Tuesday, September 5, 2017
# Mendeley Application Critique #
[Random sketch - NOT the real logo]
Summary
Team 6 (represented by SJ) is the first who presented and they analysed Mendeley app. SJ describe Mendeley as a one-stop app for researchers, educators and students to network, auto-citation, organize, import, share and publish research papers in pdf formats, backup with cloud storage. In addition, they have open-sourced parts of their codes to allow public developers to expand and improve on its services.
Since I can only select 3 points I will select these: This app is a one-stop tool to help organize and annotate research papers (1) across-platforms, (2) wonderful reference manager and (3) open sourced services
1. Cross-Platform
This point was briefly brought through in the presentation, in fragments like having chrome plugin and in the flaws where there is an inconsistency between desktop version and web version. I think this is an very important in an application as in a networking application, you should be able to reach out to a wide spectrum of audience. However there is also a flaw in my argument because you just need to reach out to the majority and not everyone. In a quick google search [1], Mendeley is actually not the best cross platform app.
(A bit side-tracking) For example, even for something like a compiler, back in Year 1, someone (also in CS3216 now) was showing me how to code something on his phone. To me, I would only code on a laptop because a phone keyboard is pretty small to me (or because my phone is too small). It would be good to reach out to another group of users who uses it.
(A bit side-tracking) For example, even for something like a compiler, back in Year 1, someone (also in CS3216 now) was showing me how to code something on his phone. To me, I would only code on a laptop because a phone keyboard is pretty small to me (or because my phone is too small). It would be good to reach out to another group of users who uses it.
2. Reference Manager
I personally really liked this. I did solo-FYP in my polytechnic days and have several reports in university that I have to cite. I'm thankful I took ES1102 which the key takeaway is really know how to cite in APA format. I still kept the paper in teaching me how to cite and referred to it several times because either the auto-generator database does not contain the document I needed, or it doesn't churn out the format I wanted. I've a group of peers in university who also faced the same difficulty and somehow we are all using the same site [3], which doesn't come in the same platform as where we typed our documents. The best auto generated citation format I've used so far is LaTeX, but I guess Mendeley beats it by auto-filling up all those information.
However, SJ mentioned a flaw in their reference manager which there isn't much verification. From what I understand from SJ speech, anyone can upload a document and claimed to their work. I believe this is a problem and also not a problem in a peer-review community, because a poor written journal can be rejected from other authenticated researchers. It is also a problem because plagiarism can be rampant and goes undetected.
However, SJ mentioned a flaw in their reference manager which there isn't much verification. From what I understand from SJ speech, anyone can upload a document and claimed to their work. I believe this is a problem and also not a problem in a peer-review community, because a poor written journal can be rejected from other authenticated researchers. It is also a problem because plagiarism can be rampant and goes undetected.
3. Open-Sourced Services
To me, this is a job well done. By having public APIs and partially open-source the codes, they will expand their user base by improving their services, or free marketing from the public developers for free. There are successful stories from other social networking platforms and a very good example is the Assignment 1 we are doing. This is important because the user needs is constantly changing.
My Original Thoughts
(I really don't understand this question because I'm not sure am I supposed to write about my thoughts on the contents of the presentation, or about the application or anything under the sun related to this. I would just assume the combination of everything.)
I felt that this presentation was more like a business presentation to push for investors for this app, about the features, potentials, drawbacks and marketing, but lacking in user experiences and UI aspects which CS3216 tries to focus a significant part into. I'm not sure if I remembered wrongly but there was minimal screenshots of the features and most of the contents are filled by the speech itself. I am dearly thankful SJ was really clear with his speech by iterating the points.
There was one part that I was really confused near to the end of the presentation because it was touch and go without much context, was the mentioning of some poor UX because of manual syncing is required, and continuing on to suggest implementation like socket.IO and some database to solve it. I don't quite understand what exactly is manual syncing and my first impression was like how desktop files work, which the copy I opened will start from the state when I opened it, and the latest save copy will be the one stored in the folder. I understood better after I googled about it [2]; its more like a git control.
While I was typing this Application Critique, I found out a striking news about Mendeley [4] being sold out to its competitors (with a different business strategy) back in 2013. I felt unjust for the users when I was reading the article and it makes me a little emo about life is as uncertain, as I end this Application Critique.
Thank you for reading!
While I was typing this Application Critique, I found out a striking news about Mendeley [4] being sold out to its competitors (with a different business strategy) back in 2013. I felt unjust for the users when I was reading the article and it makes me a little emo about life is as uncertain, as I end this Application Critique.
Thank you for reading!
References
1. Comparisons of Reference Managers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_reference_management_software
2. Manual Syncing
1. Comparisons of Reference Managers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_reference_management_software
2. Manual Syncing
https://www.mendeley.com/guides/web/01-web-library
3. Auto-Citation
http://www.citationmachine.net/apa/cite-a-book
4. Sold out
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/when-the-rebel-alliance-sells-out
3. Auto-Citation
http://www.citationmachine.net/apa/cite-a-book
4. Sold out
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/when-the-rebel-alliance-sells-out