Where have I been for the past few months? What have I been doing? Certainly not blogging – but hopefully that will change soon.
I’ve been back at work on a project that I first conceived of almost two years ago; a phone-based system for voting. It’s been tough trying to squeeze work in on this side project, now that I’m developing VoiceXML applications for a living (sometimes you don’t feel like working when you come home from work), but I’m making progress.
If your interested, you can read my original proposal on this subject which I submitted to the The National Institute of Standards and Technology in early 2005. What’s taken me so long on this one? A few things:
- First and foremost, I needed some time to develop my skills. I’m now a better programmer in general, and a better VoiceXML programmer specifically. I feel like I can now do the idea justice.
- Second, my original proposal called for using elements of the draft VoiceXML 2.1 specification – these elements are now more widely support by VoiceXML platform vendors.
- Finally, there was one additional issue that gave me pause – the rampant paranoia about using technology in the voting process. Seems like most people are convinced that the only way to go is back to plain old paper ballots, with no computer technology of any kind. I’ll have more to say on this one in future posts.
If your interested in helping out on this protect, and you’ve got some coding skills, let me know. Otherwise, check back in from time to time to see how I’m doing.