Googling Magazine

Google Drops IE6 support from Google Apps

2010-02-02T06:29:45Z

In an email sent to Google Apps Admins, Google Apps team are dropping old browsers support from Google Apps in order to improve their products and deliver more sophisticated features and performance. As a result, in 2010, support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as other older browsers that are not supported by their own manufacturers will be phased out.

We plan to begin phasing out support of these older browsers on the Google Docs suite and the Google Sites editor on March 1, 2010. After that point, certain functionality within these applications may have higher latency and may not work correctly in these older browsers. Later in 2010, we will start to phase out support for these browsers for Google Mail and Google Calendar.

Google Apps will continue to support Internet Explorer 7.0 and above, Firefox 3.0 and above, Google Chrome 4.0 and above, and Safari 3.0 and above. If you are still using an old browser somewhere it's time to change, since it's no more supported anywhere and Google is making a good step to encourage people using new supported and more secure browsers.

If the Google Apps team delivered more than 100 improvements in 2009, I think this number will be beated in 2010 to deliver the best and most innovative collaboration products for businesses.

Google released Wave Protocol Code

2009-07-22T11:35:49Z

While I'm still waiting for my Wave invitation, Google released today code for the wave protocol with installation instructions to create your own wave servers, and how to generate a Self-Signed Wave Federation Certificate

The open source Wave Federation Prototype Server is delivered as a Java application that conforms to XEP-0114, the Jabber Component Protocol. In the examples below we show how to install the Wave Federation Prototype Server as an extension to the Openfire XMPP server, but it should run against any XEP-0114 compliant server.

The wave protocol specification draft defines Google Wave as a communication and collaboration platform based on hosted conversations, called waves. A wave consists of XML documents and supports concurrent modifications and low-latency updates between participants on the wave.

The wave federation protocol enables everyone to become a wave provider and share waves with others. For instance, an organization can operate as a wave provider for its members, an individual can run a wave server as a wave provider for a single user or family members, and an Internet service provider can run a wave service as another Internet service for its users as a supplement to email, IM, ftp, etc. A decentralized architecture that makes Google wave implementations limited only to your imagination.

Is Your Website Safe For Browsing ?

2009-06-10T08:15:22Z

Google have an interesting webmaster tool safe browsing you can use it to check from time to time if your website or server is victim of malicious software or exploits. Sometimes your server might be attacked and the owner is not aware about it, so if you want to check simply open :

http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=phpmagazine.net

And put your website after site=, the diagnostic page will include the current status, previous status during the last 90 days. Exploits are mainly scripting exploits, and google record also the server IP which host the malicious software.

The diagnostic will tell you also if your website have acted as intermediary in the distribution of malware, probably not very useful information for you, but it is safe to know if something was going wrong.

I think it's an excellent diagnostic that you can get for FREE for your website to make sure that it is safe to browse on your website.

Google Analytics PHP Class & Official Analytics API

2009-06-07T09:12:26Z

We have previously talked about Google Analytics PHP API, in that time there was no official API available yet. Today Google Analytics API is officially available to developers, so you can get your code working with a real API instead of hacks that might broke anytime if Google update their service... etc.

Doug Tan, Ask about PHP, have written Google Analytics PHP Class using the new API and a good tutorial on how to use it. Pretty simple and very easy to use, you will get Analytics data right in your applications in minutes. Below a sample code :

Google Images Got Colors, the power of tagging

2009-04-12T19:02:22Z

Darren pointed to a new feature in Google images search letting you to filter results by color ! The results looks very accurate that you will be interested to know how google are indexing colors ? Are they using image recognition techniques to index every image in their database ? That will be crazy if you think about it, but the answer could be easily found in something launched about three years ago, an ajax game, letting everyone to tag images and get scored on that : The image labeler.

Because the results are very accurate and fast, it can only be something based on a real human indexing ! You can see below for example if you search for a car model, you can get the result you are looking for, but imagine you want to see only gray cars in results, the filter can really give you what you are looking for. While if you used "gray" as keyword in search you will get something else completely different.

I find the color filter implementation very successful. Image search is getting more and more powerful search features and I expect to see more amazing filtering options, who knows !

Happy New Year 2009 Doodle

2009-01-01T08:04:40Z

I just wanted to profit from Google new year Doodle to wish happy new year to all Googling Magazine readers and PHP Magazine readers ! During more than three years I - and many others contributors - really enjoyed sharing ideas and thoughts with all of you. Thanks for your support and hope you will enjoy even more reading us in 2009.

2008 Holiday Doodle - Updated

2008-12-21T16:48:41Z

Holidays already here, so are you ready to celebrate ? Like every year, google celebrate it with a serie of Doodles, numbered 15. As usual we will keep this post updated everyday with the new doodle as it will be available.

Google Chrome, the new Browser by Google

2008-09-03T20:47:16Z

Google have just announced their entrance to the browsers war to join Microsoft IE, Mozilla FF, Safari, Opera and others. Chrome the new google browser, is very simple and very fast ! Chrome uses components from Apple's WebKit and Mozilla's Firefox, among others - and that's not everything because Google is willing to make it Open Source.

All of us at Google spend much of our time working inside a browser. We search, chat, email and collaborate in a browser. And in our spare time, we shop, bank, read news and keep in touch with friends -- all using a browser. Because we spend so much time online, we began seriously thinking about what kind of browser could exist if we started from scratch and built on the best elements out there.

For more information and download : http://www.google.com/chrome

Google Notebook Integration with PHP

2008-06-06T12:14:49Z

Vikram Vaswani have written an interesting article over IBM developerWorks on processing and integration of Google Notebook data with PHP. In the article, the author explains how to use the Google Notebook REST API to build PHP-based client applications.

Google Notebook is a free service that allows users to save and share notes and Web clippings in an online journal. A REST-based API allows developers to build customized PHP applications around this service using SimpleXML. In this article, you learn how to use the API, with examples of reading notebooks and notebook contents using PHP.

50 Cool Things You Can Do with Google Charts API

2008-06-06T11:17:31Z

If you know Google Charts, you might have a look at this great collection of 50 cool things you can do with google charts API. If you just want to have fun with charts, for mapping, tracking, Integration, Finance, Business, Education, At Home, Showing Off, or any other thing, be sure to check this out !

Chartophiles, have you heard that Google has made it incredibly easy to generate your own slick-looking charts? It�s true, and all it takes to make one is the ability to read and edit a URL. This has made it possible for lots of people to get creative with charts.

Google Maps With or Without JavaScript

2008-05-28T08:57:50Z

Mika Tuupola shared his experience over his blog about using Google Maps without JavaScript. The problem faced was map empty for empty for browsers with JavaScript disabled, and the render time which was too long. We can probably talk also about accessible maps here. He wrote a static version of Google maps which works without JavaScript, render faster, and defintely solve the previous problems. The only difference that the new static map don't provide bubbles, but I think it's great work if we talk about accessibility and rendering speed. You can see a working demo of Google Maps without Javascript, source code is also available on the svn.

Google Docs Goes Offline

2008-05-27T22:24:14Z

Google just rolled out Google Docs offline, a feature announced previously at end March. A Microsoft Office killer feature that is going to change the way you use Google Docs web application. The new feature is powered by Google Gears, and allow you to keep working on your documents even when connection is lost. Once you are back online, the documents sync up with the server. Currently Google Docs Offline support only documents, presentations and spreadsheets will be probably supported in future versions. You can find more about the Google Docs offline feature in the FAQs.

Install of the Offline feature

Security warning from Gears

Docs Synchronizing progress

Earth Day Doodle

2008-04-23T06:53:27Z

The Earth Day from wikipedia is one of two different observances, both held annually during spring in the northern hemisphere, and autumn in the southern hemisphere. These are intended to inspire awareness of and appreciation for the Earth's environment. Google celebrated the Earth Day with a new original Doodle. Hope that we goes green not just on websites.

Use the YouTube API with PHP

2008-04-19T08:13:09Z

Vikram Vaswani, Founder, Melonfire, have written an interesting article at IBM developerWorks on using the Youtube API with PHP. Notice that a PEAR package Services_YouTube is available if you are looking for a library to use Youtube API with PHP, but is alpha since 2006.

The article introduces the YouTube Data API, demonstrates how you can use it to browse user-generated video content; access video metadata, comments and responses; and perform keyword searches. The author used the power of SimpleXML to parse Youtube data and build customized PHP applications.

2007 Holiday Doodle - Updated

2007-12-22T21:04:11Z

As usual during holidays a new series of Doodles, and like every year we'll keep this posted updated with 2007 holiday's Doodles. It's amazing how in a very small portion of the page, Google is able to have some fun and keep all eyes on it. Notice there is always a small story behind Holiday's Doodles.