterm, an email app, an IM app, and a tabbed-to-the-hilt browser.


      I'm glad I'm not alone.

      I remember the first time I saw Java one a browser. I think it was 1995 or 96. I just asked myself "why?". The only really useful thing I've seem since 1996 on the web technology field was CSS and XHTML. Flash, Javascript, Java, Shockwave Director, ActiveX ... I just keep asking myself: "Why?" These days, every stupid webpage needs Javascript and has some flash nonsense on it.

      Granted, I use xterm, read my e-mail on Mutt, run IceWM, keep javascript (NoScript) and Java (always) disabled, and generally block flash. What happened to keeping things simple ? That old Emacs joke seems now to apply to web browsers: "(Firefox|IE|Opera|Mozilla) is an excellent operating system, all it lacks is a good web browser."

      I've found out that, as a rule of thumb, the flashier the site, the worst the content. Hummm, maybe that is why they do it ...
      --
      morcego
  8. Firefox only by Animats · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Note that it's Firefox-only. No Internet Explorer support.

    Intel has lately started to move into Microsoft's space. Microsoft used to object when Intel did much with software on mainstream platforms, and Intel used to back off. Intel isn't backing off any more. Interesting.

    1. Re:Firefox only by allcar · · Score: 2, Interesting

      This gives me wood! A massive commercial outfit like Intel producing stuff for FF only is really exciting. As an enterprise Web Developer, I know how much easier it is to develop for one browser only (especially if that browser is standards compliant (ie: not IE)) and this may well be just laziness on behalf of Intel's devs. Anyway, more power to their elbows.

    2. Re:Firefox only by jez9999 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Note that it's Firefox-only. This gives me wood! This tells us all we need to know about you.
      --
      == Jez ==
      Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
  9. Re:Legal issue.... by Minwee · · Score: 3, Funny

    Actually, saying that things are illegal when they aren't is illegal.

  10. WTF is a mashup? by noidentity · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Article summary could have had a few extra words summarizing what a "mashup" is. To me it sounds like what I do with my potatoes before I eat them.

    1. Re:WTF is a mashup? by LighterShadeOfBlack · · Score: 4, Funny
      From TFA:

      Mashups [allow] us to transform the Internet from being a collection of separate website islands, into a unified intelligence in which knowledge from one web site can be automatically combined with knowledge from another. ...uhh... so now you know.

      I smell synergy.
      --
      Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and stupid comments are intentional.
    2. Re:WTF is a mashup? by acoster · · Score: 2, Informative

      Mashup = Buzzword for "site that mixes contents from more than one site".

      --
      "Go forth, and be excellent to each other" --Bill & Ted
  11. the truth is by pair-a-noyd · · Score: 5, Insightful

    older folks such as myself don't use this mashup crap because it sounds STUPID.
    The name alone implies that it's some sort of hap-hazardly created frankenstein stuff that 10 year olds create.
    The name does not indicate at all, in any way what a mashup is or does.

    It just sounds stupid and totally un-professional.

    No, I'm not trolling, this isn't flamebait, I'm giving MY take on it from the perspective of someone near 50 years old.

    Why not call this stuff, what ever it is, by a name that gives people a sense of what it's about?

    1. Re:the truth is by crush · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Yahoo has a nicer name: Pipes. Admittedly it's just a straightforward rip-off of the UNIX concept, but it's more expressive of what's happening really. Someone pointed out that the whole Web2.0 thing is just taking whatever good CLI stuff worked nicely and slapping a webpage interface on top of it. So:
      • email --> GMail, YahooMail, Hotmail
      • chaining commands through pipes --> mashups
      • usenet --> webforums
    2. Re:the truth is by zullnero · · Score: 2, Informative

      It does have its uses.

      For example, when I was looking for my current apartment, I wanted to see all available apartments on craigslist that were within sane walking distance from where I worked. By mashing up google maps and craigslist, you get a pushpins on the map type of view, without having to grab 30 or so and search them individually. Saved me a lot of time and a heck of a lot of web searches.

      One could apply the same thing to trying to find the closest veterinarian, closest hospital, bike repair shop, etc. Closest shoe store that sells some line of shoes that you like. Heck, you could take that and combine it with Cityguide/Citysearch descriptions or reviews, and you could make an interactive nightlife map a whole lot faster, and with probably a lot less plagiarism, than making one from scratch.

      It's just a way of tying together various services and making something that serves a more specific purpose. That's all it is. There's no reason to whine about how the world is leaving you behind.

  12. Re:Legal issue.... by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 2, Funny

    "Actually, saying that things are illegal when they aren't is illegal."
    Seems like you just broke the law in your little fantasy reality :-)
    --
    Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
  13. They did the mash... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...they did the website mash
    The website mash
    It was a network smash!

    Chris Mattern

  14. We did it! by redcaboodle · · Score: 5, Funny

    We actually slashdotted Intel.

    --
    -- Put crudely, the world is an extremely large problem instance. (Russel/Norvig Artificial Intelligence)
  15. I've noticed... by TerranFury · · Score: 3, Informative

    Businesspeople have taken to using the phrases,

    • "exponentially"
    • "order of magnitude"

    The problem is, none of them seem to know what either of the above actually mean...

    1. Re:I've noticed... by dbIII · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The more clueless business people also like "spiraling". The ironic or simple sad thing is they think in purely linear terms so think something going up exponentially is just a really steep line. As for order of magnitude - I suppose the way they use it works properly for base 2 and small numbers. The answer is to improve pre-college education (all they really get) and cut off their cocaine supply - or outsource management to a country with decent education system.

  16. Yeah Yeah Yeah... by Colin+Smith · · Score: 2, Funny

    I want a name...

    And address would be handy.

    --
    Deleted
  17. Not necessarily stupid by lee1 · · Score: 2, Informative

    After reading Intel's description of their product I have no interest, but the mashup idea, despite the stupid name, had its early expression in some really brilliant and useful work. Check out http://www.chicagocrime.org/ for a superb example. Of course, this was created by programming (using the nifty django framework, which uses python, by one of its creators) rather than by clicking on a toolbar.