2011 Blog Review

I ventured into google analytics the other day to check out some browser stats, the general result is positive, by the way - 42% Firefox, 27% Chrome & 20% IE, Safari only down at 4%.

But what I thought I'd do is have a look at last years stats - it seems to be the thing to do this time of year...

Off the bat I'm happy with over 50% increase in page views compared to 2010. I don't care so much about specific numbers, but it's good to know whatever I'm doing is expanding. I'm quite motivated to write more often this year - I already have a bunch scheduled - once a week every Wednesday is the aim. Plus any random stuff I might put up, usually on a lighter note on Friday.

I'm happy I had the motivation one week while on the road to re-design the blog to bring it into this decade. It looks less tacky and a little bit more thought out. There's still a few little things I want to touch up, but it will do for now. Other projects on the go first...

As for what people are reading, in 2010 here are the top 5 pages (behind root)

1. Short circuit evaluations - I promoted this topic a bit, I'm a big fan of COALESCE
2. Another Apex 4.0 feature for Forms - Tree view in Apex 4.0
3. Why I use Google Chrome for Oracle Apex - because it's awesome and light!
4. Using JQuery dialog boxes - Very handy
5. Automating Apex backups from DB - backup backup backup

In 2011 we moved along to more focused pages

1. Presentations - I think my Apex Security one bumped those stats up
2. A mash of Oracle related thoughts - lots of distinct topics, looking back
3. Automating Apex backups from DB - up from fifth, good work backing up!
4. Useful Oracle Apex URLs - Popular with those learning
5. Apex in Amazon Cloud - Listen out this year, I'll probably be doing a cloud implementation in 2012 and I'll be sure to blog about it - and probably do a prezi in October.

Most weren't hugely out of the ball park, although last year 1st had 50% more hits than 5th, but it does show what people specifically read I guess, as opposed to strolling past on apexblogs.info

Most visitors are from US by far, Australia distant second, then UK, India, Germany just pipping Netherlands. Canada-Russia equal, then drops away.

Top mobile devices - iPhone, iPad, (not set), Samsung Galaxy S (probably me ;-), HTC Sappire

Windows order magnitude more than Mac, then Linux.

And finally top search terms - all fairly obvious. "Oracle" three times more than "oracle apex jquery datepicker"; some not provided; "triangle circle square", "oracle apex", "apex amazon cloud", "apex post calculation computation", "apex login page", "oracle apex 4.2"

The last one is interesting since it I published my wish list in early Jan, but accidentally published it as December when I first drafted it. It falls in the 2011/12 archive - so I wonder how that gets counted in their queries ;-)

There are no major milestones to come, I haven't reached 200 posts yet, so in time... I'm glad I started.

I'll have to remember to do this next year and compare!

Photo by Robbert van der Steeg - check this one out!

Observations in pattern matching

Sometimes while driving the suburbs, I'll see a line of cars the stands out for the most benign reason - each boldly coloured - red - blue - yellow - green.

The first time I became aware of how much it stood out for me, I've kept an eye out for it again - a simple alignment of colours. Look around, often you see is really nothing exciting white, white, grey, red, white, white... more variety in the models. So the bright sequence is an outlier that appears very low on my bell curve.

However, I don't really do cars, but when using computers, sometimes I see strange alignments in behaviour. As a developer, I see issues in code behaviour, and sometimes just the way it looks. It's same same but different for testing colour-blindness with the Ishihara color test; and it would be fascinating to hear something with synaesthesia describing the stroop effect, and how the could also be used to find spies!

These days, many people are becoming proficient in using Google. And the engine learns from the use of everyone. People get familiar, particularly with their regular style of searching. I'm reading a fascinating book right now called Click: What Millions of People Are Doing Online and Why it Matters. It's phenomenal the amount of information to be mined & utilised.

That was a tired ramble, this is what I saw that spurred it on

Just like the four words of Isaiah Mustafa "silver fish hand catch", "computers marijuana guns shareholding" were part of four terms I never thought I'd see together in the top four results.

And onya Google for honouring the first human space flight - pairing nicely with another book I've started by Buzz Aldrin.

Over.

ScottWe