Backchannelmedia

InformationWeek, November 6, 2006

Under Construction: Lightweight Development

By Charles Babcock

Speed is one of the hallmarks of Web 2.0. Sites add and kill features quickly, sometimes daily. Yet one size doesn't fit all. Web 2.0 sites must be highly adaptable to changing interests, and developers are finding that lightweight development tools can be a big help.

Two popular options--Ruby and Flash--are similar to Ajax, the lightweight, browser-based combination of JavaScript and XML on which Google Maps and other interactive sites are based. Unlike Ajax, which is relatively new, Ruby and Flash are Web site building technologies with mature toolsets.

Backchannelmedia built its site using Ruby on Rails, a specialized Web platform with its own lightweight programming language, Ruby. The site gives customers rapid access to a massive database of the results of TV commercials. Advertisers can match up TV viewer 800-number call-in orders with where their ad played in different markets throughout the day.

Backchannelmedia CIO Madeleine Noland says the firm of 25 employees had the skills to use Java, Visual Studio .Net, Ruby, and PHP when it decided a year ago to rebuild its customer interaction service, DRTV Research, using Ruby on Rails. The service was built in two months, rather than the nine months it would have taken if the company had used Java, says Jason Toy, director of technology, and it required only one-tenth the lines of code Java would have needed. The service adds 2.5 million ad records a day to the database while maintaining a capability to deliver a million different Web page results based on user queries.

Nike kicked off a new store built on Flash, just like its sneakers, NikeStore, another interactive site, was built with Adobe Systems' Flash, a multimedia engine that runs Macromedia's ActionScript inside the browser Window. (Macromedia was acquired by Adobe.) NikeStore was launched in early September as a retail site employing the latest capabilities for shopper interaction, says John Mayo-Smith, CTO of Nike's site building agent, R/GA. For example, as a visitor's cursor moves over headings such as "Men" or "Kids," a drop-down menu of products appropriate to the category appears. Clicking on a featured item transforms the window surrounding it into a chance to view it in different colors and with related products. The transformations take place nearly instantaneously, without any changes to the surrounding page.

The shopper can personalize footwear at NikeID, a separate site that's tightly integrated into NikeStore, and put the selection in a shopping cart. It's as if everything sought by the shopper is being brought to the page he's on, rather than sending him to another page. In addition, the back button works throughout the site, which isn't common at many retail sites. "The shopper's experience," Mayo-Smith says, "lines up much better with people's expectations."