Thursday, December 22, 2022
One of the tasks I wanted to complete by the end of the year was to install the FCC Station License Query app on the WiredPages Media page.
An earlier discussion of the FCC Station License Tool is found on my personal blog (It's Personal) in an August 2021 entry.
Illustrations of sample queries, additional station information found on the FCC site by following app provided links (part of the search results), and the overall look of the tool are shown below:
The illustration below, shows the application installed on the WiredPages
Media page.
You will notice slight differences in the overall appearance of the tool from that of the screen-grabs (shown in the first illustration above) taken when I was testing the app in my development environment to how the tool now looks, installed on the page.
Friday, May 07, 2021
Occupation wage data for 2020 is now available from the U.S. Department of Labor through their CareerOneStop site.
The illustration below provides salary data for lawyers in the Washington, DC area for the years 2017, 2019 and 2020.
The newly updated information, is provided via the Occupation Wage Data resource found on the WiredPages Employment page. The tool which was developed and installed on WiredPages in 2018, is powered by the CareerOneStop API.
More about the WiredPages offering can be found in this earlier post.
Sunday, March 14, 2021
Recent, major updates to the WiredPages Employment page, provided an opportunity to recheck other tools and data sources already available on the page.
It turns out, the Department of Labor has updated many of the occupational titles and their associated codes, so the Occupation Wage Data, research tool, developed using a CareerOneStop API, made requests of the resource that were no longer valid.
This discovery, made only today, was an easy fix (used Excel to massage the data, for inclusion in the program), however other updates I wanted to make to the table, I felt were a little more time consuming.
Mainly, the color scheme of the research tool. Illustrations below, show the old table color scheme and the Excel data providing the updated list of occupational titles and codes.
The image below shows the new color scheme as well as some of the other widgets and graphs recently added to the page.
It is a busy time, and I really wanted more time to adjust new color options for the research tool. This to explain why more updates may be in the works at a later date. Currently, enrolled in a class and have a final exam at the end of the month.
Also note, some of the new codes, Military, etc. are not yet providing results via the API. New wage data for 2020 will be available shortly, though I am not sure if this is the reason the new occupational titles and codes are returning invalid results responses from the API.
Tuesday, December 08, 2020
The Department of Labor (DOL) provides a lot of employment data and statistics as related to US job markets.
The WiredPages Employment page attempts to encapsulate the data for quick retrieval and presentation for those researching the US job market in general or job seekers looking for specific data.
WiredPages retrieves US employment data mainly through API access to DOL databases.
To stay current with trends, new tools are being researched and developed for WiredPages, in hopes of providing the type of data that will assist many with the current employment situation.
The latest tool, presents the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) in the form of a statistical bug as shown in the illustration below.
The JOLTS tool will be installed early next year, if not before.
Friday, June 12, 2020
Development efforts for WiredPages have been ongoing for awhile. A recent post on It's Personal outlines some of the new tools that are ready for installation.
Provided below, a quick summary:
WirefPages Home page -Market Indices bug |
WiredPages Real Estate page -Mortgage Calculator. |
WiredPages Business & Markets page -Market Indices bug & Biz Zip Search tool. |
WiredPages Style & Events page- "This Day In History Calendar".  |
The WiredPages Media page -NPR One StationFinder interface. |
The WiredPages Health & Wellness page -FatSecret Nutrition Information Search tool. |
The WiredPages Arts & Entertainment page -Youtube Music Video Search & Playback tool. |
The WiredPages Reference page
-World Factbook interface. |
The WiredPages Technology page -Alexa Site
Rank tool. |
Also in the works, the FCC Station Licensing Information Search Tool. The screen grabs below, show json results provided by the service for several stations.
The FCC Search tool has been in the works for some time. Just getting around to completing this development effort because of local environment SSL resource limitations. Those issues were corrected in December 2019 (acquisition of new hardware and updated Java JDK). Most projects put on hold because of the limitations, have now been completed. The FCC development effort- the last of those projects.
Tuesday, July 30, 2019
Are you a researcher interested in wage data based on occupation type for specific U.S. locations? Good news, the U.S. Department of Labor through their CareerOneStop site, recently updated the occupation wage database to reflect 2018 statistics.
The newly updated information, is also now provided via the Occupation Wage Data resource found on the WiredPages Employment page. The tool which was developed and installed on WiredPages in 2018, is powered by the CareerOneStop API.
More about the WiredPages offering can be found in this earlier post.
Sunday, April 07, 2019
Yesterday, I completed most of the work on a new interface which provides details about new services or resources added to WiredPages.
The interface, a Java Servlet is powered by the Facebook API.
Last year, Facebook defined new procedures for access to their APIs. In August 2018, when I originally sought access through the new procedures, I planned to provide event listings and details for the WiredPages Style & Events page.
In October 2017, I developed the first events Facebook API interface using the old access procedures, discussed in this post. The interface discussed in that post was never installed on WiredPages.
Last year, many changes were introduced to the Facebook API including depreciation of the Facebook Events API. So, I decided to post about new developments on the news service, to the WiredPages Facebook page and then use my newly established Facebook API access to provide details on What's New on the service. This weekend I finally decided to develop and install the new interface.
Originally, I planned to install the new interface on the Technology page (last), however decided last week to use the home page.
Email wiredpages @ qisoftware dot com if you have problems or suggestions.
Sunday, February 24, 2019
CareerOneStop offers a robust set of APIs for program development of career related tools and services.
Currently beta testing a new job search tool powered by one of CareerOneStop APIs. The following illustrates an initial look at the new tool and its features.
Current plans are to install an intermediate version on the WiredPages Employment page which may become permanent in the future.
The following is a live beta version of the new tool.
Your feedback is welcome, send an email to wiredpages@qisoftware.com.
Monday, November 05, 2018
With the holidays right around the corner, two new shopping related interfaces have been added to WiredPages & It's Personal.
The interfaces are powered by popular shopping networks which offer developers API access for tool development. The new QiSoftware tools are demonstrated via the following links.
Another QiSoftware tool which uses Amazon's Product Advertising API is demonstrated on the WiredPages Libraries page - the New York Times BestSellers.
Do you follow behind-the-scenes dealings with media executives and personalities? The WiredPages Media page has a new resource which provides headlines primarily associated with media personalities and executives.
Other plans for the Media page include:
- FCC API Call Sign Station Search
- NPR API Station Search w/ Live Playback
There are several new tool additions planned for WiredPages, so stay tuned.
Sunday, October 28, 2018
In 2011, I installed a tool on the WiredPages Reference page which provided USPS Postal Codes & the ZIP+4, along with latitude/longitude geo-coordinates for any address in the US.
Though the original data source continues to offer geo coordinates for any address in the world, the US Postal Codes are no longer available.
Over the summer (2018), I discovered the USPS offered API business services including:
- Price Calculator
- Verify an Address
- Track a Package
- Print a Shipping Label
- Lookup Delivery Dates
Late last week, the interface I developed using the Address Verification API was installed in the main area of QiSoftware[.com] as a product demonstration.
The Address Verification API is sophisticated and can, upon request, provide business related address information, however the QiSoftware demonstration does not allow for the optional input of the business name as part of the query submission to the API.
As shown in the above illustration, the new interface also provides the geo-coordinates and now also- the Google Static Map for the address.
Why not reinstall the new interface on the WiredPages Reference page? Simply a matter of preference. When I initially installed the "PlaceFinder" tool on WiredPages, bloggers were using different services that required geo-coordinates1. The intent was to provide an easy means to retrieve latitude/longitude coordinates.
QiSoftware offers customized software solutions to assist business owners with everyday needs. The USPS Web Tools® APIs offer useful data specifically geared toward business owners. How do you want your data?
1 Latitude/Longitude can be entered in the <meta name= .... /> area of the <head> .... </head> section of an "HTML" file.
Sunday, October 14, 2018
Work continues in an effort to provide entertainment level services for visitors to the WiredPages Style & Events page.
The latest addition to the page, an Eventful API powered interface allowing visitors to search for events anywhere in the world.
Eventful is an online calendar and events discovery service owned by Entercom. The service allows users to search for and track upcoming entertainment events in their area...
PageSix also includes a Facebook Plugin providing "notable events" both here and elsewhere. Extensive research goes into providing links for the events listed, so if you have a notable event and would like consideration-- provide the Facebook Event in a message via the WiredPages Facebook Page. Not all events are listed, however suggestions are welcome.
Sunday, September 23, 2018
Visitors to the WiredPages Employment page can now obtain information related to wages for a specified occupation and US location.
The new tool is a Java Servlet powered by a Department of Labor resource through the CareerOneStop website. The screengrab (below) illustrates the tool running in standalone development mode.
The data is presented in percentiles and based on prior year data collection.
Briefly, Wikipedia's definition of Percentile
A percentile (or a centile) is a measure used in statistics indicating the value below which a given percentage of observations in a group of observations fall. For example, the 20th percentile is the value (or score) below which 20% of the observations may be found.
Below, illustration of how the new tool appears on the Employment page.
CareerOneStop and the Department of Labor offer many useful online tools for job hunters and researchers.
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
Are you a business owner? Have you claimed your Yelp Business page?
The WiredPages Dining & Travel page now boasts a new tool, Yelp Reviews.
The Yelp API offered several options for custom program development, or business owners may want to install pre-defined HTML snippets which will produce custom Yelp Badges for use on business sites. This is a great promotional tool if your business is well received.
During the development phase of this project, I noticed unicode escape characters in some of the "json" results data. This mainly, when requesting international business locations.
The Java Servlet used in this implementation was adapted to transform the Unicode escape sequence to the international character being represented, for display results.
Yelp, is a great resource for business owners, business patrons, and reviewers alike.
Monday, August 06, 2018
Plans are to add the popular online business review resource, Yelp to several pages of WiredPages.
Illustrated below, debug and preliminary app images, showing development progress on the new tool.
Technologies used in this implementation include; the Yelp API [graphQL] and a Java Servlet. Note, most WiredPages applications are Java Servlets.
Current plans to install the new tool on these WiredPages:
- Business & Markets
- Dining & Travel
- Reference-- maybe.
This application will be installed sometime in the future, though most of the work has been completed. Still remaining, minor adjustments to the appearance and user interface, however security issues the reason for the installation delay.
Saturday, July 28, 2018
With its inception, Instagram was [and is] one of the most popular online services. A little late providing demonstration of the API resources available with this popular service, however that will be corrected in short order- [now installed].
Illustrated below, demonstration of the new QiSoftware Instagram interface running in local mode in an Integrated Development Environment [IDE].
The demonstration interface is a very basic adaption using the API data, providing photos and links for the nine most recent Instagram posts. Customization options are available.
The interface is installed as one of the catalog demonstration apps, in the main site area of QiSoftware.com.
Wednesday, December 20, 2017
One of the many software services QiSoftware supports, custom tool development using Application Program Interface (API) resources. Refer to this list for some of the supported APIs and demonstrations.
Many major online services, i.e., Google, Yahoo, Facebook (just to name a few), offer API hooks to allow developers and web site owners an easy means to incorporate their data.
Over the years, QiSoftware has developed many tools using API services with one glaring oversight, Facebook. In October 2017, after a bit of research the first Facebook API tool was developed, as discussed in this post.
Recently, in preparation for major updates to the WiredPages News Service, I developed a new interface that incorporates the WiredPages Facebook Page, related events, and Facebook API. To populate the WiredPages Facebook Events Page, I scour Facebook for noteworthy national and international events.
Shown in the illustration below, the earlier Facebook Events tool for my local business community (Hanover, Maryland), the new WiredPages interface and the Facebook event page for one of the listed events (Warner Theater's "The Nutcracker") shown in the results on the WiredPages tool.
Note, the tool demonstrations are running in local mode and powered by my IDE (Netbeans). As mentioned, major updates are in the works for WiredPages, however I am still no closer to providing a more accurate time frame for when the updates will go into production [online] mode.
Saturday, October 07, 2017
Several years ago, because of exponential business growth in our area, I decided to create a Facebook Business Page [2010] providing details about the business community. See this link.
When the Maryland Live Casino opened in 2012, I started doing more with the page, including:
- Photos & Videos
- A weekly post about a local business.
- Added several tabs providing various resources about the area for visitors.
- Researching local events for inclusion to the page.
I also registered a .org domain to use with the page, however I have yet to set it up. That said, I wanted to start building tools and resources to use with an external site. Two ideas I thought may be useful for the new .org domain; [1] a business directory and [2] a list of upcoming area events.
Today, I completed most of the major work on a Java Servlet that uses the Facebook API to provide the list of Events associated with the page. The illustration shows the Servlet running in local mode on my Macbook.
Note: only using 3 earliest events [updated this image].
I am not sure when the new interface will go into production, however I am pretty happy this project is mostly done [custom formating and fine tuning the remaining tasks]. Over the years, I have done one or two things with Facebook as a developer, however not a lot. This project gave me the opportunity to take a good look at the Facebook API and I am glad I did.
Friday, February 17, 2017
In April 2011, I developed a political interface allowing visitors to the WiredPages Government & Education page, the ability to query for political officials based on a United States address.
Illustrated in this post, how the interface used to look on the page.
Almost from the very beginning there were issues with the initial version of the interface, mainly because it required three entirely different input resources- to generate the data.
The initial resources included:
- Sunlight Labs
- VoteSmart
- Yahoo
In 2013 or so, I stopped trying to maintain the political officials interface and then of course, the hosting-q.com domain moved to a new IP which caused a security risk for all of the tools I maintain on that domain.
Rather than update my security triggers, I decided to allow most of the tools hosted on hosting-q.com to use the "unauthorized use" message. That said, many of the tools still work-- [I can run them from my local environment]- however I will not update the online versions until I can secure my domains. I am not sure when this will happen.
In any case, yesterday morning I found a service that offers the political data as part of their API offerings-- and decided to implement a new interface. This is how the new interface looks- running in the local environment [via NetBeans] on my Macbook.
Also shown, part of the data returned from the API service. As I have indicated on a number of occasions, I am not sure when I will install the new interfaces I have been updating or rewriting entirely, however I am ready to go if I resolve my domain security issues.
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Those who read my personal blog [It's Personal], know that I maintain a Facebook Page for Hanover, MD Businesses which attempts to highlight the many businesses & happenings in my hometown.
Hanover, Maryland these days seems more like an ever growing metropolis, rather than the mid-size town I moved to in 1996.
There are several reasons for this...
- Arundel Mills [huge outlet mall that hosts big outlets for major retailers like Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Ave] opened in 2000. See a complete list here.
- Maryland Live! Casino opened in 2012
- Proximity to Fort Meade and the National Security Agency.
- It also does not hurt that an international airport, BWI is less than 5 miles away.
When I started the FB Hanover, MD Business Page in 2010, I thought I would connect with other business owners in the area, even though my business, QiSoftware is listed with a Columbia address.
In 2013 or so, I started listing websites and Facebook pages for the businesses or events in the area.
New features that I want to add to the pages include:
- Hanover, MD Jobs, currently the "Use App" button on the Facebook page
- Area Events, The Casino and RamsHead Stage often offer headliners.
- Real Estate, another area that has grown quite a bit.
To that end, today, I built two new interfaces that I will eventually integrate as page tabs for the FB Hanover MD Business page. One offering, area jobs as provided by Indeed, and the other, area events offered by Eventful.
Shown below, the new servlets running in stand-alone mode on my Macbook. Just behind the two windows showing the output from each, is the Netbeans IDE which is providing the local server I use for implementation, testing and debug for most of the software I develop.
There are several restrictions when integrating widgets and interfaces on Facebook pages, including size restrictions and using resources from secure sites. Neither of my sites, qisoftware.com nor hosting-q.com uses SSL certifications, however I hope to incorporate this feature to one or both of the sites- sometime in the future.
In the meantime, I do have other options for installing the new interfaces to the Hanover MD Business Page-- as a tab on the Facebook page, however want to hold off to investigate as many options as possible. Hopefully, I will have these new interfaces in place in the near future.
Friday, September 30, 2016
Last week I finished populating the Celebrity Birthday Database I maintain locally on my Macbook. It was a manual process, in that I no longer maintain the database online for security reasons.
In the past, the WiredPages Style and Events page used the data within a Java Applet to provide visitors with the current Celebrity Birthdays.
Initially, I developed a JDBC servlet which on a daily basis- extracted the data from a source and then inserted the data to my online database. About 3 months before retrieving all of the data for a complete year of celebrity birthdays- I made a mistake and deleted most of the records. The most recent backup was missing about a month of the records.
Also when I checked the online database, I found the data was corrupt. Birthdays that I had intentionally deleted, [that first year I checked every day to insure the data being inserted would be useful to WiredPages visitors and therefore manually deleted some of the records my software inserted]-- were somehow reinserted. I know this was malicious because of the birthdays selected for reinsertion.
I maintain several databases I custom built for WiredPages, and the Celebrity Birthday Database perhaps the most valuable in that the data was mined from a credible source-- initially with software.
Because of the security issues with both the idea of theft of the database and the insertion of data I did not want, I chose not to leave a credible database online at the current location.
My plan was/is to move the entire site to a more secure host and create and build the new version online from the Celebrity Birthday Database I maintain on my Macbook.
I have been planning this move for awhile. Right now, mainly hoping that DOJ and others help with the resolution of the many legal issues involved with my business and personal affairs.
So though I try to do very little in the way of coding, and even less in the way of updating anything online-- I did do a little work today.
I am moving away from the Java Applet and starting to work on new interfaces that provide the same data to WiredPages' visitors without the Applet. In the future, I will continue to use Java-- however mostly only Java Servlet technology. This will be more friendly for mobile devices and the newer browsers being used with the latest releases of operating systems, i.e., Windows 10, Chrome, etc..
Shown below-- my work environment today, including my IDE, local Database Management Software and a Firefox browser window showing how the new Celebrity Birthday Interface will look. The interface is shown in stand alone mode-- however will be easy to integrate on the WiredPages Style & Events Page when I decide to move everything online.
I was so pleased to complete the insertion of the remaining records to the local Celebrity Birthday Database earlier in the week, I could not wait to rewrite the JDBC Servlet interface to access the data. I really miss coding and researching new ideas for WiredPages. I hope to get moving on other updates in the near future, however wanted to provide some of the details involved.
