Google Docs & Spreadsheets on Opera

Opera is a great browser, but unfortunately it does not work with many of the web 2.0 sites. Google services in particular seem to ignore Opera.

However it is possible to use Google Docs & Spreadsheet in Opera, with some tweaks:

- Browse to docs.google.com. It will tell you that you cannot use this browser.
- Right click on the page and go to "Edit site preferences..."
- In the "Network" tab, choose "Mark as Internet Explorer" for the "Browser identification".

Once you load the doc list, click on a spreadsheet and repeat the same steps for spreadsheets.google.com.

It works ok, some things look bad, but the main functionalities are there. However, one huge problem: you cannot edit docs, only view them. Spreadsheets are fine.

Hopefully the soon to be released Opera 9.1 will solve this problem.

For the moment I am still using Firefox.

Writely + Google Spreadsheets = Google Docs & Spreadsheets

Today I found out that Google combined Writely and Spreadsheets. I haven't seen this announced anywhere, but I might have missed it. The new service is now called Google Docs & Spreadsheets (from now on GDS). I wonder why don't they just call it Google Office, it is much easier!!

Being a user of both Writely and Google Spreadsheets, I will write down the main differences I have noted in the hour I've been using the new GDS.

GDS now uses Writely's file manager to list both docs and spreadsheets. I am really happy about this, since I was missing this on the old Spreadsheets. All the main actions remain: tag, delete, archive, star, delete. The old Writely design has been changed to match all other Google services, and the Writely brand is nowhere to be seen. So we can assume that the Writely aquisition is complete.

Following are some minor changes/bugs:

• When trying to assign/remove tag to files, the tag list is not complete. However if you click on the Browse D&S button it will show all my tags. I am sure this will be rectified in the future.
• There is an unarchive button that I don't think was in Writely. Usually active docs are those modified in the last 30 days. Older files are archived. The unarchive button simply changes the timestamp of a file to "7 hours ago" and bumps it up to the active list. This doesn't seem an elegant way to do this, I wish they could come up with something better, but for the moment it works.
• It is now possible to save any file as PDF. I tried saving a spreadsheet but it didn't look very good. Maybe I have to play with the settings.
• Not sure if this is new, but it is now possible to open gmail attachments with GDS, which is a very nice integration of services.
• Posting to a blog works as well as before, even updating the post. I tried updating with Writely but it didn't work in the past.

There are probably other things, but I haven't found them yet. What's missing is blogging to Blogger Beta, and setting up multiple blogs.

Overall I am very happy with this change, it still needs some bug fixing and important features, but this is already a great product. Next step: presentation files?

GoogleTube is here!

So it is finally confirmed: Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion in a stock-for-stock transaction.

I think this is a good thing for YouTube, since they were burning bandwidth money while not having a clear business plan. But with Google backing them now, they will have the freedom to develop their platform and improve their services.

On the other hand, I hope Google has a plan for YouTube. Maybe their ad plan will work with it, I hope so for them. In the meantime I am just glad that I can keep using YouTube for the forseeable future.

Technorati claim

Nothing to see here. Move along. Technorati Profile

Google Reader? no, Bloglines!

I have many RSS feeds to read daily, so I used a web aggregator to read them. I chose a web and not a desktop aggregator because I wanted to read them both at home and at work, and I also cannot install programs at work. Not to mention that if I install a program which downloads feeds every hour I would skyrocket to the top of internet users in my company and flagged by IT (which actually happened to me, when I used Opera for a little while, so dumb!!).

So my aggregator of choice is Bloglines. It really does everything I need, even though it might not be the best one. I tried Rojo and Newsgator, but I couldn't get their feed display. So I always stuck with Bloglines, even though it seemed to lag behind the web 2.0 revolution.

Last week Google Reader was revamped, and it seemed very attractive to me. The new interface was very cool, and almost similar to what I was used on Bloglines. And it was very fast. I almost decided to switch to it and have one more Google application (after Writely, Spreadsheet, Gmail, and this blog). However for some reason it wouldn't load at work. I could log in and see the main Reader page, but my feeds weren't loading.

Plus, on the same day I tried Reader, Bloglines comes up with its own little changes, which were actually nice enough to convince me to stay with them. The main change was an ajaxy left pane which containes the feeds tree. Previously it was normal html, so whenever the left pane was refreshed it was reloaded completely. Now if there are new posts, the left pane simply updates the post count, without reloading the whole frame.

I will always monitor what Google Reader and others introduce in the future, but for the momet I am happy with Bloglines.

R.I.P. EvokeTV

EvokeTV was a great TV listing site. You could rate your shows/episodes, and get a feed of all your favorite shows, that would update before each episode's showing. It was a wonderful tool to help keep track of new episodes.

Notice I use the past, since it was just announced in their blog that EvokeTV is no more.

This is very sad for me, and just as the TV season is starting. I hope either they can continue their site in the future, or someone else creates a new site. I can't believe this isn't used by everyone.

Writely switch to Google accounts

Writely has completed the switch to Google accounts for its logins. At first I was confused, cos reading the help it looked like they created a new Google account, but I didn't see anything about merging with an existing Google account.

Today I found that you can move your docs from the old account to your existing Google account. So that worked out fine. I can't wait to see integration with other Google services.

Apple's streaming video

For the first time I watched the streaming of the entire presentation by Steve Jobs, which you can find here. It's a little over an hour long, and even though I already knew everything he said, I was still entertained by him.

He is a very good speaker, and the presentation material is excellent. I like how every once in a while he will sit down on a Mac and demo the new features.

Watching Jobs in action did make me change one opinion: iTunes 7 looks very good. I am now tempted to download it. I am afraid that it will break my podcatcher, but I am even willing to risk that in order to try the new iTunes features. However there will be bugs on Windows, so I still will wait.

Also the games on iPod 5G look very cool, but I won't be able to buy them anyway. The iPod 5G is also very cheap especially for its 80GB version.

Steve Jobs is very good.

Apple Showtime

Go here for details on Apple announcement. Here are my thoughts:

• iPod 5G: disappointed that it's not the widescreen video, but we knew it was too early. This is a good upgrade, if I didn't know about the possible widescreen video I would get this. Games are also cool, though I will never be able to buy them in China...
• iPod Nano: they now look like the old Mini, just thinner. I prefer the more squarish design of the first Nano. Colors will surely appeal to girls, I am happy with my black. The difference between 4GB and 8GB is a lot, but not enough to hold an entire music collection.
• iPod Shuffle: now this I am tempted to buy, even though I already have the first Shuffle. It's just so tiny and cheap. Although the first Shuffle with a headphone/lanyard combo is more wearable than the new one, since there's no cable cluttering.
• iTunes 7: iTunes on PC never works very well at first, so I will wait for bug fixes before upgrading. It also almost always breaks my podcatcher integration, so I'll wait. I don't think I am going to use Cover Flow though, since I rip all my music and I don't have covers. And since I don't have an iTunes account, I can't download cover art freely.
• Movie Download: prices are reasonable, video quality seems good. Catalog is very limited, for the moment. Hopefully more studios will jump onboard. But what I think Jobs is counting on to make this successful is...
• iTV: so that you can stream what you download from iTune Store to your TV. I have my PC wired to my TV, so I can watch video on my TV. But my PC is in the living room, which is not very beautiful. So video streaming is something I would use everyday. Waiting for 2007 Q1...

These are the highlights. My wife and wallet are happy that there's nothing I want to buy at the moment, apart from the inexpensive Shuffle.

Zooomr Portals

Zooomr just launched a cool new feature: Portals. Basically you can connect two or more photos with notes, and create a navigable series of photos. Check out the official blog here, complete with video description. You can find examples of portals here.

I tried this with IE6 and it does not work. If you want to check out these portals use Firefox or Opera (you shouldn't use IE as your main browser anyway!).

I already have an idea on how to use portals, it's something I always wanted to do, but this new feature makes it so easy to implement!

BT capable router

This ASUS WL-700gE wireless router is a dream gadget for me:

The unit comes with a 160GB IDE drive pre-installed. It only supports IDE, not SATA. There are also three USB 2.0 ports for hard drive expansion, printer connection or data copy from a USB flash drive. With a USB drive connected, it supports RAID levels 0 and 1 (striping and mirroring) all from a router!

Apart from the highly impressive hardware feature set, the main attraction with the WL-700gE is its in-built operating system. Based on a minimalist Linux build, the onboard OS is embedded into the firmware and takes over the full capacity of the hard drive.

The Download Master page allows to initiate new downloads from within the router’s web interface without the need for a client, and to interact with jobs already running.

Simply paste in the URL of the download you’re after, specify the appropriate protocol (HTTP, FTP or BT) and press Download. All incoming files are stored in the Download folder.

The main advantage of course, is that no computers need to be running to keep the downloads active the router handles all communication natively.

So this is a wireless router, a NAS device and has download capabilities. Not having to keep my desktop on 24/7 would be a big relief for my ears (PC fans are very loud!), and with this device I could download files without my PC. Awesome.

Writely as Blogging Editor

Writely is now open to public sign-ups. Previously new accounts were invitation only.

In response to RJ's post about Writely, I have been using Writely to post to my wordpress.com blog, and it has worked fine. Not only does it post well, but it also selects the correct Wordpress category from the Writely tag.

However formatting errors have occurred, for example sometimes the font is too small, even though I did not change it in Writely. One time Writely couldn't post the blog, so I went to the Writely Group and asked for help. Not long after someone at Writely/Google solved the issue, and that problem never occurred again.

I think formatting problems are very common, I've had problem in many many online editors (Vox, Wordpress, and Blogger.com). These depend on many variables, including browser, OS, blogging platform etc... This is not an excuse for Writely to have these problems, but I can sort of understand them. Hopefully they will solve these soon. For the moment I am happy with Writely in general.

Microsoft Zune

By now you've probably read about the new Microsoft Zune MP3 Player, to be released soon and aimed at bringing down the iTunes/iPod empire.

We now have an unofficial image of the player and some details thanks to Gizmodo:

First off, that scroll wheel you see? That's not a wheel. It's just four buttons arranged in a wheel formation.

So they want to kind of copy the iPod, but not enough to be seen as a copycat. Or maybe they just can't come up with their own design.

I might be wrong, but I really don't see this new device de-throning Apple anytime soon, or at all. But if Apple doesn't come out with a new iPod, who knows?

Google Login

One bad thing about transferring Blogger.com login to Google accounts, is that if Google.com is blocked, than I cannot sign in. And yes, Google.com is often blocked here. But there are other ways to post to blogger.

E-mail: I can't enter labels (or tags), but at least the post should be there. Unfortunately my e-mail was rejected with the message: "Blogger could not process your message at this time."

Writely: I use Writely to post to my wordpress.com blog, so maybe I can use it to post to Blogger too. Just tried it, and obviously it does not post to the new Blogger Beta. Oh well, it IS beta. Also Writely can only set one blog, so I would have to change settings everytime I switch blogs. Of course I can alwyas have more than one Writely account...

New iPod, a mirage?

I have an iPod Nano (black, 4GB), like many other people. I am very satisfied with it, I listen to it 18 hours a day. I wear it on my neck the whole day, inside my shirt so it doesn't bother anyone. However I've been wanting to watch some video on the go, but I don't want to buy the current iPod 5G, the screen is just too small. I am waiting for the new widescreen/touchscreen iPod Video that everybody has been talking about. However it still isn't here, and I am getting a little bit disappointed. It's been almost a year since the last new iPod, and we keep hearing delays on the next one.

At least we might get wi-fi, according to DigiTimes. I like the idea of wi-fi, but I hope I won't have to wait later than Jan 2007...

Blogger.com Review

Here are my thoughts on the new features.

Login

They are now switching login to Google accounts, which makes sense. So I have now created a new account with my Google login. Since I already had a Blogger account, they promised that in the future we will be able to merge the two accounts. I can't wait for more Google services integration; think of the Google Calendar, Writely, Spreadsheet...

Template Editing

It is now very easy to customize the blog template. With Page Elements it is possible to change the blog layout with simple drag and drop. Each element can also be edited individually. For example you can change all titles for each element, or even re-arrange items in posts (title, time, content, comments etc...).

It is also possible to add a footer, which is very handy for credits or third party code (I added a stat counter). Even the navbar can be customized, you have 4 colors from which to choose from, so that it blends better with your template.

Some missing features: an element for feeds. At the moment there is just one link for all posts feed, placed on the main page after the posts. I wish I could move it to the sidebar and customize it. I am sure this will be done in the future. Another cool feature would be a header graphic, which could be added in the HTML editing, but it is not available yet.

Fonts and Colors can also be changed for each item in your template. I didn't play with it because I am not good at colors, so I left the default.

If you are signed in and view your blog, you can see links to edit each single element of your template. Very cool.

Feeds

There are now 3 feeds available: blog posts, blog comments, per-post comments. The only problem is that I cannot put them in my template. My current template only shows the first one. And only atom not rss.

Backlinks

Backlinks are basically trackbacks. I still have to test it, but it is a needed addition.

Labels

Another needed addition (and one of the reasons I abandoned Blogger in the past) is tags, which are called labels here. Luckily I can easily edit the template so that it displays as tag.

Permissions

It is now possible to limit reading permission to a group of people. To me blogging is about putting yourself out for the world to see, so I will always blog publically, but it is a nice feature to have.

No more publishing...

Previously after each edit (to post or template) you had to re-publish the blog, which could take a long time if your blog was very large. There is no need to re-publish anymore, each modification is done instantly.

New Templates

I am not too familiar with the previous templates, but I did not see the promised new templates. Or did I miss them?

Conclusion

Overall an excellent improvement over the old system, but I hope they continue realease new features in the future instead of stagnate and let it become irrelevant again.

Update: some formatting problems occurred writing this post, which is really annoying. It seems the Compose doesn't work that well. Also I have no idea how to use backlinks. I posted on another blog linking to this post, but there are no backlinks. Not sure what happens there.

Welcome

I am crazy about blogs. I can't seem to have enough of them. Maybe too many. But I just like this new medium, and I am also interested in the technology behind it. So many times I start a blog because I want to try the new blog host.

In this case, I wanted to try out the new features of Blogger.com, especially now that all blogpost.com blogs are not banned in China anymore. Look for a review next.

If I enjoy writing this blog and continue writing it, I will be writing about tech. Any tech news, opinions and reviews. Hope you find it interesting.