Google started to index Android and iOS apps in June, but the results were only displayed as part of an OneBox. Now you can select "Android apps" or "iPhone apps" from Google's sidebar and restrict the results to mobile apps from the Android Market or the Apple App Store. Obviously, this option is only available if you use an Android or an iOS device.
Google uses a different way to rank applications than the app stores, so this feature could help users find new applications. Unfortunately, Google's snippets aren't always useful because they include the first sentences from the descriptions, which are sometimes used to announce new features or promote other applications.
Google launched a new music service, this time for India. Google Music India helps you find Hindi songs and play them in your browser. Google aggregates the results from 3 partner sites: in.com, Saavn and Saregama, but it doesn't offer too many additional features.
"Google Music Search (India) Labs licenses meta-data of thousands of songs owned or licensed by partners to make them searchable on Internet. Once you search and find the music you want, our partners stream the music directly from their websites to your computer," explains the FAQ.
Google plans to launch a music store for Android. "Rubin, Google's vice president of engineering, hopes to have the service up and running by Christmas," according to some sources.
Google sends email notifications to all Google Groups owners to inform them about some unfortunate changes.
"Starting in January 2011, Groups will no longer allow the creation or editing of welcome messages, files and pages; the content will only be available for viewing and only existing files will be downloadable. If you would like to keep the content currently on the pages and files sections of your group, we highly encourage you to export and migrate it to another product. In February 2011, we will turn off these features, and you will no longer be able to access that content."
Google says that you can create pages using Google Sites and store files by attaching them to Google Sites pages. After creating a site, you can invite the members of your group. "Add the email address for the Google Group (for instance, example@googlegroups.com) with which you'd like to share the site, and select the level of access you'd like the members of the group to have."
It's difficult to understand why Google didn't automatically migrate the files and pages to Google Sites. Users could've used these features from the Google Groups interface, even if they were powered by Google Sites.
Google says that the features have been removed "to focus on improving the core functionality of Google Groups -- mailing lists and forum discussions". I don't remember seeing significant improvements from 2006, when Google Groups added the features that are now removed: custom welcome message, pages and files. Since then, Google abandoned almost all its groups and started to use the Help Forum platform. Ironically, even the Google Groups group has been shut down.
The only way to share your Google bookmarks is by creating lists. By default, lists are private, but you can share them with other people and make them public. The nice thing about public bookmark lists is that they're searchable and you can find them below your Google Bookmarks search results.
I entered the URL for one of my bookmarks (a JavaScript compressor) and Google returned a list of pages related to web development. I bookmarked some of the pages, but I could also copy the bookmarks to one of my lists.
When I searched for this blog's URL, Google Bookmarks returned a list with useful Google sites and Google-related blogs. I could also enter some keywords in the search box, but the results aren't always relevant.
This time, Google Creative Lab developed a site called Demo Slam, where users can submit tech demos for Google products. "Demo Slam is a place where boring tech demos become (hopefully) gotta-show-my-friends awesome—thanks to the creativity of Google users like you. Beginning today, you can watch Preseason Slams and declare a Champ of the week. Then each week, new featured slams will vie for your attention and a shot at demo glory," explains Google.
Google's promotional videos are rarely boring, but not many of them have gone viral. The most popular YouTube video about Google's products has more than 20 million views and it's a short introduction to Google Sky, a Google Earth feature. Other popular videos announce draggable driving directions in Google Maps, Google Earth 4.3, Street View and Google Buzz. All these videos have been embedded by Google's sites and that's probably the main reason why they have so many views.
Demo Slam wants "to take tech demos from mundane to mind-blowing" and to "get the people who would never watch a tech demo — the people who ironically need them most — to not only watch them, but like them and share them with their friends." Why would you help Google promote its products? Google doesn't offer a prize, but it's a great opportunity to show your creativity.
According to the terms and conditions, participation is open only to US residents, videos should have less than 2 minutes and should showcase the use of one of the featured Google products (Book Search, Chrome, Docs, Earth, Goggles, Image Search, Translate, Maps, Picasa, Voice Search and more).
My favorite Demo Slam from this week is a video that promotes Google Goggles:
Google Docs adds a feature that's already available in Gmail: you can now upload images using drag and drop. Open a new document and drag an image from your desktop or from a file manager. This feature only works in the latest versions of Firefox, Chrome and Safari because it requires HTML5's File API. Unfortunately, you can't upload multiple images and Google Docs doesn't show a placeholder image or a progress bar.
Speaking of uploading images, it's difficult to understand why Picasa Web Albums doesn't have a better way to upload images. An HTML5 uploader could add cool features like multiple file upload, progress bar, drag and drop upload. Even a Flash uploader would be much better. Right now, Picasa Web Albums uses an ActiveX control in Internet Explorer and recommends installing Picasa to upload images. If you don't use IE or Picasa, you have to upload one image at a time.
Google News continues to integrate with Twitter and other microblogging services. After testing a section that shows newsworthy tweets from your subscription, Google started to add to the Google News Onebox the number of times a story has been shared.
For example, Google's Onebox shows that this article about Google TV has been shared by more than 50 Twitter users. Google links to the realtime results for this article, but the page only includes 10 results.
Google Chrome's extension gallery started to display the price for each extension, which suggests that Chrome Web Store is going to be launched soon. All the extensions uploaded to the gallery can be installed for free, but web apps won't necessarily be free. "Developers will have the option to easily sell their apps through the store using a convenient and secure payment system," informs Chromium's blog.
"In this stable release, we've focused primarily on hundreds of bug fixes. We’ve also included a few other things that may be of interest to developers, such as full AppleScript support on Mac OS X for UI automation and implementation of the HTML5 parsing algorithm, the File API, and directory upload."
New York Times has another article about Google's efforts to create successful social services. A former Google employee confirms what Aaron Iba and Peter Norvig have previously said: Google didn't understand the value of social networking.
There is some belief at Google that their DNA is not perfectly suited to build social products, and it's a quite controversial topic internally. The part of social that's about stalking people, sharing photos, looking cool — it's mentally foreign to engineers. All those little details are subtle and sometimes missed, especially by technical people who are brought up in a very utilitarian company.
Now that social networks have become very popular, Google realized there's a lot of value in sharing information with your friends. Search results can include web pages recommended by your friends, ads can be better targeted based on your social profile and web apps like Google Latitude or Google Buzz can be more useful.
Eric Schmidt said that Google will add a social layer to its existent services and it won't create a social network like Facebook. Google also acquired start-ups that created apps for social networks (Slide, Jambool). "In a rare move for an outsider, Google has named Max Levchin, former CEO of Slide and cofounder of PayPal, a vice president of engineering," reported VentureBeat two months ago.
Google will have to learn to create social services, but it won't be easy and Google's culture might have to change. Here's what Max Levchin said a few months before becoming Google VP:
For some strange reason, in the last few years, the industry, or the press that covers the industry, has come to glorify failure. I think it's completely wrong. Failure is not good.
Apple's CEO says that Android is fragmented and that the open vs. closed dilemma is not important as long as Apple's proprietary mobile operating system manages to provide a better user experience.
"Many Android OEMs install proprietary user-interfaces to differentiate themselves from the commodity Android experience. The user is left to figure it all out. Compare this with iPhone where ever handset works the same. (...) We think the open vs closed is just a smokescreen to try and hide the real issue, which is: What's best for the customer? Fragmented vs. integrated. We think Android is very very fragmented and becoming more fragmented by the day."
Steve Jobs is right, the real question is: What's best for the customer? Some people like to have options. Not everyone likes iPhone's form factor, iPhone's interface and some may even want a hardware keyboard, a custom virtual keyboard or a weather widget. Android is a diverse ecosystem and there's a lot to learn until Google, hardware manufacturers and all their partners manage to come up with revolutionary phones, consistent interfaces and integrated experiences. Android is just an opportunity to innovate, it's not a complete package. Google chose a non-restrictive license for Android to encourage innovation, even if that meant less control and more fragmentation.
Mobile phones are more personal than computers and I don't think we'll live in a world where every smartphone user will choose an iPhone. There's always a trade-off and not everyone wants a perfect phone if that means they'll have to change their definition of a perfect phone.
Program ini adalah sebuah program sederhana dimana kita bisa mengetahui apakah tiga bilangan bisa dijadikan sisi sebuah segitiga. Pertama kita memasukkan 3 buah bilangan, apakah dari ketiga bilangan ini, jika digabung bisa menjadi sebuah sisi segitiga yang benar. Syarat agar 3 buah bilangan dapat dijadikan sebuah segitiga yang benar adalah sebagai berikut.
Jumlah sisi pertama dan sisi kedua harus lebih besar daripada sisi ketiga. Jumlah sisi pertama dan jumlah sisi ketiga harus lebih besar daripada sisi kedua. Dengan kata lain, jumlah dua buah sisi segitiga harus lebih besar dari sisi lainnya.
Jika sudah mengetahui logikanya, maka kita bisa mulai membuat kode nya. Lihat pada kode dibawah ini:
Tutorial kali ini berlanjut pada C++, disini kita akan mempelajari cara membuat persegi dari bintang dalam C++. Terdapat beberapa syarat disini yang harus saya berikan. Lebar persegi harus diantara 1 dan 20. Disini kita menggunakan statemen for untuk mencetak bintang. Lalu didalam pernyataan for, kita menambahkan lagi pernyataan if, gunanya agar bisa menentukan di index ke berapa saja nanti bintang akan dicetak.
Sebenarnya ini adalah tugas mingguan yang diberikan dosen kepada saya, tetapi saya putuskan untuk membaginya kepada teman-teman sekalian.
Google found a nice way to wish you Happy Birthday. If you visit Google's homepage when you are signed in and it's your birthday, you'll see a special doodle that links to your Google profile. When you go to your profile, you'll find colorful confetti and a Happy Birthday message, but that's not new.
"Because doodles are such a fun part of the search experience, we thought we'd share a fun little way Google will help celebrate your birthday. When you include your date of birth on your Google profile, you may notice a special treat on the Google homepage on your birthday (be sure to sign in). Click on the doodle for another birthday surprise," informs the Google blog.
To change your birthday, go to your profile, click on "Edit profile" and select the "Contact info" tab. The tab lets you enter some information that can be shared with your contacts.
