Friday, February 5, 2010

Googland

Googland

[G] Dive in to our Ocean Showcase

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 07:24 PM PST

Google LatLong: Dive in to our Ocean Showcase

With the launch of our new Ocean Showcase, you can now tour the ocean from the comfort of your web browser using the Google Earth plugin.

Follow along as National Geographic explorer, Sylvia Earle, narrates a tour through highlights of the Explore the Ocean layer in Google Earth. You can pause the tour at any time to watch videos of the surrounding areas and marine animals, like the humpback whales below.


Take a ride with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), as their Western Flyer research ship works off the U.S. west coast. View the discoveries they've made, like the transparent-headed barreleye fish.


Visit some exciting shipwrecks like the World War II USS Truxton Destroyer, and see divers explore the shipwrecks with video from Eco-Nova's Shipwreck Central.


Take a narrated tour of some of the world's best dive sites with Wannadive.net and the best surf sites with Wannasurf.com.




In addition, you can see some of the highest resolution data available of the ocean with the Underwater Terrain tour. And finally, let NOAA's Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory, GLERL, take you on a tour of the Great Lakes with a special feature on Lake Superior.


Over the past year, many photographers, naturalists, government groups and non-profit partners have added photos and videos to the Explore the Ocean layer in Google Earth, providing a great introduction to lots of ocean features. Enthusiasts continue to add photos and ratings to Wannadive.net and Wannasurf.com, improving the Ocean Sports layers.

Anyone can be a desktop Cousteau. And we welcome more contributions. Go here to tell us about your ocean data.

To take the plunge, download any tour and open it in Google Earth, where you can explore many more exciting ocean photos and videos by checking the Ocean folder in the left-hand layers panel.

Posted by Jenifer Austin Foulkes, Product Manager
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2010/02/dive-in-to-our-ocean-showcase.html

[G] Quick Survey on the Help Center

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 07:24 PM PST

Google Analytics Blog: Quick Survey on the Help Center

We're always looking for ways to improve Google Analytics - not just the product itself, but also the ways in which we provide information about the product. So help us help you - take a minute to fill out this quick survey on our Help Center, and let us know what we can improve!

Posted by the Google Analytics Writing Team
URL: http://analytics.blogspot.com/2010/02/quick-survey-on-help-center.html

[G] Donate your AdSense earnings to help Haiti

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 05:04 PM PST

Inside AdSense: Donate your AdSense earnings to help Haiti

As you may have already seen, Google has made various efforts to contribute to the earthquake relief response in Haiti. We've heard repeatedly from AdSense publishers on forums about wanting to help, and today, we're pleased to let you know how you can do so with your AdSense earnings.

We're currently accepting donations from AdSense publishers with an unpaid account balance through January 31, 2010. To see what your unpaid account balance is, please visit the 'Payment History' page within your account. Your January earnings will post in the next few days, so feel free to refer to your 'Advanced Reports' page for an earnings estimate until those are finalized.



Working with our teammates at Google.org, we've identified Partners In Health (PIH) as the recipient of these funds. Your funds will go to provide medical aid via PIH and their Haiti-based partner organization. Any contribution you can make will help to ensure that PIH can continue their work throughout this time of great need.

Photo courtesy of PIH

You can donate a portion or all of your entire unpaid balance as of the end of January. Whether you have a balance of $0.10 or $100 in your account, we invite you to participate within the next week.

As you may expect, there are certain restrictions to donating, and all our normal policies still apply -- so even if you're donating, please don't ask others to click on your ads in order to increase your earnings. For more information on how to participate, visit our donation form.

Posted by Elizabeth Ferdon - AdSense Payments Team
URL: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/02/donate-your-adsense-earnings-to-help.html

[G] Life's a Beach: Google Summer of Code and the Abelian Sandpile Model

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 03:39 PM PST

Google Open Source Blog: Life's a Beach: Google Summer of Code and the Abelian Sandpile Model

The Abelian Sandpile Model (ASM) is a mathematical model of a pile of sand developed by physicists around 1990 to exemplify self-organized criticality, a phenomenon conjecturally ubiquitous in nature. Roughly, self-organized criticality describes a system that naturally evolves into a barely-stable non-equilibrium condition, where the instability is characterized by scale invariance. The Gutenberg-Richter law in geophysics and Zipf's law in linguistics are often sited as real-world examples. More recently, the ASM has been shown to have connections to algebraic geometry, combinatorics, and number theory.

The ASM starts with a graph having a finite number of vertices and edges. One is allowed to place grains of sand on each vertex. If there is enough sand on a vertex, the vertex is allowed to "fire", sending a grain of sand along each out-going edge to its neighboring vertices. These vertices, in turn, may then have enough sand to fire, etc., creating an avalanche. One often designates a "sink" vertex that only absorbs sand. In this case, if each vertex has a edge-path to the sink, any configuration of sand put on the graph will, after a sequence of firings, eventually stabilize. This stable state is independent of the order of the firings.

For his Google Summer of Code™ project, working in consultation with experts in the field, Bryan Head created a state-of-the art Java program to visualize and analyze the ASM. His program includes: a flexible graph editing environment for the creation of sandpiles on arbitrary weighted digraphs; multiple visualization modes in two- and three-dimensions using OpenGL; and an interface to the free open-source mathematical software, Sage, in particular with David Perkinson's Sage Sandpiles software.

This codebase has attracted significant interest from the sandpiles community. Bryan's visualizations are helping researchers develop better mathematical models.



If you are interested in sandpiles, you can download Bryan's program or learn more about ASM.

By: Bart Massey, Google Summer of Code Organization Administrator
URL: http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2010/02/lifes-beach-google-summer-of-code-and.html

[G] WWII historical imagery in Google Earth

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 11:58 AM PST

Google LatLong: WWII historical imagery in Google Earth

Many of us have heard stories, read books and watched films which show the many impacts of WWII across the world. Today we're giving you another way to understand this period in time - by exploring a new set of historical aerial images, taken over European cities during World War II, via the historical imagery feature in Google Earth. They can now be compared directly to images from the present day.

The historical imagery feature gives people a unique perspective on the events of the past using today's latest mapping technology. We hope that this World War II imagery will enable all of us to understand our shared history in a new way and to learn more about the impact of the war on the development of our cities.

Images taken in 1943 show the effect of wartime bombing on more than 35 European towns and cities. Imagery for Warsaw, which was heavily destroyed at the time, is available from both years 1935 and 1945. They remind us all of the devastating impact of war on the people in those cities and also the remarkable way in which urban environments are reconstructed and regenerated over time.

You can explore the German city of Stuttgart, which was subject to over 50 air raids during the War.




Naples was the most bombed in Italian city in WWII and the impact of these attacks can be seen here:



The French city of Lyon was the center of France's resistance movement against the German occupation. See how it was damaged and rebuilt over the years:



Imagery from 1935 and 1945 for Warsaw in Poland is particularly compelling. The city was amongst those most badly damaged in the war and comparisons with today are striking.

Contrast can be seen for example by comparing the imagery of the Historic Centre of Warsaw, a UNESCO World Heritage site, described as an 'outstanding example of a near-total reconstruction of a span of history covering the 13th to the 20th century'. The Royal Castle was completely burned to the ground, for example, and subsequently reconstructed, between 1971-1988.



Read more about one Googler's impressions here.

To access all the imagery for yourself, and compare to the present day cityscape, click the clock icon in the top-level toolbar to activate a time-line in the Google Earth display. Move back in forth in time by dragging the time slider from left to right or by clicking the back/forwards arrows.

Posted by Laura Scott, Google Europe
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2010/02/wwii-historical-imagery-in-google-earth.html

[G] Spotlight on historical imagery: Warsaw in 1935, 1945 and today

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 11:58 AM PST

Google LatLong: Spotlight on historical imagery: Warsaw in 1935, 1945 and today

When I think about Poland, I think about my grandma. Babcia fondly recalled the Polish-American community of her childhood in Yonkers, N.Y., she told stories of traveling to Poland with my uncle, she read out loud the letters she received from our family there, and during Christmas she led aunts, uncles, and cousins in sharing a wafer called opłatek, which prompted hugs and kisses around the table. These are all good memories.

Like many, I have often used Google Earth to explore the world around me. When it comes to Warsaw, Poland, imagery now available from 1935 and 1945 reveals an opportunity to better understand the history of a city destroyed and rebuilt.

I studied the global devastations of World War II in school and read books about history, but the atrocities that took place during the 1930s and '40s bore little resemblance to much of the country I saw when I first visited in 2005. Poland had recently joined the European Union and brimmed with an overarching energy and enthusiasm toward the future, amidst reminders of a history that could not be forgotten. During three weeks spent traveling from Wrocław to Zamość and many places in between, I found myself mired in the contrasts between present and past: mesmerized by the beauty of Kraków, speechless with sorrow at Auschwitz.

In Warsaw, I stayed with cousins, ate plate after plate of pierogi and naleśniki, and explored the parks, squares, markets, and side streets that wove throughout the city. The realities of what had taken place only decades prior struck me powerfully at the Warsaw Rising Museum, which commemorates the resistance of the Polish Home Army. I left horrified and humbled. Four years later, here at Google I met with a representative working on the multimedia efforts of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, set to open in 2012 on the site of the former Warsaw Ghetto. More than anything, we spoke about the fundamental importance of memory and the power of technology for sharing with a community around the world.

The following images are from 1935, 1945, and the present day. Click to enlarge.


The largest ghetto in all of Europe, the Warsaw Ghetto was the site of the deportations and murders of hundreds of thousands of Jewish people between 1940 and 1943, as well as the location of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.


























Founded in 1816, the University of Warsaw is Poland's largest university and the academic centerpiece of the city. Between 1939 and 1944, the university lost a majority of its buildings and collections, and many of its students and professors lost their lives.
























As we view these aerial scenes in Google Earth using the historical imagery time slider, we see the history of Warsaw against a much different landscape today. I think of how many grandparents, like my babcia, have shared stories of their childhoods and families, including memories both good and bad. Images like these help unlock and preserve the past even as we look to the present and the future.

Posted by Sean Carlson, Global Communications & Public Affairs
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2010/02/spotlight-on-historical-imagery-warsaw.html

[G] Bringing log search to the cloud: Introducing Message Log Search for Postini

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 10:41 AM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: Bringing log search to the cloud: Introducing Message Log Search for Postini

Today, we're introducing a new feature for Google Postini Services: Message Log Search. This feature delivers the search and analysis capabilities normally available with on-premise solutions, but without the associated complexity or maintenance.

When messages pass through the Postini service, header and transaction data about these messages is stored in a log. Previously, admins only had access to this data through customer support. With the Message Log Search feature, email administrators can now easily run searches on these logs and drill down to the details about how specific messages were processed.

For example, admins can view the disposition of messages, such as whether a message or group of messages was delivered, quarantined, archived, or encrypted.

Say an admin was checking the delivery status of all inbound emails from Matthew Smith:


Message Log Search returns results which include who received the message, date/time, disposition, and more. Click the image below for full view.


Customers trying a beta version of Message Log Search have found many useful, time-saving applications for the feature. For example, Dave Lugo at Affiliated Computer Systems is "very happy" that Message Log Search helps him track errant emails and easily resolve the "they didn't get it / we didn't get it" tickets he receives from his users. Joe Stark at HeidelbergCement uses log searching to "proactively search for problem senders" and block them entirely from his network.

Other customers have found that the Message Log Search interface is "very fast and responsive," and helps them to determine the effectiveness of new content policies and gain insight into traffic patterns across their organization.

These are a few examples that illustrate the flexibility and power of Message Log Search, and starting today, you can try the feature for yourself. Message Log Search is now available through the Postini service administration console to Postini and Google Apps Premier Edition customers.

For more information on Google Postini Services, please visit www.google.com/postini.

Note: Message Log Search data is managed and stored in Google datacenters pursuant to the privacy and data confidentiality provisions spelled out in our customer agreements. The message security service stores information about messages in a log, such as how it is processed, but does not store the content of messages.

Posted by Gopal Shah, Google Postini team
URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2010/02/bringing-log-search-to-cloud.html

[G] Stand Up for Your Favorite Health Organization

Posted: 04 Feb 2010 07:57 AM PST

YouTube Blog: Stand Up for Your Favorite Health Organization

Today is World Cancer Day, which was created by the World Health Organization to raise awareness about one of the world's leading causes of death. And in an effort to raise awareness of not only cancer, but all major health issues, we're kicking off a health-specific round of Video Volunteers.



You know the drill: just pick a health organization that you care about (or find one on the Video Volunteers channel), make an under-three-minute video promoting their work, and the top three will be featured on the YouTube homepage at the end of the month. Our guest curator this month is musician Jesse McCartney, who took the time to talk about his favorite health org, Stand Up 2 Cancer, and why you should make a video for your health nonprofit of choice:






If you're passionate about raising money to buy malaria nets, want to increase awareness about AIDS/HIV or can help an organization by vlogging about life as a diabetic, we want to see your videos. Submit them at www.youtube.com/videovolunteers by February 23.


Ramya Raghavan, Nonprofits & Activism, recently watched "Pet Adoption - Ditched."


URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/QA-D7XaW0gE/stand-up-for-your-favorite-health.html
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