Daily Tech Digest

Facebook Trending Articles spotted in NewsFeed

2012-04-28T16:00:00.000+05:30

Is Facebook going the twitter way ? We all know Facebook has a very large user base and with so many social reading apps coming up in last 6 months or so, Facebook has also started getting lot of traction even for social reading. There were reports a few weeks back that Facebook has started to test a feature named as ‘Trending Articles’ on a few profiles.

Today I spotted a smaller version of the Trending Article feature in my news feed. Well it just sits in the middle of your news feed , displaying 5 articles that are trending right now. Here is a screenshot of the same.

I am still not sure how Facebook decides what articles need to be displayed as a ‘Trending Articles’ , whether it is a global trend or a trend that has been followed by your friends, or a combination. Another thing that is to be noted whether these Articles are needed by an user, or if he finds them intrusive.

I felt it to be non necessary feature, as I already felt the same about ‘Recently Read’ articles by friends displayed by most social reading app.

Do you see ‘Trending Articles’ feature enabled on your feed. And do you like it or not ? Let us know in comments.

Zerg Rush – A Google Doodle to kill your time

2012-04-28T07:58:00.001+05:30

According to Wikipedia ‘Zerg’ is a character from the RTS game ‘StarCraft’ who assimilate other races in pursuit of genetic perfection. And what a way Google has found out to help you kill your spare time with this new Google Doodle ‘Zerg Rush’. It has created an interactive shooting game that not only keeps you frantically clicking your mouse but also gives you a score which you can share with your friends.

To try this new doodle just type 'Zerg Rush’ in Google search.

The next thing you will see small ‘O’s in Google colours coming up and start eating your search results, but that's not all what it is all about. Just aim at them and start shooting them by clicking on them and watch their health decrease and die.

Once all the search results are gobbled up, you can see your score and even share it with your friends on Google Plus.

Last but not the least all the remaining O’s come together and create a giant GG (a gaming term usually said at the end of a game meaning ‘Good Game’)

An addictive game nevertheless and with scores given to compete with each other its one of the good doodles by Google, but on the hindsight with the only sharing option being on Google+ , seems Google is trying to gain some more traction on its social networking site by positively utilizing your spare time.

So all you FPS gamers, do a Zerg Rush and share your scores here.

Visit Google | Do a Zerg Rush | Google

Google does restrict traffic to search

2012-03-24T01:44:00.000+05:30

While surfing today through my college network, I was greeted by a webpage which I hadn’t seen over all my years using Google It stated that “Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. This page checks to see if it's really you sending the requests, and not a robot.” and in order to continue you will have to fill the Captcha.

Now thats a surprise given the fact any College network would be having too many simultaneous connections that would be on google.com. Well filling in the Captcha made life easier and Google did not ask me the captcha again.

Here is the Official Support Thread for the Issue

Facebook launches High Res Photos [Better Quality plus Full Screen]

2012-03-23T02:55:00.000+05:30

Facebook has been playing around with how the photographs look on their website. They had introduced Photo Theatre Feature back in Feb 2011. Since then it has been toying around with the photo viewer in small steps. Now it has announced that it would now support High Resolution photos too.

Those who have noticed , Facebook Photos now has a full screen mode too, which allows the photos to be viewed in full screen.

All you need to do is click the expand arrow on the top right corner of the screen.

It has also given clear cut options through which you can download / tag / view full screen / report the image. Just click on the options menu at the bottom right of Photo when you hover on the image.

Whilst in Full Screen Mode the comments and likes are hidden. You can view them by clicking at the bottom right in the Full Screen Mode

The Full Screen Mode can be exited by pressing the ESC Button.

You can read more about the feature at the official announcement page.

Tell us if you liked the Features or are the larger images taking time to load for you. Write us in comments.

Related Read : Facebook Launches timeline for Pages

Download Windows 8 Consumer Preview [beta]

2012-03-01T19:02:00.001+05:30

It was coming since long and its here now. With all those goodies written about Microsoft’s latest operating system ‘Windows 8’ its time for the official sneak peek into the OS by the end consumers. The Consumer Preview (beta) version is now officially available for download.

The Latest Operating system has been applauded by the tech community since its developer preview was out , and how intuitive its Metro UI has been. Well now you can try it yourself.

The Download is available in two Formats : Downloadable Setup and as an ISO Image.

Download Windows 8 Consumer Preview as a Setup

Download Windows 8 Consumer Preview as an ISO Image.

The download is available as both 32 bit and 64 bit OS. The Minimum configuration to run Windows 8 is same as of Windows 7. The minimum config is :

Processor: 1 GHz or faster
RAM: 1 gigabyte (GB) (32-bit) / 2 GB (64-bit)
Hard disk space: 16 GB (32-bit) / 20 GB (64-bit)
Graphics card: Microsoft DirectX 9 or higher
Minimum Screen Resolution : 1024 x 768

So get your hands on the the latest offering from Microsoft and let us know how it feels and performs… Is it all froth and no substance or has Microsoft really turned things around this time.

Timeline for Pages is here [New Facebook Pages]

2012-03-01T17:16:00.001+05:30

Well the timeline feature that Facebook launched was received with mixed reviews by the social media. Few loved it and few outright hated it, and yes there was no going back. Now the clock has come full circle with Facebook announcing that it would be implementing Timeline for Pages soon.

The Facebook Page Owners would be seeing a message as shown below which says that on 30th March 2012 , The all new Facebook pages would be going live. Till that time you can test drive the feature and once you are ready you can publish it. And yes once you publish the page there is no going back to the old design even before 30th of march.

The new pages would be a kin to the Facebook Timeline, and would show the activity on your page chronologically backwards.

Well the main features of the New Facebook Pages would be :

Cover Photo : The same way as it is on timeline profiles, you can choose a cover photo for your page. The advantages of using the cover photo is giving your Page a unique identity. As can be seen in the example the official Manchester United page on Facebook showcases the cover page as the team after their 19th Championship victory.

Pin the Post : Pin the post on your page timeline so that it is easily visible to your visitors.
Private Messages : you can also send the private message to the page (if the page has enabled it) and the admin of the page would see it in the admin area as can be seen in this Plugged.in Facebook Page..

Unlike Timeline for profiles , timeline for pages is inevitable, and 30th march ‘12 is the day. So what can you do.

Till that time you can :

Clean-up your timeline
Work on cover image – make it catchy and sassy as that is going to be your brand’s identity on Facebook.

Test drive the new Facebook pages and let us know if you like it or not.

Related : Facebook | Change Facebook Page title

Top sites for Browser usage statistics

2012-02-05T01:21:00.001+05:30

The browser wars are heating up, and so are the statistics related to them. With Microsoft going aggressive with its Internet Explorer, Chrome gaining market share as with Firefox losing it, the demand for relaible stats is increasing. Whether you need it for knowledge , research project or for your web development, which are the most popular and reliable sites that can be looked upon for the statistical data.

We list down 5 of the better sites for the statistics:

STATCOUNTER

StatCounter Global Stats provide a very useful insight into the browsers that the world is using, based upon the tracking code being used by the sites it tracks.the number of sites tracked by it is more than 3 million websites.

Source: StatCounter Global Stats - Browser Market Share

NETMARKETSHARE

They are a firm that displays statistics for the internet usage., and the data they display is based on around 160 million visitors per month.

STATSOWL

Another leading statistics provider, with the statistics being based on more than 28 million users per month

CLICKY

Yet another traffic tracking website, giving out pretty reliable data. The statistics are based upon more than 300 million daily page views across the 300,000+ web sites that use Clicky Web Analytics

GOOGLE ANALYTICS

Well while they might nnot give universal statistics, but they surely provide you with statistics for your own website, which can give you fairly good idea about on what browser is your website being viewed.

Which of these do you use ? let us know in your comments.

Amazon enters Indian Market – its Junglee.com

2012-02-02T17:15:00.000+05:30

The long wait is finally over. Amazon.com has finally arrived in Indian markets as Junglee.com but before you get all too excited by the news, the catch is its more of a comparison site unlike amazon.com.

The site compares rates and checks availability of books, gadgets and other items on various other Online/offline retailers. Some of the retailers include indiaplaza, snapdeal, Microsoft India store etc. You can not buy from junglee.com , but you would have offers from Amazon.com .

A Typical Product page on Jungle is seen as below.(Note the price difference between Amazon and other sellers)

The first thing you would notice would be the clean interface that the website has unlike its parent company. Its also to be seen when the website would start offering checkout option too. Another factor that needs to be checked how it changes the game for the market leader Flipkart.com and other websites like LetsBuy.com. Till then enjoy the site as a price comparison tool.

How did you like the website? do let us know in the comments below.

Hide Facebook News ticker [How To]

2012-02-01T20:31:00.000+05:30

Finally you will be able to hide the Facebook Ticker - a feature that has been liked and hated by many Facebook users. For the Uninitiated (really?) Ticker is the feature of Facebook that constantly updates as and when your friends like, comment on, upload photos or any content on Facebook. A feature that has been considered a nuisance by many users.

Facebook has now enabled its users to hide the ticker. All you need to do is that go to the top right corner of News Ticker and click the ‘up arrow’ present there.

Seems Facebook takes its users feedback very seriously. The more control users have the better it is.

So how do you prefer your ticker to be? Hidden or Visible ? Do drop in your comments.

Also Read: Change Facebook page Title | Facebook

Google ‘Search plus your World’ [Why]

2012-01-11T15:27:00.000+05:30

Google has started rolling out one of the most drastic changes ever to its search engine. It has started to incorporate Google+ (Google Plus) results into the search engine. Now this means your search is going social (or that's what Google makes you think and believe)

Now this feature would change the way your search results would appear. As mentioned in the Google Blog’s Official post about Search plus your World the changes would include following results too.

1. Personal Results

2. People and Pages

3. Profiles in Search

Now I did a search on Google regarding ‘Best WordPress Plugins’ and here is what I got.

Now both the search results show same 10 Personal results and on expanding them this is what I got as front page of results.

Now you can clearly see that the relevance of the Personal Results is very less as compared to what is expected from the keywords searched. And frankly speaking I wont be liking that my search results get dominated by what my friends have shared. What I would be looking for is more relevance and much wider audience, and that's what Google had made possible over the years. It was the relevance.

Yes I would agree that it may help when you are searching for places but for everything else like for example Images, why would I search on Google when you have already integrated Picasa With Google+ . Shouldn’t I just click the +You at top left corner to do these things if the need be.

HOW TO REMOVE / STOP ‘GOOGLE PLUS YOUR WORLD’

All you need to do to stop personal results to appear in Google Search is Click on the Following Button on the Top Right of the search page.

For me it seems this is a very Drastic change that Google has done to its Search Engine, which I would consider as not a Game Changing but a Creepier one. For me personally I would like my results to be sane and relevant., Google has been an expert in PUSH MARKETING as we have seen over the years, and it seems to me that it is an attempt to revive Google+ , which Google thought would gain popularity as Gmail and other services did (pull – push marketing) , but failed to gain momentum as the time passed..

What do you think about ‘Search plus your world’ Leave us a comment below.

RELATED LINKS : Search Plus your World | Google

Open .daa disc images without PowerISO [Free Utility]

2012-01-05T20:21:00.000+05:30

The DAA (Direct Access Archive) extension is a disc image format created by PowerISO and is similar to a standard disc image extension .iso which is most commonly used. DAA format boasts of high compression and password protection amongst others, and so it has somewhat gained popularity especially when it comes to getting disc images of pirated software and games.

The problem with DAA is that it can only be opened by PowerISO, which is a paid software.(Trial Version opens DAA files upto a certain file size). This issue is very well handled by a small program called DAA2ISO

DAA2ISO is a small program that helps you convert an image with DAA extension to .ISO and that too free. Now you can easily burn that Image file using image burning tools like Nero or Roxio or you can mount the image using any of the free disc drive emulation software like Daemon Tools

All that needs to be done is :

Download DAA2ISO
Open the DAA File and Choose the save location for ISO file

It would unpack and save your disc image in the .ISO format.

Voila you are done! use the ISO file the way you wish to.

LINKS : Download DAA2ISO | More in Softwares | Tips and Tricks | Hacks

Gmail Revamps Again [8 Features you should know]

2011-11-08T02:11:00.000+05:30

Well Gmail has been undergoing a lot of changes, in terms of looks and other features that it offers through its Labs. We talked about Gmail previews, Priority Inbox and previous revamps. As with the case with Yahoo Mail undergoing a complete revamp in May, Gmail too this time has undergone a complete makeover falling in line with the aesthetic changes that Google has been undergoing over all its services.

The aesthetic changes with Gmail have been a mixed reaction, while most people have welcomed it, there are a few who still love the old simplistic look.

The major feature changes that Gmail has undergone are:

Clean Look : The new look is Uber clean. No clutter and no fuss, the default colours are also in line with the look that Google search carries and is pleasant to eyes.

Adjustable Sidebar and Chat Window : The length of left sidebar is customizable by just drag and leave. Hover over the labels and they automatically expand. Also the three options of Mail, contacts and Tasks has been done away with as three separate links but have been clubbed as a dropdown on the top left. Also you can choose between showing gadgets or the Chat Window.
Changed Toolbar : Gone are the days when all the toolbars in Gmail used to have text written. The new toolbar just has dark grey icons depicting the action they are supposed to do upon clicking.The toolbar differs for both the default inbox view and for a single mail

Density Control : Gmail has given you the option to change the density of the inbox. The three options, comfortable, cozy and compact let you have three options for the same. In our view the Comfortable view gives the best look, the others make the inbox feel a little congested. But yes they would go well on handheld devices and tablets.
Improved Search : The best part that they have done this time is to give multiple options while searching the mail. You can search specific folders , have filters over attachments, date and much more. And not to forget the option of ‘Create Filter with this search’
Conversations : The mail conversations have been tweaked, the look and the feel is great as with the fact that the conversations previews are also better this time. The Gtalk Chat pic is displayed on each conversation if the sender is in your chat list or contacts. Also a liked feature is the truncation/ hiding of the long emails.
Themes : Gmail has done away with a few Themes but also has come up with HD themes. Well why HD themes ? I too am not sure about this, and in my own view I would like to keep my email theme as simple as possible.
Auto Adaptation on Window Resize : The new Gmail auto adapts itself in case the browser is resized, therefore minimizing the efforts needed to scroll the Page.

So how did you rate the new Gmail. Write it to us in the comments section below.

Preview your Gmail Mail without opening it

2011-10-03T19:48:00.000+05:30

Well the debate between Gmail and Outlook – “Which is better” is a never ending one. But there has been one feature which has been a standout for Outlook and that has been the mail preview which is also called as ‘Reading Pane’. The feature has been in Outlook since Office 2007, and the same has been incorporated by other web based email clients like Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail.

Now the same features can be incorporated in Gmail so as to have a sneak peak of the mail without opening it. this is not exactly same as Reading Pane but does the job pretty handy with a simple right click. To enable this feature you need to follow one simple step.

ENABLING MESSAGE SNEAK PEEK

Go to the Gmail Labs by visiting the URL : https://mail.google.com/mail/?shva=1#settings/labs
Enable the Message Sneak Peek Lab

Click on the ‘Save Changes’ Button at the bottom of the page

PREVIEWING THE EMAILS

To preview the Emails in Gmail all you need to do is right click on an Email in your Inbox and you would see a reading pane pan out , showing you the contents of the mail.

So enjoy a better Gmail! and let us know how you feel about it.

RELATED : 8 Features that make Yahoo Mail Better | Yahoo! | Gmail

8 Features that make Yahoo Mail Beta Better

2011-05-25T01:40:00.000+05:30

Many of you would have upgraded your yahoo mail to the new Beta Version. Yahoo has upgraded its mail to a yet new Beta version and had sent out notification mails to most of its users in the end of April 2011. While Gmail has been slowly capturing the email marketplace but there do exist Yahoo Mail loyals. Lets have a look at the best features that Yahoo! Mail Beta has to offer this time around.

1. Clean Look:

This is one thing that would surely be noticed. After a long time Gmail's simplicity has been challenged, and the new look Yahoo Mail Beta is seriously clean.

2. Browse Your Chat Logs:

Easily browse through your saved chat logs by clicking on the Conversations link just under the Inbox. Log settings can be changed in messenger settings.

3. Organized Folders:

Folders are an expandable link now and are easily accessible too. While yahoo doesn't have labels folders are the way to go in yahoo mail

4. Facebook Chat :

Chat with your Facebook from within the mail after attaching your Facebook account with yahoo. Also easily accessible is the Yahoo Messenger Chat .

5. Optimized Search:

This is the biggest change. The search is a lot better now and easily accessible on the top rightmost corner with 2 options to search mail and web. Choose as you wish to.

6. Contacts:

Another Big improvement ala Gmail with contacts now being easier to find . Import option is given too from Facebook, Gmail, Hotmail and other mail services. Also present is the duplicate contact finder one feature that I loved with Gmail too.

7. Unlimited Storage:

This one is tempting though, but only if you are a power user. Gmail still has around seven and a half GB of storage.

8. Themes:

Last but not the least the look and feel can be changed through the multiple themes that are available for selection.

You can also Try Yahoo Mail beta from here if you haven’t already.

Do let us know about your suggestions regarding the New mail beta.

RELATED : Make yahoo Messenger Multi-messenger | Yahoo

Disable Dynamic Views on Blogger Blogs

2011-04-06T18:13:00.003+05:30

Recently Blogger has launched the dynamic views for blogger hosted blog. Its a nice feature for those who wishto view blogs clean and elegant. But there would be a few publishers who would like to disable the Dynamic views.

The advantage and the disadvantage of having dynamic views is its clean look. While you may love the clean layout but also rue over the fact that this layout wont serve your ads or anything that's not posted as a post.
Here's How to disable it.
Goto DashBoard > Settings > Formatting
Go to Enable Dynamic views and Select No and save the settings.

Well thats how to disable the Dynamic view for Blogger. View CoA - Your Daily Tech Digest in Dynamic View.

Related Posts : Dynamic Views for Blogger | Read more on Blogger

Blogger now has dynamic views

2011-03-31T00:42:00.000+05:30

Google is constantly evolving the blogger platform keeping in view the stiff competition from another amazing platform WordPress. While for WordPress it has an amazing network and loads of man-hours are being put by the open-source community for its evolution, whereas blogger being Google's project evolves slowly but it has the reliability of Google's zero downtime and stability. Well after the new comment system and other changes with blogger google has also launched five new dramatic ways of viewing a Blogger hosted blog.

The new 5 ways allow a user to view a blogger hosted blog in a totally different way by just appending /view at the end of the URL. For example you can view us by visiting the link http://www.corpseofattic.com/view.

The Five views gone live as of now are:

Flipcard – This view places the posts in neat and clean horizontal lines as thumbnails. The details and name of post is revealed on hovering over the post.

Mosiac – This view arranges the the images present in posts like mosiac tiles and hoveing over the thumbnail zooms the image out, and on clicking would take you to the post.

Sidebar – This view enables your posts to be listed as a sidebar and the post opened in the right pane. Clean and elegant look.

Snapshot – This view places the thumbnails as randomly arranged polaroids. Hovering over the image would show you a small snippet of the post.

Timeslide – This view comprises of three columns , the leftmost one having most recent posts with max details, middle columns has previous posts with lesser details and rightmost column only having the titles of the posts.

These five themes give a lot of dynamism to the blogger blog’s look. The best part about them these views allow you to view a blog without the frills, no ads or sidebars. Clean and elegant is what it is meant at.

What do you feel about the dynamic views on Blogger?

Facebook New Photo Viewer [Theatre] Feature

2011-02-17T03:01:00.000+05:30

Facebook has started rolling out its new Photo viewer feature to everyone. This was one feature that had apparently leaked out last year in an accidental update. Facebook had since then taken downtime to rollback them, but a friend of mine Sarandeep always had this light box version of Photo viewer active on his profile with photos being viewed in black background.

This is how the new PhotoViewer (Theatre) feature looks like, kind of lightbox popup which pops as soon as you click a photo. Then as before you can use the keyboard shortcuts to navigate through the album.

Some Noticeable changes that you can notice upfront are:

Visible Navigation buttons
Close button on the top right
Like and comment buttons at bottom left
An option of downloading the photograph which was not present before(only Hi-res pictures were available for download before).
No need to leave the page you are currently to view Photos

What certainly is missing out is the ease of navigation from one album to another using the hyperlinks that were available in earlier version of Photo Viewer as with clicking outside the photo viewer accidentally would close the popup.

So far so good, the new Theatre feature is 3/5 for me, majorly because the that extra navigation you need to do to view other albums.

Let us know how you felt about the new Photo viewer. Till then Happy Networking.

Photo Courtesy : Saksham Gupta

You Can Change Facebook Page Title or Name

2010-11-07T15:55:00.000+05:30

Yes its true. After such a long time Facebook has finally allowed Page admins to change the title of their pages. A feature which most admins had wanted for ages. earlier it used to be that if you have created a page with a wrong title you are stuck with it with no option of changing it in future.

But now it seems that Facebook has provided the facility to change them as it can be seen from the screenshot of Our Facebook page.

Well a thing needs to be seen is that if all the users have been provided with the feature to change the title because Facebook help as of Today still shows that Page Title cant be changed

Anyways the good news is that the change is here, and hopefully it is shared with everyone very soon. And yes this comes very soon after Facebook Launched Friendship Pages.

Please Note : As of now this change is visible on Pages with lesser number of Likes(probably less then 100 Fans/likes). Lets see when it would be available for all if it does so.

Facebook launches friendship pages

2010-11-03T11:18:00.001+05:30

Facebook has launched yet another innovative feature called the friendship pages. Now this feature is dedicated to see the common things between two friends. For example if you or someone shares a lot of posts or pictures in common then these would come up in your and the other person’s friendship page.

These pages include everything common between you and the other profile connected through the friendship page - including wall posts, mutual friends, commonly tagged pictures, common pages amongst others. You can see a friendship page if you are friend with one of the person and can view both the profiles.

So for the friends whose friendship page I was checking, the URL are of the format : http://www.facebook.com/corpseofattic?and=sakshamgupta which means the generic URL is of the type : http://www.facebook.com/UID-user1?and=UID-user2

For the pages which haven’t chosen their usernames the UIDs need to be replaced with the respective profile ID numbers. You can also see your friendship page with another person by Visiting the View you and User Link on someone’s profile page as can be seen from the image on the left.

Pretty cool idea thought by Facebook. Tell us what you think of the new feature – the Friendship pages. So go socializing and looking out for Friendship pages.

Best Dictionary Tooltip extensions for Web Browsers

2010-10-03T02:47:00.000+05:30

Ever wondered why you don’t have a dictionary at your disposal when you are reading an article online and just found out a new word but you don’t know its meaning. And you have to open up answers.com or dictionary.com . Well now you can save some hassles for sure. There are a few add-ons for browsers which you can use to display meaning of words as and when you read in the same window.

Here are the best free add-ons that you can use with Internet explorer, Firefox or chrome, that might just save you quite some time.

Firefox :

Dictionary Tooltip

This is a very popular add-on . All you need to do is to install this add-on from Firefox add-on website : Download Dictionary Tooltip for Firefox. Restart Firefox and Voila you are done. All you need to do is Ctrl+Shift+k or Double-Click or right click and see meaning , after you select the word to be showed the meaning of. Best way to do is double click the word, a small DT icon appears, hover over it and you get the meaning. With this tool you have an option of selecting multiple dictionaries too

Google Chrome :

Google Dictionary

Although Google chrome isn’t that popular a browser, but this one is a personal favourite. The way it shows meaning of a word is very uncluttered and clean, synonymous of Google’s other products. You can download if from here Google Dictionary extension for Chrome. Install the extension and you are done. All you need to do is just double click the word and it will pop up the meaning in an elegant way. On clicking More link it opens the word in Google dictionary.

You can also search by clicking the red Dictionary icon in the URLbar of chrome.

Very clean and very quick.

Internet Explorer :

Dictionary MenuItem

Not as good as the other two but can surely do the job. It’s a bit old fashioned in looks. All you need to do is Install Dictionary menuItem for Internet Explorer. It’s a normal Setup, Install it and restart Internet Explorer. Then just select the word and right click and select mean. You’ll get the meaning in a Popup Form. Not that Good but might just do .

The Output comes something like this as a popup.

So the verdict : My Vote goes to Google dictionary but Google hasn’t launched such an extension for Firefox which lets hope it does one day. Tooltip is also a great plug-in but Internet Explorers might just have to wait for something better.

Google URL Shortener – goes Live

2010-10-01T02:48:00.001+05:30

goo.gl the official Google URL shortener that was announced last year and was integrated into quite a few Google websites and apps has gone live. Google has just announced that they have officially launched goo.gl and users can use the website for URL shorteneing.

All you need to do is go to http://goo.gl and start shortening the URLs. Pretty simple service and Google claims to have 100% uptime too. If you sign in using your google account you would be able to see the shortening History too.

So just go ahead and start minimizing the length of the links. You can visit CorpseofAttic.com by visiting http://goo.gl/eaxM now that's pretty short .

Related read : Google Introduces Priority Inbox | Google | Official Post

New Interface of Orkut Yet Again

2010-09-03T00:00:00.001+05:30

Looks like Google is at the helm of revamping its stable of products. Yesterday we notified you about the New Feature on Gmail – Priority Inbox, and before about the New Commenting system on Blogger, It seems its the turn of Orkut this time. Google has revamped the Orkut Interface yet again.

Some times back Google had changed the Orkut Interface, which many people found it cluttered, and hated it, while few loved it. With Orkut losing ground in its old strongholds like India too, to facebook , Google has taken initiative to rev its engine up and bring back the community to Orkut.

Quite a new Features have been Added in the new Orkut, a few of them are:

Send scraps to anyone from the Homepage – Just Select who you want to send the scrap and voila you can send the scrap/ post images right from the homepage .
Send Scraps to multiple Friends from the Home page. – we had published a hack to send multiple scraps, which has now been deprecated and you can send multiple scraps through the Orkut homepage itself. Just select the change link in the TO section and select the users.
More Privacy Options. – Just select the ‘Visible to’ link and decide who the scrap is visible to
Important Groups are available as Tabs – This can be seen on your Homepage as being available in tabs , and you can click on them to see which groups updates you wish to see.
Group Scrap – You can select the Friend groups available in tabs, and write a scrap only to that group. The other friend groups that are not visible automatically can be viewed by clicking the + sign on the extreme right of the tabs, and similarly you can send the scraps to that group too.
Applications have a Dedicated Box – its available lower down the homepage below the Communities box, not of a much importance but good enough to keep the cleanliness of the interface.

It is yet to see how the orkut community reacts to these changes but as far as my opinion goes, the interface looks a lot organised and clean than the earlier versions, and quite fast to load.

Go check it out for yourself at orkut, or see a guided tour of the new Orkut. and Let us Know how you feel about the new interfaced Orkut.

Links : Orkut Homepage | Related Posts About Orkut

Gmail Introduces Priority Inbox

2010-09-02T05:17:00.000+05:30

Google has been at the helm of innovation since quite sometime now. It has done so many changes to Gmail in recent past. Continuing with the same tradition Gmail has introduced another feather in its Gmail brand – named Priority Inbox. This is kind of an inbuilt filter feature, and might prove to be really useful to people who use Filters to sort out emails and still get so many mails in Inbox that it almost freaks them out.

While Gmail has nice filter mechanism wherein you can define rules that attaches to the mails specified labels, or performs certain actions as specified. Priority Inbox would sort out the mails you receive into those of priority and those with low importance. So that you can just check the ones with high priority and then go onto the non important ones. The working mechanism is kind of similar to what Gmail has for its spam detection.

It detects the way you work, which mails you open, whom you reply to and whom you frequently interact with, These few traits are noticed over a span of time and as it progresses the mechanism grows better. You will also have an option to mark mail as important if the priority inbox misses out and doing Vice Versa.

We had notified about the new commenting system on the Blogger which too works on a similar mechanism The more you mark spam comments as spam the less they are published. So Similarly on this too the more you manage your mails the better it manages and analyses on how to sort out mail.

This is a Short Video Depicting how it works.

Read the official notification at Google mail blog OR learn more about it at Priority Inbox HomePage

Links : Official Blog Post | Home Page | Google Related Posts

Blogger Gets a New Comment System – Review

2010-08-23T23:36:00.001+05:30

Yes its Blogger again in news now. A Few days back we had compiled a short list of features that Blogger might need to address for its comment review and spam detection system Looks like people at Google certainly have paid attention to what bloggers round the world have asked for. Blogger has just released a new comment system which has addressed a few problems that were asked for.

Most of you would have started seeing the new ‘COMMENTS’ tab in your blogger dashboard. This is the place which allows you to have more control over what and how your comments are posted. It has two sub tabs namely Published and Spam. Published is the place where all your comments which are visible on the blog are placed, which can be reviewed from there. The second tab named spam is where the automatically detected spam comments are placed. For those who have enabled moderation on their blogs can see a third tab named ‘Awaiting Moderation’ besides these two tabs.

In the Published tab you can see the comments already published and you have an option to either mark them as spam, delete the comment or clear the contents of the comment. While in the spam tab you have an option to either delete them or mark them as not Spam. This can be seen in the screenshots below.

There are two major changes that can be observed from this. Firstly Multiple comments can be managed / deleted at a single go. Secondly the ability to mark comment as spam. There are still some that need to be addressed for on how comments should be changed for blogger. There are still a few concerns that have been raised by the blogger community after these changes, most notable that the spam comments pop up again. Now that's one thing that needs to be seen on how Blogger detects a comment as a spam. or whether marking a comment as spam has any affect on future comments, and how spam is separated from others genuine ones, is it email or the website URL or the name itself.

But all things said and done, it is a welcome change, and we all should appreciate that. ;) Till then happy blogging guys :)

LINKS : Official Notification | What all needs to be changed in Blogger Comments | Blogger

Gmail Tweaks Itself Again

2010-08-11T17:05:00.001+05:30

Looks like Gmail is up and bound for some real good changes. Of the late Gmail has started becoming the best internet mail system, courtesy its ultra clean look and no fuss approach. With it being lighter than other email systems it obviously goes out to become the best (some people may disagree) internet mail client. So carrying forward the legacy of clean interface Gmail has yet again cleaned up itself.

The most prominent change that has occurred is the changing of the top left interface. The Compose Mail link has become a button now, and mail, contacts have been moved up on the left hand panel. Yet again something up for grabs when it comes to being clean and tidy. The Select all checkbox now has a drop down too wherein you can select which messages you wish to select

Other changes Include tweaking up the contacts section, which now has keyboard shortcuts, and multiple other tweaks including auto save. more Features have been put up at official Blog Post for the tweak

LINKS : Gmail | Updates to Contacts at gmailblog | Gmail Tweaks