Google Tests a New Interface for Google Suggest

Cameron Beyer spotted an experiment that simplifies the interface for Google Suggest and adds Google's search buttons below the list of suggestions.


This is not the only experiment for Google Suggest: other changes include the direct access to the top result for navigational queries, direct answers and suggestions from your search history.

Since many people replaced the address box from their browsers with Google's search box, it's natural for Google to make the search box more powerful and to provide even faster access to search results. If Google's search box first became ubiquitous through Google Toolbar, then Google Toolbar's search box evolved into Chrome's Omnibox, the added functionality should now be included in Google's homepage.

Attach Files to Google Calendar Events

Brandon Kraft spotted a new feature in the Google Apps version of Google Calendar: attaching files from Google Docs and photos from Picasa Web Albums to an event. Sometimes you can provide all the details of an event in the description box and you may need to attach photos, presentations and other useful documents.


What I don't understand is why there's no rich-text editor in Google Calendar, where you could drag and drop content from web pages and even images. Hopefully, when GDrive finally launches, you'll be able to access the files stored in Google's Web Drive from any other Google service.

{ Image licensed as Creative Commons Noncommercial Share-Alike. }

Multiple Views in Your Gmail Inbox

Gmail released another Labs experiment and this one converts your Gmail inbox to a structured dashboard that shows multiple views. The improperly-named "Multiple inboxes" lets you add up to 5 lists of search results next to your Gmail inbox: in the right side of the inbox, below or above the inbox.

Use the advanced search operators to build searches like label:name-of-label, subject:linux or is:unread -in:inbox. If you were expecting to actually see the inboxes of multiple email accounts, you can achieve this by using Gmail's mail fetcher, which automatically labels the messages fetched from other accounts and archives them. You can then create panes that have the following format: label:myotheraccount@gmail.com or to:myotheraccount.com.


"After you turn on Multiple Inboxes from the Labs tab under Settings, you can configure what you want to see, as well as set the number of messages displayed and the positioning of your panels from the Multiple Inboxes section under Settings," explains Octavian Costache, who created this feature.

"Multiple inboxes" works especially well if you have a high resolution monitor and if you use filters that automatically archive some classes of messages.

Related:
Simplified Gmail searches
A dashboard for Google Docs

Print Preview in Google Docs

Google's PDF viewer has many practical uses: you can view the PDF files uploaded to Google Docs, view your Gmail attachments (and not just PDF files). The same viewer is now used to implement "print preview" in Google Docs, a feature available in the File menu.


Use "print preview" before printing a document or just to find the number of pages in your document.

The feature also works for presentations, but it's not yet available from the interface. You will need to manually create the URL:

http://docs.google.com/gview?a=v&pid=writely&srcid=DOCUMENT_ID

where DOCUMENT_ID is the ID of the document or presentation (you can obtain it from the docid parameter).

{ via Google Docs Blog }

Google Chrome Will Have Extensions by May

Nicholas Moline noticed an interesting session from Google I/O, a developer conference that will be held in May.

Developing extensions for Google Chrome

"Learn how Google Chrome makes it easy to write extensions using the web technologies you already know. This talk will cover the basics of the extension system (distribution/packaging, installation, updates), as well as the different APIs to enhance with the browser."

We can assume that Google Chrome will add support for extensions before May 27th, when the conference starts.

A recently published document explains the process model for extensions. The latest developer versions of Google Chrome already supports user scripts, which could later become part of more complex extensions.

"Chromium extensions will follow a multi-process architecture to share the same kind of stability and security that regular web pages have in Chromium. All of an extension's code runs in a single process, separate from the browser (with the exception of user scripts which run in whichever renderers they apply to). Extension code can communicate with user scripts, and vice versa, through a message passing API."

There's also a list of APIs that includes support for changing the theme, customizing toolstrips and buttons, manipulating the download system, interacting with the history and bookmark system, adding support for sidebars and status bars.

{ "Chrome Drip" licensed as Creative Commons by ViaMoi. }

Offline Google Calendar for Google Apps

Some Google Apps users noticed a new option in Google Calendar: read-only offline access to the calendars using Google Gears. Mark Mathson has screenshots for the new feature, but it's surprising to see that Google Apps users, who usually received the updates later than Google Accounts users, get the offline Calendar earlier.


Google's help page mentions that users can decide which calendars are available offline. "Calendar keeps you on time, even when you're not online. Offline Calendar allows you to access your events through your browser without requiring Internet access. It's perfect for flaky connections or for when you're in between meetings and have no idea where you're supposed to be next. Note that while offline, Calendar will be read-only - it will not be possible to create, edit, or delete events."

It's interesting that the version briefly available in October 2007 allowed you to "view and edit the next 3 months of your Google Calendar when you're not connected to the Internet". Google decided that it's important to synchronize all the events and that editing the events is too difficult to implement reliably.

{ Thanks, Mark Mathson and Tom Rodman. }

Google Latitude: Share Your Location with Friends

The latest version of Google Maps for Mobile adds a new feature that lets you share your location with friends and see their locations in real-time. Google Latitude is the first step for adding more social features to Google Maps and to other Google services.

"How often do you find yourself wondering where your friends are and what they're up to? It's a pretty central question to our daily social lives, and it's precisely the question you can now answer using Google Latitude," explains Google's blog.


After installing Google Maps Mobile 3.0 (only available for Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Symbian S60 right now), you can share your location automatically or set your location manually. You can also post a short status and choose a profile photo.


Here's the complete list of things you can do using Latitude:

After selecting yourself, you can:
- Change your status message across Google products. Your status will only be shared with your current Google Talk or Gmail chat friends.
- Change your photo across Google products.
- Submit or edit your phone number in Latitude for your friends.
- Edit your privacy settings for all friends.

After selecting a friend, you can:
- Show the friend in map view.
- Search for places near your friend.
- Call if a phone number is available in your Google Contacts or Latitude.
- Chat using Google Talk or Gmail chat if available.
- Send an email.
- Get directions to the friend's approximate location.
- Set sharing options. You can choose to hide your location or share only city level location with individual friends.
- Remove the friend. Your friend cannot see your location and you cannot see the friend's location.

"Everything about Latitude is opt-in. You not only control exactly who gets to see your location, but you also decide the location that they see. For instance, let's say you are in Rome. Instead of having your approximate location detected and shared automatically, you can manually set your location for elsewhere — perhaps a visit to Niagara Falls. Since you may not want to share the same information with everyone, Latitude lets you change the settings on a friend-by-friend basis. So for each person, you can choose to share your best available location or your city-level location, or you can hide."

If your mobile phone is not yet supported by the new version of Google Maps, you can add an iGoogle gadget that has similar features.


Location-based services will be increasingly popular now that mobile phones with GPS and fast Internet connections become the standard and the privacy expectations are changing. Eventually, you'll be able to share your location with other applications and obtain personalized information, alerts and even recommendations. From this perspective, Yahoo's Fire Eagle is better-suited for shaping the future of location-based services.

Gmail Adds Folders by Improving Label Management

For those who wondered "when do we get folders in Gmail?", there's a good news: even though Gmail still uses labels, you can treat them like folders starting from today.

Gmail added a "move to" drop-down that combines two actions that were difficult to find or difficult to understand: labeling and archiving. Instead of clicking on "More actions", selecting a label and then archiving the message, you can now click on "Move to" and select a label.

Those who like keyboard shortcuts will be happy to know that the "Move to" drop-down can be selected by typing "v" and you can type the first letters of a label to select it.


A similar functionality is available for the new "Labels" drop-down, but you can select multiple labels.


So what's the difference between the two drop-downs?

"Move to" applies the label selected from the list and removes the label of the current view. Keyboard shortcut: v.

"Labels" lets you add or remove labels from the list in a single action. You no longer have to repeatedly click on "More actions" to add multiple labels. Keyboard shortcut: l.

"One of the features that makes Gmail different is its use of labels instead of folders. Sure, labels can serve pretty much the same purpose -- they can help organize mail or flag messages for follow up. And unlike with folders, messages can have several labels, so if I get an email from a friend about a trip we're taking together, I can add both a "Friends" and a "Travel" label to it. But it's not always obvious how to use labels, especially for people who are new to Gmail and used to using folders, and it hasn't helped that some common tasks have been more complicated than they should be," mentions Gmail's blog.

If you don't see the new features in your Gmail account, they'll be enabled in the next few hours. While the new functionality is a huge improvement, the design refresh is a step backwards. "Gmail just changed its archive, report, move icons from their fun bubbly shape to rectangular attached uglies," commented Garry S., a reader of this blog.

{ Thanks, gxg and Garry. }

Chat With a Martian in Google Earth 5

Open the latest version of Google Earth, switch to "Mars" and search for "Meliza". Click on the small robotic icon and you'll be able to chat with Meliza, a friendly relative of Eliza, one of the first chat bots. A message informs Earthlings that "Meliza is using an account on a different planet. There may be translation errors." The chat bot has some predefined text related to Mars and it can't answer to many questions, but it's always ready to rephrase your messages.

Here's Meliza's first message: "Greetings, Earthling! What do you think of Google Mars?Have you checked out Valles Marineris? It's like the Grand Canyon, but bigger. Mars is so much better than Earth!"


In other news, Google and NASA sponsor Singularity University. "In 2005, futurist Ray Kurzweil published The Singularity Is Near, a comfort-rattling forecast of a few decades hence when artificial intelligence will overtake human capability and an array of other huge leaps will fundamentally alter our lives. Now, Kurzweil is helping to launch a university rooted in the book's predictions. In June, Singularity University is scheduled to open with a faculty replete with scientific celebrities, and an initial class of 30 students at NASA's Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley."

{ Thanks, Tom. }

Google Earth 5 Plus the Ocean

Google Earth 5, the latest version of Google's 3D geo-browser, brings an important feature from the discontinued Google Earth Plus, which used to cost $20/year. You can now read tracks and waypoints from a GPS device like Magellan and Garmin and you can import GPS files in GPX and LOC format.

Another interesting new feature is the ability to visualize geographical changes over time. Google Earth shows historical imagery that goes back to the 40s in some places like San Francisco.


If you find an interesting way to visualize a location, there's a new "record a tour" option that saves the places you visit in Google Earth and lets you replay the tour. Unfortunately, you can't export a tour in a video format using the free version of Google Earth, but the good news is that you can record a voice commentary.

Google Earth is no longer just about the Earth and stars, now you can use it to view imagery and terrain of Mars by clicking on the planet icon.


While all these additions useful, you'll most likely download Google Earth 5 to explore the ocean. "Dive beneath the surface and visit the deepest part of the ocean, the Mariana Trench. Explore the ocean with top marine experts including National Geographic and BBC. Learn about ocean observations, climate change, and endangered species. Discover new places including surf, dive, and travel hot spots and shipwrecks."


Google Earth 5 for Windows, Linux and Mac can be downloaded from earth.google.com. The Windows version is not download directly: you first install Google Update, which downloads the setup and then installs the application. For those who can't use Google Update, here's a direct link to the Windows client.

Tip: Before installing Google Earth, read the user guide.

Standalone Versions of Google Tasks for iPhone and iGoogle

There's a new interface for Google Tasks, the experiment initially launched as part of Gmail Labs. Now you can view and edit your tasks on an iPhone by visiting http://mail.google.com/tasks/iphone (a shorter URL: gmail.com/tasks).



Google also launched an iGoogle gadget that provides similar functionality. The gadget is only a wrapper for the standalone version available at http://mail.google.com/tasks/ig, a page you can bookmark or add it to your sidebar in browsers that support this feature (Firefox, Opera).



Gmail Blog explains that the most important competitor for Google Tasks is paper (I remember a similar statement regarding Google Calendar). "Among the world's leading productivity tools is an advanced technology known as paper. Many of the world's top corporations and most active internet users have adopted paper as a method of organizing their daily lives. (...) When we set out to build Tasks (now in Gmail Labs), one of our goals was to improve upon paper. With the version of Tasks in Gmail, we focused on making editing very fast and simple -- as close to paper as we could."

Hopefully the next iterations will bring a proper standalone version, the integration with Google Calendar and an API that will facilitate synchronization with other applications. That will give Google Tasks competitive edge over paper.