We have been playing just about with Google Wave for sometime now.
We have also started seeing slight updates that Google has been making to further improve the service.
Here are few changes we have noticed in the last couple of days.
You can now remove a user from a wave. Previously it is not possible. You cannot remove the very first user that was added to a wave.
Google fixed manual link insertion in waves. Previously when you typed in a URL, the link would extend to the text written after the link and now it is fixed.
Feel free to include changes that you noticed on Google Wave during your testing on it!
The much talked about intelligent spell checker will not work for us in our account.
When it comes to maps, Google has had almost everything: great satellite imagery, massive coverage, and even some basic navigation features, but not what everyone that’s ever used a GPS device actually wants: turn-by-turn navigation. This changes today, as Google has released a beta version of Google Maps Navigation for Android 2.0 and here is a quick overview of the features: - Search in plain English, so you can quickly search and navigate to places, businesses, landmarks. - Search by means of voice. - View of live traffic data through Internet. - Search along route, so that you can find locations near your current path. - Satellite view, so that you can view the same satellite imagery you have seen Google Maps, on your mobile phone. - Street View, check out what the accurate surroundings of a location look like. - Car dock mode, when you leave certain devices in a car dock, a special mode activates to enables easier operation. Google Maps Navigation does two very essential things for Google: it makes it a competitor to established GPS firms similar to TomTom and Garmin, which should make this space a lot more interest, and it suddenly makes Android – the only platform this app is now available on - a lot more desirable. And - you guessed it - the very first Android 2.0 phone to support this app is the forthcoming Motorola Droid. Since the application is free of charge, we may expect Google to add advertisements to it at some point. But currently, as you have to pay for every other mobile turn-by-turn navigation app out there (we are not talking pocket change here, either), the sheer fact that this thing is free will definitely make it a huge hit. Take a look at the video overview of Google Maps Navigation and a few screenshots.
Way back in April, Google re-launched Google Labs, the place where the company tests its new and experimental features. When it re-launched, it added an extremely interesting experimental feature towards Google Image Search: Similar Images.
A review if you don’t remember similar images: it utilizes image recognition technology to help out filter search results. If you find an action shot of soccer/football celebrity David Beckham and want to find more similar to it, for instance, you can use Similar Images to filter your outcome and find similar images.
The feature has been in Google Labs for more than half a year, but that is no longer the case. Google has announced that Similar Images has now turned out to be a standard feature of Google Image search.
It was just a matter of time until Similar Images made its first appearance in GoogleSearch. It is very helpful and astonishingly accurate feature that actually helps you filter images. We can suppose to see a lot of users utilizing this feature very soon.
In a little flurry of activity, Google has added another feature to several of its products, together with its search tool.
The company has released a Social Search feature, which basically shows favoritism to a user's finest pals.
"Sign in to Google and do a search. If there is related web content written by people in your social circle, it will automatically show up at the bottom of your search results under a section called 'Results from people in your social circle'," says the company.
A user's social circle consists of Gmail contacts moreover they are publicly connected to on social networking sites - even though not, it seems, Facebook, which is rather a noteworthy omission. Google is also expanding GoogleVoice to work with subsisting cellphone numbers; transcribing messages and sending email notification after new messages are received.
Previously, this feature only works with Google Voice numbers and deterring users who may not want to alter their phone number.
And the company also promised to 'liberate your Google Docs' by toting up a Convert, Zip and Download" feature. This will permit the users to download multiple Docs concurrently.
Los Angeles - Having access to dozens of sources for the most recent news events in the tech world right at your fingertips, and if you are an enthusiastic Google Reader user as well, you now have the cause to enjoy... The search titan, previous week added some new personalization features to its Google Reader to assist tailor content on its Web 2.0 feed more smartly, by tracking a user's online behavior, the company wrote in a blog post.
The Mountain View, California, company has unveiled two more updates that include something called the “Explore” segment that appears under the “People You Follow” section. The latest Explore section appears in your sidebar over your already-existing folders and feeds and provides you with “Popular Items”as well as “Recommended Sources.”
“We make use of algorithms to find top-rising images, videos and pages from anywhere (not just your subscriptions), gather them in the new Popular items section and order them with what we think you will like best,” explains Google's Beverly Yang. “Now you don’t have to be embarrassed about missing that hilarious video everybody is talking about -- it must show up in your 'Popular Items' feed automatically.”
Google have also re-jigged its reader's recommendations feature section by moving it below the newly added app's Explore section. Google also given it a new name called “Recommended Sources”, but it still utilize its Reader Trends as well as Web History features to pull a list of in isolation targeted feeds together.
Apart from adding the new Explore section, Google has also scattered a bit of; fairy dust on Reader by creating a sort option dubbed “Magic” that creepily reorder items in the feed based on your individual usage and overall activity in Google Reader.
This feature can be accessed when you will either hover your cursor over a feed or folder. The grand news here is that the feature actually gets better over time. The more you share or “like” stories, the superior the sorting will become.
“Unlike the old 'auto' ranking, this latest ranking is personalized for you, and gets better with time as we learn what you like best -- the more you 'like' and 'share' things, the better your magic sort will be,” says Yang. “Just give it a try on a high-volume feed folder or else all items and see for yourself!”
It will be exciting to use Google's new personalization features in Reader moving forward. And if you have not yet made yourself familiar with the new features, give it a swivel and enjoy.
Google has advanced the look and feel of its Maps program, in what the company calls "the largest such changes since we first launched about 4.7 years ago." These changes mostly sharpen the image and making things more size appropriate. In the photo above, for instance, Google has enhanced the readability and density of the roads.
"Today's changes are intended to remain the same information-rich map while making it easier to pick and choose out the information that is most helpful," Google wrote in a blog post.
The roads neighboring the English town of Portinscale are now more visible.
In San Francisco, Google made some changes to color and font. "All the similar information is maintained on the map, but there is more dissimilarity between background detail such as local roads, and important orientation signals like neighborhoods and major arterial roads," Googleadded.
Google had one busier week pushing out updates. That is really no surprise considering Apple released product refreshes and Microsoft released Windows 7. Google hasn't let any main update from any competitor go by devoid of their own news and this week was no different. Google already got a deal with Twitter (identical to Bing deal with Twitter) and a new social search experiment set up in Google Labs. Here are seven updates that are slightly minor but you still want to know about: Custom Search is currently available for mobile search experiences on smartphone and higher-end devices. Google will even host your mobile-optimized tradition search pages for you; otherwise you can horde it on your mobile site. AdWords API has a recent version that includes asynchronous calls, keyword along with placement ideas, also a location extensions preview. Google Maps for Mobile has brought out layers for Blackberry users. Google Search Appliance, an enterprise search server which releases an update that consists of a Self-Learning Scorer. Google Friend Connect has a novel Wordpress plugin.
Webmaster Central has new directions for verifying a Blogger blog in Webmaster Tools. Google Reader added Popular Items along with Personalized Ranking features.
Google is set to face Apple, Spotify and more than a few players in the digital music space by launching Google Audio, TechCrunch reported October 21, citing various sources. Google spent the last few weeks striking deals to seed the service with music content from the most important music labels, according to the report. The service will allegedly be an exodus from the Google China search and download music service the company launched in the year 2008.
"This new service will be obtainable for at least U.S. users, our sources confirm, even though it isn't clear if it is a download or streaming service, or both," wrote TechCrunch's Michael Arrington. Google will offer enhanced music search with a streaming function and it will Search for an artist or song will bring up a box with a streaming link assigned to streams either from Lala or iLike. In an update, Arrington alleged that the launch will be on October 28 at a Hollywood concert event.
That's it on the skimpy details, even if a streaming model would make sense given Google’s predilection intended for running applications on the Internet cloud. Google declined to comment. If such a service does draw closer to fruition it would be yet one more front where Google is waging war versus one-time buddy Apple, which has put up a wall by eliminating the Google Voice phone management application. Google as well as Apple are increasingly butting hands in the smartphone arena, where Google is seeing T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon Wireless to offer smartphones based on its Android mobile operating system. The companies are also contending in mobile applications, and Google expects to issue the Chrome Operating System for netbooks next year, challenging Windows as well as Mac OS X. But that may not be all. Google might be taking a page out of Apple's design-the-device-yourself handbook by releasing an actually Google Phone, goes the next huge rumor to come up with Googleplex this week.
Northeast Securities analyst Ashok Kumar says Google's design partners told him Google is working with a smartphone manufacturer, probably HTC, to have a Google-branded phone accessible this year through retailers and this gadget will be powered by Qualcomm baseband chips.
The idea is to bypass traditional carriers so that Google might control what features and applications run on it -- the accurate solution for the situations such as Apple's treatment of Google Voice. On the other hand, this can also undermine efforts from Motorola, which is betting the company on its Cliq along with Droid smartphones, and others such as Dell and Samsung.
After June 2009, Google Page Rank forthcoming update was definitely expected in September 2009, at present there is some news coming as Google has started the process and these changes might reflect in end of October 2009.
Google updates the PR at a gap of 3 months or so however this time they are taking more time. Google just released the Google Wave moreover they are also busy in Google Caffeine.
Webmaster team is too busy in the upgrading the Webmaster Tool. However this time various websites confirming the news that Google has started the process and they will be done by the update by end of October 2009.
Google has extended its flu trends to another 16 countries to include almost all Europe. Attention: they are not talking about the swine flu; Google is talking about flu in general which affects millions of people around the globe each year. This is a project from Google.org, and now the website is obtainable in no less than 37 languages.
The flu is a most important concern for all the people in the world, and last year in November Google has decided to initiate the GoogleFlu Trends in the US thanks to an algorithm that tracks the fame of search queries and estimates the flu level in almost real-time. The GoogleFluTrends tool is incredibly accurate as it had a “0.92 correlation with official US flu data.”
After enjoying a huge hit with the US GoogleFlu Trends and seeing the swine flu explode in Mexico and Australia, the search giant decided to spread out their coverage to the aforementioned countries and New Zealand. If you want to know more about the Google Flu Trends then please take a look at the video below the post especially made by Google.
Google,the world's largest search engine seen many updates all over the year.These updates helps the users to make there search more effective and simple.
In the past week google has tested their home page with their upcoming updates. When the user explores the home page of Google they can view only the Google logo along with the Google search bar and the others like Web,Images,Videos etc will be invisible for the user.
To make it visible the user has to move the mouse over the home page or by keypress.If this succeds then the long time users of google might get another useful updates.
Google is increasingly rolling out some new updates to the Google Docs service. These updates will make it much easier to share files inside folders and make it easier for groups to collaborate also work together on particular Google Docs files.
Sharing a group of items or files is now simply done just by putting those items into a folder and then sharing that folder to all the members of your working group. Once you shared a folder, something that you add in that folder will automatically be shared. Similarly, if you add someone to the list of people who can right to use that folder they can immediately access all the items contained in that folder. This means that you don’t have to share files one at a time anymore.
In addition to sharing folders, Google has also made it easier to upload more than one item to Google Docs. Google Docs’ new upload pages now allow you to select multiple files and upload all of them collectively at the same time.
An additional update on Google Docs has something to do with the “Items Not in Folder.” Moreover here are the instances while files are categorized as such:
• When you create a new item or an item that is directly shared to you and it is in “Items not in folders”.
• When an item is shared to you through a folder and it is not in “Items not in folders”. • When you append an item to a folder and it will no longer be in “Items not in folders”. • When you eliminate an item from all its folders and it will once again be in “Items not in folders”.
Finally, Google has also slightly tweaked the Google Docs interface. Some changes on colors, spacing and buttons were also made.
In general, these could just be some minor enhancements but you will appreciate these enhancements if you are a big time user of Google Docs.
When Google Squared launched back in June, it was very clear that it was absolutely a product of Labs: promising, but a bit rough around the edges.
However they are not quite ready to seize off the Labs training wheels just yet, Google’s “smart spreadsheet” product got lots of needed improvements in recent times.
Since Google Squared all about understands structured data, one of the most excellent updates in Google Squared is better quality data.
Google upped the ante there in two ways. Initially, when the Square is first being built, an attempt is made to toss out attributes as well as rows without adequate good facts to support them. Secondly, they built several self-learning mechanisms into the code so that Squared in fact learns from user edits and corrections over time.
You can also just store more data in a Square — it is up to 120 facts per Square from a mere 30. At present you can also export your data to Google spreadsheet, where other transformations as well as visualizations can be done with the information. Or else, export to a standard CSV file also edit the data in a desktop or other spreadsheet application of your choice.
Finally, Google added column sort to the mix so that you can reschedule attributes and line up your desired comparisons more simply. Squared will even convert units in the background to make sure that attribute comparisons take place properly.
It is still not quite a game-changer, but these are some steps towards making use of the enormous amounts of structured data that are out there on the web is venerable. And if they keep toting up improvements like these, Squared could shortly become extremely useful to researchers, writers as well as infovores alike.
Have you ever used Google Squared? If you’ve had a possibility to try it together before and after the new updates, so what may be your thoughts on these changes?
Google made quite a few updates to its mapping program on Wednesday, including the capability for users to report problems, a pledge to permanently blur peoples' faces in its database after a year, and an expansion of Street View.
Google has added a "Report a Problem" link on its maps along with directions so that users can report inaccuracies: if, for instance, the name of a park has altered, a road has been closed; otherwise a particular building has been knocked down.
"Once we have received your edit or suggestion we will confirm it with other users, data sources, or imagery," says Andrew Lookingbill, a software engineer at Google and he wrote this in a blog post. "We hope to resolve each alteration within a month."
Put forward your e-mail address, and Google will alert you when modify has been made. In the meantime, the company is looking to add new datasets to Maps and at present they are working on adding biking directions, Lookingbill wrote.
However what if Google's Street View cameras capture your picture on the street?The company has previously pledged to blur out faces on the public version of Street View, although Google kept the un-blurred photos in its servers.
"We keep these un-blurred images in our databases so we can be able to build better products, for instance by persistently improving our blurring technology so that it obscures more of the things it ought to and less of the things it shouldn't," Peter Fleischer, Google's global privacy counsel, wrote in a blog post. "For instance, we may need to read a street sign in a Street View image to make in no doubt that the street is appropriately named on Google Maps."
In June, however, the Article 29 Working Party and a group of 27 European data protection authorities has asked Google to set a time limit on how long they keep unblurred photos in their database.
"Starting today, we will everlastingly blur images on our internal database within one year of their publication on Street View," Fleischer wrote. "This means that long period the only photocopy we keep will be the blurred version. In countries where Street View is previously launched the year long maintenance period will start today."
In toting up, Google pledged to fast-track any requests for image exclusion in Street View. "We will move those images to the front of the queue, and everlastingly blur those pictures in our records as promptly as possible," Fleischer said.
During the next few months, Google will also launch revamped Street View Web sites with more complete information about the service and where the company's cars are driving.
In recent times Google car made a trip to Canada. Google Street View is now live in Vancouver, Whistler, Kitchener-Waterloo, Toronto, Squamish, Banff, Calgary, Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec City as well as Halifax, Google announced Wednesday.
Google has announced the launch of a new dataset for Google Maps, which opens up a lot more scenery. Now Google is able to afford better imagery as well as maps for things like parks, college campuses, plus hiking trails.
Google has been working with a large number of "authoritative information sources" to create the new dataset. The company says that such organization that generate the data do the best job of keeping it accurate and up-to-date. Google software engineer Andrew Lookingbill explains on the Google Lat Long Blog:
For instance, in the US there are a number of broadly accessible geospatial datasets created by the government for the Census, land surveying as well as transportation. These datasets supply information on the whole thing from road networks and water bodies to toll roads and bridges. By integrating this information, and working with focused data sources like the USDA Forest Service's Forest Boundaries also the US Geological Survey's National Hydrography Dataset, we have been capable to expand as well as improve features in our maps like parks along with water bodies.
Satellite, aerial as well as Street View imagery also helped. With overhead imagery, we might zoom in on roadway details to figure out particulars like the size of the road. Our Street View imagery, which you recognize as a tool to help you explore new places, turns out to be incredibly helpful to understand road restrictions and confirm street data by understanding street signs.
The most excellent part about this new dataset is that Google has been able to append a lot of new, complete information to Google Maps - information that helps public better explore and get around the real world. For instance, college students will be pleased to see maps of various campuses; and cyclists will now locate many more trails and paths to explore. In a little while Google has planned to provide you with biking directions to take advantage of this new data. Of course, in the true Google spirit of "launch and iterate," So they plan to work with more data sources to add new features in the map.
Google has also added a new tool to allow users to report problems with maps. There is a "report a problem" link resting on the bottom right of Google Maps. You can also find it by right-clicking on the map itself and the reported problems will be confirmed with the other users’ users, data sources, and imagery, and will be edited within a month if confirmed, according to Google. You can also surrender your email address, and Google will put in the picture to you about the changes they made.
According to Google, around 2009 15,000 miles of roadway are built in the US every year. That is just a single example of how Maps can keep on changing. This represents the significance of keeping datasets up-to-date. It is got to be a colossal task, but in the curiosity of accuracy, it is a good thing Google has the cooperation of organizations as well as users.
Yahoorecently released an API forMeme, the company's microblogging service, which is still in beta. If you are not familiar with Meme, it's kind of resembling Yahoo'sversion of Twitter, minus the huge amount of hype.
Memewas only accessible in Portuguese and Spanish before becoming available in English to persons who got invites at the beginning of September. Through the API, developers can harness the power ofMemeto build applications along with mashups.
TheMeme APIis built on crest of theYahoo Query Language (YQL)platform. Yahoo says the API can simply be used to create mashups with other products built on Yahoo Query Language (YQL). Yahoo itself used the API to build the mobile version ofMemefor smartphones.
Yahoo says Meme permits the people to:
- Post their individual content and repost the content of others users that they find interesting
- One-Click reposts for effortless and easy publishing
- Follow other Meme users also comment on their posts
- Eliminate content from their Meme including previous updates, reposts, comments, etc.
- Check out the most admired posts
- Consume and generate content via their mobile devices
- Content limits are up to 2,000 characters and up to 7MB for each and every photo.
The jury is still out on whetherMemewill be a victory forYahoo or not. Availability will have to open up more for one thing. The API would absolutely be a step in the right direction and the genuine question is do people need another Twitter? IfYahoocan prop up the service between loyal Yahoousers, maybe it can do well, but with Yahoo's new homepage, which can include other social networks users are already a part of, are they going to be worried about becoming a part of the Meme community too? I guess we will see.
Google's Chrome web browser has seen one more update on the dev channel. The new version is 4.0.220.1 furthermore it bring down a series of fixes, notes Jonathan Conradt, Engineering Program Manager. The new-fangled flavor has the Native Client as a built-in feature, which happens for the very first time as quickly as it comes to the Windows version of Chrome moreover there is also a series of Extensions APIs incorporated with this release.
The new Google Chrome 4.0.220.1 dev has new features also fixes for all platforms, together with the elimination of “Remove Item” from download item context menu (which is no longer needed as the shelf removes all completed and canceled items on close), or the truth that Omnibox now understands Zeroconf .local hosts. Once it comes to the Windows version of the browser, the noteworthy change is that the Native Client is currently built into the renderer.
One thing that must be noted at this time is that the Native Client is disabled by default, and that users will have to do quite a few actions to enable it. After downloading Google Chrome as well as registering tot hr dev channel, “launch Google Chrome from the command line, adding --internal-nacl.
If you are in the directory that contains chrome.exe (somewhat like C:\Documents and Settings\me\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\Application) and your command be supposed to look like this: chrome.exe --internal-nacl. Warning: Currently, using --internal-nacl, this will disable the Google Chrome sandbox. This is interrelated to a bug that we look forward to fix soon, but for now, we suggest to run Google Chrome with this flag simply for testing Native Client and it is not for regular web browsing.” Additional details can be found here.
As for the changes with extensions, the list shows extensions menu item currently in “wrench” menu; the occurrence of Browser Actions; extension packing has been implemented for Linux; the toolstrip dragging is being limited to extension shelf; when the “ask for destination” choice has been set in download options, the themes as well as the extensions will install; a crash with non-extension iframe has been rigid; initial i18n API included; at present the content scripts are enabled to see their own functions in setTimeout.
Earlier this year, Google has launched Google Sync which allows the user to synchronize their Gmail Contacts as well as Google Calendar with there iPhone, Windows Mobile, and S60 devices. Google has added the Gmail support to Google Sync for iPhone, iPod Touch along with Windows Mobile devices.
Using Google Sync, you can currently get your Gmail messages pushed straight to your phone. Having an over-the-air, always-on connection means that your inbox is currently up to date, no matter wherever you are or what you're doing. Sync works with your phone's native email application so there is no added software needed. Only interested in syncing your Gmail, but it is not for your Calendar? Google Syncallows you to sync just your Contacts, Calendar, or Gmail, or a few combination of the three.
To try Google Sync, move on to the site m.google.com/sync from your computer. If you are already using Google Sync then learn how to enable Gmail sync. From the time when push Gmail has been a well-liked request on our Product Ideas page and Help Forum, Google is looking forward to hearing your feedback, so drop them a line and let know them how it's working or what you'd like to see next.
Google updates the verification tool which will be easier for webmasters to verify their sites. There are three key changes:
(1) New-fangled look for HTML file verification process:
(2) If you make use of the META TAG verification option and you change your email address tied to that Google account, at present the sites is still remain verified.
(3) If you make use of the HTML file verification option, you no longer need to make clear in your mind that your 404 pages actually return a 404 server status code.
With this update, several publishing tools no longer have the capability to verify their sites with Google Webmaster Tools, one example is Google Sites. Google is attentive of this and functioning on addressing the issue.
The version 3 for Yahoo User Interface library released on Tuesday by Yahoo, software collection programmers can use to give Web sites with fancy user interface elements written in JavaScript as well as Cascading Style Sheets.
On Tuesday Yahoo’sEric Miraglia said to a blogspot that "YUI 3's core infrastructure as well as its utility suite is all considered production-ready with today's release". "The code we are shipping today in 3.0.0 is the similar code that drives the new Yahoo Home Page, and it goes out with confidence that it has been exercised forcefully and at scale."
The YUI libraries are open-source which is freely available, and used widely all around the Internet for Web site tasks together with animation, drag-and-drop, fetching data from various types of sources, and responding towards events--chores that are more complex but that often are helpful as the Web moves from static Web pages toward interactive applications.
Compared with YUI 2, the new version is smaller, quicker, easier to program with, and it is also more secure, Yahoo said. It is very much easy to break code into minimum-size pieces throughout a dependency configurator or YUI's ability to download required components on its own. Moreover, Yahoo is working to add widget abilities for creating smaller programs.
A suitable YUI feature is that Yahoo is willing to host the majority of it on its own servers, saving hassle and Web server bandwidth.
The new version is the first ground-up reworking of the software since 2005. There is no doubt that YUI will be the subject of discussion at Open Hack Day as well as YUIConf, both in October.
