MC+A

Google has just released 6.4 on the enterprise support site and has updated code.google.com’s documentation.  We have yet to install and verify.  But some of the big changes so far:

JavaScript Crawling

The search appliance now can detect links and content generated dynamically.  I wonder if this will help the forms authentication wizard?

Serve Time Authentication

You will no longer need to enable or disable security manager and legacy auth as in 6.2. The default behavior of the appliance is to now centralize authentication for:

• Cookies
• HTTP Basic and NTLM
• Kerberos
• SAML
• Connectors

Administrative Improvements

There are various administration improvements, most notably:

• LDAP Setup
  New options to use LDAP during serve-time and looking up a user’s group during authentication.
• Timeout for Auth Requests
  New option allows specification wait time for GSA before processing batch authorizations.
• Head Requestor Deny Rules
  Allows you to identify URLs where content servers deny users access with codes other than HTTP code 401. (Non web standard pages)

The full documentation is here.

This past weekend MC+A participated in the 2010 MS Walk on the Chicago Lakefront. It was a great event for a great cause and our team was happy to be part of the movement. Our sponsored team, Cizmar Fundraisers, raised over $2,000.

The Finish Line

The course was around 3 miles. It turned out to be a great day despite some iffy clouds threating to rain on the event.

The Team

Our team. Cizmar Fundraisers raised over $2,000.

The money raised by the MS Walk 2010 supports programs, services and vital research into the cause(s) of and cure for Multiple Sclerosis. Find out what the Greater Illinois Chapter of the MS Society is doing to support the cause.

Special Thanks

Archaia Entertainment LLC
Kunoichi Incorporated LLC
Dave Gallerizzo, Figleaf Software
Chris Cleveland, Dieselpoint

See you next year!

Google introduced Asynchronous Tracking as an “alternate way to track” websites. To recap the benefits of using the new asynchronous ga.js snippet over the older ga.js are:

• Faster tracking code load times via improved code execution
• Improvements in data collection accuracy
• Elimination of tracking errors caused by the ga.js snippet not being fully loaded

A recent Google Analytics script test preformed by Position 2 reveal quantifiable speed increases when using the asynchronous.

Analytics Tracking Code Test Key Findings

Position 2 observed the following results from their test:

1. A 17% speed increase in page load using the asynchronous ga.js over the traditional ga.js code
2. Page placement has little effect on the asynchronous ga.js load time conpared to the traditional ga.js
3. Top of the page placement no longer slows the page load. This is important when tracking clicks is and possible while page is loading content.

Full Position 2 Report

People living with MS overcome challenges everyday to do things we all take for granted, walking, going to the store, and on. It is important to us at MC+A to support the mission of the National MS Society through fundraising and raising awareness, supporting research for a cure.

MC+A is proud to be sponsoring a Walk team “Cizmar Fundraisers” for the 2010 MS Walk on Chicago’s Lakefront on May 2nd. We will be posting updates about the team’s progress. If you are interested in supporting the team please donate online.

We have updated our RSS feed. Please update you Feed Reader Links:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/mcplusa/vJTb

Best

Previously I had authored a series of new features that came as part of the 6.0 software release that was not noted in the software release. For many of our customers, these feature releases are more significant than say GSA unification since they only have a single GSA.

Metadata Base64 Encoding

In software release 6.2, you can now base64 encode both metadata names and metadata values.

 <record url=<a href="http://www.mcplusa.com">http://www.mcplusa.com</a> action="add" mimetype="text/html">
<metadata>
<meta encoding="base64binary" name="acdJvamFXQWjdF9uWEXl" content="asdfLKZUoiuoiasdfmoaioeit">
</metadata>
</record>

Note: the correct encoding attribute is base64binary and not base64 as Google’s documentation states.

A month ago I reported a screenshot of Google’s new layout in a previous post.   During my last few searches I’ve been given this layout.  The icons have been updated and take up less of the screen.  As well, the filtering has been compacted.

Google announced  new details about improvements to Google Docs.  The main features of the release are:

• A new margin ruler
• Better numbering and bullets
• Better placement of images
• “Higher Fidelity” document import
• Faster JavaScript process
• Faster Collaboration

Check it out below

Google released the latest patch to software version 6.2.  Please contact your MC+A customer support contact for information regarding this or to schedule a time for an upgrade to be performed.

The Steps To Implement Search History On A Google Search Appliance or Google Mini

A few weeks ago there was a thread on the Google Groups regarding how to display search history on a Google Search Appliance query results page.  Our approach typically at MC+A is to utilize the xslt as much as possible as it provides less complicated infrastructure.  Because of this, we tend to utilize JQuery to provide some dynamics features to the interface.  In this case, it’s search history.  This article assumes you have some idea about jQuery, specifically the Ready function.

Step 1 – Create A DIV

Create a HTML DIV in your results page that you would like the history to be displayed.  For example:

<div id=”recentHistory”>No Recent Searches</div>

Note the id that you use for later in this process. You can also place text with the div that will be displayed until the jQuery finishes loading.

Step 2 – Add A Function Call to jQuery.Ready

$(document).ready(function(){
    setHistory(); //Function to set the Div
});

Step 3 – Add the Function Call

The following function relies on 5 other functions:

1. GetCookieVal – Get’s the Cookie Value
2. GetCookie – Get’s a raw Cookie
3. DeleteCookie – Delet’e’s a Cookie
4. SetCookie – Set’s a Cookie
5. GetParameter – Get’s a Query String Value

function setHistory(){
    var gsaCollection = getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1), "site");
    var gsaClient = getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1), "client");
    var gsaStylesheet = getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1), "proxystylesheet");
    //var gsaAccess =getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1),"a");
    var recentHistory = "<ul>";
    var historyTemp = GetCookie("searchhistory");
    var history;
    if (historyTemp == null) {
        var q = getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1), "q")
        if ((q == null) || (q == "")) {
            //no history
            recentHistory = recentHistory + "<li>None</li>";
        }
        else {
            recentHistory = recentHistory + "<li><a href=\"search?site=" + gsaCollection + "&client=" +
            gsaClient +
            "&proxystylesheet=" +
            gsaStylesheet +
            "&access=a" +
            "&q=" +
            q +
            "&output=xml_no_dtd" +
            "\" > " +
            q +
            "</a></li>";
            SetCookie("searchhistory", q, expiry);
        }
    }
    else {
        historyString = new String(historyTemp);
        history = historyString.split("|");
        var newHistory = new Array(5);
        var newHistoryString = "";
        newHistory[0] = getParameter(window.top.location.search.substring(1), "q");
        newHistoryString = newHistory[0];
        recentHistory = recentHistory + "<li><a href=\"search?site=" + gsaCollection + "&client=" +
        gsaClient +
        "&proxystylesheet=" +
        gsaStylesheet +
        "&access=a" +
        "&output=xml_no_dtd" +
        "&q=" +
        newHistory[0] +
        "\" > " +
        newHistory[0].replace(‘+’, ‘ ‘) +
        "</a></li>";
        for (var i = 0; i < history.length & i < 4; i++) {
            newHistory[i + 1] = history[i];
            newHistoryString = newHistoryString + "|" + history[i];
            recentHistory = recentHistory + "<li><a href=\"search?site=" + gsaCollection + "&client=" +
            gsaClient +
            "&proxystylesheet=" +
            gsaStylesheet +
            "&access=a" +
            "&output=xml_no_dtd" +
            "&q=" +
            history[i] +
            "\" > " +
            history[i].replace(‘+’, ‘ ‘) +
            "</a></li>";
        }
        SetCookie("searchhistory", newHistoryString, expiry);
    }
    recentHistory = recentHistory + "</ul>";
    document.getElementById("recentSearches").innerHTML = recentHistory;
}

I am planning on cleaning up the function and posting it here it its entirety in the next couple of days.;

Reply with a comment to nudge me along if I forget.