Hordit - you have information, we help you hoard it!

Hordit University - Search

Today's tutorial covers the "search" functionality. 

Like most search engines you search on hordit by entering search keywords in a box.  Hordit offers suggestions as you type to save time.  Once you search you can see results from various "pools" of information - your own items,  items shared with the groups you belong too, items stored by friends, etc.   You can even search Google, all within the hordit search results. 

Find relevant information quickly by searching on Hordit!

Matt

P.S.  As always the entire suite of tutorial videos can be found on our tutorials page.

Hordit University - Research Assistant

Today's tutorial covers the "research assistant" functionality.  This is a powerful time-saver that lets you filter articles from your favorite blogs or other information sources.  How?  You simply tell "research assistant" what sources (RSS feeds) you want to scan, then what topics you're interested in (i.e. "social networking"). 

Hordit does the rest, tirelessly munching your feeds and queuing up articles for you to read at your convenience.

And of course if you find something you like, you can hoard it on the spot and/or share it!

Matt

P.S.  As always the entire suite of tutorial videos can be found on our tutorials page.

Hordit University - Look Later

Today's video tutorial covers "look later".

Who hasn't had a friend send them a link just as they're knee-deep in work, heading to a meeting or busy watching the latest episode of CSI?    Your look later list is handy for managing links you want to....well...look at later.   

Matt

Hordit University - Daily Read

Well the "flurry" that I talked about last week was delayed a few days as we discovered some minor issues Monday.  Those have been addressed and we're ready to release the next video!

Also one user did let me know that the link in the prior post did not open correctly in IE.  This has since been corrected.

The new video delves into the "daily read" functionality which enables you to tap into your favorite information sources and store and share what you find there all while never leaving your Hordit account.

Matt

From The Mailbag: "Is Hordit A Social Network?"

The answer is yes and no.   

Lets look at sites like Facebook and MySpace.  These are sites that clearly focus on social interaction.  Some of it's meaningful and some is more trivial, but the bottom line is that they are far less interesting if you're not "connected" to other users. 

Hordit started out as a research tool for individual use and added social elements as the idea evolved.  While I certainly think Hordit becomes more powerful the more you share and connect with like-minded people, it is still a very powerful tool even if you never share a single thing.

Hopefully that makes sense and keep the questions coming.  I answer them all and the most interesting ones will show up here!  You can send them in via the contact link at the bottom of any page on the Hordit.com site or directly to my inbox at mbrown@hordit.com.

Matt

Hordit University - My Items

Beginning today we'll be releasing a flurry of tutorial videos that go into more detail about specific Hordit functionality.

Today's topic revolves around the very heart of Hordit - "my items".  Your items are the information items you "hoard" away in your Hordit account for later reference, to share with your groups and friends, etc.

This video gives you a comprehensive overview of storing and working with items as well as the folder tree you can use to organize your items.

This and all of the Hordit tutorials can be found on the Hordit tutorial page.

As always, we welcome your comments.

Matt

What Is "Powered by Byteswap"?

You may have noticed a very attractive two-tone blue logo at the bottom of every page on the Hordit.com site.  It's the "powered by byteswap" logo.   But what is this Byteswap thing anyway?

As some of our users know, Hordit started out as Byteswap.com.  The Byteswap site was flawed in a number of ways, not least of all a poor interface.  Hordit is a completely new site built from the ground up.   It was actually built by a 3rd party much more suited to such work than I am.  I'll talk about that process in a future post.  Along the way we added some new functionality, made some things more clear and intuitive and just generally made it "better".

Some of the "DNA" of byteswap remains, however. 

<technical description>
The SOAP-based web services that encapsulated the underlying functionality of Byteswap.com are still there "powering" Hordit.com.  These services were cleaned up a bit and re-engineered to support multiple sites.  In essence, we've created a platform capable of powering Hordit and any number of other sites.
</technical description>

<non-technical description>
Let's think of this in terms of your house.   Your house has a foundation and framing.  It has plumbing, electrical, and HVAC systems.  These make the house function as a place you can live.  The Byteswap platform is a little like these elements of your house.   

Your house also has walls, siding, windows and doors, nice paint and carpeting.   These  make the house look nice, make it usable and "user-friendly".   Hordit is kind of like these elements of your house. 

It just so happens that Byteswap can provide the same foundation for Hordit AND any number of other sites as well.  So maybe, to extend the analogy, its similar to including the power, sewer and road infrastructure that provide service to multiple houses. 
</non-technical description>

So that's what that means to you.  What it means to us is that aside from having the great tool that is Hordit, we also have a platform that we can leverage in a number of ways.  More on that later.

Matt

Toolbar Update

We updated our browser toolbars for Firefox and IE today.  Now when you store an item via the toolbar both the URL AND Title will be passed. This was suggested by one of our users and was overlooked in the original development.   We really do listen to our users and YOU can help shape the future of the product!

Also, when using the send2friend feature both from the site and from the toolbar, you can now include a personal note which will be included in the email sent to the folks you're sharing with.

Matt