Last week, Ning launched a new feature that lets any Ning network add social applications. Ning Apps include a Google Docs presentation app, which means you're now able to embed a Google Docs presentation on your Ning social network. This makes it easy to add text, images, and even videos to your profile.
For those of you unfamiliar with Ning, it's social network platform that lets users build their own social networks. Who might benefit from an embedded presentation on their profile? A small business owner might want to post an overview of their service, a thought leader might want to post a presentation from a recently delivered talk, or a teacher might want to post a lecture from a class or a lesson plan.
Our Ning application was built on OpenSocial, an open standard for building social applications across the web. Last year, we launched this same app on LinkedIn.
Senin, 14 September 2009
Rabu, 09 September 2009
Using Google Docs to manage a website redesign
Guest post: Michelle Madhok, the founder and CEO of SheFinds Media, a New York, NY company that publishes editorial websites that help women shop online, recently used Google Docs spreadsheets to manage her site's relaunch. Here's what she told us about her experience:
The five employees at SheFinds Media write, manage and promote all of the content on SheFinds.com and MomFinds.com, which keeps us pretty busy - so we outsource a lot of the tech work to other firms.
We recently re-launched our flagship site, SheFinds.com, and the process was bumpy to say the least. All three parties working on the re-launch - the SheFinds staffers, our SEO firm, and our design and development agency - were finding random bugs, broken links, and failed redirects on the new site. After a few days of incessant back-and-forth e-mails about fixing one-off issues, our inboxes were stuffed and the whole team was confused about who was assigned what responsibilities.
Switching the process over to Google Docs streamlined the whole thing. We listed all the bugs and errant links in a spreadsheet, color-coded the status of each issue, and added comment columns so everyone could see the nitty gritty of each problem without doing a dozen inbox searches.
Our Google Doc also made managing the whole process a lot less stressful, since I knew all the items were accounted for and nothing would be overlooked.
We're re-launching MomFinds.com in a few weeks, and I can say right now, there will be a Google Doc up and waiting when the site goes live - I anticipate some of the same re-direct and broken link issues, and I'm glad to be prepared to solve them in an organized way from the outset. The tool makes coordinating information from three different companies in three different locations logistically simple - we're happy to have discovered it the first time around.
Michelle Madhok, Founder and CEO, SheFinds Media
The five employees at SheFinds Media write, manage and promote all of the content on SheFinds.com and MomFinds.com, which keeps us pretty busy - so we outsource a lot of the tech work to other firms.
We recently re-launched our flagship site, SheFinds.com, and the process was bumpy to say the least. All three parties working on the re-launch - the SheFinds staffers, our SEO firm, and our design and development agency - were finding random bugs, broken links, and failed redirects on the new site. After a few days of incessant back-and-forth e-mails about fixing one-off issues, our inboxes were stuffed and the whole team was confused about who was assigned what responsibilities.
Switching the process over to Google Docs streamlined the whole thing. We listed all the bugs and errant links in a spreadsheet, color-coded the status of each issue, and added comment columns so everyone could see the nitty gritty of each problem without doing a dozen inbox searches.
Our Google Doc also made managing the whole process a lot less stressful, since I knew all the items were accounted for and nothing would be overlooked.
We're re-launching MomFinds.com in a few weeks, and I can say right now, there will be a Google Doc up and waiting when the site goes live - I anticipate some of the same re-direct and broken link issues, and I'm glad to be prepared to solve them in an organized way from the outset. The tool makes coordinating information from three different companies in three different locations logistically simple - we're happy to have discovered it the first time around.
Michelle Madhok, Founder and CEO, SheFinds Media
Kamis, 03 September 2009
New flowchart shapes and multi-line text in drawings
We've just released two new improvements to the drawings in Google Docs. First, we made it easier for you to build flowcharts in drawings by adding 20 new shapes for standard flowchart components. Second, we made it possible for you to have more control over drawing text layout by supporting explicit line breaks in text boxes and text within shapes.
Try out these new features by going to any document, spreadsheet, or presentation, and inserting a drawing.
Try out these new features by going to any document, spreadsheet, or presentation, and inserting a drawing.
New Features in Forms
Today, we added a few new features to Google forms:
Grid question type
You can now quickly gather responses for a group of similar questions in a new, compact grid format. The new grid question type allows you to label a few columns and create as many rows as you like.
Each row result appears in its own spreadsheet column, with its own summary chart, which brings us to...
Improved results summary charts
We've polished up our results summary charts, with clearer formatting of statistics and better formatting of charts for each question type.
Bi-directional language support
The form editor now supports right-to-left (RTL) text input. When you enter RTL text in the form editor, it will automatically switch the directionality of the form editor and rendered forms (similar to Gmail and other Google Apps). This means your text and questions will flip directionality, making it easier for RTL users to create and use forms.
Sign-in to view form
If you are a Google Apps customer, there are now two options to help you use forms within your organization. In addition to the being able to automatically collect respondent's usernames, we now offer the ability to require sign-in to view a form. This provides an additional layer of security for sensitive forms.
Pre-populate a form with parameters
For developers who would like to integrate forms with their own applications, we now provide an easy way to pre-populate a form with data. Simply append an entry string for each response field you'd like to pre-populate. As an example, this URL...
Grid question type
You can now quickly gather responses for a group of similar questions in a new, compact grid format. The new grid question type allows you to label a few columns and create as many rows as you like.
Each row result appears in its own spreadsheet column, with its own summary chart, which brings us to...
Improved results summary charts
We've polished up our results summary charts, with clearer formatting of statistics and better formatting of charts for each question type.
Bi-directional language support
The form editor now supports right-to-left (RTL) text input. When you enter RTL text in the form editor, it will automatically switch the directionality of the form editor and rendered forms (similar to Gmail and other Google Apps). This means your text and questions will flip directionality, making it easier for RTL users to create and use forms.
Sign-in to view form
If you are a Google Apps customer, there are now two options to help you use forms within your organization. In addition to the being able to automatically collect respondent's usernames, we now offer the ability to require sign-in to view a form. This provides an additional layer of security for sensitive forms.
Pre-populate a form with parameters
For developers who would like to integrate forms with their own applications, we now provide an easy way to pre-populate a form with data. Simply append an entry string for each response field you'd like to pre-populate. As an example, this URL...
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=12345&entry_0=Barack&entry_1=Obama&entry_2=1600+Pennsylvania+Ave&entry_3=pistachios|spinach|broccoli&entry_4=8/4/1967... pre-populates the form below....
Kamis, 27 Agustus 2009
Google Docs and college life
As the start of the academic year draws close, students are always looking for new ways to make life at school run more smoothly, whether it's working on group projects or keeping track of dorm budgets.
With that in mind, we're launching a new Google Docs page for college students. This page has new Google Docs tips including some templates designed specifically for resident assistants, teaching assistants, and student leaders. We've also made a video showcasing how a lovestruck student collaborates with friends using Docs.
To learn more about how Google Docs can help college students, check out our new page.
With that in mind, we're launching a new Google Docs page for college students. This page has new Google Docs tips including some templates designed specifically for resident assistants, teaching assistants, and student leaders. We've also made a video showcasing how a lovestruck student collaborates with friends using Docs.
To learn more about how Google Docs can help college students, check out our new page.
Translate documents: sharing across languages and generations
(Cross-posted from the Official Google Blog)
My cousin is in first grade and sometimes she writes short stories for class. I try to share the stories with her grandparents, but because Japanese is their first language and they don't speak English very well, it's been tough. Today we're releasing a feature for Google Docs to make this kind of multi-lingual sharing easier — you can now automatically translate documents into 42 different languages.
So for my cousin's latest story, I helped her type it up in Google Docs and then clicked "Translate document" from the "Tools" menu. In a matter of seconds, Google Docs has translated the whole story into Japanese using Google Translate's technology.
You can replace the original document with the translation or make a new translated version. I like keeping an English version for friends here and creating a separate Japanese version for her grandparents. All the formatting and layout is preserved no matter what language it's in — translations aren't perfect, but we are continuously working on improving translation quality over time. We hope this new feature helps you more easily share information without worrying about language barriers.
My cousin is in first grade and sometimes she writes short stories for class. I try to share the stories with her grandparents, but because Japanese is their first language and they don't speak English very well, it's been tough. Today we're releasing a feature for Google Docs to make this kind of multi-lingual sharing easier — you can now automatically translate documents into 42 different languages.
So for my cousin's latest story, I helped her type it up in Google Docs and then clicked "Translate document" from the "Tools" menu. In a matter of seconds, Google Docs has translated the whole story into Japanese using Google Translate's technology.
You can replace the original document with the translation or make a new translated version. I like keeping an English version for friends here and creating a separate Japanese version for her grandparents. All the formatting and layout is preserved no matter what language it's in — translations aren't perfect, but we are continuously working on improving translation quality over time. We hope this new feature helps you more easily share information without worrying about language barriers.
Kamis, 13 Agustus 2009
Getting your ducks in a row with snap to grid
Today, we're launching snap to grid in Google Docs presentations. Snap to grid makes it easy to auto-align text, images, shapes, and tables within your slides. This option is on by default, so you may have already used it without noticing anything, apart from a mild sense of euphoria.
But, there's more than meets the eye with snap to grid. Try out these handy keyboard modifiers:
[ALT] while dragging turns off the grid and gives you smooth drag (use [OPTION] on a mac)
[SHIFT] while dragging enables vertical and horizontal dragging guides
[SHIFT] while moving an object with arrow keys enables 1 pixel nudge
[SHIFT] while resizing preserves the aspect ratio of the object
[CTRL] while moving leaves the original object and drops a duplicate in the new location
You can disable and re-enable snap to grid through the slide context menu or the arrange menu.
Please let us know what you think on the Google Docs user forum.
But, there's more than meets the eye with snap to grid. Try out these handy keyboard modifiers:
[ALT] while dragging turns off the grid and gives you smooth drag (use [OPTION] on a mac)
[SHIFT] while dragging enables vertical and horizontal dragging guides
[SHIFT] while moving an object with arrow keys enables 1 pixel nudge
[SHIFT] while resizing preserves the aspect ratio of the object
[CTRL] while moving leaves the original object and drops a duplicate in the new location
You can disable and re-enable snap to grid through the slide context menu or the arrange menu.
Please let us know what you think on the Google Docs user forum.
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