Sitemaps

Wikipedia says of XML:

"Its syntax is fairly verbose and partially redundant. This can hurt human readability and application efficiency, and yields higher storage costs. It can also make XML difficult to apply in cases where bandwidth is limited..."

Not especially encouraging for a 10 Mb subdomain site. Still, the Google Sitemaps (Beta) seems to have its heart in the right place, offering an opportunity to straighten out the mess googlebot seems to get itself into.

After giving Sitemaps a thorough trial, I've decided that the main advantage of the program is the additional statistics that it makes available. Unfortunately, these are not available on subdomains. What little advantage they might have conferred weren't worth the effort and drivespace they consumed.

It seems that googlebot is perfectly capable of traversing a site. The apparent problem stems from Google's secret ranking algorithm, which deems a lot of pages unworthy of listing, especially pages that are in deeply-nested directories. So much for the supposed advantages of using keywords as directory names! Foo.

New Intel iMacs

I should have seen it coming. Well actually I did, but I didn't expect it so soon. With the introduction of the OS X operating system, Apple effectively bridged the software gap. One of the drawbacks of MacIntosh systems has always been the lack of available software relative to the "Wintel" architecture.

OS X is an Apple proprietary GUI running on the Darwin BSD microkernel. As such, it runs a whole host of Open Source software. If you're used to paying for Windows software every six months, let me explain: That's fully-functional often industry-leading applications and utilities at the low, low, bargain price of ... well, they're free.

Apple has been involved with the OpenDarwin Project since the beginning, and everybody knew there was also a Darwin '386 kernel and an i386 interoperability group. "Obviously", Apple would have the inside track on developing the first Intel iMacs. They're a little pricier than I had hoped, but I'm sure they'll come down after the "early adopter" rush. Heck, they're not even shipping yet!

If you're not familiar with Open Source, you really must read Eric Raymond's The Cathedral and the Bazaar

Search Engine Challenge

Which search engine gives the most relevant results? It's hard to say. Each search engine and its related spider is constantly updated in an effort to gain a competitive advantage.

With each crawl, the search database changes. Sometimes for the better, other times not so much. I couldn't tell you what each search will retrieve over the life of this page, but it might be kind of interesting to give an equivalent search to different engines, and see what comes up.

Now, without further ado (or comment) -- four searches for you to compare:

For more on search engines see Google Hacks (O'Reilly)

Natural Cures You Should Know About

Natural Cures "They" Don't Want You To Know About by Kevin Trudeau is a publishing phenomenon. Too bad it isn't a better book. Largely a come-on for Trudeau's website, the book contains little real information and none that isn't readily available elsewhere.

While portraying himself as "a journalist," Trudeau is in fact a very effective marketeer, which is the essence of numerous FTC complaints against his "allegedly" deceptive infomercials. One thing is clear, he has struck a responsive chord with the American public's distrust of giant pharmaceutical companies.

If you're into the conspiracy aspects of this story, you'd do better to read:

• The Truth About the Drug Companies (Random House)
• On The Take: How Medicine's Complicity with Big Business Can Endanger Your Health (Oxford University Press)
• Inside the FDA: The Business and Politics Behind the Drugs We Take and the Food We Eat (Wiley)

On the other hand, if you or a loved one is in need of alternative or holistic medicine, we recommend that you start with something by Dr. Andrew Weil, who is well-respected in both "mainstream" and holistic (or "integrative") medicine. Or you could opt for a reference on herbal remedies.

If you really want Trudeau's book, that's O.K. -- We'll even sell it to you. The thing is we'd rather that you got better value for your money.