Why Google can have a much better Social Networking Site than Facebook

To me, Social Networking is all about knowing whats happening with my friends and how the application engages me into more socially active activities. Going through this PDF, we come to know of how complex is the world behind social networking sites, all because of privacy & security. Let me not dwell into that. That article does too good a research of it. Let me try to attempt why a social networking site from Google can be more appealing and engaging than what we see today in Facebook. Let me call Google's Social Networking Site as GSN. And ya, it is for the Strong Ties. Weak and Temporary Ties may accordingly have these features or not.

1. Search by photograph
We have FB suggesting friends depending on the number of mutual friends and by an email id. But Google can give us a friend by face. If I have a friend's photograph, I can upload & Google will search for me all the people who match to that photograph. How is this possible and how can I say this? I can say this because of the superb Face Recognition implementation in Picasa Web. It automatically recognizes similar faces and suggests who that person may be, depending on the name tags which were provided earlier.

2. Travelling for work/vacation
If I were to use Google Latitude in GNS and say that I am travelling to so and so place, GNS would tell me

• What is the current climatic conditions of that place (Google Weather)
• What is the current time and timezone changes needed (Google Time)
• Currency conversion that would be required and what is the current conversion rate going on (Google Currency Conversions)
• What are the local businesses which I may be interested in (Google Local Business Search)
• What are the noted and well known restaurants / theme parks which are famous in that location alongwith their ratings (Google SideWiki / Google Places)
• Latest news about that place (Google News)
• What are the routes to go to these places, how much time it will take (Google Maps)
• Who are my friends who are currently located in that place (Simple search / Google Location)
• How many are my colleagues, how many are college-mates (Simple search aggregation over friend's profiles), their phones numbers with an option to call them immediately and talk or send an SMS (Google Voice / Google Voice & Video Chat). This would also provide a parameterized radius to include nearby friends and other friends who visited it earlier and the videos which they have uploaded of that place.
• Following this update, automatically my Vacation Responder gets created for those dates (like the one in Gmail), Google Chat status gets set (Google Talk) and event gets created in my Calendar so that I can invite friends. Also, these dates get blocked for others to know that I am out of station (Google Calendar).
• This data can also get created as a status update with an option for me to post.
• An option to view the demographics of the place from Google Public Data.
• In recent past, which all friends of mine visited that place, how they spent their time, where all they went, what all they did (Status updates), what they highlighted as a must watch, must do, etc.
• Similarly, who are the renowned artists/celebrities from that place? When they last visited and any other news.
• What is the local language and any translation that may be required (Google Translation).
• When flight number is stored as part of the travel details, it will keep track of the flight (Google Flight Tracker).
• Movies which are shown in that location on my dates of visit with their timings (Google Movie Times).
• Any sports which are undertaken in that location or within a radius (parametrized) and the current scores, depending on the sports interests that I have listed in my Google Profile (Google Sports Scores)
• All related Videos (from Youtube) for the above activities at relevant locations.

3. Info about my profile
I will know people from which part of the world, with what operating systems, through which browsers are viewing my profile and many more. Yes, integrated Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools to my Profile! Must be fun :)

4. Trends
What is the latest trend among my friends and their activities, category-wise. The feel of it.
Yup! Its Google Trends that would do this job

5. Profile Links

• From the profile, Google Books will be linked to the books that I have read or planning to read, which are part of my library, etc.
• Movies will be linked to Google Movie Times to give any updates on those movies, etc. 
• Sports info will be linked to Google Sports Scores & Schedules (from Google Calendar) for my current location & other locations, to update on any upcoming matches, etc. 
• Plus, features like favourites teams & settings on when to alert me (Google Alerts comes in!) with parameters of which teams, what place, what timings, etc. will help the person know if any relevant activity is around. Updates from friends on these set parameters will add to the interest of the user.
• Bookmark interesting profiles, links, events, etc. (an extension to Google Bookmarks).

6. Health
Though information regarding health is a very sensitive issue, GSN can give one an option to fill up the details & get to know a lot of related things - from within friends, from medical fraternity, from news, from standards practised, diet needed, personalized advice, etc. All this can straight come up from Google Health, but this time socialized.

GSN can provide all the above information in a clean & a pleasing interface.

Thus, with the existing services that Google provides and the engineering outlook it has, it can create a Social Networking experience which no Facebook has provided yet. I do understand that this is not the comprehensive and exhaustive listing but is surely a good starting point to build on.

You think you have some more/better ideas that can contribute to this list? Have  your say ...

GChat tips

A word in GChat can be emphasized in many ways, most common being Bold, Italics & Underline.
Knew that adding * on either side of the word (eg. *word* = word) would make it bold, but learnt from the 10tip of Gmail NInja tips page that we can even italicize by adding _ on either side of the word (eg. _word_ = word) and with - on either side, it strikes the word (eg. -word- = word).[SOURCE]

OpenID

Now a days, we see OpenID on so many websites. Wanted to know what this concept was about.

In simple terms, OpenID is a Universal ID (specifically a URL) which once created, can be used on an OpenID complaint website for a specific activity. For eg. on Blogger (OpenID compliant website), one can comment (specific activity) using an OpenID. One need not create a separate OpenID if one already has a Gmail id (or Google Accounts ID), Yahoo id, a blog on Blogger, etc. Best part about OpenID is that it is not dependent on any single OpenID provider. One can switch to any OpenID provider as one wishes, without monopoly of any specific company. It is an open standard with decentralized server.

So, next thing to know is which all are the OpenID providers. The list is here as well as here.

I wanted to use Gmail as an OpenID. To create an OpenID URL for Google Account ID or Gmail ID go here [SOURCE]. To use your Blog URL as an OpenID, details are given here.

Know how to run your own OpenID here.

Go here to get to know about having your own OpenID.

More on OpenID:

Spread OpenID

OpenID Foundation

QR Code & Microsoft Tags

Heard about QR codes (QR stands for Quick Response) today at this post on Google Docs Blog. QR Code is another way of storing information, like Bar Code, through 2-D images developed and popularly used in Japan.

One can create an image like the one shown aside. This image is for this very blog.There are QR Readers available (most of the phones now a days are coming with QR Reader embedded). When the reader scans this QR Code on their cell phone (with GPRS enabled), it will get one to this blog.





The fields & patterns correspond and convey a particular information. The image beside gives some insight into it.

Wiki has got all the information in short and crisp fashion, worth a read.

One can create this code by using Google API.

URL for creating code for this blog was: http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?chs=250x250&cht=qr&chl=http://robadilavoro.blogspot.com/

Change the url and have yours! :)

This template is the QR Code Gadget template available in Google docs. They say

Make a QR code of your data. Just put in the data and instantly a QR code is created matching a comma separated list of your data.

Surely worth a try.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Microsoft has got a similar one called Microsoft Tags


Signup, Create Tags and share them. Need not worry if you dont have a Windows Live login id. One can Signup with Gmail Id as Windows Live ID and use it for all future purposes.

The Tag created for this blog by Microsoft Tag looks like the one shown aside





If these were not enough, Wiki gives a list of other types of codes existing. The list is as below:

• Aztec Code
• Barcode
• Data Matrix
• E-Reader
• CueCat
• High Capacity Color Barcode
• PDF417
• Semacode
• ShotCode

Google insisted for secure Gmail & Docs

This piece of article from Security Watch on Google is intriguing. Google has been asked to secure the complete Gmail and GDocs sessions. Though Gmail already has a feature to optionally choose it but not defaulted, these security safeguarders and law makers felt it is not safe to leave it without HTTPS and have urged Google to secure it completely.

These people have not questioned Yahoo, Rediff or for that matter any other mail provider. Gmail was the first one to introduce HTTPS into free mailing environment and they only are questioned for not having it mandatorily put up throughout! Its ridiculous.

Surprisingly, Google is going to work on securing the whole session from next tuesday onwards, on a selected user's base

GTasks in GCal

Google Tasks have been integrated with Google Calendar (finally! Expected this to be the first step than following its integration with Gmail). Features are awesome.

• Once a Task is added to GTasks with a due date, it becomes a day's event in GCalendar.
• One can create a Tasks from Calendar (only in All Day and Month views only).
• Using Sort option in Actions of Tasks, one can finish in the order of due date
  

Things expected in future:

• Assigning Priorities to Tasks (Its available in standalone GTasks app).
  
• Adding Time aspect to the due date. Currently, its only at the Date level and not at Date & Time level
• Default Calendar Notifications to get applicable to the Task (as in a Calendar event).

Access Calendar events through SMS:

Similar to SMS events usage in Google SMS Channels, one can create an event, know which is the next event for the day, total agenda for the day, next day's schedule - all through sms! Number: 48368 (GVENT). Its currently available only for US citizens. How to create using SMS? They give an example (Source):

"Send a message with something like "Shopping with Sarah at Monterey Market 5pm Saturday," Google Calendar can figure out what you mean and pop the new event into your calendar."

Horoscope Calendar:

 I personally liked the Horoscope Public Calendar. So, if one is interested, just click on the links below and get the respective zodiac sign's calendar added to your list of calendars (Source)

"For some cosmic direction, get your daily horoscope directly in Google Calendar. Just click the icon showing your sign in the upper-left corner of the day to read your overview, courtesy of tarot.com.
To subscribe to your horoscope calendar, click the appropriate link in the following table:

Horoscope Calendars
	Aries		Libra
	Taurus		Scorpio
	Gemini		Sagittarius
	Cancer		Capricorn
	Leo		Aquarius
	Virgo		Pisces

 "

Google Contacts

This thought had been there for quite a while that there should be a Birthday field in GContacts. And when we enter it, it should automatically create an event in GCal [or give a choice whether we want to create or not] with Recurring type, Repeating Annually and stuff like that. Who doesnt have! Even a simple 14 field contacts manager in a Sony Ericsson mobile phone has it [including setting a custom ringtone for each user! :)] which at the end of adding a birthday prompts whether we want to add reminder to the calendar. This reminder in SE automatically reminds every year!

Well, GContacts has come out as a separate service from Google. It does contain the Birthday field, an Anniversary too, plus Other option [good news! :)]. Though integration with GCal is yet a feature to look at [bad news:(]. Now, one can maintain quite good amount of data here. It is better managed than Gmail Contacts. Though some fields here are duplicated from GProfile. The service is available even in GApps [after admin enables it. Steps given here].

Hoping a day comes when we will have to enter our information only once, and it will get reflected in all possible places.

HTML Signatures in Gmail

Now one can create HTML signatures in Gmail and insert them using a Greasemonkey script: User Script 


In Gmail, it creates a box (shown aside) where one can create a signature.





Firefox Add-on: Black Canvas Gmail Signatures

In their own words,
Automatically inserts HTML signatures into your Gmail messages based on which address you are sending from. Supports up to four signatures for each address you have set up. Works for Compose Message and Reply/Forward.

SMS Notification for a mail in Gmail

Now one can get an sms notification for

• any mail that appears into Gmail / Yahoo
  
• a specific mail that appears into Gmail / Yahoo
  

How? Answer is Way2SMS.com

Way2SMS has come long way from its preliminary old. Their UI resembles the AJAX technology and has its similarities with Gmail UI. As in 160by2, one will get the 'A message from Recipient's Name' instead of 'A message from WAY2SMS.COM' which is common for all the free web sms websites.

It provides with 110 characters as against 90 of 160by2.com and Indyarocks.com

One can set a mail alerts for Gmail and Yahoo. The funda is: Whenever a mail appears in the inbox of Way2SMS.com, one can activate an alert, which will send an sms for every mail that appears in way2sms.com. So, to get an alert for all mails that appear in Gmail or Yahoo, create a filter (to suit the needs) and say Forward to your Way2SMS.com mail id and Woah! You get an sms whenever a mail meeting those conditions appears in Gmail or Yahoo! Help of Way2SMS for Gmail Configuration and Yahoo Configuration.

Chat with both Yahoo and Gmail users simultaneously.

For other features, sign up for Way2SMS.com and check out.

gaiald in Gmail

Today, as I was updated contacts in Gmail, there was some value appearing against a legend gaiald. I initially tried finding out from where it was picking, but could not make out. It was part of More Information -> Other -> Drop-down (Home, Work, Custom, gaiald)
Tried googling, nothing worth showed what it was.

Well, for a normal contact, this option does not appear at all. Only Home, Work, Custom appears. But it was appearing for mail ids to which mails were sent for the first time from mobile phone. As I was getting convinced that the mail ids which were sent for the first from mobile phone were getting that particular id added, I checked for one more person for whom a mail was sent through mobile phone. This contact was under Suggested Contacts and that value did not exist! Added this contact to My Contacts group. Yet it did not appear.

Though for most part of it, it seems to be due to automatic addition of mail id when a mail was sent through mobile phone, this one exception is still a mystery.

Firefox Add-ons

Finally, this post has become a reality. I had mentioned in an earlier post that soon there would be a post on my favourite add-ons from firefox. There would surely be more than these, but currently these Add-ons are actively decorating my Firefox. In Firefox's own words:

"You spend more time online than on the road, but you probably think more about avoiding traffic than enjoying the best of the Web.

So, why not customize your Firefox for the things you really love to do? Take your browser from simple to spectacular.

Firefox add-ons are little extras that allow you to add a personal touch to your browser. Select your favorites from the categories to accessorize your Web!"

So, here is the list of 9 add-ons for firefox:

• Lock the Fox - password protect Firefox window
• Server Spy - know which brand of HTTP server runs a particular site
• Tamper Data - view and modify http/https headers and post parameters
• TestGen4Web - Record/Store/Play Firefox sessions
• FormFox - Displays the Form action
• Event Spy - can watch Javascript events as they occur
• Add n Edit Cookies - name conveys all
• Cache Status - Easy cache management
• Cookie Swap - Swap Cookies to log into multiple Gmail accounts
  

Hope you would find them useful, as much as I enjoyed in finding them and trying them out.

Update: Forgot to add one more add-on - PDF Convertor - convert any webpage into a pdf then and there.

Gmail Access & Plinky

If one forgets Gmail password, one can get it reset either by answering the security question or by requesting a reset password link to the secondary mail id. But, if these do not work. Say, the account has been taken over and security question & secondary mail id are changed to something else, then how to recover? Well Gmail has an Account Recovery Form where they ask for some information so that the account is made available only to the correct person.

Blogger through SMS: Now, one can enable posting through mobile phone, currently available only to USian's

Plinky: Well, its another website where one can add up blogs, or Facebook, Twitter accounts and by answering the prompts, automatically all the linked services would get updated! Its surely good. This is created by one the original blogger team-members - Jason Shellen. Anyone wanna follow me there, here is the URL (First time I got a profile URL without a need for additional numerals or surname initials... that shows no other Rampy has yet signed up there :) )

Google Web Servers

Google has got its own web servers which are currently running the web for Google ranked 3rd by Netcraft Web Server Survey. Heard its a modified version of Apache Web Server. The whole list of web servers running each of the Google product is given below:

(*) - denotes encrypted page

• (GWS: Google Web Server)
• Main Search: GWS/2.1
• Google Accounts: GFE/1.3*
• Google AdSense: GFE/1.3*
• Google AdWords: GFE/1.3*
• Google Hosted(mail for your domain) : GWS/2.1
• Google Analytics (Login Page): GWS/2.1
• Google Analytics (Auth Page): GFE/1.3*
• Google Analytics (Other Pages): ucfe*
• Google Analytics (Analysis Image and JS): ucfe
• Google Analytics (Images/JS/CSS/Flash): ga-reporting-fe
• Google Answers: GFE/1.3
• Google Base: asfe
• Blogger: Apache
• Google Book Search: OFE/0.1
• Google Calendar: GFE/1.3
• Google Catalogs: OFE/0.1
• Google Checkout: GFE/1.3*
• Google Code: codesite/2750796
• Google Co-Op: pfe
• Google Desktop: GFE/1.3
• Google Directory: DFE/1.0
• Google Downloads: GWS/2.1
• Google Finance: SFE/0.8
• Google Finance Stock Charts (Images): FTS (C)1997-2006 IS.Teledata AG
• Froogle: cffe
• Google Groups: GWS-GRFE/0.50
• Hello: Apache/2.0.53
• Google Help Pages: TrakhelpServer/1.0a
• Google Images: GWS/2.1
• Google Labs: Apache
• Google Local / Maps: mfe
• Google Local/Maps (Images): Keyhole Server 2.4
• Google Mail: GFE/1.3
• Google Mobile: GWS/2.1
• Google Moon: mfe
• Google Moon (Images): Keyhole Server 2.4
• Google Music Search: mws
• Google News: NFE/1.0
• Google Notebook GFE/1.3
• Orkut: GFE/1.3*
• Google Pack: COMINST/1.0
• Picasa (.com): Apache/2.0.53
• Picasa (.google.com): GWS/2.1
• Picasa Web Album: GFE/1.3
• Picasa Web Album (Static Images): staticfe
• Picasa Web Album (Uploaded Images): cachefe:image
• Google Page Creator (Sign-up page): GFE/1.3*
• Google Page Creator (User pages): GFE/1.3
• Google Personalized Homepage: igfe
• Google Scholar: GWS/2.1
• Google Search History: Search-History HTTP Server
• Google Sets: Apache
• Google Site-Flavored: GWS/2.1
• Google Sitemaps: GFE/1.3
• Google SMS: GWS/2.1
• Google SMS Search Requests: SMPP server 1.0
• Google SMS (GMail Registration): GFE/1.3*
• Google SMS (Page Viewer): GFE/1.3
• Google Spreadsheet: GFE/1.3
• Google Suggest: Auto-Completion Server
• Google Transit: mfe
• Google Translate: TWS/0.9
• Google Trends: Google Trends
• Google Video: GFE/1.3
• Google Video (Thumbnails): thumbnail_server.cc version 1.0
• Google Reader: GFE/1.3
• Google Ride Finder: Apache
• Google Talk: GWS/2.1
• Google Toolbar: GFE/1.3
• Google Toolbar (PR Lookup): GWS/2.1
• Google Web Accelerator: GFE/1.3
• Google Web Alerts: PSFE/4.0
• Writely: GFE/1.3

 How did I come to know of this? Well. There is a add-on in Firefox which displays the web server that rendered the current web page. Its name is Server Spy. Await for yet another list of useful add-ons to Firefox in the next post.

Source 1

Source 2

Customized Inbox in gmail

Multiple Inboxes and query strings, together can become a powerful tool for one to have a customized inbox in gmail. For example, one wants the secondary inbox to show all the unread mails from userid xyz@gmail.com, then go to Settings->Multiple Inboxes->Panel 1 (or whichever panel one wants to add it to) type in:

is:unread from:xyz@gmail.com

Whoa! Check your secondary inbox, you have your customized view! If one wants all unread mails from label For Fun, then type in:

is:unread is:For-Fun ('-' is the replacement for a space in label)

and you have all desired results. Go through all the remaining boolean operators and you will be on your way to a better managed gmail power-user.

YM Emoticarolers & Power User

How much ever Google has captured the market in Search, Mail, OnlineDocs, they could never reach Yahoo Messenger in terms of the features, functionalities and grace of emoticons. GTalk could, to some extent, improve one's voice experience, but otherwise, enough are there who still prefer Yahoo Messenger when it comes to standalone client application. Integration of Chat into Gmail is a separate run-away success of Google.

Yahoo Messenger has got this concept of Power Users who, they say, will be identified depending on the end-users use of YM. More the use, sooner they will be crowned as 'Power User'. The link mentions other benefits like earlier use of new features, exclusive online indicators, enhanced customer care, custom avtaar accessories, etc. Once a Power User (or even otherwise), one can join the Messenger All-Stars group to be up-to-date with the latest in YM.

PingBox: We all know about adding GTalk badge to our websites, blogs. Now even YM gives that option. They call it Pingbox. Not bad.

Emoticarolers: Now this is interesting. With the classy yahoo emoticons (which go on improving with added age), one can send a jingle, carol to their friends!!! The look, feel is awesome. One can add their custom lyrics to the chosen tunes, currently only four. Worth a try and definitely a good way to wish :)

Gears in full winamped gears

Continuing with its trends, Google has integrated Gears into Gmail. A much expected step with Gmail being their crown service, gears had to come in soon. This thought of existence to ease our work did pass the mind while trying out Gears on GDocs and GReader.

Winamp 5.541:
Tried this new version of Winamp, and its a lot impressive. Its no more a cylinder holding our playlists, its grown massively to hold a lot under the sun. It includes, SHOUTcast, Radio FM, AOL radio, AOL music, impressive Winamp Remote, etc. etc. (complete list of features). One can upload their favourite playlists, songs online and listen to them through Winamp from anywhere in the world. It has got its own toolbar which can be installed in the browser. The personalized data is stored against a free login ID and a password. Worth a try (download from here).

GVid within GChat

Google has done it again. Following the trend that we see in the developments of Google services, we can guess the direction in which they are heading. Integration of all services into all of it, is the visible aim of Google. But, auto-generation of video preview within the chat window and an option to view it then and there when one sends a Youtube or Google Video links, is another out-of-the-box, least expected addition. Nevertheless, it is one of the useful addition. Gmail Blogpost.

Just yesterday, I was going through GDocs and was happy to see some of the developments there. Now one can publish a Doc (Excel, Word, Powerpoint) with Google Analytics working on it for tracking the developments. One can enable RSS feeds feature to these Docs which enables a person, who has subscribed to these feeds, know and track changes to the subscribed Doc.

Last night, tried Google Gears on Google Reader, it worked fine and well. When tried with GDocs, it gave an error on interruption. Have to check again.

Blogger seems to have made their pop-up boxes (Preview, Hyperlink) transparent. It creates a distraction since it merges of with the background.

Imp & Exp between Outlook and Gmail

Important information

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/HA102220481033.aspx

G G G

Found few things:

Gmail help has improved with a different UI, and better feedback. Every help page trails with

Groups to GApps
Groups, though not full-fledged, but customized for use in organizations by access rights and permissions control, has been added to GApps, starting from free edition. More here

Mailing limits for Gmail and GApps

Known list of issues in Gmail

Add Gmail to your RSS Feed Reader

To get notified of new Gmail messages in your RSS news feed reader:

• Launch your RSS feed reader like Google Reader.
• Create a new channel.
• Type "https://gmail.google.com/gmail/feed/atom" for the URL of the new feed.
• Enter your Gmail user name ("sammy.sample") when prompted for a user name.
• Use your Gmail password as the feed's password, too.
  • If that does not work, try using "https://[your Gmail user name]:­[your Gmail password]@gmail.google.com/­gmail/­feed/atom" (like "https://sammy.sample:passphrase@gmail.google.com/­gmail/­feed/­atom") for the URL.

To get notifications for new messages in a Gmail label in your RSS feed reader:

• Append the label to the "https://gmail.google.com/­gmail/­feed/­atom/" URL (note '/' at the end).
  • For example, a label called "todo" can be tracked using the URL "https://gmail.google.com/­gmail/­feed/­atom/­todo".
• Add the URL to your RSS feed reader as above. 

Source