Author Archive for Ahmed

Celebrate, partcipate: It’s OneWebDay!

Published by Ahmed on September 22, 2008 in events, fun and what's hot. 1 Comment

Nestoreaderos, Celebrate!

Today is OneWebDay:

The idea behind OneWebDay is to focus attention on a key internet value (this year, online participation in democracy…)

We do try our best to involve our users in our development process - providing you with feedback opportunities whenever possible - every piece of which is read by our Democratic Feedback Monitor.

However, OneWebDay this year is about more than that - it’s about widening participation on the internet, reaching out especially to developing countries and those less able to access the internet. It’s also about learning and spreading knowledge - have you ever edited a Wikipedia article? Or submitted some geodata to OpenStreetMap or GeoNames. Or worked on an open source software project? Or supported heros of online democracy mySociety? If not, maybe today’s the day to get started.

To read more, feel free to visit the OneWebDay site, or look for a meetup in your locality. For those of us resident in London, there’s a get together planned for 6:30 this evening at Inn 1188.

As always, please feel free to comment below, or send us some feedback (naughty or nice). 

Browser Wars at Nestoria (Take 3)

Published by Ahmed on July 31, 2008 in about us, search, technical and what's hot. 3 Comments

It’s nearly a full 6 months since we brought you our last update on the state of the browser world (Nestoria style) and well over a year since the first installment.

If you haven’t read any post in this series before, I urge you to do so if you’re interested in learning why we place so much emphasis on tracking browser usage so religiously: we do it for you, our loyal (or brand-new) users. We want to make your experience as pleasant and uniform as possible, across all platforms and browsers.

With that in mind, let’s move onto look at the trends for Jan 08 - July 08 and how these contrast with our last review.

General Trends

Overall Share

Internet Explorer’s (IE) share has dropped from 84% to 81%, wheras FIrefox (FF) gained a full 2% points, claiming a 14% share of our users. Safari’s 4% share remains stable, leaving the same 1% for other browsers combined.

It seems that over time, IE is losing it’s share to FF. It also seems apparent that Apple’s release of Safari on Windows hasn’t yet seen any serious uptake/usage, with Safari’s share relatively unchanged.

Firefox Comparison Internet Explorer Comparison Big 3 Browsers Comparison

Version Trends

Previous trends seem to be continuing as far as version uptake is concerned; IE7 usage is increasing every day, with IE6 becoming less favoured but still accounting for a large portion of visits.

We saw a more extreme migration to FF2.x in our last post (with nearly all users quickly switching to the new version), resulting in very low usage of 1.5. The introduction of version 3 this June again saw a fairly swift initial uptake, representing 1/3 of Firefox usage within a few weeks of release.

The long tail of browser/device usage

Whilst traditional platforms and browsers account for the bulk of Nestoria usage, it’s becoming clear that there are a number of capable browsers on a greater and greater range of devices, and that people are beginning to use these devices for the odd spot of property hunting.

Windows accounts for 94.11%, Macintosh for 5.28 and Linux for 0.35%. Things get interesting when you see that the next most popular platform is the iPhone, claiming 0.06% or around 700 visits per month. Next up is the iPod touch with about half the usage of the iPhone. Symbian (all phones) has around the same usage as the touch, whilst the PS3 and Wii bring up the rear with around 200 visits per month.

So, please do let us know how Nestoria’s doing on your chosen system/os/browser, especially if you wish the experience was better.

Manchester Congestion Charge

Published by Ahmed on June 10, 2008 in New Features, about us and what's hot. 0 Comments

First came road-charging in Durham, then the London congestion charge (+ extension) and now plans have been given the go-ahead for a similar scheme in Manchester.

We’re sure everyone knows what these are by now - systems put in place to charge motorists entering or present within a specific area, with the aim of reducing traffic congestion.

A few facts about the Manchester system:

  • Setup is expected to cost £2.8bn
  • Provisional launch set for 2013
  • Will consist of 2 ‘zones’ (one outer, one inner)
  • The outer zone will be drawn roughly around the M60
  • The inner zone will outline the city centre
  • Entry charges will only be triggered during the morning (07:00-09:00) or evening (16:00-18:30) and will be £2 for entering the outer zone plus a further £1 for the inner zone
  • Exit charges will only be triggered during the evening and will be £1 upon exiting each zone
  • Public transport capacity and links are expected to be increased to ensure alternatives for motorists

Map of Manchester Congestion Charging Zones - Credit: BBC

What does this mean for Nestoria users?

Those that have used Nestoria to search for aproperty in central London may well have seen a little London Congestion Charge Logo next to some properties. This is to let you know that this property is within the congestion charging zone. Why is this important? If you live within the zone, you get a 90% discount on the charge - not bad! There may also be other impacts - it would be more expensive for friends to drive to see you and so on.

We had this data up for London as soon as we launched, and even marked those properties in the London western extension before it went live, so that you could plan ahead.

We plan on doing the same for Manchester as soon as the zones are agreed upon - this should help you make the right decision about your next property, and make your search for the perfect nest that much easier.

Happy hunting!

Browser Wars at Nestoria (Take 2)

Published by Ahmed on January 16, 2008 in about us and technical. 2 Comments
  • You are important to us (Nestoria reader/user)
  • You use a browser to get to us
  • Therefore, the browser you use is important to us too

3 simple truths, just as true now as they were almost a year ago, when we brought you our original ‘Browser Wars’ post.

With several recent developments in the area (the sad demise of Netscape, and the rise of questionable ‘viral’ campaigns), we thought now would be a good time to provide you with the 2007 data for Nestoria browser usage. Please click to enlarge the graphs.

Browsers 2007

No major surprises overall. The Windows-bundled Internet Explorer led the pack, with a 2007 average of 84% of all visits. Firefox came in a respectable second, with 12% of visits. Safari representation was uncharacteristically high at 4%, Opera bringing up the rear of the big hitters with 1%. Interestingly, our statistics vary considerably from W3School’s, which has Firefox only 20% behind IE.

IE?Ĵs ShareFirefox?Ĵs ShareIE vs FF

So what about specific IE / Firefox trends? Well, there’s possibly a very slight negative trend in % of IE use, and a very slight positive trend in % of Firefox usage. Relative share seems fairly stable.

IE Version uptakeFirefox version uptake

Possibly the most interesting data is that for version share. IE7 overtook IE6 around October 2007 - showing that Microsoft’s big push hasn’t been in vain. However, there’s still a high number of IE6 users - I would hazard a guess that these are mostly within the workplace, where managers have not yet made the move to IE7. Unhindered by similar issues, the switchover from Firefox 1.5.x to 2.x was quick and progressed almost to 100% usage of 2.x.

To conclude
What do these statistics mean? For us, they mean time spent testing and tweaking our site on the appropriate range of browsers. For you, faithful user*, this hopefully translates into increased site performance and Property Hunting Pleasure?Ѣ?Ć.

As always, please feel free to fire off a comment, or send us some feedback.

* For the crazy cats accessing Nestoria on their PSPs, PS3s, Wiis, iPhones, we’ll do our best.

?Ć This isn’t really trademarked…

Data is fun

Published by Ahmed on November 30, 2007 in fun. 1 Comment

Regular Netorblogswotians (readers) know how we roll at Nestoria. We like our data. We like data that makes us smile even more.

So, in the vein of ‘funny data’ blog posts that have gone before, I bring you:

A list of Slightly Amusing UK place names

Continue reading ‘Data is fun’

Get the Scots while they’re hot

Published by Ahmed on October 21, 2007 in fun and what's hot. 3 Comments

According to a recent article, Scottish house prices are rising even faster than those in England…

Surely this is the perfect time to grab a little hot cake before it burns up!

Properties in Inverurie and properties in Greenock were said to see the highest rises, whilst properties in Edinburgh still tops the tables as Scotland’s most expensive place to buy a home.

So stop reading and get searching, before you can’t afford a garage…

Origin of the name ‘Nestoria’

Published by Ahmed on October 9, 2007 in about us. 3 Comments

People are always asking us where the name ‘Nestoria‘ comes from.

Ask and ye shall receive. Prepare yourselves for a journey that will take you through space, time, London, and latex.

When we were looking to set up the company in the UK, we did all kinds of research into what would be an appropriate name for our baby, the easiest way to find UK property. We trawled through page after page of books claiming to provide everything we needed to make that once in a lifetime decision. Alas 20,000 suggestions later we were still unconvinced. We needed something with real pizzaz, something weighty and meaningful.

So we donned our latex gloves and headed for the British Museum’s most secure and sacred vaults. Through a personal academic contact, we were able to gain access to thousand year-old texts barely scoured by the human eye. During our fourth day in the vaults, whilst unbundling yet another tome, a small scrap of yellowed parchment swayed to the floor.

Our friend at the museum quickly identified the note to be from the hand of Vincentius the 3rd. Translated, the note told of expeditions to Londinium and the many wonderful new experiences to be had there. Vincentius made heavy use of derivations of the ancient Latin stem ‘nestor’ which has been translated to mean ‘to search and find’.

With the team running low on food and water, we took this as a sign. The site must be called ‘nestor’. Not catchy. Nestoria. Much better.

And so there you have it, the solid, precious history of the name ‘Nestoria’.

PS

Anyone who says otherwise, comment away. Anyone suggesting we named ourselves after an Argonaut can go straight to the feedback form.

Why just talk like a pirate?

Published by Ahmed on September 19, 2007 in fun. 4 Comments

Ahoy!

Today is a very special day. Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

The infamous Jolly Roger

Arrr, that’s right me’arties…

My fellow pirates in the Nestoria ship/office were thinking, why just talk like a pirate when you can live the pirate life too. Life would be so much easier - steal whenever you’re a little short of cash, drink plenty of grog and have a good hornpipe every now and then.

If all that sounds like a little too much effort, you should at least consider looking for your new abode in a town with historic pirate ties…

Avast landlubbers, get ye house hunting!

Iron Leg Henson

How to spend ??35m

Published by Ahmed on August 15, 2007 in what's hot. 1 Comment

I wonder how many of our loyal readers wish that they were Glaswegian postal workers. Perhaps not many, until today.

Upon checking the contents of her handbag, one such worker, suddenly went from earning ??20,000 a year to most probably earning more than that per week in interest alone after discovering her win of ??35m on the Euro Millions lottery.

The winner is quoted as saying, “My son does not want to move out of the flat and I don’t want to move too far away because he is going into fourth year at school.”.

May we suggest that Nestoria be your first stop. Ditch the den and move into a luxurious 1.5m property in Thorntonhall.

We’re sure your son won’t mind too much.

Alternatively, if you fancy blowing ??20m out of the ??35m, then why not take a look at property in Kensington?

Come to think of it, why not do both?

When a picture isn’t worth 1000 words

Published by Ahmed on July 17, 2007 in Nestoria Rank and about us. 1 Comment

Here at Nestoria, we like to provide our users with quality information, in order to enable them to search for their dream house quickly and efficiently.

This means providing snippets of key information, and of course, lovely thumbnail (small) images of the properties in question. However, some sites provide us with images that sadly turn out to be far from lovely, and have little relevance for someone searching for a home to buy or rent.

Take for example these gems:


But we don’t mean to single these few out, there are actually quite a few bad apples. Here’s a little quilt of ‘image not available’ images. And these are just a tiny, tiny percentage of the ‘bad images’ we come across.

bad images

We’ve developed algorithms to weed out these less useful images, and promote those listings that do have relevant photographs.

This is just one way in which we aim to make the life of the property searcher easier. If you ever come across an unsavory image in our listings, please get in touch and we’ll make sure it doesn’t show up again.

How do we detect these sub-par images? One word: magic.

Enjoy your picture-filled property searching.

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