TECHTIFIED » google

Google Testing Voice Integration Into Gmail As A VOIP Service

techtified — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 13:49:34 +0000

It sure comes as a bit surprising news keeping in view that Google has been working extensively to compete with and outgrow the VOIP providers but it sure is good news for the Gmail users. Alex Chitu from Google OS blogged that Google are in the process of testing Full-on voice integration with Gmail.

There are certain subtle changes in the UI. Soon, it is believed, we will be able to make Google voice calls right from within the mail box. A new phone icon appears loaded with a dialpad and contact list. It also shows credit balance and a call button.

Image source

The new feature will allow the users to make calls over the internet instead of having to use a mobile or logging on to the Google Phone’s website. It is also rumored that a desktop application is also in the pipeline as was reported by Techcrunch some time ago.

Google to hand over Wi-Fi data to European authorities

techtified — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 13:57:59 +0000

German authorities were enraged last week when Google failed to hand over Wi-Fi data it had collected while taking images for its street view service. Google responded by stating that such a hand over had legal implications and it needed to review. This led the German data protection supervisor to hint a possible legal investigation against Google.

Now a week after the whole situation came to the limelight Google had finished reviewing the data and is ready to hand it over to European regulators in an attempt to avoid any further controversy. The relevant authorities in France, Germany and Italy will be the first to receive the data.

“We screwed up. Let’s be very clear about that, If you are honest about your mistakes it is the best defence for it not happening again”, told Google CEO Eric Schmidt, while talking to Financial Times.

According to Schmidt disciplinary action is underway against the engineer who wrote the impertinent code.

GMail sweatshirts anyone?

techtified — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 13:29:12 +0000

GMail, which keeps you connected will now keep you warm too. Google just added these cool sweatshirts to its Google Store, these full zip hooded jacket with the Gmail logo come at a price of 41.75$.

This is how the store have advertised the hoody,

Stay warm in this stylish American Apparel fitted, yet sporty, unisex hoody. The hoody is made of Flex Fleece (50% Polyester / 50% Cotton Fleece) construction. It also features a metal zipper and drawcord in white, a perfect contrast for the grey hoodie. Comes in asphalt with a full color Gmail logo embroidered on the left chest.

Anyone else want to poke the guy in the chest to load up a GMail window?

Twitter is ‘greener’ than Google, reports suggest

techtified — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 21:15:10 +0000

Believe it or not you are destroying the environment by tweeting and what’s even more incredible is the fact that Googling stuff is worse for the environment compared to tweeting. Strange as it may sound, Raffi Krikorian, a developer working for twitter, has come up with some numbers which suggest that you should be spending more time on twitter and less time googling if you are concerned about your carbon footprint.

According to the stats, every 140 character tweet consumes approximately 90 Joules which amounts to 0.02 grams of Co2. Now, a total of 50million tweets/day on average works out to be around a metric ton of Co2.

On the other hand, a single Google search, consumes about 1Kilo Joules and that amounts to 0.2 grams of Co2. Google surely has the clear edge when it comes to destroying the planet. But that does not (and would not) change the fact that many of us can get by completely without one and not the other.

Here is a NSFW video of what Krikorian had to say on the matter. Skip to the 3 minute mark for the relevant topic.

Goolge to help you find people you might want to follow on Twitter

techtified — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 19:21:31 +0000

Google has shaken hands with twitter to roll out a service named “Follow Finder” that will help people on twitter to find out other people who they might be interested in or share similar interests on the basis of their twitter followers and following.

To use the service, enter your twitter username on the follow finder page. Google will then look through your follower list and the people who you are following and similarly assess the accounts that are interlinked. It then dishes out a list of people who are connected to each other on twitter, the ones you are not connected to directly appear on the result page.

So, this is a pretty handy tool if you want to find more people on twitter who are interested in things you do, links you share and things you say like to say about yourself or your profession for that matter.

Search Faster Than Google With ‘Heapr’

techtified — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:28:43 +0000

Search engine aggregators which combine results from multiple sites are nothing that new, but Heapr.com combines the expected Google results with Twitter, Wolfram Alpha and Wikipedia for a pretty contemporary mix of results. Searches are completed ON KEY PRESS which allows for a faster, more fluid user experience.

Click to visit the search page

Heapr presents Google-generated results on the left-hand side of the screen, while you can choose between the other sources at right. Arguably, Wolfram Alpha’s the most interesting addition, since Wikipedia results often show up high in Google anyway, though in practice Wolfram can’t cope well with many standard searches.

Additionally, Heapr provides Google image results along side Flickr image results and allows you to query YouTube, Hulu, and Vimeo videos together.

A browser plugin for Firefox, Chrome, and IE users is provided.

Check out the site at http://www.heapr.com

Google fails to renew operational license in China

techtified — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 16:03:39 +0000

Google’s internet content provider license to work in China has expired and the company has failed to renew its license.

This was always on the horizon as Google’s response to continued firewall blockages from the Chinese government. The license was valid till 31st March and allowed Google to serve as an internet content and services provider but now that the license has expired Google has finally made its ambitions clear that it will no longer bear with “The Great Firewall” imposed in mainland China. Although Google can still function from its hong kong, that is where Google moved it search service, that is google.com.hk.

It has to be noted though, that Google can still work on research, development and sales of its android phone inside China as well as proved its advertising services to webpages with chinese origin.

Google services in China : A summary

techtified — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 10:11:23 +0000

Google has setup a special page that shows which Google services are available for internet users from within mainland China. The page is updated daily and it specifies whether a particular service is ‘blocked’, ‘partially blocked’ or it has ‘no issues’. There is however no information of whether this page itself is blocked by the Chinese Government or not.

Chrome beta gets new features, goes public

techtified — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:53:24 +0000

Earlier this month a the new beta version of Google chrome was launched which that came with an automatic translation system and improved privacy features.

Today, all the new features of the beta version have been made avaiable for public use by promoting them to the stable channel. The stable channel also provides some additional privacy features along with some minor tweaks to Google’s update technology.There is a “content section” that gives the user the power of handling images, cookies, plugins, javascript and popups on a site to site basis.

Here is a video tutorial on how to use all these new features in the content section.

The browser is now available for public download including all the new features and looks promising.

How Top webpages of the world looked when they were first launched?

techtified — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:22:27 +0000

Google

This snapshot was taken on December 20, 1998.

Click to enlarge

The fully functional old interface can be found on a link here.

Yahoo

This snapshot was taken on October 20, 1996.

Click to enlarge