The term Enterprise 2.0 has become a popular term used to describe the general transformation taking place within the enterprise as companies move towards embracing Web 2.0 technologies and practices.  I mentioned the trend a couple of days ago. The phenomena is actually very simple and very prevalent - what makes sense on the Internet, eventually makes sense in the enterprise - think Enterprise Mashups, Enterprise Widgets, Enterprise Social Networks, Enterprise Video and even Enterprise user-generated content!

Enterprise 2.0 User Interface Design:
More recently companies have gotten around to updating internal (and external) web-based application to incorporate Web 2.0 design and technologies. Here are some of macro and micro trends we have seen or proposed as it relates to enterprise clients:

• Updating their presentation layers to leverage XHTML/CSS
• Incorporating AJAX and FLEX components in their UI’s
• Moving away from “Frame-based” design to simpler CSS-inspired skinnable UIs (this CSS Zen Garden for the Enterprise)
• Adding support for user feedback and user-generated content in the form of rating widgets, user comments and discussions, as well as content upload capabilities
• Adding support for RSS and other forms of syndication to their applications
• Mashup that integrate both Internet and enterprise feeds
• Continued move towards Enterprise “start-pages” (Enterprise dashboards like Netvibe, i.e.) and Enterprise Widget
• Increased support for Video and other rich media content
• Mobile application support (especially for the iPhone and Blackberry)
• Converting from SOAP and WSUI based web service architectures to more modern XML REST and JSON

Quite often we get the request: “I want a widget”. Although most people making that request have an good idea of what platform they want their widget deployed on, some don’t. Here is a quick look at some of the common widget platforms options available, their pros and cons, and other important considerations:

• Flash-based Web Widgets: This remains the most common platform for widget development. Widgets built in Flash are generally designed to be embedded on social networks, blogs and other web pages (by simply cutting and pasting a snippet of HTML code). They can be distributed directly or using a Widget marketplace or distribution platform. About 80% of the actual widgets we build fall into this category.
  

• Other Web-based Widgets: There are a number of other web-based start pages, portals and communities that prospective clients are sometimes interested in developing widgets for. These include services like iGoogle, Windows Live.com, Pageflakes and Netvibes. Widgets built for specific web-based services are generally are generally not portable across services. We usually build widgets in a way that increases the likelihood reuse (since most services support some flavor of Javascript), additionally some services, like Netvibes, have “wrappers” that allow them to be used in other start-pages.
  
  See more comprehensive lists…

• Desktop Widgets: Desktop widget platforms include Yahoo! Widgets, MacOS X Widgets, Microsoft Vista Gadgets and Google Desktop Gadgets. Widgets built for these platforms are designed to run on a user’s desktop. As a result, they are generally are not spread virally or via “drive-by” marketing. Prospective clients evaluating or considering desktop widget platforms are usually driven by specific customer requests or applications. Most widgets built for a desktop platform require that the user first install a widget engine (Windows Vista and MacOS are exceptions), a process that can be time consuming and can pose a barrier to adoption.
  
  See more comprehensive lists…

• Facebook Application: Although a a widget can be embedded in a Facebook (FB) application, a FB app is “technically” not a widget – its a lot more. When building “widgets” for the FB platform, most people are talking about developing a Flash-based widget and then build a FB application to “contain” it (the are some limitations). The alternative is to ditch the widget idea and simply build a full featured FB app that takes full advantage of the platform.

  

• Other Social Media Applications: This involves building applications or “porting” existing Flash-based widgets to platforms like OpenSocial (for MySpace, Hi5, Orkut and others) and Ning. Unless you have a compelling reason for doing this, you are probably better off with one of the other options.
  
  See more comprehensive lists…

So What Widget Do I Need?
Hopefully you have already answered that question. The platform (or platforms) you select to develop and deploy your widget(s) on depends on the following:

• who your target customer is (consumer, customer, enterprise, prospects, i.e.)

• the purpose of the widget (marketing or utility)

• what your marketing or customer acquisition goals are (related to purpose)

• how you envision the widget being used and distributed (is it viral?, i.e.)

Clients interested in solving marketing, awareness and branding problems are usually interested in Web-based widgets (or social media applications) that are often seen, easily spread and hopefully come with a compelling reason for folks “driving-by” to spread them.

Clients interested in using widgets to deliver utility or functionality or extend an existing application, are probably most interested in Desktop widgets.

Clients that want marketing exposure on numerous widget marketplaces (WidgetBox, Netvibes, Yahoo! Widgets, i.e.) are probably going to want to build smaller (feature poor) widgets on a technology (Flash, i.e.) that works on multiple platforms.

Clients targeting “paying” or enterprise customers are probably looking at specific desktop widget platforms.

More Widget Platform Information
I hope this answers some of the questions people about widget platforms. I have also created a section (wiki.metablocks.com/widget-platforms) on the Metablocks Wiki dedicated to tracking relevant widget development platforms, feel free to check it out.

Tags: facebook, opensocial, ning, widgets, flash, google, netvibes

I have always been a big fan of Rapid Application Development (RAD). Wikipedia defines RAD as:

…the term and its acronym have come to be used in a broader, generic sense that encompasses a variety of techniques aimed at speeding application development, such as the use of web application frameworks and other types of software frameworks.

In the past, the key to a lot of rapid application development has been the use of software frameworks or toolkits. Unfortunately these types of frameworks are sadly missing when it comes to widget development.

Recent entrants in the space have failed to deliver compelling widget RAD solutions for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, most of them (such as WidgetBox and ClearSpring) are marketplaces or distribution plays and have no real intention at being or becoming a toolkit! Although both WidgetBox and ClearSpring have things such as “Facebook App Generators” or accelerators, these simply try and stuff existing Flash-based widgets into new social networking platforms and are not toolkits per se. Others like KickApps see themselves as hosted, white-label platforms! The closest thing to a widget toolkit is probably Sprout Builder, but its feature set has limitations, some find that its “development” environment is complex, and users have no control over the memory footprint or branding.

In general, here are some problems with many of today widget toolkits:

• Branding: Most toolkits (as well as “wrappers” from WidgetBox, ClearSpring and Sprout) have mandatory branding (that promotes their service) which cannot be removed.
• Size: Even if you can live with someone else’s branding, anything that is “general purpose” tends to be very large, and on the Internet size matters! I remember a recent client that tried to build a widget using one of the toolkits only to find that they had created a 500KB monster. We were able to recreate the same widget in 50KB!
• Cost: But wait a minute, you say, these toolkits are FREE! Unless you don’t put any value on your own time, then yes, is all free. Unfortunately the client I mentioned above had invested over 20 hours in the exercise, only to find out it didn’t meet their needs, and this does not take into account potential future support cost!
• Integration: None of the toolkits that I know of support any deep integration (other than an simple RSS feed) with client or third-party API’s.
• Tracking: Although a growing number of “toolkit” provider are starting to provide some support for traffic reports and analytics, this support is limited and cannot be customized or integrated with a customers existing reporting system.
• Support: Actually, the lack thereof. As you can imagine, most “free” toolkits do not come with support.

So what’s the alternative? At Metablocks, we build custom widgets to exacting brand, size and platform requirements. We have our own “internal toolkits” that speed up the process when it comes to things like XML communication, tracking and user interaction, but these are small and agile software frameworks that bring no extra “weight” (or wait) to the project. Obviously many of the things we do, cannot be duplicated with a general purpose toolkit. Thing like two-way communication (even within social networks), custom tracking and reporting, advanced video and audio support to name just a few. In addition, if something goes wrong, there is always someone there to fix it. If you have tried a general purpose toolkit and are less than pleased with the results, please give us a call!

Once you have a custom widget that works, THEN you can a marketplace like WidgetBox to distribute it. Remember that most of these companies (like WidgetBox and ClearSpring) are trying to solve a distribution problem, not a development or design problem!

Tags: widgets, widetbox, clearspring, sprout, flash

Metablocks recently designed and develop a Flash-based widget for the HR folks at Lockheed Martin that sheds light on some of the social media best-practices employed by departments in corporate America. It’s a project we worked on with the Bernard Hodes Group, an integrated talent solutions provider that works with Lockheed Martin’s HR team.

Here is what I like about Lockheed Martin’s HR group’s approach:

• A Forward Thinking Approach: Lockheed Martin has a world-class HR department that continues to leverage their website (lockheedjobs.com) very effectively as part of their recruiting efforts. The site gives visitors access to compelling content that includes video testimonials, a newsletter, job search, an events calendar and even live chat - Web 2.0 and community features that I am sure are the envy of their contemporaries, so it’s no surprise they decided to add widgets to the mix!
• An Integrated Approach: The widget not only display the latest Lockheed Martin news (from the department’s blog), it also allows visitors to embed the widget on their sites or blogs or subscribe to ts RSS feed need, and it features video from Lockheed Martin video archives! So in one fell swoop, the folks at lockheedjobs.com and Bernard Hodes Group have managed to integrate video and rich-media, blogging and RSS, with widgets and social media marketing!

In May 2007, at the Facebook F8 event, Facebook launched its application platform and announced a slew of third party developers. Since then Facebook has the Web’s “App De Jour”. By courting developers, rather than fretting over third party widgets (like MySpace), the flood of new Facebook applications has accelerated the social network’s already runaway growth, contributing to 37% of Facebook’s growth since the platform was opened in May.

The success of Facebook has promoted a growing number of application, service and content providers to include Facebook apps as part of their marketing and product mix. In fact, Facebook application design and development has become the most requested service here at Metablocks. We have found, however, that even more important then building Facebook apps is understanding how to strategically design and deploy social media applications (including widgets) to achieve a client’s business goals. Social media applications do not exist in a vacuum, and can have one or more of the following objectives:

• To promote a service by serving a “viral marketing” function and getting the word out or creating brand awareness
• To extend a service’s feature set or functionality by enabling its use within social networks
• To add to or extend the collaborative or community aspect of a service by leveraging the relationships users have on social networks
• To provide application functionality or utility that currently doesn’t exist on a social network or is significantly better than what currently exists

I also like the way Leveraging Ideas categories Facebook apps into their 3 categories:

• Facebook apps that exposes a company’s content to an audience
• Facebook apps designed to gain as many users as quickly as possible
• Facebook apps that create something that provides users with true value

Regardless of how you wish to categorize social media applications, content and service providers need to understand that social media development strategy is just as important as social media application development. Even before Metablocks got into the business of developing Facebook and other social media applications, many of our widget development projects included a social media strategy component to help clients understand how widgets, gadgets, blogs, wikis, and social networks worked together as part of a comprehensive social media strategy. I always continue to stress to clients that they need a viable social media strategy and not just a Facebook app or widget!