Google Social Network

You may or may not have heard the rumblings, but Google seems to be planning a social network of sorts. They themselves have already openly said that they are working to integrate social aspects to their products. There also have been several changes over the last little while to Google's services that indicate something is coming soon. You have most likely noticed that across most of their services there is a new navigation bar across the top of the page, including a settings icon in the top right. 


In addition to just the new navigation bar, Techcruch is one of many who reported a couple months ago about a leaked picture showing additional icons and information in the navigation bar, pictured below. There's a 'Share' button, a location for a potential profile pic, and also some sort of counter. Who knows what will make the final cut or be changed up before it's all released, but it at least gives indication of their work on the project.

Another sign came just a few days ago when Google changed things around with their Google Profiles pages. It now makes the profiles a bit more like a social networking site profile page (think Facebook). There are all sorts of different fields for sharing all the information that you'd like.

I'm excited by the possibilities that could come from social aspects being heavily integrated with Google. I find myself spending a good portion of my time in Google products throughout the day, and so having social aspects added to improve the product would be welcomed. Once you are linked up with your friends or colleagues online, it would only help to improve search results, and sharing across all the different product offerings. Of course there might be some that are nervous or hesitant to share all your details with Google to make the 'whole package' work, but something to remember is that if you use a cell phone, your provider already knows plenty of information about you already (phone calls, texts, location, etc...), so what harm could there be from another company like Google knowing it as well?..

So, what are you waiting for!? Go make sure your Google Profile is setup just the way you'd like it and get ready for Google Me/Google +1, or whatever they might end up calling it!

iPad 2 - Apple Still Leading the Way

Today was the much anticipated iPad 2 announcement day, and I've got to say that I actually want one now. I've learned from others and their mistakes that it's normally not the best idea to adopt a 1st generation Apple product, as the 2nd generation is always MUCH better. I think that this also holds true with iPad 2. You're got great features like the dual-core A5 processor which Apple claims is twice as fast as it's predecessor; front and rear cameras; the iPad 2 is thinner than an iPhone 5 (!!!!); it weighs less now; and when you consider all of that, the battery still lasts 10 hours; AND it sells for the exact same prices as the 1st gen iPad! That seems to be quite the feat, especially considering that the only thing that qualifies as a competitor at this point, the Motorola Xoom, is hundreds more than the cheapest iPad 2.

Initially I wasn't on the iPad bandwagon because it just seemed like a giant iPod touch and that wasn't enough to convince me to buy one. After playing with one though, I realized the potential that it has and how cool it actually was. Now throw in that you can actually use the iPad 2 as a content creation device and there's not much holding it back (or me back from buying one).

I'll save you from all the crazy specifications and tech talk that you can find elsewhere. Just head over to Apple.com to check out all the juicy details on the new beauty. Oh, and don't you think the magnetic cover for it is freaking awesome (excluding the fact that the price is ridiculous...)!?

Sound off in the comments if you completely disagree, or if you want to join me on the Apple fanboy bandwagon.

A Cr-48 Update

It's been about 2 weeks since I received my Cr-48 Chrome OS notebook from Google and so I thought I'd write something up quickly now that I've had a bit of time to use it day in and day out. For my original impressions, head over to the last post.

I like to 'tinker' around with my gadgets with the hopes of making them better, so naturally I spent lots of time searching around in the beginning for any bit of info I could find about modifying this thing (blogging from it currently) for the better. The first thing I did was get on the developer release channel of Chrome OS. If you remember from my last post about this, the clickpad was one of the most annoying parts. Guess what, it works now! That's probably the #1 best part about being on this channel. I LOVE the clickpad now. The right click works great; the 2-finger scrolling is great; and now the only thing to make it better would be other multi-touch controls like those on MacBook trackpads.

I really enjoy the OS now. It's so easy to surf the web and get things done online. But, being the 'tinkerer' that I am, I wanted to dual boot with Ubuntu. My main reasoning for this is so that I could run NetBeans for my Java programming class. I looked everywhere online to find some sort of way to code and test the code using only a browser but had no luck so I went with dual boot Ubuntu/Chrome OS. Even though I have a full OS to use in Ubuntu, I still find myself coming back to the Chrome OS side. I like it better here. In fact, there are only two situations that I use Ubuntu in. One is at school where their network is setup such that Chrome OS can't connect and I need NetBeans, and the other is if I'm out and about and need to look something up and need to connect to the ad-hoc network on my iPhone (something that Chrome OS also can't connect too). I would just use the built-in Verizon 3G card, but it's only 100 MB and I'm afraid I'd blow right through it.

Those are some of the biggest things that I've wanted to throw up over the last while. As always, post any questions you might have and I'll get to them in another post.

GOOGLE NOTEBOOK CR-48 - FIRST IMPRESSIONS

You'll find many posts similar to this online, but I still wanted to throw my opinions out there about the Google Notebook (Cr-48) that I received yesterday. My great wife was kind enough to do the whole unboxing scene for me while I was at work, so now I can spare you with all the detailed pictures of each step as I take it out of the box. I'll just give you the one picture that she sent me. :-)

I signed up for the pilot program to test the notebook seconds after it was announced :-), which was about 2 months ago. A couple of weeks ago I was also able to sign up using a special link through Box.net. I'm guessing that was the link/survey that got me into the program, but who knows. If you want more info about the pilot program or to apply to be a tester head over to the Google site here.

Overall, I like it! The feel of the notebook is great. It reminds me of a black MacBook. The keyboard looks good, and works great. I've only used the built-in webcam for a short time, but it was fine. There is a sensor next to the webcam that adjusts the screen brightness automatically that is kind of nice, but I still find myself using the physical buttons, located in the place where you'd normally find function keys at the top of the keyboard. The clickpad feels great, but has flaws (covered later). The battery life is amazing. I turned it on at 7am this morning and immediately put it to sleep, used it on the bus ride to work for about 15 min, showed it to several coworkers throughout the day, and it slept the entire rest of the day between those 'events.' I got home and have been using it for a little over 3 hours while surfing the web, watching tv shows, streaming music, blogging - and the battery is telling me that it still has 50% remaining and expects itself to last 5 more hours. Pretty impressive if you ask me.

So a bit about the actual operating system, Chrome OS. It's snappy. It wakes up from sleep in about 1 second. Really quick. That made it super easy to whip out and show to my coworkers though. It boots in several seconds as well. No wait times found there. In the end, it's very minimalistic which helps make it so quick. It's basically just Google's Chrome browser that you can install on Windows/Mac/Linux with a few extra things.

Now how about some of the flaws, eh? That clickpad... It looks great and flows with the rest of the notebook, but it's not that great when it comes to function. To left click you can just tap your finger, or you can press your finger down and the entire pad clicks... clickpad. :-) Right click is a bit more tricky unfortunately... You use two fingers and press down the clickpad. I have about a 50% success rate. It normally just thinks that I want to left click. The alternate right click has a 100% success rate, but isn't the 'cool' option - hold 'alt' and click normally. To scroll down pages you can drag two fingers on the clickpad. It works a bit better than the two-fingered right click, but it ends up jumping around the page for me. Maybe it will all get better with practice, but it's propably just finicky hardware. But we're not supposed to be testing the hardware, Google is giving these to use to test the software. :-)

Another problem I've encountered for all you techies is that it wont connect to the ad-hoc wifi network that my iPhone uses to tether. I've read that the hardware is able to connect, but the software prevents is. I hope Google enables that soon. Also disabled -The ability to use wireless networks other than Verizon which is already configured and ready to go for you. There's even a slot under the battery for a SIM card (think AT&T/T-Mobile). The built in bluetooth is also disabled. Might also be able to use the bluetooth to tether to my phone's internet once they enable it.

I also wish that you had more access to the file system. I know it's designed to be completely in the cloud, but it's still nice, and needed I think, to be able to access some of my files on an external USB drive. Or what about the files that you download? I'd like to be able to get to them at a later time easily, and once a file is downloaded, it seems that there's no way to rename it.

Something else that didn't work as well as I'd have liked and was a downer on the whole user experience was streaming those TV shows that I mentioned earlier. I used Hulu and had to turn it down to the lowest resolution of 280p and the video was still very choppy. I turned it up to 480p and it would almost skip entire scenes. The hardware just isn't quite fast enough, so hopefully real production units will be better equiped.

Anyway, those are a few of the things that I've found and played with. Granted it hasn't been more than a few hours and so maybe with more time I'll find my way around better, or learn tricks to make that dang clickpad do what I want. Thanks for following through my mess of thoughts. If you have any questions, want anything cleared up or explained better, or want me to 'report' on any other features or something you might have heard about just comment below and I'll get it into a following post.