Novedge Pulse Pushes the Limits of Social Media for CAD

Blogs are an important source of information. We all know this. Most of us started bookmarking one CAD blog and going back every day to read the new posts. It was a nice way to stay updated while drinking a morning coffee. Soon, we found our attention and time split among a set of cross-referenced blogs. Gradually we realized that going through all this interesting stuff would take up a good slice of our morning, more than we could afford. This was the moment when we switched to an RSS reader. In the beginning, the RSS reader worked perfectly. It reduced the time we dedicated to blogs and news with minimal compromises. But before we knew it, the amount of blogs and news exceeded the time budgeted. At this point the more adventurous of us began experimenting with Digg and Delicios, and found, unfortunately, that they didn't work. Digg and Delicios are general tools that can't be customized to focus on our specific areas of interest. At this point I realized I could create something new, something that would take the best of available technologies and rescue CAD users and professionals, giving back the pleasure of the morning coffee-CAD news ritual.

take the best of available technologies giving back the pleasure of the morning coffee-CAD news ritual

Today Novedge Pulse processes the feed of about 350 different sources, matching each post and news with a database of over 550 authors. Each author is clearly recognizable by his picture, and fully traceable with a link to his LinkedIn profile and his Twitter page. Posts and news are grouped together on a daily base. Readers vote on each item with a click of the mouse — either promoting it with a heart beat or demoting it with a heart burn. The collective preferences of Novedge readers dynamically creates a list of the most interesting and relevant posts as they appear on the Internet.

Novedge Pulse processes about 350 different sources, matching each post and news with a db of over 550 authors

I receive feedback from Pulse users almost every day. My goal is to improve usability, adding a few select features while keeping Pulse as simple as possible. I recently released a new version of Novedge Pulse with some important improvements and tuning. Now I have additional reasons to believe that Novedge Pulse is the most advanced source of information in the CAD and 3D graphics online world. Here are the reasons for my statement:

• Novedge Pulse collects information from about 350 sources and matches each news item with a database of over 550 authors.
• All news and blog posts are gathered and published on Pulse in real-time.
• Readers can easily vote on every single item with just a click. This simple rating system lets the best posts and most interesting news of the day quickly emerge at the top of the page, while pushing the less important items towards the bottom.
• Novedge Pulse contextualizes each news and blog post. Based on the type of information and availability, each item shows a link to the author profile on LinkedIn, the author page on Twitter, the source RSS feed, and for companies, a link to the corresponding Yahoo! Finance pages. This is valuable for readers who want to be able to quickly verify employers, affiliations, and resumes of every blogger.
• Novedge Pulse can be browsed by date and by author, selecting different levels of detail. The page will remember your preferences the next time you come back, without requiring a login.
• Each news or blog post can be easily identified and linked by a permalink. Text and video comments are also enabled on every item page as way to complement the comments on the original blog page.
• All news and blog posts on Novedge Pulse can be easily republished thanks to a public RSS feed. Publishers don't have to worry about annoying ads. Pulse is free and the RSS feed is ads free.

The number of visitors to Novedge Pulse is constantly growing, pushing Novedge to improve the service and allocate more resources to guarantee a better and more reliable service. We are committed to support and extend Novedge Pulse. Make Novedge Pulse your first website in the morning!

Franco Folini