I finally did it: ordered 20 gigabyte of Google Storage to store my pictures in the cloud. I need to pay 5 dollar every year. A real bargain if you ask me. I wished to upgrade my quota because the free gigabyte everybody gets on Picasa Web was getting full. My pictures are stored on my mac and are backuped by Time Machine. So a solution to safeguard my pictures in case of a real catastrophy that destroys both the mac and the backup was not in place yet. With the extra gigabytes on Google storage, I now can store an extra copy in the cloud. It's not only an extra safety for the storage but comes in very handy because of the convience of the Picasa tool and Picasaweb website for sharing pictures.
My workflow is now as follows:
Copy the pictures from my digital camera (currently a Canon Ixus 300 HS) to my mac with Iphoto. Iphoto puts the pictures into new events (= pictures taken at the same time of the day)
Then I select the pictures I like and put them into an album of Iphoto.
Next I export the album on Picasa Web using Picasa Web Albums Uploader, selecting "Actual Size" so that it archives the original files in the cloud. This may take a bit longer for uploading but will save the day when all my pictures disappear from my mac and backup.
If I manage to fill up the 20 Gigabyte, it can upgrade to 80 GByte/ year for 20 dollar/year. So that's save for the future ;-)
This morning I discovered a new recipe on Google App Engine Cookbook to send out Iphone 3.0 Push notifications via Google App Engine. In fact, the recipe makes use of a service called Urban Airship. They provide a free service that allows to send upto 5000 Push notifications a month. For larger volumes, the price seems reasonable. Image now that all content producers become pubsubhubbub (the pseudo realtime webhook based enabled publish/subscribe protocol proposed by two Googlers) enabled and maybe we scratch the surface of the future internet architecture that will drive the realtime web. Who knows?
I own a Nokia 6124 Classic since a few months. It's the entry model employees get from my employer. Since I work on mac, I could not sync the contacts because there is no free Isync plugin available yet. Recently, Google Sync was announced. It worked very good to sync my contactc on my Iphone with my Google contacts. I use Google Contact as my main database. Hence, I begun to wonder if I could sync my Nokia using Google Sync. Based upon the instructions from Google for another type of Nokia phone, I was able to derive a working setup. Here are the instructions:
From the main menu, go to the "Settings" folder and select "Connectivity".
From the Sync screen, select "Options"->"New sync profile" and enter the following:
Sync profile name: Google Sync
Select "Applications" then "Contacts"
Include in sync: Yes
Remote database: contacts
Synchronisation type: Both Ways
Select "Back" then "Back" then "Connection settings"
Server version: 1.2
Server ID: Google
Data bearer: Internet
Access point: Always ask
Host address: https://m.google.com/syncml
Port: 80
Username: username@gmail.com (fill in your own username)
Password: the password of your Google Account
Allow sync requests: Yes
Accept all sync requests: No
Network authentication: No
Select "Back", "Back" and then "Exit" to save the settings
You have now finished the setup
To perform the sync operation, take the following steps:
From the main Settings menu, select "Connectivity".
From the Connectivity menu, select "Sync"'
Highlight your Google Sync Profile.
Select "Options" and click "Synchronise".
Select your access point: Px Live (depends on your configuration)
That's it. Your 6124 Classic will now connect and sync its phonebook with your Google Contacts. The contacts on your phone will appear in your google contacts and all your Google contact are stored into your phone. If you don't want this, change the value for the synchronization type set in step 7 of the setup
The synchronisation goes via Internet over the air (OTA). The next I would like to find out if i could pair the phone to my mac via Bluetooth and use the internet connection of my mac to do the synchronisation. I don't now if that possible. On the other hand, the synchronisation of my 800 contacts or so only took a few minutes, so I don't know its worth the hassle.
Google is doing a tour around Europe to get into contact with the developers. Today, I'm attending the developer day in London at the Wembley station. More later.
A "Quick Response" or QR code is an image that can be decoded into an text. It's like a two-dimensional barcode. Here's an example: Scanning this picture resolves into the URL of this blog: http://castfortwo.blogspot.com .
This kind of pictures are typically used for tagging. Add the QR code picture to a thing, take a picture of the thing, decode the picture on the thing and there's the text. For example, a link to a website with product information. You can make your QR code yourself here : http://qrcode.kaywa.com/
Using the Google Chart API, you can also generate QR codes. The URL http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?chs=300x300&alt;cht=qr&alt;chl=Hello|World
generates a QR code for "Hello World":
Changing the parameter chl to the URL of this blog: http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?chs=300x300&alt;cht=qr&alt;chl=http://castfortwo.blogspot.com/
gives:
Every BBC programme has also an QR code. Just add /qrcode to the URL. For example, the URL of the Top Gear programme is: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006mj59 Adding /qrcode gives: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006mj59/qrcode
which render to:
There are several free applications on the iphone that can decode QR codes:
The ceo of Google, Eric Smidt, was announced to speak at a management summit on May 29, 2008. But instead of speaking he just opens the floor for questions. If you're interested in innovation, this "converstation" is a must see.
Blogger in Draft , the beta version of Google's blog service Blogger, aanounces a new feature. They provide a page element that you can easily add to your blog with blog links. The nice thing is that you can import the links to the feeds you read with Google Reader and make a selection out of them.
A few months ago, I asked Google to join the group of people that have access to Google Mashup Editor. As soon as Google granted my access to the private beta, I played around a bit with the tool. Altough its possibilities are endless, I had no good idea for a mashup that I would want. Since I'm happy owner of an Ipod Touch, I started to think about a customized version of this blog especially for the Ipod Touch/Iphone. After some playing around, I was quickly able to make a simple gadget, that takes the atom feed of his blog and strips everything but the essential. To access the gadget, surf to http://castfortwo.googlemashups.com. To add the Google gadget to your personalized homepage, go to your homepage, click on "Add items", select "Add a feed or gadget" and enter the address of the gadget : http://castfortwo.googlemashups.com/gadget.xml. The gadget should now appear on your homepage:
This how it looks on the Ipod Touch mobile version of iGoogle:
Google provided an updated script to call the new javascript ga.js to enable to track usage of html pages with Google Analytics. <script type="text/javascript"> var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https:// ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google- analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); </script> <script type="text/javascript"> var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-xxxx-xx"); pageTracker._initData(); pageTracker._trackPageview(); </script>
I injected above code in to the template of this blog and everyting is now working fine. If you want to try it, Andy wrote an how to.
In a previous post "No new Google homepage for Ipod Touch in Belgium yet" I remarked that when entering the URL http://www.google.com in mobile Safari, the browser is redirected to the classic Google homepage with the URL http://www.google.be/m. So Ipod Touch users in Belgium can not try the new integrated that Google announced. However, if you type in http://www.google.com/m in Belgium on the Iphone or Ipod Touch you reach the new Google interface on the Ipod/Itouch.
Google asks to update the Google Analytics script to: <script type=”text/javascript”> var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? " https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write("\<script src='" + gaJsHost + " google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'>\<\/script>" );
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker(“UA-xxxxxx-x”); pageTracker._initData(); pageTracker._trackVisit(); </script>
When entering this in to the Blogger HTML template, I get an error:
Open quote is expected for attribute "{1}" associated with an element type "type".
If you don't need the secure http access, you can simplify the script to: <script src='http://www.google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'> </script> <script type='text/javascript'> var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-xxxxxxx-x"); pageTracker._initData(); pageTracker._trackPageview(); </script>
Please only use the above code if you urgently want to test the new script. It might be wise to wait until the Google engineers have ironed out this issue if you do not want to put your huge analytics income at risk ;-)
Google announced a new Google home page for the Iphone. Here are screenshots how the new homepage looks on the Iphone. However, if you surf to http://www.google.com in Belgium on a Ipod Touch, you still get the classical homepage: It looks that because the Apple Iphone is still not available in Belgium, Ipod touch owners have to wait. I know that Wifi is far from ubiquitous in Belgium, so large pratical value is not to be expected. Still I'm eager how the new Google homepage is experienced. I already value a lot the Gmail, Google Reader and Google Calendar are refitted for the Ipod Touch.
I downloaded Engadget visual tour of Android's UI in Iphoto, cutted out the screens and synced them on my Ipod Touch. Voila, a visual impression of Google Android UI on Apple Ipod Touch:
The uptime monitoring company Pingdom issued a report comparing uptimes of google sites. In Belgium, Google.be was unreachable for 22 minutes in the period from September 1, 2006 to September 1, 2007. This cumulated downtime is close to the average of 23 minutes for all 32 international google search sites measured in the report. All sites have an availability above 99,99%. This is considered very good.
Recently, Google's Blogger added the ability to upload video. While the video is uploaded you can continue working on your blogpost. Neat. Here is the result:
This is a screenshot of how the post appears in Google Reader: Also in Netvibes, the video appears (but twice ;-)).
This is the code generated (with long encoded URL's edited out):
So if the Flash object can not be rendered, at least a link to a RTSP server with a 3GPP video is presented. The latter is probably the case on mobile browsers (Iphone?). The movie size is 320x266. Probably this corresponts to a default 4:3 aspect ratio and 320x240 pixels video surface. So there are 26 lines at the bottom for the controls. So if the the original footage has 16:9 format, black borders are added automatically so that aspect ratio is maintained.
Conclusion: Google Blogger upload works well, uploading goes fast and allows continuing editing while uploading goes on. Nicely done!
Apple invited the press tomorrow 5 september. A lot of rumors are going on. New Ipod, the Beatles on Itunes, .... stay tuned. Other rumours are heating forecast Google Wiki will be launched next week. Somthing I was waiting for more then a year (after they acquired Jotspot). Remember that it's more important how you can write the web than reading it. I guess Google Wiki will prove that.
And in case you didn't notice, Google buys news directly from press agencies and publishes on Google News. Just like Lost Remote I also think it's a landmark for Google because they leave the position being a neutral platform and become competitors of news agency's. Cutting out players in the value chain has always been a interesting strategy. The question will be if the automated news aggregation that taps the wisdom of the crowd will outperform human intelligence of experts. Indeed, interesting times ahead.
Huray, I'm signed up to the Google Mashup Editor beta test program. First impression is that its less graphical then the pipes from Yahoo! I don't know if that's a bad thing. More on this later.
Google is sending out private invites for their Google Mashup Editor. I already signed up for it. Google Mashup Editor (GME) is a webbased tool for creating mashups using GME syntax along with HTML, CSS and Javascript. Hopefully I'm selected for an invite so that I can tell more about it. Read/write Web has already received their invite and wrote about it. Take the GME tour to learn the basics.
GME is based on the Google Web Toolkit. More and more AJAX libraries are popping up. I think about things like BackBase. What would you do, using GWT or Backbase ? Or dou you prefer vertical integration and thus opt for Adobe Flex ? It makes me wonder if GME makes using Google Gears really easy. In that case, GME might be a strong contender for Adobe Flex.
Much to my despair, I noticed the Google Spreadsheet included in a blog post of this blog does not render nicely (even after some digging into the issue, see post1 and post2) in Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 and 7: While reading Make Magazine in Google Reader, I noticed that the Youtube movie of post "Thomas Edsison hates cats" was coming trough nicely. I looked up the HTML code in the RSS feed and adapted the code I found for displaying inline HTML code. It boils down to something like this: <![CDATA[<p> <object data="URL to HTML page" type="text/html" width="520" height="350"> <embed src="URL to HTML page" type="text/html" width="520" height="350"></embed> </object></p> <p>Title of HTML Page <a href="URL to HTML page">Link</a></p>]]>
Unfortunatly, Blogger does not accept the <
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