G-Crushing!

Last week Google came out and absolutely crushed their gMail design by changing around the buttons that allow you to send and delete emails by making them completely image less (CSS). They also created the ability to "Move To" which allows you to automatically label a piece of email and archive it in one button. Even though this may not sound like a huge thing, it breaks gMail away from the shackles of images and allows them to be easily 're-skinned' via themes. Google this week, might have one upped itself with something completely crazy for us iPhone users.

For the longest time there was only one way syncing between iCal and Google Calendars unless you relied on third party software. Perhaps a month or so ago, Google released the ability to sync both ways between iCal and gCal but since they were considered network servers, you could not sync them to the iPhone...until now. Yesterday, or today they set up an Exchange (email on its way apparently) service that allows users of gCal and Google contacts to sync with your iPhone. Unfortunately, if you do this you actually erase all of your calendars or contacts. This is fairly crap-tacular if you relied on all your calendars...however you could boot up iCal, use the collaboration tool to set up your exhisting gCal accounts and drag the local calender items to their corresponding gCal calndar. There really is not a huge work around for the contacts however, I have no need to sync my contacts.

Testing the sync over the air was great and pulled down all the needed information from the Google servers. There are a couple hickups, specifically since you can only sync up to 5 calendars and you actually need to log onto the service via your phone to allow the phone to sync even more then one calendar when you first set up the service (I got crazy tripped up on this issue...maybe I should read the full instructions). Besides a couple of minor bugs everything is syncing between gCal, iCal, and my iPhone. Kudos to Google for getting all of this stuff together and making life with calendars just that much easier. Also a huge thanks needs to be given to Apple for creating an amazing phone along with an amazing computing experience.

As you all can see I am totally psyched about this along with my pik of the day which is something I got hooked up with on the accident:

Mobile Lacie Rugged 500 Gig hard drive (Triple interface: F400, F800, USB 2.0)

An Ebook Prize Fight

Due to a ton of craziness this blog has been left a little on the dormant side of life which makes me a super sad individual. Beyond the regret, last year I produced right around 100 quality(?) posts and this year I am going to one up myself and shoot for the elusive 200. So last year basically came to a halt at 150 meaning that this year will come to a screeching halt around the 350 mark. This is an incredibly ambitious idea with the year that lies ahead but I am going to except the challenge and go at head full speed.

On a much greater not, Google has just released a basic ebook reader for the G1 and the iPhone which is a direct poke in the eye to Amazon and their upcoming Kindle 2 announcement on the 9th of February. There have been quite a few leaked pictures of what could be the new kindle. However, late last night several other pictures and an other wise recession proof price ($359) was leaked prior to the Feb 9th date. Yes it is a super sexy thin monster with all the ebooks that you can easily purchase and download from Amazon but is it worth the hefty price tag?

To start right off, yes I believe that the new Kindle or the 'Kindle 2' is completely worth the price of admissions. This is of course a very premature jump up before you wiped action, but for people who are constantly on the move and love to read this is exactly what the doctor ordered. A great example is a 4'X3' bin that I have to lug with me whenever I move because I do not want to give up the books that are inside. With the kindle, all your books are right there with you in a package that weights under 1 pound...astonishing. Anyway getting back on track, both the Google and Amazon service offer two different perspectives on reading.

Google gives you a great ability to read the tomes of yore along with a hefty amount of books that had a limited print availability. This is great if you really get down on the literature with Sense and Sensibility or Faulkner. If you are looking for a recently released title you are otherwise SOL with the Google service and should look towards Amazon's large ebook library. These differences are really the only ones that can be compared since Amazon offers hardware with their service where Google is simply the service. I am super excited to see the new Kindle in action mainly because I have always wanted one but the first iterations got such bad reviews. However, it is too intoxicating to step into a Barnes and Noble and have the new book smell wash over you. Comment up on what you love: Easiness of the ebook revolution or classic paper books?

Nip Tastic Temps

Yep, you guessed it, it is freezing cold here (here is classified due to the generous amount of fans who would absolutely hound the crap out of me if they found out my location). Beyond the dimming light, shrouded in an impregnable veil of money is the Christmas season and boy is it coming up fast. So what might you ask should you do about all those hard to buy for people in your household? Well how about ask them? Christmas becomes this bonkers time where you spend money to show off your economic status on presents that you "think" will be well received. Well never fear, a solution is here and it is called Google documents. By setting up a simple two column document and sharing it with the fiancee we both can share links to great things we would enjoy way more then a guess for Christmas.

Sure this is not the "correct" or timeless way of doing things but Christmas is really about being with each other, help people out and taking a day away from your usual binge drinking routine (especially before new years hits). So take the time to be smart this season even if you have to play the game a little different.

Steel Baby, Stainless

Google Chrome is a spectacular browser, no matter what anyone says. It is mind bendingly fast, works very well with Google Docs/Gmail/etc, and against all the hater's ideas, Google did remove the clause in their ULA that claimed anything you posted on the internet through Chrome was property of Google. Of course this is all well and good for the folks who still run a Windows PC as an every day machine and not just for games but, for the people who use Mac OS X or Linux on a daily basis are a little up the river.

We could use the Crossover Cromium port but it really just looks like what you get on Windows XP. So it looks like we are stuck waiting it out until the end of the year (MAYBE!)...or you could check out Stainless. Stainless' simplicity is an almost identical match to that of Chrome; with it's single search and url bar (brilliant), extreme light weight, and how it actually looks like it belongs on the Mac. Personally, I have been using it for a couple of days now and it is blazingly fast and very lightweight (compared to firefox with 1 extension). Of course there are some problems due to it being very early in its development phase.

Sometimes it is so lightweight that OSX does not realize you have jumped from one window to Stainless. The options literally get stuck to say finder or iTunes. This can be solved by simply minimizing and bring the Stainless window back into view. It also does not show you a view of all of your visited sites, like Firefox and Chrome have on their smart bars (which both work very well in my mind). Overall these issues can be overlooked because of the speed and horsepower that the browser brings to the desktop. Check it out here (Leopard Only..segway into previous post) and give me some feedback on what you all think, ciao. Oh, also give share the browsers that you have in your dock, or on your desktop (quick launch). Currently I am rocking 4: Safari, Cruz, Stainless, Firefox.

Sketchy

If anyone has ever had some kind of interest in Architecture or interior design then you probably have looked at Google Sketchup. Sketchup has always been a free for both Windows and Mac (no idea why they have been lagging on the linux version for so long) and has given aspiring 3d artists or just folks who like to a play, a good opertunity to. Monday marks a great day for you people who have been waiting for Google to update their Sketchup platform. Sketchup 7 looks very familiar to its younger brother but probably has quite a few little easter eggs in it. One obvious improvement is its speed which, on a mid 2008 Macbook Pro used to lag like a three legged dog. 7 seems to start up fine and keep on plugging away without any seemingly obvious memory leaks.

Hopefully soon I will be able to play with it and write up a propper review however, for now it will be let lose upon an Architect firm to see how they like it. Hopeful opinions will be here shortly.

Blingtastic Experiences

Ok. so I might have missed a day but I made up for it with the double post two days ago so I am still on track for the 20 posts this month.  Anyway....CHROME!

Playing with the beta of Google's new browser has been, an absolute charm.  Running it under Vista Home Premium on my Macbook Pro was as easy as downloading and installing.  No fuss, no real google adware, and nothing really to get in the way of someone simply clicking yes through all the prompts.  So a big thumbs up for an easy beta install.

From there the experience only got better.  The layout of Chrome is astonishing with no extra information or bars to clog up the bottom, the left or the right side of the browser.  This lends itself to be safari - esk where they want you to have a complete and unhindered browsing experience.  If you look simply upward you are welcomed with a simple and elegant single bar that will process a .com address or search a word in google.  This process has been tried before with Firefox and Opera however, it was often times hard to discern if the browser was going to search or attempt to complete the url.  Chrome battles these issues with a simple "search google" preface before the word you typed.  This makes life both easy and quick when it comes to finding what you need.

When it comes to browsers the entire world is concerned with the amount of memory that one takes up.  Firefox used to be a huge memory sucker, IE...don't even get me started (Beta 8 I sorta like), Opera...no, and Safari...boring.  Chrome for the moment processes each seperate tab as another spot in memory which seems to speed up browsing and make the browser fairly stable for its beta itteration.  However, it does seem to take up more memory then trusty firefox but...for now atleast, it is a beta and should be a memory hog.  

This is a fairly simple run through of the browser but it must be said that the browser is itself, very simple.  However, this does not detract from a wonderful, clean and well thought out browser by the folks at Google.  With so many browsers populating the world most of the normal folks stick with trusty old IE but if Google can get its Chrome name out there then I think they have a good a chance of taking a large portion of the market.  Moreover, this will probably be the same browser we see on the Android setup later this year which will make the experience competetive for all us iphone safari users.  I say bring it, and bring it hard Google.  Complete that OS we all know you have in the works and grab that market share.  Shuttle PC, Google OS, Chrome, Lightened Simplicity.....utterly amazing.  

One last thing though....get this on the Mac port asap and I will browse with it every day.