Just a few days ago I took a deeper look at Conduit Open. Not because I have any shares in the company, but because we as library are using the tool for years now, as well as Netvibes. And to my surprise, it now looks they both started working very closely together!
Conduit Open is a beta version of a marketplace for toolbar components.It was launched a couple of months ago.
For Toolbar Creators
Basically they implemented a way for toolbar owners [you cant call them developers as creating a toolbar is made dead simple] to SHARE not the toolbar itself, but the seperate toolbar elements, menu*s and buttons. (Hélas not the searchbox with all the library custom searches.)
- Admins find a share-option in the edit-mode of the toolbar at each element. This way the component gets published in the Marketplace, available for all.
- Admins can also choose to search for new components in the Marketplace when logged-in. This Search service offers móre information about the components compared to the search version for "normal users & everybody else". Like the total amount of 64.114 components( October 4th 2009), a rating system, some stats, a preview options and their origin. It was here that I noticed that a very substantial amount of the components actually come from Netvibes own widget "marketplace" Eco-netvibes.com, but not all , as Netvibes holds 185.047 widgets today.
I would like to know how they selected those components ... To my surprise all my own created Netvibes widgets can be found in this Conduit Marketplace.
Components added by admins are visible right away for all Toolbar users. - In the Marketplace Tab you can also find the 2Go-option.
"Each 2go button represents one piece of content or one application, which you can then add easily to any page of your website using basic code. When a visitor comes to your website they can click on your 2go button and your stuff will be added to their branded toolbar if it is powered by the Conduit platform. And if the visitor does not have a community toolbar, then they will be prompted to add your free toolbar to their browser" (See the example of the PubMed News Button from the Pubmed Toolbar in the rightmenu of this blog.) - Libraries can created search & news components easily with the Add gadgets function that accepts codes & scripts in an easy copy&paste way. The Conduit platform powered with Netvibes functionality offers a great way to ensure that library content and services can be offered and distributed in an easy and quick way for many other platorms.
Users of the toolbars are offered a Add Stuff button [+] at the right end of the toolbar.
Marketplace 68.000 components by others toolbar admins and a very substantial amount of Netvibes widgets from Netvibes own widget marketplace Eco.netvibes.comSearch for Toolbar components (for toolbar users and other interested people)
All Netvibes component show, when opened in a Toolbar the Netvibes share button, and the text
It takes users to the eco-netvibes widget page where they can choose to install the widget in Netvibes, iGoogle, Apple Dashboard, Opera, Vista & Windows Live.
