Google Acquires AppJet

Google buys yet another company: AppJet, the start-up that created EtherPad, an innovative online word processor. The EtherPad team, that includes three former Googlers, will join the Google Wave team. EtherPad will be available for the existing users until March 31, 2010.

"Other real-time editors like Google Docs work by broadcasting an updated copy of the document to everyone every 15 seconds. This creates a noticeable lag that gets in the way of collaboration. You start editing something, only to find 10 seconds later that someone else deleted it. Etherpad updates every copy of the document every half second. This 30x increase in speed changes the experience completely. Your edits hardly ever clash with other users'. So you work confidently instead of tentatively."  (from EtherPad's site)



{ via Paul Buchheit }

Disable Google's Fade-in Animation

If you don't like the fade-in animation from Google's homepage and you want the old homepage, one option is to disable JavaScript. Google will no longer hide navigation elements, but you won't be able to use many web apps that require JavaScript.

Another option is to install a Greasemonkey script that disables the animation. The script requires Greasemonkey if you use Firefox and GreaseKit for Safari.

You can also add the script in Opera if you follow this guide. Chrome users can install the script if they switch to the dev channel.

If you still use Internet Explorer, install IE7Pro, save the script, rename it to nogooglefade.ieuser.js and copy the script to C:\Program Files\IEPro\userscripts. Enable the script in IE7Pro's settings.

Update: Google Chrome users should install this extension to disable Google's animation.

Google Replaces Answers.com with Google Dictionary

If your query includes a single word or it's an expression, Google links to the definition in the blue bar that mentions the number of results. Initially, Google linked to dictionary.com, then it switched to answers.com and now it uses its own service: Google Dictionary.

As mentioned in January, Google updated the English dictionary with synonyms, antonyms, pronunciations, detailed definitions and examples from Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary. Google's dictionary lists the most recent 5 searches, you can star words, find related words and definitions from the Web.

In 2007, Answers.com's CEO said that "there's no deal between Google and Answers.com for the definition links. Google picked Answers.com because it thought Answers.com was a good resource, not because the two companies had negotiated any placement."

Google Dictionary is not a perfect replacement for Answers.com because it doesn't include information from encyclopedias. Some people might miss Answers.com's reference pages that aggregated information from many reputable sources, but those who clicked on Google's definition links to read definitions and to find synonyms won't be very disappointed.

{ via Los Angeles Times }

Google DNS

Google launched a DNS resolving service called Google Public DNS that uses Google's infrastructure to improve page loading time. A DNS resolver converts domain names into IP addresses and this process might slow down browsing.

"As the web continues to grow, greater load is placed on existing DNS infrastructure. Since Google's search engine already crawls the web on a daily basis and in the process resolves and caches DNS information, we wanted to leverage our technology to experiment with new ways of addressing some of the existing DNS challenges around performance and security."

You can replace your ISP's DNS service with Google Public DNS by changing the settings of the network connection and using the following IP addresses:

* 8.8.8.8
* 8.8.4.4

An important problem is that DNS resolvers can track all the web pages sites you visit and build a profile of your interests. Google's privacy page says that the full IP addresses are deleted within 48 hours and Google does not permanently store personally identifiable information. "We built Google Public DNS to make the web faster and to retain as little information about usage as we could, while still being able to detect and fix problems."

OpenDNS, a popular third-party DNS resolving service, offers more feature than Google Public DNS: web content filtering, stats, typo correction, shortcuts, but they're available if you create an account and enter personal information like your name and address. When you type an invalid URL, OpenDNS redirects you to its own search engine to show suggestions and ads. Other free DNS resolution services: Comodo Secure DNS, OpenNIC, DNS Advantage.

You can test all the services and decide which one works best for you by using GRC's Domain Name Speed Benchmark. Don't forget to add Google's memorable IPs: 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.

{ via Google Code Blog }

Google Translated Search, Now More Powerful

Google Translated Search was launched as a Google Translate feature that helped you search in other languages. Google automated several steps that made it difficult to find information written in a language you don't know: Google translated the query, used it to obtain the search result and then translated the results in your language.

The feature is now available in the search toolbelt and it's much smarter: Google automatically detects the most appropriate languages for your query. Click on "show options", select "translated search" and Google shows a box that lists some languages, the translations of your query and the top search results for those translated queries.

For example, if you search for [oslo museums], Google shows a list of web pages written in Norwegian. When you search for [romantic art], Google suggests more than one language: Spanish, French, Italian and German.

"If you're traveling and want to find hotels, restaurants, activities or reviews written from a local perspective, or if you're just curious to find what's being written about a company, product or topic in another language, give Translated search in the Search Options panel a try," suggests Google.

YouTube Feather

Feather is a new feature from YouTube Labs. The goal is "to serve YouTube video watch pages with the lowest latency possible. It achieves this by severely limiting the features available to the viewer and making use of advanced web techniques for reducing the total amount of bytes downloaded by the browser."

Chrome's dev tools show that the improvements are noticeable: the resources downloaded when you watch a video only have 52 KB, instead of 391 KB.

There are many missing features in the "feather" version: search suggestions, posting comments, viewing all the comments, rating videos, customizing the embedded player. Another issue is that the lite version is not available for all videos.

{ Thanks, Michael. }

Google's Homepage Goes Back to Basics

Google has been testing a new version of its homepage that hides the navigational elements until you use the mouse. Most people visit Google's homepage to search the Web, so the links to other Google services are distracting. After testing 10 variants of the new homepage, including an interface that removed the buttons, Google decided to keep the search buttons and to use a subtle fade-in effect before displaying the links.

"Internally, a large number of Google employees have been using the new homepage. They have come to really like it — it represents our focus on great search yet helps searchers efficiently access all of Google's products. Like the new supersized search box we launched several months ago, this change is one that is very noticeable at first, and then quickly becomes second nature," explains Google's blog.

I rarely go to Google's homepage to search the Web, since browsers include a search box and I don't have to load a new web page to enter a query. The latest UI changes will make me visit Google's homepage more often: the search box is bigger, the search results are loaded without opening a new page using Ajax and the new clutter-free interface helps you concentrate.