WebWare

I love good webware. Webware is essentially a service or software (lots of time it's open source) that is web-based.

I like fast, clean, and well written webware. I've been creating and around it for 10 years and can really appreciate when an interface is well done. I like to take some of that love and channel it in inspiration for Globat software.

Right now, my favorites are:
1) Confluence - the best wiki platform I've seen. It's very intuitive and complete.
2) B2Evolution.net - clean, precise and well run project. (I use blogger.com w/Globat for this blog).
3) Mint.com - an unreal web-interface which is polished like no other.
4) Gmail - I am still a huge fan of the gmail interface.

I am currently a big fan of Yahoo's YUI design components and FusionCharts for graphs. I use YSlow on everything, and insist our development team does. Speed and usability are vitally important.

As you're developing web applications, don't just use the same old styles. Look around and find what is cutting edge, fast and intuitive. Your users will love you for it.

--Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

Quitting!

What a great post title. (a la Seth Godin) :-)

A great lesson I've learned over the years. Quitting is very important and people that become "the best" know not only how to quit, but when to quit. Now, I'm not talking about quitting your job, but rather quitting anything that is going to hold you back from being "the best". There is a long path between starting something and mastery - and it is important to choose carefully. Your mind share will get bogged down and you will never master something if you get distracted by unimportant tasks.

In order to be a super star, you need to quit unimportant things fast and quit often. In the grand scheme of learning and success, they don't matter. For the things that do matter - you have to envision the end in mind and keep moving forward at every cost.

Here's to success and mastery!

--Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

PHP 4 & 5

As I'm sure many of you have heard, the PHP Project is taking a direction of making PHP5 their exclusively supported language. PHP4 will not be developed any further. Unlike some other hosts, Globat will continue to support PHP4 to ensure that all your scripts work. PHP5 has a tenancy of not being backwards compatible - especially with certain Open Sorce scripts. We will keep running PHP4 as long as it is secure and desired. You can choose which version of PHP you run on a Globat.com account by using a .htaccess file. If you're not running an app that is compatible with PHP5, we invite you to install the latest version.

We do support PHP5 and believe in it as a project. We invite all open source software authors to follow.

Here are the versions all Globat servers are running (as of Jan 31st 2008):

Version 4.4.8 (Jan '08)
http://treasure.globat.com/phpinfo.php

Version 5.2.5 (Nov '07)
http://treasure.globat.com/phpinfo.php5

Enjoy and happy coding.

--Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

Mail, Mail, Mail.

At Globat, we've recently overhauled how the backend of our e-mail system works. Today, we have finished migrating the the last batch of customers. The entire process has been a pleasure and I am happy with the result. Our feeling here is that our customers should never have to worry about their mail being unavailable. Every time a customer clicks refresh to see if an important mail came, it should be there. Spam and Virus protection should be so easy and effective that it's taken for granted. We also want to give as many choices possible to customers on how to read and manage their email. We believe the webmail interface should be beautiful, intuitive and slick to use.

I am happy with our platform, and have been hearing great things from our customers.

Here are a few more details of what the new Globat e-mail platform includes:

1) Total Protection - Filtering nearly all spam and viruses out.
2) Ajax Webmail - Having a webmail that looks like Outlook, and responds quickly.
3) No Ceilings - Allowing for increased space utilization and the ability to send large attachments
5) Options - The ability to connect how you want: IMAP, POP, or Webmail. Works with Blackberry, iPhone, Outlook, Thunderbird, Trio, and iMail.
6) Encryption - 128-Bit SSL encryption securing Webmail, IMAP, POP, and authenticated SMTP connections.
7) Delivery Assurance - Daily testing of delivery reports to major carriers.
4) Blacklist Delivery Prevention - Real-time 24/7 blacklist monitoring and preventing to ensure fast delivery.

Enjoy.

-Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

Performance Hosting

My team and I spend a lot of time talking about website performance. I've been doing a lot of research on ways to measure and improve website performance.

Globat's entire dev team now runs YSlow. It is based off of the FireBug Firefox extension. It gives us an objective view of how our services are performing as well as getting into the real opportunities for increasing our customers' website performance.

One of the ways we are investigating increasing performance is using reverse caching techniques at the edge of our network to cache frequently accessed files. We're seeing initial tests with cache hits as high as 75% for certain sites. This cuts down latency and speeds up delivery of websites to the visitors of our customers websites. I'm seeing performance gains as higher than 100%. For example, a site which takes 3.84 seconds to load (which has 30 jpeg thumbnails) cuts down to 1.28 seconds - with out any optimization of the client's site.

As our front end test progress, I look forward to bringing this speed to our customer base. We're on the cutting edge of shared hosting and delivery speed is on the front of our agenda.


-Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

"Operational Innovation"

Think bigger - don't just go for optimizing, shoot for revolutionizing.

One of my favorite articles of all time is from the April 2004 issue of the Harvard Business Review. I read it whenever I want to be inspired. I recommend you do the same.

The theory the author, Michael Hammer, is presenting is how to create deep change through operational innovation. Hammer writes about some case studies - which are the most interesting part of the article and the part you should study. He presents ideas and pointers on how to get these exciting disruptive changes through an organization. At Globat.com, my team is always looking for ways to not just tweak, but revolutionize the way operations are performed.

Why You Should Be Interested in Progressive Insurance

Often times in an industry, things are done the "same old way" because that's how "they've always been done". The concept is to break through and not just operate very well, but to leap frog the competition's process to innovate with in operations.

Progressive Corporation was well known to me from their commercials on television. Progressive was founded way-back in 1937. In the late 90s, there was nothing special or booming about the insurance industry - insurance performs with GDP and is a 100 year old industry, yet the old company performed amazingly! They innovated. It wasn't just solid execution or good marketing, it was operational innovation.

What did they do?
1 - Started sending out IRVs (Immediate Response Vehicles) to process claims on site.
2- Opened up their website to share competitors rates - as insurance rates are regulated.
3- They realized FICO scores were very good indicators of risk level.

This may seem on the surface as 3 good marketing ideas. In reality, it's much, much deeper than that. The numbers show that.

In 1991, Progressive had $1.3 billion in sales. By 2002, that figure had grown to $9.5 billion. Today, Progressive is listed on the S&P 500 with $14.8 Billion in revenue.

By deploying adjusters in their mobile offices (Immediate Response Vehicles), it cut something like 7 people out of the loop, boosted customer satisfaction and saved the company money since people were willing to settle for less.

Change your Organization

The changes Progressive made were revolutionary to their business. Get out there and create Operational Innovation in your business today. It's going to change every metric in your business and lead to delighted customers.

--Chris Ueland / President, Globat.com

(You can actually buy the article online on the HBR website from their back issues.)