Official Google Blog |
| Posted: 25 Mar 2011 04:47 PM PDT This is part of a regular series of posts on search experience updates that runs on Fridays. Look for the label "This week in search" and subscribe to the series. - Ed. Time is a precious commodity for most of us. To save you more precious seconds as you search, we've introduced Google Instant in Places View and redesigned the Google Search app for iPhone for faster, easier searching—whether you're on your way out or already on the go. Instant for Places View As part of our ongoing effort to give you the Instant experience everywhere on Google, this week we've enabled Instant in Places View so you can find where you want to go even more quickly. To get to Places View, click "Places" in the left-hand panel; once you're there, any search you perform will have place and map results that update as you type. We'll continue to expand Instant to all views, languages and domains over the next few months.  Google Search app for iPhone The redesigned Google Search app for iPhone, formerly known as Google Mobile App, improves the Google search experience on iOS mobile devices, giving you intuitive gesture controls. First, when browsing through search results or looking at a webpage, you can swipe down to see the search bar to type in a new query or change your settings.  The redesigned home screen of Google Search app There's also a new toolbar that makes it easier for you to filter your results—for example, if you only want to see images or shopping results. You can open this toolbar by swiping from left to right.  The toolbar helps you filter your results Plus, now it's easier to pick up searching where you left off. If you leave the app and come back later, you'll be able to get back to exactly where you were by tapping on the lower part of the page. To use the Google Search app, download or update it in the iTunes App Store. Search in Cherokee (ᏣᎳᎩ) With translation help from the Cherokee Nation staff and community members, we've added Cherokee (ᏣᎳᎩ) as an interface language on Google. You can set Cherokee as your default from the Language Tools page (available to the right of the search box). We've also included an on-screen Cherokee keyboard—which you can access by clicking the icon at the right side of the search box—for people who don't have a physical Cherokee keyboard.       |
| Google Apps highlights – 3/25/2011 Posted: 25 Mar 2011 02:08 PM PDT This is part of a regular series of Google Apps updates that we post every couple of weeks. Look for the label "Google Apps highlights" and subscribe to the series. - Ed. We've been busy over the last few weeks adding better discussion tools to Google Docs, improving collaboration within traditional productivity software and making it faster and easier to work with information in your email inbox. Google Apps administrators can also now view detailed information about how their users are being more productive with our collaboration tools, and control how quickly new features are released to their organizations. Better discussions in Google documents Productive discussions can help teams write better documents, and last Wednesday we introduced improvements to how you can converse about documents within Google Docs. Profile pictures and timestamps make it easy to see who made a comment and when, and you can direct a comment to someone using an @mention. You can follow discussions with notifications right in your inbox—and even continue a discussion from your inbox by replying to the notification email. Instead of deleting a discussion when it's wrapped up to remove clutter, you can now mark discussions as resolved so you can go back later and see how the discussion played out. Data filtering, new chart options and more in Google spreadsheets We've added a heap of frequently requested features to Google spreadsheets over the last few weeks. First, you can now filter spreadsheet data to hone in on rows that match criteria you set as filter options. For example, a sales manager could choose to view transactions processed by Peter and Phil, but not those managed by Andrew, Cindy and the rest of the sales team.   We've also improved charting in spreadsheets by making it possible to plot non-contiguous data. Multiple chart ranges help you create great charts without rearranging your data.   In addition, you can now hide cell gridlines or entire sheets in Google spreadsheets—giving your spreadsheets a cleaner look by removing extraneous formatting and data from view until you need it at a later time.   Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office As we continue to add functionality to Google Docs, many people are finding that that they no longer need software-based word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software. And now we also have an alternative for people who want streamlined collaboration but aren't quite ready for 100% web productivity tools. Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office brings multi-person editing, automatic backup and complete revision history to Microsoft Word®, Excel® and PowerPoint® in Microsoft Office® 2003, 2007 and 2010. By bringing this functionality to existing versions of Microsoft Office, organizations can work more efficiently with the software that they've already paid for and implemented. Smart Labels in Gmail Labs Chances are, you get lots of email from newsletters, group mailing lists, account alerts and other automated systems. These messages aren't spam, but they're probably not your most important emails either. To help you separate and organize these kinds of messages, we introduced the Smart Labels feature in Gmail Labs. Once you turn on this feature from the Labs tab in Gmail settings, Gmail will automatically categorize incoming Bulk, Forum and Notification messages and label them appropriately, removing clutter in your inbox to help your most important messages stand out.  Improved attachment viewing in Gmail We've also made viewing attachments in Gmail faster, easier, more affordable and more secure by adding browser-based attachment viewing for 12 more file types: .XLS, .XLSX, .PPTX, .PAGES, .AI, .PSD, .DXF, .SVG, .EPS, .PS, .TTF and .XPS. So instead of downloading attachments and then opening files with software you may or may not have for each format, you can just click the "View" link next to the attachment in Gmail. This will instantly display the attachment in your browser—no software required.  Collaboration dashboard for Google Apps customers To help customers see the productivity benefits of Google Apps at a glance, we recently introduced a new collaboration dashboard. From the Google Apps administrative control panel, IT managers can view insights about how their users are working together with Google Docs. This dashboard offers a new level of transparency that traditional software can't offer, and we think this kind of information will help businesses invest in technologies that actually get put to use, not software that—according to customers—sometimes sits idle after being installed.  New Google Apps release process Our customers love Google Apps for lots of reasons, but the ability to rapidly get new features—like the ones described in this post—without having to install complex patches or upgrades rises to the top. Instead of large, disruptive batches of new features that only come every few years, people see a continuous stream of better functionality week after week. Still, some customers with more complex IT environments have asked for a bit more advanced notice so they can prepare for what's coming. For these organizations, we've introduced a new release process for Google Apps features. Customers can choose to get new features immediately when they're available, or have at least a week to prepare for new features after they're initially introduced. Along with this new choice, we've launched whatsnew.googleapps.com, where customers can learn more about new features in the process of being released. Who's gone Google? The pace of new customers coming onto Google Apps continues to accelerate among schools, businesses and other organizations. In the world of education, we're happy to welcome the University of Alberta, Anhanguera Educational and thousands of other schools to Google Apps. In fact, over 50 percent of the NCAA® Championship bracket has gone Google! We also invite you to read how businesses and government agencies including Dominion Enterprises, Macomb County Circuit Court and Clerk, Revevol, Mad Genius, Cadillac Fairview, Sun Windows, Hammock and The Standard Agency are saving money and helping workers be more productive with Google Apps, joining more than 3 million other businesses that have gone Google. I hope these product updates and customer stories help you and your organization get even more from Google Apps. For more details and the latest news, check out the Google Apps Blog.     |
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