I came across Google Squared the other day and it seems like an interesting new approach to semantic search that’s not like WolframAlpha. Google’s approach seems to be around clustering data into families. Its better at answering questions where you’re looking for a class of data. Searches like “Intel Processors” or “Pasta.” It relies on human input to build squares it doesn’t know much about, and I wonder how dependent it is on that input. Not much is known about the product other than the fact that its out there, but it seems like a step in the right direction for semantic search. Meanwhile, I doubt it answers this yet!

So I have 15 minutes for a quick post before I head out to class. I was wondering what I should post about, and I had an idea. I’m teaching a StuCo called “How The Web Works” next semester and was trying to come up with a syllabus to explain what its’ all about. After a couple of hours ironing that out, I came to the point where I had to design it to put it online. My first attempt was in Microsoft Word, and it was a complete horror.

Then, 51-261 (Communication Design Fundamentals) came to the rescue! Its a class that introduces Communication Design to non-majors, which I’m taking as part of the Human-Computer Interaction Curriculum. Now armed with InDesign and some knowledge of how typography is done with grids, I set out to make a better looking syllabus, and here’s the results:

98-135 Syllabus

Feedback’s welcome! Also, if you’re at CMU, take the course next semester, its awesome! =P

So this is my umpteenth attempt at blogging, and probably the third time I’ve reset this blog. They keep failing for no good reason, or maybe my sheer boredom, but whatever, here we go again…