On most days I find myself using at least 3 different Google accounts, and with that comes the hassle of logging in and out of each one separately. Normally what I end up doing is logging into one account on Chrome and one on Firefox but somehow, and this really annoys me (or it used to annoy me), I would begin editing a Google Document, forgetting that I was signed into a different account in Gmail, and then I would suddenly get the little pop-up “you are not signed into this account. No changes have been saved. Please log out and log into this account”… or something like that.
Thanks to newly released Multiple Account Sign-in, I think those days are over.
It’s pretty simple to set up – and you can learn how by watching the 2 minute screencast below:
Rapportive is an extremely useful plug-in for Gmail (Chrome, Firefox and Safari) that pushes the online Web activity of your contacts, right into your Gmail sidebar.
Every time you click on an email Rapport will replace the Google Ads in the right sidebar with your contacts photo, occupation and links to various social networks. Anything that has been made public on the Web can be added to the Rapport. You can also add notes about the person that are visible only to you.
After I first installed Rapport I figured I was going to have to wait and see how many of my contacts signed up for it before I would begin seeing their info in my sidebar – but that’s not the case. If it’s public on the Web then it’s fair game for Rapport. When I looked up my profile on Rapport I found my photo, occupation, a link to my Twitter account, my Google profile and my LinkedIn profile. If someone is using Rapport and I send them an email then they’re going to automatically have links to places on the Web that I want them to see. If I was trying to hide something then it wouldn’t be public in the first place. Of course, once you install Rapport you have the option of going in and updating your public Rapport profile where you can choose to add or remove anything you want. All in all I think it’s a great tool that I will continue to use.
To see Rapport in action, watch the screencast below:
MobileRSS syncs with your Google Reader so you can keep up with all of your favorite blogs and websites at all times. There’s a free version and a pro for $2.99 (iTunes links) which I’ll show you in the screencast.
After you install it and sign in with your Google account it will automatically sync up. All of your folders, tags, shared and stared items will be in place along with people who you follow. MobileRSS works a lot like Google Reader and you can also share items via email, Twitter, Facebook, Instapaper, and more.
I installed both the free and paid-for versions and am happy with both. If you’re unsure about spending the money then install the free version, it works great and will give you a feel of what you get for your money.
To see MobileRSS in action, watch the screencast below:
TechCrunch posted a story today about Google Moderator being available on YouTube and I decided to test it out. The learning curve is not very steep — just go to your channel modules, enable moderator, post a request for ideas or suggestions and then wait for your subscribers to respond.
DemoGirl gets a lot of screencast suggestions every day, but we don’t usually see the same request from two different people. Molly is often busy with custom work and weeding through all these suggestions can be time-consuming. This is where I think Moderator on YouTube might be useful — by providing us with a way to have our readers help us determine what people want to see covered here.
When I logged into Gmail this morning I finally saw what I really wanted to see yesterday afternoon – “Buzz”. It was right where everyone said it would be, under my inbox tab.
After spending a few hours poking around and (unsuccessfully) searching for some help topics on exactly who can see what, I think I finally got the gist of Google Buzz. Oh, and just in case you’re wondering, I like it. I like it a lot.
To learn how to get started using Google Buzz, watch the screencast below:
You see, I’m getting ready for my Mom to come visit me in San Francisco this weekend and now, instead of copying and pasting numerous Google search results of places we should check out into an email, I can simply start composing my email to her and then do Google searches within that message. The search results can all be pasted right into the email, links and all.
You need to go into your lab settings first and enable Google search and make sure your rich text editor is enabled. That’s all there is to it!
To see how easy it is to use Google search in Gmail, watch the screencast below:
TabJump is an extension for Google Chrome that helps you manage your tabs. After you install it you’ll see all of your most used tabs that are open, related tabs, and recently closed tabs. You can also lock tabs – but since you can find recently closed tabs, this feature doesn’t seem all that necessary. It’s a really handy extension that doesn’t take up a lot of browser real estate, much like most Google Chrome Extensions.
To see what TabJump can do, watch the screencast below:
Google City Tours is a Labs project that has some pretty helpful features for people planning a trip to an unfamiliar city. You can begin by entering in the name or address of the place where you’ll be staying. From there, Google City Tours will load a map with various points of interest that you can walk to from your originating point. Each destination shows an approximate amount of time it should take you to walk as well as walking directions from point A to point B to point C…
You can also remove and add points of interest to the map and include the number of days you’ll be in town so that your sightseeing can be spread out over a few days.
I really like Google City Tours, especially because my Mom is coming to visit me in San Francisco next month and I would love her to map out all the places we can walk to from her hotel. With that said, these are my issues:
How do you save your Google City Tour? I couldn’t find a “save” link anywhere.
Can you share your City Tour with, for instance, the person who’s visiting?
I’d like options to switch from walking to driving to public transit. My Mom is NOT going to walk to the Golden Gate Bridge from Union Square.
Of course, Google City Tours is in Labs, which means that it’s a work in progress. Those are just some things that I think should be at the top of the “to-do” list for the people working on it .
To see Google City Tours in action, watch the screencast below:
Google Chrome has a lot of Extensions worth checking out, but these are three that I find myself using throughout the day. Don’t expect a lot of bells and whistles here, folks – these three Extensions just help me get things done a bit quicker. Watch the screencasts that follow the brief introduction to see how they can work for you:
The Picnik Extension for Chrome allows you to easily take screenshots and edit them using the online image editor Picnik.com.
The Session Manager Extension gives you a really handy way to save your browsing sessions so that you can come back to them later – without having to bookmark a bunch of sites.
Tab Menu is an Extension that allows you to easily sort through, organize, and even close your tabs within a drop-down menu in your bookmarks toolbar.
ShinySearch allows you to create a customized homepage with almost zero effort. It comes loaded with links to most email services, social networking sites, news sites and popular Web destinations.
All you need to do is go to ShinySearch.com and select a theme and give it a name. There’s no sign up and no need to enter in links to all of your favorite sites.
ShinySearch does have quite a few themes to choose from, but I want to note that I use the term “customized” loosely. It appears that the only thing you can customize is the theme – which isn’t necessarily bad because it seems to have links to most sites that I visit regularly. With that said, I would like to see the ability to remove sites that I don’t use and add ones that aren’t listed so that it is truly customized to my needs.
To see ShinySearch in action, watch the screencast below:
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