Healthcare 2.0 Sites (2) : Keas technical reveal

The previous post went over features of Keas, now let’s look under the covers and see if we can figure out how they do this. There are no technical documents I could find describing the architecture, so I’ll do what i can.

Integration w/ Services (Google, HealthVault, Quest)

Quest:

Integration with Quest is through an API as far as I can tell. The integration is well done – no redirects.

Google Health

Integration is through redirects:

https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=health&nui=1&continue=https%3A%2F%2Fhealth.google.com%2Fhealth%2Fauthsub%3Fnext%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.keas.com%252Fgoogle-account-page.html%253F%2526actionqs%253Dlink%26scope%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.google.com%252Fhealth%25Ffeeds%252F%26secure%3D1%26session%3D1%26permission%3D1&followup=https%3A%2F%2Fhealth.google.com%2Fhealth%2Fauthsub%3Fnext%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.keas.com%252Fgoogle-account-page.html%253F%2526actionqs%253Dlink%26scope%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.google.com%252Fhealth%252Ffeeds%252F%26secure%3D1%26session%3D1%26permission%E1&rm=hide

Health Vault:

Integration is a hybrid b/w the well integrated Quest form and the blatant (unco-branded) redirect of Google Health.

Authentication / Verification & Cert:

Sign-up and an email is sent to your email account, click on the link and you’re ready to go.

https://www.keas.com/confirm-account-creation.html?pid=[VERY LONG ID]

HTTPS Certificate is from Go Daddy SCA

HTML / CSS Quality & Validation:

Keas is kind enough to support IE6 – no small commitment:

><!--[if IE 6]>

<style type="text/css">.iepngfix { behavior: url('/ui/owrap/css/iepngfix.htc?vid=22399') }</style>

<script type="text/javascript">var IEPNGFix = window.IEPNGFix || {}; IEPNGFix.blankImg = '/ui/owrap/images/blank.gif?vid=22399';</script><![endif]-->

First let do some basic validation of the home page: (This isn’t a big deal, but it is interesting)

1. HTML Fail
2. CSS Failed

JavaScript: JQuery 1.3.2 (current release)

Let’s see what they write / use.

They use JQuery but not any of the CDN (Content Delivery Networks) like Google. They are using the latest release of JQuery  1.3.2

/ui/js/jquery/jquery-1.3.2.min.js

Layout & Feeds (CSS Layout)

Primarily there are two ways to layout content on a page, using <Table …/> tags w/ rows & columns, or using <DIV..> and CSS. See Table versus CSS Style Layout ( google search ). Basically this just indicates that we have a CSS purest behind the UI.

The Feeds are coming from various news sites: (Guardian & NYTimes). They look to be hand entered

NYTIMES : http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=7f118af1361b2825fe30eac626a4d54a

Guardian : http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/oct/25/obesity-rights-discrimination-nhs-cost

Lacking Content Delivery Networks

Like the JQuery libraries, Keas’ images don’t use CDN’s either – which is an indication that these guys are focusing on core features before trying to achieve scale that may not be warranted (yet). Smart.

Web Server / Proxy [ NGINX ]

Based on the LB (Load Balancing) Cookie, the web server they use looks to be http://nginx.net/

nginx [engine x] is a HTTP server and mail proxy server written by me (Igor Sysoev).

Cookie:

RSS / Plan Form & Subscription

Plans look to be subscriptions to RSS feeds that are integrated into your Keas Home Page Live Feed:

About hitmanalan

Alan has worked in Healthcare IT for the past 9 years at the following companies: http://www.medco.com/, http://www.merck.com/, http://www.ammeddirect.com/.