Yes, we are still all about search

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Marissa Mayer, Vice President of Search Products and User Experience</span><br /><br />We are often asked at Google what we are doing to improve regular web search. There's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes, but today, at our <a href="http://www.google.com/pressday">press event</a>, we announced four new products that will give you a better sense of how all this work becomes reality.<br /><br />Our new products offer a pretty wide range of services and capabilities, but they have one thing in common: They all enhance and improve the search experience for our users.<br /><br />- <a href="http://www.google.com/coop/">Google Co-op</a> is a way for users to help us improve search. It lets people and organizations label web pages and create specialized links related to their unique expertise. Whether it's information about a hobby, a profession, or an unusual interest, everyone can contribute to making Google search more relevant and useful for the entire community.<br /><br />- <a href="http://desktop.google.com">Google Desktop 4</a> gives you another way to improve search, by personalizing your desktop. New "Google Gadgets" deliver an array of information--ranging from games and media players to weather updates and news--straight to your desktop.<br /><br />- <a href="http://www.google.com/notebook">Google Notebook</a> (which we'll be launching next week) is a personal browser tool that lets you clip text, images, and links from the pages you're searching, save clippings to an online notebook, and then share notebooks with others.<br /><br />- <a href="http://www.google.com/trends">Google Trends</a> builds on the idea behind the Google Zeitgeist, allowing you to sort through several years of Google search queries from around the world to get a general idea of everything from user preferences on ice-cream flavors to the relative popularity of politicians in their respective cities or countries.<br /><br />If you're interested in hearing what was said on stage today, check out the webcast of our press event at <a href="http://www.google.com/pressday">www.google.com/pressday</a>.

Yes, we are still all about search

Posted by Marissa Mayer, Vice President of Search Products and User Experience We are often asked at Google what we are doing to improve reg...

Đọc thêm »

Conference on automated testing

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Allen Hutchison, Engineering Manager</span><br /><br />Those who follow the world of automated testing may be interested in the call for papers for our <a href="http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2006/04/our-conference-on-automated-testing.html">upcoming conference</a> on the subject. Deadline for papers: June 1.

Conference on automated testing

Posted by Allen Hutchison, Engineering Manager Those who follow the world of automated testing may be interested in the call for papers for ...

Đọc thêm »

News + Suggest join forces

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Jon McAlister, Software Engineer</span><br /><br />I've always been a big fan of both <a href="http://news.google.com">Google News</a> and <a href="http://labs.google.com/suggest">Google Suggest</a>. So in my 20% time, I've worked on a way to bring them together, and I'm now happy to report the launch of <a href="http://news.google.com/news?complete=1">Google Suggest on Google News</a>, which provides you with search suggestions specific to news in your country, in real time, while you type. If you're already a Suggest user, you'll see this right away, but it's not on by default. Although Suggest + News is currently English-only, the suggestions will reflect the English-language regional edition you're viewing.<br /><br />I find that this helps me save time while doing frequent searches (e.g. [<a href="http://news.google.com/news?complete=1&q=google">google</a>]. And seeing the Suggest list gives me a sense of the most common news queries. Enjoy!

News + Suggest join forces

Posted by Jon McAlister, Software Engineer I've always been a big fan of both Google News and Google Suggest . So in my 20% time, I'...

Đọc thêm »

A great day for 3D

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Brad Schell, Product Management Director, Google SketchUp</span> <br /><br />Last month we <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/03/new-home-for-last-software.html">told you</a> that @Last Software had joined the Google fold. Today we’re releasing <a href="http://sketchup.google.com/">Google SketchUp</a>, a free version of our 3D modeling software, which makes our long-time vision of making 3D accessible to everyone a reality.<br /><br />We’re still offering <a href="http://www.sketchup.com/?id=106">SketchUp Pro 5</a> for design professionals like architects, designers, builders, art directors and game developers. Both Google SketchUp and SketchUp Pro 5 enable you to place models in <a href="http://earth.google.com/">Google Earth</a>; Pro users get some additional features.<br /><br />The new Google SketchUp is for the do-it-yourselfer, the hobbyist — really anyone who wants to build 3D models for use in Google Earth. Go ahead and model that new kitchen, or deck, landscape your virtual garden, or impress your teacher with a roller coaster or medieval castle. When you’re finished, place your model in Google Earth. There! The beginning of a virtual world. Warning: don’t start messing with this stuff after dinner because your first experience could be an all-nighter… making an idea come to life in 3D can be <b style="">very</b> addicting.<br /><br />And what could be better than that? Well, sharing your work with everyone else through the <a href="http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/">3D Warehouse</a>. Accessible through both versions of SketchUp, 3D Warehouse enables you to upload, search, browse, view, and download SketchUp models. Just as you do with Google search, enter some keywords and the 3D Warehouse shows you all your options. Grab the one you want and import it into your model. (Note that the Warehouse is not stocked up yet — so model something yourself and upload it for all the world to see.)<br /><br />Visionaries, utopians, virtual world builders: your time has come.

A great day for 3D

Posted by Brad Schell, Product Management Director, Google SketchUp Last month we told you that @Last Software had joined the Google fold....

Đọc thêm »

Google Maps in Europe

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Steven Crossan, Product Manager, Google Maps Europe</span><br /><br />We're excited to announce that we have just launched beta versions of Google Maps for <a href="http://maps.google.fr/">France</a>, <a href="http://maps.google.de/">Germany</a>, <a href="http://maps.google.it/">Italy</a>, and <a href="http://maps.google.es/">Spain</a>. These sites include the full suite of interactive street maps, driving directions, and integrated local business search. This has been a global effort with Google teams in Paris, Hamburg, Milan, Madrid, New York, Mountain View, Kirkland, Sydney, London, Dublin, and Zurich working together for much of the past year to build a truly "local" product.<br /><br />Accompanying this release, we have greatly improved high resolution imagery coverage for Europe in both Google Maps and <a href="http://earth.google.com/">Google Earth</a>. Check out the <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?q=eiffel+tower&ll=48.858278,2.294442&spn=0.001475,0.002835&t=k&om=0 ">Eiffel Tower</a> in Paris, <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?q=berlin&ll=52.514722,13.239491&spn=0.002223,0.00375&t=k&om=0">Olympiastadion</a> in Berlin, and the <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?q=venezia&t=k&amp;amp;om=0&ll=45.437023,12.333977&spn=0.004118,0.01123">Grand Canal</a> in Venice.<br /><br />To give you a preview of what's to come, we've also rendered street maps for many other countries in Europe. Developers, you can incorporate these maps and imagery into your own websites using the free <a href="http://www.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/">Google Maps API Version 2</a>. <p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"> </p>

Google Maps in Europe

Posted by Steven Crossan, Product Manager, Google Maps Europe We're excited to announce that we have just launched beta versions of Goog...

Đọc thêm »

This is a test. This is only a test.

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Ambar Pansari, Product Manager, Search User Experience, and Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products and User Experience</span><br /><br />From time to time, we run live experiments on Google — tests visible to a relatively few people -- to discover better ways to search. We do this because there’s no good substitute for understanding how real people, in real-world situations, actually operate. Theories are fine, but “improving the user experience” really happens best when we understand what people do online.<br /><br />So to learn more, we sometimes randomly select a group of people to see a possible improvement to search options. Or we may select a group of people and try out a new element while they're searching. If you ever wonder why your Google site looks slightly different from that of the person sitting next to you, this is why.<br /><br />We are currently testing new ways to refine searches so that, for example, a search for jobs might offer a choice of job location or function, rather than forcing you to continually narrow the terms you type in to a standard Google search.<br /><br /><img alt="" border="0" src="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/post_search_exps_jobs-703257.JPG" /><br /><br />We’ve run another test to learn more about how people navigate to find the information most relevant to them: how you might find image search or information in Froogle, for example, when that might be just the thing you want. Here’s how that one looks.<br /><br /><img alt="" border="0" src="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/post_search_exps_options-775766.JPG" /><br /><br />And we test ways to enrich web results, such as by offering a "Remove Result" option that would omit particular results from future searches if you decide they’re not useful. You'll see this feature if you're already signed in to a Google service when you perform your web search.<br /><br /><img alt="" border="0" src="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/search_exps_remove_ui-756513.JPG" /><br /><br />There's no set schedule when we'll roll out these sorts of new ideas (if at all), but these tests help us to improve your search experience.<br /><br />p.s.: Google is also active in CHI, the major organization on user experience and usability. We're participating in the annual conference this week in Montreal. <a href="http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2006/04/see-you-at-chi.html">More here.</a>

This is a test. This is only a test.

Posted by Ambar Pansari, Product Manager, Search User Experience, and Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products and User Experience From time to ti...

Đọc thêm »

Celebrating Earth Day

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Cristin Frodella, Product Marketing Manager</span><br /><br />To help spread the word about keeping our planet green this <a href="http://www.earthday.org/">Earth Day</a>, Google has joined forces with Scholastic – the folks who brought us Clifford the Big Red Dog – to distribute lesson plans (and a contest) to middle-schoolers across the U.S. <br /><br />Using <a href="http://earth.google.com/">Google Earth</a>, teachers can fly their students around the world to talk to them about issues like climate change and how it has affected places like Glacier National Park, the Chesapeake Bay and Los Angeles. And they can introduce students to community initiatives across the country where volunteers are cleaning up their cities, planting trees and beautifying. Using Google Earth, teachers can show their students placemarks of the towns where outreach projects are taking place and students can get involved in cleaning up their own environment.<br /><br />As for the contest, students write their own environmental stories by researching a topic of interest and illustrating it with Google Earth images. Following detailed instructions, they can create their own Keyhole Markup Language (KML) files which they will send to us for review. The top three environmental story creators will win prizes for themselves, their class and their teachers, including a week at Earth Camp, technology grants and Lenovo laptops for the classrooms.<br /><br />This Earth Day project goes to 30,000 middle school teachers across the country in poster form (with placemarks on the front and lesson plan suggestions on the back), and it’s also being emailed to 100,000 more teachers. There’s a Scholastic <a href="http://www.scholastic.com/exploreyourearth">website</a> for teachers and a special <a href="http://earth.google.com/scholastic">Google Earth page</a> too.

Celebrating Earth Day

Posted by Cristin Frodella, Product Marketing Manager To help spread the word about keeping our planet green this Earth Day , Google has joi...

Đọc thêm »