Don't drop while you shop

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Jessica Lee, Associate Product Manager</span><br /><br />There's bravery, and then there's hitting the mall the day after Thanksgiving, also known as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_%28shopping%29">Black Friday</a>. Which is one reason we just launched a feature on Froogle that helps you to shop locally -- and that in turn might help you through the upcoming shopping ordeal(s). Now you can search over the product inventory of brick & mortar stores in your neighborhood to compare online deals and local sales all at the same time. Instead of wandering aimlessly through crowded malls looking for that elusive perfect gift (not to mention a parking spot), just find it on Froogle, call the store to reserve it and go pick it up.<br /><br />Froogle local shopping is also useful for finding items that you want to try before you buy (<a href="http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=+dress&addr=san+francisco%2C+ca&btnG=Search+Froogle&lmode=unknown">clothing</a>), or where shipping is expensive (heavy things like <a href="http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=sofa&addr=new+york&btnG=Search+Froogle&lmode=unknown">sofas</a> or <a href="http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=ford+mustang&addr=oklahoma+city&btnG=Search+Froogle&lmode=unknown">cars</a>). Just add a location to your Froogle query and we'll look for products in your area.<br /><br />Right now we have local content from hundreds of merchants across the U.S., but we encourage any merchant with a website to upload their own inventory (did we mention that it's free?) via Google Base. Get started by going to <a href="http://www.google.com/sellonfroogle">www.google.com/sellonfroogle</a>.<br /><br />Besides finding stuff closer to home, Froogle now offers more options for refining your searches, including brand names and related search suggestions. If you search for <a href="http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=home+theater+system&btnG=Search+Froogle&lmode=unknown"> [home theater system]</a>, we suggest brands like Bose and Kenwood, as well as queries that will help narrow your results, like [wireless home theater system].<br /><br />Hope you find these features useful during this holiday shopping season. And have a happy Turkey Day!

Don't drop while you shop

Posted by Jessica Lee, Associate Product Manager There's bravery, and then there's hitting the mall the day after Thanksgiving, also...

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Wi-Fi in Mountain View

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Minnie Ingersoll, Google WiFi Product Manager </span><br /><br />There have been <a href="http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1093558,00.html">reports</a> that Google plans to unwire the world with free Wi-Fi. In fact, though, our plan is a lot simpler: to provide free Wi-Fi to the city of Mountain View, where we're headquartered. Inside Google, people think this is a plot to make sure our Mountain View employees never stop working -- but it's actually a community outreach program.<br /><br />To this end, I am proud to be working with the City Council, the city librarian, the police department, numerous neighborhood associations, both of the school superintendents, and (of course) the bookmobile driver. And huge thanks in particular to Ellis Burns at the City of Mountain View.<br /><br />We plan to build something exciting here now that the city has <a href="http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/11/17/googlewifi/index.php">approved our proposal</a>. As I wrote in my <a href="http://www.siliconbeat.com/entries/2005/11/10/more_on_googles_mountain_view_wifi_proposal.html">letter</a> to the City Council, wireless broadband has huge potential to provide inexpensive access to the Internet. Instead of trenching fiber, wireless broadband requires a bucket truck, a lamppost, and 5 minutes of installation. So look for me in a bucket truck soon!

Wi-Fi in Mountain View

Posted by Minnie Ingersoll, Google WiFi Product Manager There have been reports that Google plans to unwire the world with free Wi-Fi. In f...

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Get News in Portuguese

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Bruno Fonseca, Software Engineer</span><br /><br />We've just launched two different editions of <a href="http://news.google.com/">Google News</a>: one for <a href="http://news.google.com.br/">Brazil</a> and one for <a href="http://news.google.pt/">Portugal</a>. Google News gathers stories from more than 200 news sources in Portuguese worldwide, and automatically arranges them to present the most relevant news first. We're very pleased to be able to help Brazilian and Portuguese readers stay informed about the issues that matter most to them. <a href="http://news.google.com.br/intl/pt-BR_ALL/about_google_news.html">Read more (in Portuguese)</a> about this launch.<br /><br />For a group of Google Engineers, it's especially exciting, because in July, we <a href="http://www.google.com.br/press/pressrel/akwan.html">opened an engineering office in Brazil</a>. These Google News Portuguese editions are the first launches our team in Belo Horizonte has participated in. Here's to many more!<br /><br />Of course, Google News Brazil and Google News Portugal are small steps towards our mission. You can help by sending your <a href="http://www.google.com/support/news?hl=pt_BR">feedback, thoughts and ideas</a>. Divirta-se!

Get News in Portuguese

Posted by Bruno Fonseca, Software Engineer We've just launched two different editions of Google News : one for Brazil and one for Portu...

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Judging Book Search by its cover

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Jen Grant, Product Marketing Manager</span><br /><br />What's in a name? Quite a bit, actually; what you call yourself says a lot about what you think you are. And we've been thinking lately that Google Print should really be called <a href="http://books.google.com">Google Book Search</a>.<br /><br />Why the change? Well, one factor was all the comments we got about how excited people were that Google Print would help them print out their documents, or web pages they visit -- which of course it won't. <br /><br />More important, the change reflects our product's evolution. When we launched Google Print, our goal was to make it easier for users to discover books. Now that we're starting to achieve that, we think a more descriptive name will help clarify what our users can do with it: namely, search the full text of books to find ones that interest them and learn where to buy or borrow them.<br /><br />No, we don't think that this new name will change what some folks think about this program. But we do believe it will help a lot of people understand better what we're doing. We want to make all the world's books discoverable and searchable online, and we hope this new name will help keep everyone focused on that important goal.

Judging Book Search by its cover

Posted by Jen Grant, Product Marketing Manager What's in a name? Quite a bit, actually; what you call yourself says a lot about what you...

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Knowledge is power

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Grace Kwak, Google Sitemaps team</span><br /><br />We launched <a href="https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/siteoverview">Google Sitemaps</a> this past summer as a way for webmasters to give us information we could use to better crawl their sites. Since then, we've been adding to the kinds of information we give back. In our latest release, we provide even more interesting statistics that webmasters can use to improve the way their pages work with web crawlers, which will ultimately benefit their visitors.<br /><br />I think the most fun are the new "query stats" -- they show top Google search queries that return pages from a site, as well as the top search queries that led users to click on a site. We've also enhanced the crawl errors we show, like specific HTTP errors Google runs into when crawling a page.<br /><br />If you're a webmaster and you haven't used the Sitemaps program yet, you can now create a Sitemaps account and add a site to it even before you create a Sitemap. Once you verify ownership of the site, we'll show you all of these statistics and error details. You can always add a Sitemap later. Read more on the <a href="http://sitemaps.blogspot.com/2005/11/more-stats.html">Sitemaps blog</a> or just <a href="https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/login">log in</a> to get going.

Knowledge is power

Posted by Grace Kwak, Google Sitemaps team We launched Google Sitemaps this past summer as a way for webmasters to give us information we c...

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First Base

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Bindu Reddy, Product Manager</span><br /><br />Today we're excited to announce <a href="http://base.google.com/">Google Base</a>, an extension of our existing content collection efforts like web crawl, Google Sitemaps, Google Print and Google Video. Google Base enables content owners to easily make their information searchable online. Anyone, from large companies to website owners and individuals, can use it to submit their content in the form of data items. We'll host the items and make them searchable for free. There's <a href="http://base.google.com/base/about.html">more info here</a>.<br /><br />Some organizations are already using Google Base. Here are a few examples.<br /><ul><li>"Students need as much information as possible when they are searching for the right college or university. Google Base helps us reach students and parents and deliver more of the information they need when making important college decisions." - Hal Higginbotham, President, CollegeBoard.com </li></ul><ul><li>"We want to use knowledge and information about the environment to help motivate more responsible public and private action. With Google Base, we can bring the public key insights on sustainability issues – like climate change, human health, and resource consumption – and bring about change." – Amy Cassara, Senior Associate, World Resources Institute </li></ul><ul><li>"CareerBuilder.com's business model is built on providing employers with as many avenues as possible to connect with job seekers. Feeding our jobs to Google Base further extends our distribution network, providing employers with added support in marketing their open positions." - Richard Castellini, VP of Consumer Marketing, CareerBuilder.com </li></ul><ul><li>"We compile an enormous amount of valuable data on fine art and artists, and we want collectors, dealers, students and art aficionados to have easy access to this information. Google Base enables us to reach more people researching art and get them the information they need." - Brent Peich, Director of Marketing, Artnet</li></ul><ul><li>"Our mission is to make it easy for small businesses to use the web to drive in-store sales. Google Base gives us an ideal outlet to promote and distribute content about local products more broadly." - Kendall Fargo, Founder & CEO, StepUp Commerce</li></ul>Right now, there are two ways to submit data items to Google Base. Individuals and small website owners can use an interactive user interface; larger organizations and sites can use the bulk uploads option to send us content using standard XML formats.<br /><br />Rather than impose specific schemas and structures on the world, Google Base suggests attributes and item types based on popularity, which you can use to define and attach your own labels and attributes to each data item. Then searchers can find information more quickly and effectively by using these labels and attributes to refine their queries on the experimental version of Google Base search.<br /><br />This beta version of Google Base is another small step toward our goal, creating an online database of easily searchable, structured information. As always, we welcome <a href="http://base.google.com/support/bin/request.py">your feedback</a> and ideas.

First Base

Posted by Bindu Reddy, Product Manager Today we're excited to announce Google Base , an extension of our existing content collection eff...

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A man with a phone in Nantucket ...

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Matt Waddell, Google Mobile Team </span><br /><br />Underneath a cell tower nearby<br />SMS I decided to try:<br />[t to french grant a loan], [6 shekels in kroon]<br />Now a polyglot banker am I.*<br /><br />*This <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limerick_(poetry)">limerick</a> was inspired by <a href="http://www.google.com/sms/">Google SMS</a>, and its new <a href="http://www.google.com/sms/howtouse.html#more">translation and currency conversion features</a>. And if you're wondering, as I was: kroon is pronounced "krone."

A man with a phone in Nantucket ...

Posted by Matt Waddell, Google Mobile Team Underneath a cell tower nearby SMS I decided to try: [t to french grant a loan], [6 shekels in kr...

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