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Google says it is building Chrome OS because it wants to improve the experience of using a computer. Of course, getting more people to spend their lives online and searching can't hurt.
July 9, 2009
links for 2009-07-09
July 7, 2009
links for 2009-07-07
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I am not sure that I can live in a world where google is no longer in beta. Does this mean the feature development and release cycle will length or will we continue getting new features every Tuesday?
June 29, 2009
links for 2009-06-29
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A good reference on how to manage redirects using an htaccess file
Becoming A Gmail Ninja
Recently, Gmail put out a set of tips on using Gmail optimally. We are considering it as one of the handouts for the digging deeper with Google sessions we are offering to college employees this summer. As part of that review process I found a few tricks that I started to use this afternoon. As a result I am leaving today with a clean inbox and a compact Google Apps interface.
I hope I can defeat my opponent and earn the green belt at the next gathering. I am worried, I hear my opponent is Ralph Macchio.
June 28, 2009
links for 2009-06-28
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What a great program. I hope it is successful
June 26, 2009
Emails and Event Inviations
We are rolling people into Google Apps this summer and have had a few growing pains with scheduling meetings as people switch from MeetingMaker to Google Apps Calendar.
The link in the compose message window that allows you to add an event invitation that will go in to your calendar and send an invitation that can easily be brought into a calendar has helped to ease the growing pains. That being said I just made the connect that when you make an event invitation in this way it also brings the email conversations into the event’s description -
This is fantastic! But also a reminder to be cautious with your email conversations. They might be available to those who weren’t meant to see it…
April 27, 2009
Email Inquiry – Chat Discussion – Chat History Added To Conversation
Last week, I received an inquiry from a colleague thinking through how much energy should be given to a particular piece of a larger project. I did not get to respond to the email at that moment as I knew it would take two or three email messages to get to a decision so I left it for when I had hoped to see him face to face. The face to face never happened so it was still sitting in my inbox this afternoon when I went for my regular afternoon email session. I noticed my colleague was available via chat thanks to the 
link at the bottom of the original message. I figured that things would be more efficient as we could exchange information and clarify understand all at once and be done with it. This was true but there was the unforeseen advantage to have the message and our chat conversation available all in the same window which also provided efficiencies (at least for me, I am not sure if google chat pulls up the message in question on to my colleague’s screen or not. I will need to ask him). It was very helpful not to have to toggle between my mail and IM windows to check facts of the original messsage. This is what I was looking at when I was chatting.
The integrated email and IM produced another efficiency – a log of the conversation that we had was associated with the original email message saving the step of confirming what was determined in the chat session in a follow-up email.
I also double checked there is a way to have conversations ‘off the record’ for the few conversations that would need such a feature. I did not see a way to Reply All by Chat – nor do I know if I think such an option would be useful at this point.
April 24, 2009
Web Clips – They Ain’t Google Reader Or Advertisements
When we I got my first look at our instance of Google Apps at Allegheny I was confused at how we could have the advertisements turned off but still be getting ads across the heading of mail boxes. It took a second to figure out that the weren’t ads but headlines from preloaded RSS feeds. Google calls them web clips and I freely admit I don’t have much use for what was loaded by default. I do like the option to add my own feeds and have headlines from the past week scroll through.
Directly about my inbox messages (see area within the red box – sorry those who might be using a screen reader or color blind) I receive the most current headlines for a few select sites. I have been careful to put only certain types of news in there mainly campus news and sites related to google apps.
My Web Clips
I really like how I configured this as I very rarely go to the sites intentionally to read the news. By having it as “intentional noise” around something I pay attention to more regularly, I am more informed about what is going on on campus. I really hoped that we would be able to pre-populate some feeds but this does not seem possible. (If anyone has figured out how to control this at the enterprise level it would be great to know. ) This will be something to include in our overviews of Google Apps sessions this summer.
April 22, 2009
links for 2009-04-22
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For some reason I am having a hard time not buying one of these for my office.
April 16, 2009
links for 2009-04-16
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An idea for a personal video conferencing device as an option for video conferencing.
