Thursday, March 3, 2011

Googland

Googland

[G] Hang with Blogger @ SXSW2011

Posted: 03 Mar 2011 12:47 AM PST

Blogger Buzz: Hang with Blogger @ SXSW2011

Posted by Brett Wiltshire

The annual South by Southwest (SXSW) conference in Austin, Texas is just around the corner, and once again Team Blogger will be on the scene and hoping to mingle with as many of you as we possibly can. We'll have a booth set up on the tradeshow floor where we'll be showing off some exciting new things we've been working on, so please come find us at booth 1322 under the giant orange 'B.'

We're also throwing our annual SXSW bash at Six Lounge on Monday, March 14th. We'll have great local music, some goodies to give away, and of course, free booze. And if you come visit us at the tradeshow, we just might have some VIP invites lying around if you mention this post. Doors open at 7 p.m., so come early and avoid the lines.

Please spread the word, and we'll see you in Austin!



URL: http://buzz.blogger.com/2011/03/hang-with-blogger-sxsw2011.html

[G] Cadillac Fairview saves 75% on messaging by switching to Google Apps

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 07:18 PM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: Cadillac Fairview saves 75% on messaging by switching to Google Apps

Editor's Note: We're pleased to welcome guest blogger Scot Adams, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer of Cadillac Fairview. With 40 offices throughout Canada and North America, Cadillac Fairview is one of the largest investors, owners and managers of commercial real estate in North America. With a portfolio valued at $19 billion, Cadillac Fairview and its affiliates own and manage nearly 49 million square feet of leaseable space at 88 properties and it continues to grow. Learn more about other organizations that have gone Google on our community map or test drive life in the cloud with the Go Google Cloud Calculator.

The initial reason we looked at Google Apps was cost savings, but the ongoing value of access to information from anywhere, totally independent of the device, is where we're seeing the real gain. As time progresses my interest is less in providing gear and more in providing access, as an IT guy. What I care about is accessing my information and allowing my employees to do the same.

Prior to switching to Google Apps, we had been providing IBM® Lotus Notes for about $190 per user per year, plus the cost of storage. Google Apps' simple $50 per user per year price tag was very compelling, but providing a great web experience for employees is where we're seeing a lot of the value. We didn't have a Mac client for Lotus Notes and the web mail client was clunky and sluggish. Since moving to Google Apps, we've heard very positive feedback from employees, particularly around speed of delivery and ease of access.

The ability to access information anywhere is also important because about 600 of our 1,800 employees don't work in offices. A lot of our employees are in maintenance, security, janitorial and other "desk-less" positions. Google Apps allows us to provide them with easy access to email, calendar and documents, even though they don't have a traditional office set-up.

From an IT perspective, we no longer have to worry about maintenance windows or managing infrastructure. Google Apps makes our jobs easier. We moved 500 people to Google Apps in 3 weeks and now we have volunteers coming forward to be in the next group to 'go Google'. By the fall, all 1,800 employees will have made the switch. Since most employees already use Gmail at home, training needs have been minimal. We're looking forward to greater things than just cost savings and we believe the organization is ready.

Posted by Scot Adams, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Cadillac Fairview
URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/03/cadillac-fairview-saves-75-on-messaging.html

[G] Now available with Google Apps: User Managed Storage

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 07:18 PM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: Now available with Google Apps: User Managed Storage



Editor's note: Last year we launched an improvement that makes over 60 additional Google services available to Google Apps users. This series showcases what's new and how your organization can benefit.



Welcome to User Managed Storage
As more and more people discover the power and flexibility of creating and collaborating using nothing but the web, an increasing volume of user content is stored in the cloud. As part of our effort to support our users' move into the cloud, we're pleased to announce that over the next couple of days we will be making User Managed Storage available to Google Apps customers.

User Managed Storage is a service that has allowed users to purchase more storage space when they fill the allotted quota on their personal Google Accounts. Over the next couple of days, we will be rolling this service out for users of Google Apps accounts as well, allowing the purchase of extra storage for Google Docs, Picasa Web Albums, and photos from Blogger. Any of these products that is over its storage quota can use the extra storage on a first-come, first-served basis. Users that upload lots of files to Google Docs, sync their Office documents to the cloud using Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office, or store and share pictures using Picasa or Blogger can now expand the storage space available for these files.

Pricing for this service is the same as for personal Google Accounts:

PlanPrice
20 GB$5 USD per year
80 GB$20 USD per year
200 GB$50 USD per year
400 GB$100 USD per year
1 TB$256 USD per year
2 TB$512 USD per year
4 TB$1,024 USD per year
8 TB$2,048 USD per year
16 TB$4,096 USD per year


The User Managed Storage service is enabled or disabled by the domain administrator, and the end user purchases additional storage using his or her Google Checkout account. Additional storage added using User Managed Storage cannot be pooled or transferred to another Google Apps user account and cannot be used for Gmail.

Data stored using User Managed Storage is subject to the same ownership policy as other data in the Google Apps account.

Learn more and get started
User Managed Storage can be enabled by your domain administrator from the Google Apps Control Panel at https://www.google.com/a/[your_domain.com] (replace [your_domain.com] with your actual domain name). Note that the Google Checkout service must also be enabled to allow end users to purchase additional storage. If your organization isn't using Google Apps yet, you can learn more and sign up today at http://www.google.com/apps/more.

For more information please take a look at our Help Center.

We continue to work to enable Google Apps users to be more productive using nothing but the web. Sign up to be notified when additional storage features become available.


Posted by Gaurav Jain, Product Manager, Google Apps

Note: User Managed Storage may not be available in all areas. A Google Checkout account is required to purchase User Managed Storage and Google Checkout must be enabled by the domain administrator.
URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/03/now-available-with-google-apps-user.html

[G] Follow us on @GoogCommerceDev

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 04:21 PM PST

Official Google Checkout Blog: Follow us on @GoogCommerceDev

The Google Commerce APIs team now has a home on Twitter - @GoogCommerceDev! We'll be talking about topics relevant to commerce developers, including updates on Checkout, Product Search, and more. Our tweets will be a mix of developer product announcements, APIs and documentation coverage, developer events, coding tips and tricks, and interesting news and commentary.

If you have any suggestions for what you want to see, feel free to send an @reply or post on our forums. We can't guarantee we'll be able to respond to everyone, but we're looking forward to hearing your feedback and suggestions for @GoogCommerceDev and our Commerce APIs.

Posted by Mihai Ionescu, Commerce Developer Advocate
URL: http://googlecheckout.blogspot.com/2011/03/follow-us-on-googcommercedev.html

[G] Mobile editing in Google Docs now in 45 languages

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 03:13 PM PST

Official Google Mobile Blog: Mobile editing in Google Docs now in 45 languages

Last November, we launched the ability to edit mobile docs in English. Today we're excited to announce that you can now edit your docs on the go in 44 more languages.


To begin editing, visit docs.google.com in your mobile browser, and select a document to edit. Switch from view to edit mode by pressing 'Edit' to turn on the mobile editor and start typing away. As a reminder, mobile editing is available on Android (2.2+) and iOS (version 3.0+) devices. You can learn more about Google Docs for mobile on www.google.com/mobile. As always, feedback in the comments and on the forums is appreciated.


Posted by Carmen Wilkinson, Software Engineer
URL: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/03/mobile-editing-in-google-docs-now-in-45.html

[G] What’s new in Docs: Mobile editing in 45 languages, printing in spreadsheets

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 08:59 AM PST

Docs Blog: What's new in Docs: Mobile editing in 45 languages, printing in spreadsheets

Last year, we launched mobile editing in English and more page sizes in Google documents. We're excited to announce that we've expanded on both of these features this week by adding 44 more mobile editing languages and more print sizes to Google spreadsheets.

Mobile editing now in 45 languages
You can now edit your documents on the go in 45 languages on Android with Froyo (version 2.2) and on iOS devices (version 3.0+) including the iPad. Learn more at mobile.google.com/docs.



More print sizes
Following in the footsteps of last week's hide gridlines update, there are now eight more print sizes in Google spreadsheets, including tabloid, statement, executive, folio and A3, A5, B4 and B5.


As always, feedback in the comments and on the forums is appreciated.

Posted by: Carmen Wilkinson, Software Engineer
URL: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2011/03/whats-new-in-docs-mobile-editing-in-45.html

[G] What’s new in Docs: Mobile editing in 45 languages, printing in spreadsheets

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 08:58 AM PST

Docs Blog: What's new in Docs: Mobile editing in 45 languages, printing in spreadsheets

Last year, we launched mobile editing in English and more page sizes in Google documents. We're excited to announce that we've expanded on both of these features this week by adding 44 more mobile editing languages and more print sizes to Google spreadsheets.

Mobile editing now in 45 languages
You can now edit your documents on the go in 45 languages on Android with Froyo (version 2.2) and on iOS devices (version 3.0+) including the iPad. Learn more at mobile.google.com/docs.



More print sizes
Following in the footsteps of last week's hide gridlines update, there are now eight more print sizes in Google spreadsheets, including tabloid, statement, executive, folio and A3, A5, B4 and B5.


As always, feedback in the comments and on the forums is appreciated.

Posted by: Carmen Wilkinson, Software Engineer
URL: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2011/03/whats-new-in-docs-mobile-editing-in-45.html

[G] From Bermuda to the Bahamas with the Sargasso Sea Expedition

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 01:28 AM PST

Google LatLong: From Bermuda to the Bahamas with the Sargasso Sea Expedition


Have you ever dreamed of setting sail across the Bermuda Triangle? Well, now you can follow the recent MBARI Sargasso Sea Expedition virtually by reading a series of posts from the cruise in Google Earth. To follow this sea expedition, download the complete log kml or visit the Earth Gallery.

MBARI (Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute) researchers and scientists from the University of Hawaii, University of Miami and Stanford University sailed 940 miles (1500 km) from Bermuda to the Bahamas across the North Atlantic Ocean through the Sargasso Sea. Their goal was to better understand this unique ocean habitat which is named for the free-floating brown algae Sargassum (also called "gulf weed") and its associated community of marine life. Under the direction of Chief Scientist Ken Smith, the expedition team measured biodiversity and the impacts of climate change and carbon cycling to this ecosystem. They also learned more about deep ocean animals.

See a school of eels swarming around bait anchored to the sea floor.

The mission is the second voyage for the Schmidt Ocean Institute ship, Lone Ranger, whose Facebook page you can follow here, a former ocean tug that has been retrofitted for cutting-edge science investigations.

You can follow the MBARI Expedition Logbook to read a day by day account of the Expedition.

Posted by Jenifer Foulkes, Product Manager, the Ocean in Google Earth & Maps
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2011/03/from-bermuda-to-bahamas-with-sargasso.html

[G] Pedaling to new places with Street View

Posted: 02 Mar 2011 01:28 AM PST

Google LatLong: Pedaling to new places with Street View


Street View enables you to visit places around the world virtually, from the scenic Champs-Elysées in Paris to bustling Times Square in New York City. We're able to collect imagery of most of these places with a car, but when we find an interesting place that a car can't reach, we get more creative.

In 2009 we introduced the Trike, a modified bicycle outfitted with Street View equipment, to visit these locations, from towering castles to picturesque gardens. The Trike team has been pedaling around the world, and today we've added more of these unique places to Street View in Google Maps.

With the Trike we're able to take you inside the grounds of historic locations like the Château de Chenonceaux in Civray-de-Touraine, France.



In addition to historic sites, you can also view beautiful outdoor scenery of places like the National Botanic Gardens in Dublin.



You can now see 360-degree panoramic images of these gardens at the San Diego Art Institute, as well as several other gorgeous spots in Balboa Park in San Diego, California.


To continue exploring these and other beautiful and historic places around the world, we encourage you to visit Street View in Google Maps. If you are the owner of a private property and would to make your location available for users to explore in Street View, please visit this site to learn about our partner program.

Posted by Jeremy Pack, Software Engineer
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2011/02/pedaling-to-new-places-with-street-view.html

[G] Dig deeper into call metrics with new detailed call reports

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 08:20 PM PST

Inside AdWords: Dig deeper into call metrics with new detailed call reports

Back in November, we announced call metrics, a new AdWords feature that lets you generate and measure phone calls directly from your ads.

Since then, we've heard from many of you that while it's useful to see the number of calls generated by each campaign, you'd also like to view details about individual calls.

Today we're happy to announce new detailed call reports that show you specific metrics about each individual call that your campaign has received since call metrics was enabled, including:
  • Call start time
  • Call end time
  • Call duration
  • Call status (missed or received)
  • Caller area code

To view detailed reports about each call, you'll need to first enable the Dimensions tab in your account. Click here for instructions. Once you've enabled the Dimensions tab, click View and select Call metrics calls to open the detailed call report.


While detailed call reports let you dive deeper into the individual calls you've received, you'll still be able to view aggregated call reports for each campaign on the Campaigns tab. These metrics include total number of calls, received calls, missed calls, total call duration, and average call duration.

Note that call metrics is only available to a limited number of US advertisers. To learn more about call metrics or request the feature in your account, visit Google Ad Innovations.

Posted by Lisa Shieh, Inside AdWords crew
URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com/2011/03/dig-deeper-into-call-metrics-with-new.html

[G] The media, and the Internet, in Afghanistan

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 05:52 PM PST

YouTube Blog: The media, and the Internet, in Afghanistan

Editor's note: Steve was part of a Google/YouTube delegation that went to Afghanistan two weeks ago to examine the state of media and web content in Afghanistan, and to explore opportunities to improve the country's access to Google products and platforms.

When Pari Akbar started her blog, Millaad, to address women's issues in Afghanistan, she had no idea it would lose her her job. But as the young Afghan blogger slowly built an audience for topics ranging from the fundamental (voting rights for women) to the academic (the linguistic repression of women through semantic structures in Dari) she began to draw the ire of her co-workers at her government job in Kabul. Though they had no formal authority to do so, many of them told her to stop blogging. When she wouldn't, the physical threats began. Soon, Akbar didn't feel safe at work anymore -- but she didn't want to stop publishing. She left her secure government job and kept on writing.

Akbar was one of about a dozen bloggers we met on a recent tour of Afghanistan, sponsored by the Department of Defense, to examine the content landscape in the region and look for ways to develop and promote more local media in the country. Her story is emblematic of the country's efforts to develop a media sector since the Taliban left power. A new class of journalists and media entrepreneurs are flooding the market, working to hold the Afghan government accountable and build Afghanistan's Fourth Estate -- but formal and informal challenges remain.

While the Taliban is no longer hanging TVs from trees in an attempt to intimidate people from consuming media, journalistic freedom remains a challenge in Afghanistan. In 2009, the Karzai government passed a media law that forbids any coverage of events that "jeopardizes national security", a vaguely-worded edict that allows the government to shut down any media coverage they don't like; which they did, for example, in the wake of protests following the parliamentary elections last fall. Most journalists we met with in Kabul and Herat expressed frustration over the challenges they face in covering the Afghan government; there is simply not a culture of a free press in Afghanistan yet.

There is, however, a tremendous thirst for information. 90% of people listen to the radio every day, and even though only 30% of Afghans have electricity, 60% say they watch television daily (using generators or community viewing locations). The clear media leader on broadcast is ToloTV, a network run by an entrepreneurial Afghan named Saad Mohensi who has strong ties to American media and has built an impressive news network with 60% market share in just 5 years. "We see part of our job as facilitating social change," says Mohensi. One of his most popular programs is "Afghan Star", a local version of "American Idol" and has produced great local talent and grown a sizable audience.



The U.S. government has moved to support Afghan media enterprises with funding for programming from the State Department and USAID. In some cases, that means directly funding programs that promote values critical to building a strong Afghan society, such as the ToloTV drama, "Eagle Four", a knock-off of the "24" that features corruption-fighting cops. In other cases, it means funding media efforts intended to build local news organizations from the ground up. Internews, a global nonprofit focused on media growth, has a 22 million dollar grant from USAID to develop a series of multimedia centers across Afghanistan in 2011, teaching Afghan journalists about the web and how to use it. Internews biggest success has been their radio network, Salam Watandar ("Hello, Countrymen"), which broadcasts from 43 local stations across the country. One of its most popular shows, "Seek and Search", is essentially a Google call-in show: viewers call in with questions, which the hosts (who have broadband access) type into Google and then deliver the answer over the air.


Salam Watandar, or "Hello, Countrymen!", a program of the U.S. nonprofit Internews

The greenfield for media development is the web. However, broadband access is both paltry and exorbitantly expensive: estimates put penetration at about 1%, and the cost is $2,000 per megabit, making the web prohibitively expensive for most Afghan families. A new fiber optic backbone is currently under construction that should alleviate that somewhat, so long as the telcos pass along the savings to consumers. Foreign investors are taking notice of the opportunities in the Afghan IT sector, pouring $1.6 billion into the marketplace, more than any other industry in the country.

After decades of war, Afghanistan is a splintered nation and Afghans have come to expect inconsistency. The Internet, and a strong media, has a unique opportunity to bring Afghans together around a shared identity and an understanding of the opportunities they have to engage the world and the global economy.

Steve Grove, YouTube News and Politics, recently watched "Afghan Star Finals - Shekib Hamdard."


URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/3BCiwgSHcC0/media-and-internet-in-afghanistan.html

[G] Known Issue: Problems connecting Twitter accounts in Socialize

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 05:02 PM PST

The FeedBurner Status Blog: Known Issue: Problems connecting Twitter accounts in Socialize

Issue: Users who try to connect their Twitter account to their Google account receive an error message. We are looking into the source of this problem. Delivery should be working properly for accounts that are already connected.
URL: http://feedburnerstatus.blogspot.com/2011/03/known-issue-problems-connecting-twitter.html

[G] Honeycomb Buzzes On In

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 01:59 PM PST

Official Google Mobile Blog: Honeycomb Buzzes On In

Yesterday morning, a tasty treat arrived on our campus. And what better way to welcome Honeycomb to the Android family than with redecorating the lawn of Building 44 a bit?



Posted by Andy Rubin, VP of Android Engineering
URL: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/03/honeycomb-buzzes-on-in.html

[G] Earn additional revenue from AdSense for search

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 07:35 AM PST

Inside AdSense: Earn additional revenue from AdSense for search

Online readers have a very short attention span. You might be able to get users to your content, but what if they can't quickly find what they're looking for? That's why it's important to make sure that the users who come to your site actually stay there.

The solution is AdSense for search. This free, easy to implement product lets you place a Google search box on your website. It provides an additional layer of interactivity for your users, while helping you generate additional earnings from ads on the customizable search results page.

Here are some of our favorite AdSense for search features:

Site search: Allow users to search directly within your site to find the information they're looking for without leaving your site.

Vertical search: Allow your users to search across multiple sites you select, including related sites you think users might find relevant or a network of sites that you own.

Keywords: You can use keywords to make search results more relevant to your audience and your site content. For instance, if you own a website about Pilates, you can enter keywords such as "exercise," "fitness," "meditation," and "pilates." As a result, when a user searches for "equipment," the ads that appear will be specifically related to Pilates, rather than to any other types of equipment.

Ad location: You can optimize the location of your ads on search result pages. We recommend placing ads at the top and along the right-hand side, as we've found that this layout increases visibility and revenue.

Are you ready to give AdSense for search a try? You can find all the information you'll need to set up AdSense for search here, or watch the video below to learn more!



Posted by Miguel Romar - AdSense Optimization Specialist
URL: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2011/03/earn-additional-revenue-from-adsense.html

[G] AdSense in Your City is coming to Charlotte

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 07:35 AM PST

Inside AdSense: AdSense in Your City is coming to Charlotte

In 2010 we kicked off the AdSense in Your City program by visiting and optimizing more than 400 publishers in six different US cities. We loved getting to meet you face to face, and are very excited to head down South this March to provide even more of you with personalized optimization tips!

On Wednesday, March 9, a few of our optimizers will be in Charlotte, North Carolina to hold 20-minute optimization sessions at a local coffee shop between 9:30 am and 4:30 pm. We're going to keep it casual, so we can provide one-on-one consultations to as many of you as possible.

We'd love to meet you, so please fill out this form if you'll be in the Charlotte, NC area on March 9 and would like to schedule an appointment with our team. Once we get your RSVP, we'll follow up via email with additional details if there's still room. Scheduling will be done on a first-come, first-served basis, but we'll do our best to include as many of you as space will allow.

Hope to see you in Charlotte!

Posted by Katrina Kurnit - Inside AdSense team
URL: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2011/02/adsense-in-your-city-is-coming-to.html

[G] Slicing and dicing data for interactive visualization

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 06:29 AM PST

Official Google Research Blog: Slicing and dicing data for interactive visualization

Posted by Benjamin Yolken, Google Public Data Product Manager

A year ago, we introduced the Google Public Data Explorer, a tool that allows users to interactively explore public-interest datasets from a variety of influential sources like the World Bank, IMF, Eurostat, and the US Census Bureau. Today, users can visualize over 300 metrics across 31 datasets, including everything from labor productivity (OECD) to Internet speed (Ookla) to gender balance in parliaments (UNECE) to government debt levels (IMF) to population density by municipality (Statistics Catalonia), with more data being added every week.

Last week, as part of the launch of our dataset upload interface, we released one of the key pieces of technology behind the product: the Dataset Publishing Language (DSPL). We created this format to address a key problem in the Public Data Explorer and other, similar tools, namely, that existing data formats don't provide enough information to support easy yet powerful data exploration by non-technical users.

DSPL addresses this by adding an additional layer of metadata on top of the raw, tabular data in a dataset. This metadata, expressed in XML, describes the concepts in the dataset, for instance "country", "gender", "population", and "unemployment", giving descriptions, URLs, formatting properties, etc. for each. These concepts are then referenced in slices, which partition the former into dimensions (i.e., categories) and metrics (i.e., quantitative values) and link them with the underlying data tables (provided in CSV format). This structure, along with some additional metadata, is what allows us to provide rich, interactive dataset visualizations in the Public Data Explorer.

With the release of DSPL, we hope to accelerate the process of making the world's datasets searchable, visualizable, and understandable, without requiring a PhD in statistics. We encourage you to read more about the format and try it yourself, both in the Public Data Explorer and in your own software. Stay tuned for more DSPL extensions and applications in the future!
URL: http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2011/02/slicing-and-dicing-data-for-interactive.html

[G] Mentoring Organization Applications Now Being Accepted for Google Summer of Code!

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 06:08 AM PST

Google Open Source Blog: Mentoring Organization Applications Now Being Accepted for Google Summer of Code!

Interested in finding bright, enthusiastic new contributors to your open source project? Apply to be a mentoring organization in our Google Summer of Code program. We are now accepting applications from open source projects interested in acting as mentoring organizations.

Now in its 7th year, Google Summer of Code is a program designed to pair university students from around the world with mentors at open source projects in such varied fields as academia, language translations, content management systems, games, and operating systems. Since 2005, over 4,500 students from 85 countries have completed the Google Summer of Code program with the support of over 300 mentoring organizations. Students earn a stipend for their work during the program, allowing students to gain exposure to real-world software development and an opportunity for employment in areas related to their academic pursuits, thus "flipping bits, not burgers" during their school break. In return, mentoring organizations have the opportunity to identify and attract new developers to their projects and these students often continue their work with the organizations after Google Summer of Code concludes.

This year we're excited to expand the scope of the program by encouraging experienced Google Summer of Code mentoring organizations to refer newer, smaller organizations they think could benefit from the program to apply to be mentoring organizations.

The deadline for applying to be a mentoring organization for Google Summer of Code is Friday, March 11th at 23:00 UTC (3pm PST). The list of accepted organizations will be posted on the Google Summer of Code site on Friday, March 18th. Students will then have 10 days to reach out to the accepted organizations and discuss their ideas before we begin accepting student applications on March 28th.

Please visit our Frequently Asked Questions page for more details. You can also check out the Mentor Manual and timeline for additional information. Good luck to all of our mentoring organization applicants!

By Stephanie Taylor, Open Source Team
URL: http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2011/02/mentoring-organization-applications-now.html
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Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Googland

Googland

[G] Get in touch faster with new Gmail Contacts for Google Apps

Posted: 01 Mar 2011 04:04 AM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: Get in touch faster with new Gmail Contacts for Google Apps

In our ever-connected world, working revolves around collaborating. It's important to be able to quickly reach people in your network, speeding up the tasks you perform daily, like making a phone call or sending an email – whether you're at your desk or on the go. To help with this, we're rolling out an updated version of Contacts that makes it easier to use, organize and edit your work contacts in Gmail.

In addition to all of the improvements we made to Contacts for individual users, we've been hard at work on bringing additional, business-specific features to help you and your colleagues get in touch with contacts more easily. Now, you can:
  • Add new contact information that will default to "Work" instead of "Home" field types
  • View contact details from the domain directory together with the contact details that you've added yourself
  • Add contacts from the domain directory to your "My Contacts" list in a single click
  • Manage groups more easily by quickly adding email addresses to groups, and picking from a contact's multiple email addresses to use on a group-by-group basis
  • Revert changes to your Contacts for up to 30 days in case you need to restore deleted or merged contacts, or undo an import

If you're the Google Apps administrator for your organization, you can enable the new Contacts interface in Gmail for your users from the Service Settings > Contacts area of the next generation administrative control panel. It may take up to an hour for users to see the difference once you make the change.

Make collaboration easier today by switching to the new Gmail Contacts (and once you do, be sure to contact us with your feedback).

Posted by Sean Purcell, Product Manager, Google Contacts
URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/02/get-in-touch-faster-with-new-gmail.html

[G] Gmail back soon for everyone

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 07:04 PM PST

Official Gmail Blog: Gmail back soon for everyone

Posted by Ben Treynor, VP Engineering and Site Reliability Czar (24x7)

Imagine the sinking feeling of logging in to your Gmail account and finding it empty. That's what happened to 0.02% of Gmail users yesterday, and we're very sorry. The good news is that email was never lost and we've restored access for many of those affected. Though it may take longer than we originally expected, we're making good progress and things should be back to normal for everyone soon.

I know what some of you are thinking: how could this happen if we have multiple copies of your data, in multiple data centers? Well, in some rare instances software bugs can affect several copies of the data. That's what happened here. Some copies of mail were deleted, and we've been hard at work over the last 30 hours getting it back for the people affected by this issue.

To protect your information from these unusual bugs, we also back it up to tape. Since the tapes are offline, they're protected from such software bugs. But restoring data from them also takes longer than transferring your requests to another data center, which is why it's taken us hours to get the email back instead of milliseconds.

So what caused this problem? We released a storage software update that introduced the unexpected bug, which caused 0.02% of Gmail users to temporarily lose access to their email. When we discovered the problem, we immediately stopped the deployment of the new software and reverted to the old version.

As always, we'll post a detailed incident report outlining what happened to the Apps Status Dashboard, as well as the corrective actions we're taking to help prevent it from occurring again. If you were affected by this issue, it's important to note that email sent to you between 6:00 PM PST on February 27 and 2:00 PM PST on February 28 was likely not delivered to your mailbox, and the senders would have received a notification that their messages weren't delivered.

Thanks for bearing with us as we fix this, and sorry again for the scare.
URL: http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/gmail-back-soon-for-everyone.html

[G] Ad Preview and Diagnosis: Together at Last

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 04:15 PM PST

Inside AdWords: Ad Preview and Diagnosis: Together at Last

We recently introduced a new version of the Ad Preview Tool that integrates ad diagnosis: instead of simply showing you a preview of the search results for a given keyword, the tool now also tells you if your ad is showing for that search. If not, you can see the reason why.

Now that you can preview and diagnose your ads in a single location, we're retiring the separate Ads Diagnostic Tool and directing you to the Preview Tool instead. We'll consolidate names too; you'll see a single Ad Preview & Diagnosis tool under your account's Reporting and Tools tab in the future.

Over the last several months, we've also worked to integrate diagnosis options directly into your Campaigns tab. If you've been using the Ads Diagnostic Tool option to diagnose many keywords at once, don't worry -- you can find it without leaving your Keywords tab! Just click "Diagnose keywords..." under the "More actions" menu to get integrated diagnosis results directly on the page:


To interpret the distribution of results more quickly, click the "Filter results" link, then "Show diagnostic status" in the filter panel that opens. This will open additional filter options that are specific to the results returned by a diagnosis. Here, we've used filters to focus only on keywords that aren't triggering ads due to budget, bid, or Quality Score issues:

With filters, it's easy to focus on a specific set of issues and then make the necessary changes to get ads back up and running!

You can find more information on the integrated keyword diagnosis feature in our announcement from last summer, or visit our Help Center for additional details.

Posted by Dan Friedman, Inside AdWords crew
URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com/2011/02/ad-preview-and-diagnosis-together-at.html

[G] Optical Character Recognition (OCR) in 34 languages

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 01:59 PM PST

Docs Blog: Optical Character Recognition (OCR) in 34 languages

Last June, we introduced the ability to upload documents into Google Docs using Optical Character Recognition (OCR). OCR analyzes images and PDF files, typically produced by a scanner (or the camera of a mobile phone), extracts text and some formatting and allows you to edit the document in Google Docs.

We've gotten a lot of feedback on this feature, and one of the biggest requests was to add support for additional languages. Today, we're happy to announce that we've added support for 29 additional character sets, including those used in most European languages, Russian, Chinese Simplified and some other Asian languages. See the upload page for the full list.

How does it work? When uploading your images and PDF files using Google Docs, tell us what language your documents are in:

Hit upload, and we'll use this information to search for the right characters in your file. As usual, you will get best results with sharp, high-resolution images or PDF files. This update will also result in an improvement in OCR quality for languages that we've supported previously (English, French, Italian, German, Spanish). We've also made improvements to the way we import formatting from your documents, and are now doing a better job in preserving font and alignment information.


We'll keep adding languages and at at the same time will continue to improve speed and accuracy for the existing ones. In the meantime, we hope you take advantage of this new way to import your data into Google Docs.

Posted by Jaron Schaeffer, Software Engineer
URL: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2011/02/optical-character-recognition-ocr-in-34.html

[G] Showcasing photos from people you care about

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 11:40 AM PST

Google Photos Blog: Showcasing photos from people you care about

Posted by Ping Chen, Software engineer

Over the past few days, we've been testing a new Picasa Web Albums layout that does a better job of of updating you with new and inspiring photos. Based on the positive response we've received, we're now rolling out this new homepage for everyone.


This new design centers around photos that are interesting to you. We wanted to give you faster access to the newest photos from your family and friends along with some great photos from the talented Picasa community.

When you log in to Picasa Web Albums, you will not only see your own albums, but albums that have been shared with you, the latest public albums from people you follow, and featured photos from the Picasa community right on your home page.

Go to picasaweb.google.com now to begin exploring your new homepage.
URL: http://googlephotos.blogspot.com/2011/02/showcasing-photos-from-people-you-care.html
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