Desktop: More gadgets, more languages

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Ryan Tabone, Product Manager</span><br /><br />Desktop's last beta release made the beautiful gadgets in our <a title="Check out the great gadgets for Google Desktop!" href="http://desktop.google.com/plugins/" id="robi">Desktop gallery</a> available for use in <a title="iGoogle" href="http://www.google.com/ig" id="q3af">iGoogle</a>. Today <a title="Google Desktop 5.5" href="http://desktop.google.com/" id="nnwr">Google Desktop 5.5</a> goes out of beta and makes that same functionality available to 31 more languages, now including <a title="Thai" href="http://desktop.google.com/th/" id="odpl">Thai</a> and <a title="Indonesian" href="http://desktop.google.com/id/" id="yor_">Indonesian</a>.<br /><br />If you want to see how Desktop can help you stay connected internationally, read more about this latest release on the <a title="Google Desktop Blog" href="http://googledesktop.blogspot.com/" id="gcfk">Google Desktop Blog</a>. And remember, Google Desktop is not only about gadgets for your desktop and browser; it's a great way of <a title="searching files and launching applications" href="http://desktop.google.com/features.html#search" id="oka-">searching files and launching applications</a> too.

Desktop: More gadgets, more languages

Posted by Ryan Tabone, Product Manager Desktop's last beta release made the beautiful gadgets in our Desktop gallery available for use ...

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Why data matters

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Hal Varian, Chief Economist</span><br /><br /><i>We often use this space to discuss how we <a title="protect privacy" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/search/label/privacy" id="irrh">treat user data and protect privacy</a>. With the post below, we're beginning an occasional series that discusses how we harness the data we collect to improve our products and services for our users. We think it's appropriate to start with a post describing how data has been critical to the advancement of search technology. - Ed.</i><br /><br />Better data makes for better science. The history of information retrieval illustrates this principle well.<br /><br />Work in this area began in the early days of computing, with simple document retrieval based on matching queries with words and phrases in text files. Driven by the availability of new data sources, algorithms evolved and became more sophisticated. The arrival of the web presented new challenges for search, and now it is common to use information from web links and many other indicators as signals of relevance.<br /><br />Today's web search algorithms are trained to a large degree by the "wisdom of the crowds" drawn from the logs of billions of previous search queries. This brief overview of the history of search illustrates why using data is integral to making Google web search valuable to our users.<br /><br /><b>A brief history of search</b><br /><br />Nowadays search is a hot topic, especially with the widespread use of the web, but the history of document search dates back to the 1950s. Search engines existed in those ancient times, but their primary use was to search a static collection of documents. In the early 60s, the research community gathered new data by digitizing abstracts of articles, enabling rapid progress in the field in the 60s and 70s. But by the late 80s, progress in this area had slowed down considerably.<br /><br />In order to stimulate research in information retrieval, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) launched the <a href="http://trec.nist.gov/" id="r_82" title="Text Retrieval Conference">Text Retrieval Conference</a> (TREC) in 1992. TREC introduced new data in the form of full-text documents and used human judges to classify whether or not particular documents were relevant to a set of queries. They released a sample of this data to researchers, who used it to train and improve their systems to find the documents relevant to a new set of queries and compare their results to TREC's human judgments and other researchers' algorithms.<br /><br />The TREC data revitalized research on information retrieval. Having a standard, widely available, and carefully constructed set of data laid the groundwork for further innovation in this field. The yearly TREC conference fostered collaboration, innovation, and a measured dose of competition (and bragging rights) that led to better information retrieval.<br /><br />New ideas spread rapidly, and the algorithms improved. But with each new improvement, it became harder and harder to improve on last year's techniques, and progress eventually slowed down again.<br /><br />And then came the web. In its beginning stages, researchers used industry-standard algorithms based on the TREC research to find documents on the web. But the need for better search was apparent--now not just for researchers, but also for everyday users---and the web gave us lots of new data in the form of links that offered the possibility of new advances.<br /><br />There were developments on two fronts. On the commercial side, a few companies started offering web search engines, but no one was quite sure what business models would work.<br /><br />On the academic side, the National Science Foundation started a "Digital Library Project" which made grants to several universities. Two Stanford grad students in computer science named Larry Page and Sergey Brin worked on this project. Their insight was to recognize that existing search algorithms could be dramatically improved by using the special linking structure of web documents. Thus <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><a href="http://www.google.com/technology/" id="lv1x" title="PageRank">PageRank</a></span> was born.<br /><br /><b>How Google uses data</b><br /><br />PageRank offered a significant improvement on existing algorithms by ranking the relevance of a web page not by keywords alone but also by the quality and quantity of the sites that linked to it. If I have six links pointing to me from sites such as the <i>Wall Street Journal</i>, <i>New York Times</i>, and the House of Representatives, that carries more weight than 20 links from my old college buddies who happen to have web pages.<br /><br />Larry and Sergey initially tried to license their algorithm to some of the newly formed web search engines, but none were interested. Since they couldn't sell their algorithm, they decided to start a search engine themselves. The rest of the story is well-known.<br /><br />Over the years, Google has continued to invest in making search better. Our information retrieval experts have added more than 200 additional signals to the algorithms that determine the relevance of websites to a user's query.<br /><br />So where did those other 200 signals come from? What's the next stage of search, and what do we need to do to find even more relevant information online?<br /><br />We're <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/04/this-is-test-this-is-only-test.html" id="a9t." title="constantly experimenting">constantly experimenting</a> with our algorithm, tuning and tweaking on a weekly basis to come up with more relevant and useful results for our users.<br /><br />But in order to come up with new ranking techniques and evaluate if users find them useful, we have to store and analyze search logs. (Watch our <a href="http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=ECB20E29232BCBBA" id="d36_" title="privacy videos">videos</a> to see exactly what data we store in our logs.) What results do people click on? How does their behavior change when we change aspects of our algorithm? Using data in the logs, we can compare how well we're doing now at finding useful information for you to how we did a year ago. If we don't keep a history, we have no good way to evaluate our progress and make improvements.<br /><br />To choose a simple example: the Google spell checker is based on our analysis of user searches compiled from our logs -- not a dictionary. Similarly, we've had a lot of success in using query data to improve our information about geographic locations, enabling us to provide better local search.<br /><br />Storing and analyzing logs of user searches is how Google's algorithm learns to give you more useful results. Just as data availability has driven progress of search in the past, the data in our search logs will certainly be a critical component of future breakthroughs.

Why data matters

Posted by Hal Varian, Chief Economist We often use this space to discuss how we treat user data and protect privacy . With the post below, w...

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Summer of Code is back!

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Leslie Hawthorn, Program Manager, Open Source</span><br /><br /><a title="Google Summer of CodeTM" href="http://code.google.com/soc/2008/" id="bt92">Google Summer of Code</a>, our program to introduce students to open source software development is coming back. In the past <a title="three years" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/03/three-summers-of-open-source.html" id="uv9q">three years</a>, we've seen more than 1500 students 'graduate' from this program, working with 2000+ mentors across 90 countries to produce millions of lines of code. We're pleased to have funded more than $10M in open source development through Summer of Code, and we've increased our funding for it this year by another $1M.<br /><br />Last year alone, more than 800 students successfully completed their projects. Each received $4500 as a stipend and an awesome <a title="program t-shirt" href="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2327/2043654975_2ca729fc9d.jpg" id="gr3.">T-shirt</a>. We're looking forward to welcoming even more student participants and open source projects into the Google Summer of Code community this year.<br /><br />We're accepting applications from open source projects who'd like to act as mentoring organizations through March 13th, and will begin taking student applications on March 24th. If you're interested in learning more, just subscribe to the <a title="program discussion list" href="http://groups.google.com/group/google-summer-of-code-discuss" id="r:gc">program discussion list</a>. We hope to see you there!

Summer of Code is back!

Posted by Leslie Hawthorn, Program Manager, Open Source Google Summer of Code , our program to introduce students to open source software de...

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Hello, Pittsburgh

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Andrew Moore, Engineering Director</span><br /><br />On Tuesday, March 4, the <a href="http://maps.google.com/?q=40.444542,-79.945659+%28Google%20Pittsburgh%29&hl=en">Google Pittsburgh office</a> will open its doors to the technical community for a special evening. We'll kick things off with some mingling over beer, wine and snacks, and then transition into a tech talk with one of our local engineers, Pat Stephenson.<br /><br />Pat will discuss the implementation of Dapper, a low-overhead system for monitoring the performance of large, distributed applications at Google, and the tools his team has built to analyze the data in a talk titled "Dapper: It's 11 p.m. and do you know where your RPC is?"<br /><br />We hope to create a collegial atmosphere where members of the technical community can learn from and get to know one another.<br /><br />If you're in the Pittsburgh area, please <a href="http://services.google.com/events/pittsburgh_techtalk_dapper">join us</a>. Space is limited, however, so hurry and register.

Hello, Pittsburgh

Posted by Andrew Moore, Engineering Director On Tuesday, March 4, the Google Pittsburgh office will open its doors to the technical communi...

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Bringing it all together

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Scott Johnston, Senior Product Manager (former VP of Products at JotSpot)</span><br /><br />Many of you have been waiting for JotSpot to re-emerge, integrated into Google -- and now it's happening. Here's the story:<br /><br />In the last 10 years, the way all of us work has changed. We've grown accustomed to always being connected through email and instant messaging. Consequently, people are working together in teams more often, with larger groups, and with others who may be in different parts of the country or the world. We are shifting our focus from personal to team productivity. It's less about "you" and more about "us."<br /><br />But with this explosion in collaboration, how do you bring together everything your team needs to work? How do you take information, whether it is on your desktop or online, and share it with specific groups of people -- your team, the company, the public?<br /><br />Meet Google Sites, the newest addition to the Google Apps product suite. It was designed to allow you to easily create a network of sites and share them with whomever you choose. Google Sites lets you pull together information from across Google Apps by embedding documents, spreadsheets, presentations, videos, and calendars in your sites. Of course, we also harness the power of Google search technology so your search results are always fast and relevant.<br /><br />What does it take to start using Google Sites? Just a click of a button -- that's it. Here's an overview with more detail:<br /><br /><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/X_KnC2EIS5w"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/X_KnC2EIS5w" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />We're just finishing up the code to migrate existing JotSpot customer wikis to Google sites, so if you're already a JotSpot customer, you'll be hearing from us soon on how to make the switch.<br /><br />If you aren't a Google Apps customer yet and want to use Google Sites, sign up at <a href="http://sites.google.com/">http://sites.google.com</a>.

Bringing it all together

Posted by Scott Johnston, Senior Product Manager (former VP of Products at JotSpot) Many of you have been waiting for JotSpot to re-emerge, ...

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Google Health, a first look

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP, Search & User Products</span><br /><br />It's been a busy week for the Google Health team. Last week we <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/pilot-with-cleveland-clinic-for-health.html" id="jw56"> announced</a> our partnership and pilot with the Cleveland Clinic. This week, the team has been at the <a title="HIMSS" href="http://www.himssconference.org/" id="nka:">HIMSS</a> (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society) conference in Orlando, Florida, where Eric Schmidt gave the closing keynote. Eric's keynote marks the first time we've talked publicly about the product we've been designing and building. His talk also offered a deeper view into our overall health strategy. (<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTZKNcx9sBA">Watch the video.</a>)<br /><div class="Ih2E3d"><br />Google Health aims to solve an urgent need that dovetails with our overall mission of organizing patient information and making it accessible and useful. Through our health offering, our users will be empowered to collect, store, and manage their own medical records online.<br /><br />For the healthcare industry, online personal health records (PHRs) aren't a new idea and, in some cases, online PHRs already exist for patients. Here's what we think sets Google Health apart:<br /></div><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;"> Privacy and Security</span> - Due to the sensitive and personal nature of the data that will be stored in Google Health, we need to conduct our health service with the same privacy, security, and integrity users have come to expect in all our services. Google Health will protect the privacy of your health information by giving you complete control over your data. We won't sell or share your data without your explicit permission. Our privacy policy and practices have been developed in thoughtful collaboration with experts from the <a title="Google Health Advisory Council" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/new-advisory-group-on-health.html" id="fdm7">Google Health Advisory Council</a>.<br /></li></ul> <div class="Ih2E3d"><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Platform </span>- One of the most exciting and innovative parts of Google Health is our platform strategy. We're assembling a directory of third-party services that interoperate with Google Health. Right now, this means you'll be able to automatically import information such as your doctors' records, your prescription history, and your test results into Google Health in order to easily access and control your data. Later, this platform strategy will mean that you will be able to interact with services and tools easily, and will be able to do things like schedule appointments, refill prescriptions, and start using new wellness tools.<br /></li></ul><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Portability</span> - Our Internet presence ultimately means that through Google Health, you will be able to have access and control over your health data from anywhere. Through the Cleveland Clinic pilot, we have already found great use-cases in which, for example, people spend 6 months of the year in Ohio, and 6 months of the year in Florida or Arizona, and will now be able to move their health data between their various health providers seamlessly and with total control. Previously, this would have required carrying paper records back and forth. With Google Health, the user can simply import the data from each medical facility and then choose to share it with the other facilities. It's advances in data portability like this that we think can really make a difference in the quality of healthcare. The clearer and more comprehensive the information regarding your health becomes, the better your care will be.<br /></li></ul></div><div class="Ih2E3d"><ul><li><span style="font-weight: bold;">User focus</span> - We aren't doctors or healthcare experts, but one thing Google can create is a clean, easy-to-use user experience that makes managing your health information straightforward and easy. We're still iterating and testing our user interface, but here is what the welcome screen looks like:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYRZhyphenhyphenHYl7n52pJHRPtrh4LQi-jokoSL-3wWLP-aGvEv_FLoIAdHwKH9ScnaamX2wmcgEXk4EEA9tUWybA3a_nygeRo_-70dABytvqRMbLdLnkMqKAUJgckaUEjY005YvKg5vNDs9x-UC/s1600-h/marissa_blog_sign_in.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5172479684657962098" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBYRZhyphenhyphenHYl7n52pJHRPtrh4LQi-jokoSL-3wWLP-aGvEv_FLoIAdHwKH9ScnaamX2wmcgEXk4EEA9tUWybA3a_nygeRo_-70dABytvqRMbLdLnkMqKAUJgckaUEjY005YvKg5vNDs9x-UC/s320/marissa_blog_sign_in.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a>Here is a screenshot deeper in the application:<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijATBO7sLenlg5h_YOjLkH5n7Sk0uVkBO9877N0O_RkEPFcPoDIfvm-3aUXNGv4rNkhKGXm0Ob3LOA0bwMdqECbTrRmjf5B5aptmpgLrQXS8WV2RMf48hyphenhyphenG7SOJLbIWwJTra1cCW-8xi-N/s1600-h/marissa_blog_home_cleveland2.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5176284334534025506" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijATBO7sLenlg5h_YOjLkH5n7Sk0uVkBO9877N0O_RkEPFcPoDIfvm-3aUXNGv4rNkhKGXm0Ob3LOA0bwMdqECbTrRmjf5B5aptmpgLrQXS8WV2RMf48hyphenhyphenG7SOJLbIWwJTra1cCW-8xi-N/s320/marissa_blog_home_cleveland2.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; width: 299px; height: 191px;" /></a></div></li><li style="text-align: left;">We're proud of the product that we've designed and are continuing to build, but recognize that we are just at the initial stages of our "launch early and iterate" strategy. We look forward to the feedback we will receive from our Cleveland Clinic pilot, from all of you, and from the initial users of our service when we make it publicly available in the coming months.</li></ul><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">Update: </span>Added link to video of Eric's talk; refreshed second screenshot.<br /></div>

Google Health, a first look

Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP, Search & User Products It's been a busy week for the Google Health team. Last week we announced our p...

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Project CARE in San Francisco

<span class="byline-author">Posted by Craig Walker, Senior Product Manager</span><br /><br />As we <a title="mentioned last fall" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/08/supporting-grandcentrals-project-care.html" id="zsjx">mentioned last fall</a>, GrandCentral's Project CARE initiative, which provides permanent telephone numbers and voicemail services to the homeless, has partnered with San Francisco's <a href="http://www.sfconnect.org/AboutUs/index.php/homeless_connect/phc_our_mission.html?">Project Homeless Connect</a> (PHC) to support the city's homeless as they get back on their feet.<br /><br />Today, Mayor Gavin Newsom will announce plans to give every homeless person in San Francisco a local phone number and voicemail account through Project CARE. We're thrilled to be a part of this effort, and as a first step towards simplifying the process of setting up a phone number and voicemail, we're rolling out a website where shelters and agencies across the city can create new accounts. Project CARE will also be visiting both city-owned and private shelters to help introduce this new system, assist the staff in familiarizing with the process, and answer any questions.<br /><br />We're firm believers in the power of technology to improve the daily lives of individuals and communities as a whole, and we recognize that access to phone and voicemail services is one way that GrandCentral can help San Francisco's homeless stay connected with family, friends, social workers, health care providers, and potential employers.<br /><br />While we're excited to bring this technology to our local Bay Area community, our ultimate goal is to provide these invaluable services to cities and shelters across the country.<br /><br />If you're in San Francisco and would like to learn more about Project CARE's work with PHC, please join us at today's Project Homeless Connect 21 at the Billy Graham Civic Auditorium. If you can't make it to the event, check out Project Homeless Connect's <a title="website" href="http://www.sfconnect.org/AboutUs/index.php/homeless_connect/phc_our_mission.html" id="al92">website</a>.

Project CARE in San Francisco

Posted by Craig Walker, Senior Product Manager As we mentioned last fall , GrandCentral's Project CARE initiative, which provides perman...

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