What Effects?

One question we have frequently thrown at us is “what kind of effects is flauntR capable of?”. Or “Can it do everything that the desktop imaging software does?”

The answer to the questions is : flauntR can generate practically all categories of effects that desktop software can. These can range from the “layout types” that seem quite popular among users to ones that are more complex like manipulation of color, distortion of surfaces (ripples etc) and emulation of textures and brush strokes.

While we can create many of these effects we clearly have constrained ourselves in the “configurability of effects”. When we did this we had quite a lively discussion as to whether users wanted more configurability or less. So rather than deciding it oursleves we asked around our test users. Most of them ( except for our hacker friends ) prefered the one click approach.

So there you have it : We can do most effect types, but limit ourselves when it comes to configurability by user.

Amazonian Architecture

While the client-side image editors grab the limelight on flauntR, they are not the only “cool technology” we use.

It may be of interest to some of our users that our service runs on Amazon’s EC2 and S3 systems. The S3 flie storagesystems have definitely proved to be a great choice, especially now that our service is growing so quickly. We have relatively low costs on hard disc space and almost infinite scalability, not to mention all that secure backup stuff that amazon offers.

EC2 has been a slightly different story. Since the service is in Beta we have had to spend significant time in ensuring that it meets our demands. And technically it is not the easiest to work with. But all in all it is something we are at present happy with.

If there was a prize for coolest technology of 2006, then we definitely would name Amazon’s S3 and EC2 ahead of all those IPTV and social networking stuff. The impact of Amazon’s infrastrcture we believe is a true game changer when it comes to helping start-ups launch “robust services at low cost” .