Now You Can Search For Google Docs From Within Gmail (And It Catches Typos, Too)

Google may be synonymous with search, but some of the search functionality in its Apps products is sadly lacking — if you want to search for something in Google Docs, Calendar, or Gmail, you’ve had to do it from within its respective app. Today, it’s getting a bit better: Gmail has just launched a feature that lets you search for Google Docs and Sites directly from within Gmail. You can activate the new feature under the Labs section of Gmail settings — it’s called ‘Apps Search’.

Apps Search also activates another cool feature: when you make a typo in a search query, you’ll get a “Did you mean” suggestion. I’m not entirely sure how typo correction is related to Apps Search, but I’ll take it.

Hopefully this is the start of a new trend — it would also be nice if you could search for Google Calendar events from within Gmail (and vice versa).  Google also recently released the headache-reducing multiple accounts feature, which lets you hop between multiple Google accounts without having to repeatedly log-out and back in.

(from techcrunch)

Jolicloud 1.0 “the (free) iPhonesque OS for netbooks” goes live

It’s been roughly a year since Jolicloud‘s alpha release and the company founded by Netvibes founder, Tariq Krim, has just launched Jolicloud 1.0 to the public.

The iPhonesque open source OS oriented towards netbooks has more than just an incredibly sexy interface, with an App Store-like selection of over 700 apps (going on 1,000 before the end of the year) – giving users access to everything from Spotify to DropBox in a simple click. Jolicloud has also blended in a bit of social, allowing users a practical way to discover the best applications out there according to what their friends download and rate. Does that mean that the days of the unused Windows desktop icons are over ? Even better, users with the “Anywhere OS” installed on multiple computers automatically have access to all their applications and from whatever machine they’re on – definitely practical for when you are also transfering all your data entirely from one computer to another. Gotta love the cloud.

The Paris-based company is definitely aiming to make waves in cloud computing with its futuristic approach to operating systems, building its vision on the idea that tomorrow’s desktop computer market will be a combination of high-end Macs or netbooks – with not much in between. For anyone without the dough for a Mac, well, they’re probably going to shell-out no more than a few hundred bucks for a netbook. Thus, Krim could ultimately be banking on anyone without a Mac. Oh, but Jolicloud actually runs on a Mac as well.

Plus, that doesn’t mean Jolicloud is necessarily aiming to wipe out Windows either. Users can actually install the OS alongside Windows and use Wine for Windows-only products on the virtual desktop.

The start-up took $4.2 million from London-based Atomico Ventures and Mangrove Capital Partners last summer and should be introducing their Freemium business model sometime soon. For now, everything is entirely free and given that the number of users supposedly increased by 50% within the first day of version 1.0′s release, I figure I’ll finish with one last thought (which also happens to be the company’s tag-line): you don’t need a better computer, you need a better operating system.

(from techcrunch)

Soho OS Lands $1M, Opens Business Management Suite To All Small Businesses

A couple of months ago techcrunch covered Soho OS,describing its offering as a soup-to-nuts “hybrid of Quicken + Zoho + SalesForce”. Today, the company is announcing that it has secured $1 million in funding from The Time. This is on top of the $250K the company had raised in its pre-seed round.

The company has already begun putting the money to good use. As noted in the initial post, “the interface could certainly use a UX overhaul,” and it got one, and a new logo to boot. With a new color scheme, layout and consolidation, the new interface’s look & feel is softer, more pleasant on the eye, and more convenient to use. A definite improvement on the interface we previously reviewed.

Soho OS also beefed up communications features with video chat, SMS, VOIP, voice messaging, as well as improved conference calling and broadcast emails.

I really like where Soho OS is going but would like to see them charging a tiered service fee rather than rely exclusively on cutting commissions off their 3rd party integrated services. There’s no shame in charging your customers kids, especially if you provide them with clear value. Tattoo that please.

(from techcrunch)

Evo vs. iPhone: second round

Google Earth: Hiker’s Edition

Google Earth just released a new edition of its desktop app which hikers, runners and cyclists are going to love. They call it Google Earth 5.2. I call it the Hike’s Edition.

One of the new features allows you to recreate the path of a hike or bike ride by ingesting geo-data from one of your GPS devices. The visualizations show you the speed, elevation, and other stats from your hike, which you can see as an animation inside Google Earth.

If you collect other data about your trip, such as your heart rate or other body monitoring stats, those can be overlayed as a graph below at the bottom of the screen. I’d love to see an iPhone or Android fitness app that takes advantage of these new capabilities.

Another new feature in Google Earth is the ability to launch a regular Web browser from within the desktop app. Hopefully, that is the first step towards bringing Google Earth completely from the desktop to the Web. Otherwise, it might end up like Second Life.

Below is a video Google Earth product manager Peter Birch made of his bike ride to work.

(from techcrunch)

Microsoft Rolls Out Impressive Enhancements To Windows Live Essentials Suite

Udemy Launches Virtual Learning Academy

Online video education is a space that is growing rapidly, and even attracting the attention of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who thinks that web-based learning sites will revolutionize education. Today, Udemy is launching as a learning site that aims to democratize online education by enabling anyone to teach and learn online.

Udemy, which was incubated at the Founder Institute, provides the basic tools so anyone can create their own online course in minutes on any subject they like. Educators can upload presentations, videos, and write blog posts for their online course.

Udemy also enables instructors to engage with their users, providing participants with the ability to “subscribe” to courses so they are more engaged. They can also ask questions via the discussion boards and publish links and comments on course to Twitter and Facebook.

One of the most compelling features of Udemy is the live virtual classroom, where
instructors can host a live video conference with students using Udemy’s proprietary live video technology. Udemy Live has a whiteboard, presentation viewer, chatroom, and file-sharing component. Over 10 videos can stream on Udemy Live and 1000+ users can watch a session.

Founded by Gagan Biyani, Eren Bali and Oktay Caglar, Udemy hopes to become a portal for any education content, from a yoga class to a calculus seminar. While the online video education space includes a number of worthy competitors including EduFire and Myngle, Udemy ‘s live video technology is impressive and fairy simple to use. And perhaps as more universities and colleges offer online resources for students, video startups could license their technologies.

Silentale, the Dropbox-for-communications, opens to the public

After nearly a year in private Beta, Silentale, which is calling itself the “Dropbox for communications”, opens to the public today.

The service is a kind of personal CRM system, providing a searchable backup of your contacts, messages and attachments across various communication channels, including email and social networks Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. It’s designed to address the fragmentation of electronic communication, combining a unified address book and archive of messages .

Adopting a classic freemium model, Silentale comes in two flavours, a free and paid version. However, premium accounts are being waved for users who sign-up before the end of May.

The free version is limited to 5 services (accounts) and can only be used to import 6 months of messages. The premium plans, which are being introduced on 1st of June, offer up to 10 accounts and the ability to import 2 years of messages for $49/year, or for businesses that need to manage multiple channels, a $99/year price plan that supports up to 20 accounts with unlimited import. However, premium accounts are being waved for users who sign-up before the end of May.

Since launching in private beta, Silentale says it has processed more than 50 million messages and 10 million contacts. Interestingly, users have been archiving data from an average of 4 accounts, which would full within the free version, so perhaps that doesn’t bode so well for the company or suggests that Silentale is really targeting business and enterprise customers not individuals.

The Paris-based company offers an API for third-party developers, and a Firefox add-on is currently available that shows a contact’s details and the latest messages exchanged when viewing an email from them or browsing their profile on the likes of LinkedIn, Salesforce, Facebook etc.

Additionally, Silentale says it has an accompanying iPhone app in the works, which is very close to release, along with one for Android and an Outlook plug-in.

How Can Social Media Save the Starving Children?

Social media has superpowers. Or so goes current tech-wonk opinion on Facebook, Twitter, et. al. From creating a “social Web,” to shaking up e-commerce, to mobilizing people behind a presidential candidate, social media has reached its tentacles into pretty much everything. Except places where there aren’t iThings and high-speed wireless. Ya know, most of the places on earth. Until now.

Facebook co-founder and creator of MyBarackObama.com Chris Hughes aims to make social media matter more with his latest venture, Jumo. He’ll delve into how social media can create offline change at TechCrunch Disrupt, our conference on media and technology, taking place May 24-26, 2010, in New York City. You can get tickets at our early-bird rate if you visit our ticket page. We’re also happy to announce speakers including Meetup Co-founder and CEO, Scott Heiferman –the guy behind 50K weekly meetups — and Gilte Group CEO Susan Lyne. She’s at the helm of a buzzed-about sample-sale startup that’s caused “couture” and “clickthrough” to occur in the same sentence. Some of our latest sponsors include Google, Bing –yes, you read that right — and DataRockIt.

So, back to social media. When I say, “matter more,” I’m paraphrasing a bit. Hughes’ actual wording in an announcement last month was: “leverag[ing] the participatory web to foster long-term engagement with the issues and organizations that are relevant to each individual.” If you visitJumo now, the preview site asks you Hunch-style questions about your preferences such as which do-good cause you’d spend $100 million solving, which language you’d like to learn, and what you’d name your child. (I chose “Grace” over “Crystal.”) At Disrupt, Hughes and Heiferman will discuss how social media can foment positive fallout offline, including in places that aren’t wired and wealthy. (Hughes probably won’t tell us much about Jumo, but we’ll hear some of the inspired thinking behind it, no doubt.) Heiferman’s laudable goal with Meetup is to offer a tool for people anywhere to create communities around any interest. If you want to hear more details on what Hughes and Heiferman are dreaming up with their ventures, you’ll just have to come to Disrupt.

(from techcrunch)

Google Street View Adds Local Business Listings

Last week, the newly renamed Google Places added a ton of features to help local businesses create a directory page right on Google. Today, Google’s Street View is joining the party by showing links to local business listings right in Street View. As you turn around in Street View, names of local businesses and other “Google Places” will show up overlayed on top of buildings. As you hover over those names, a small pop-up window shows some of the listing details such as business name, phone number, and ratings.

There have been links from business listings on Google Maps directly to Street View for almost a year, but now those business listings appear right within Street View itself. Google clearly wants to own local and is sprinkling these listings everywhere it can.

The next step I’m waiting for is to see Street view in a mobile augmented reality app, so that you can just point your phone camera at a building and see the businesses listed inside. That would be so Tonchidot of Google. Our augmented reality future awaits.

(from techcrunch)

Gmail Launches Sneak Peek And Nested Labels. You’ll Want To Check These Out Right Now

If you live in Gmail all day, you’re almost certainly going to want to activate a new feature that just want live in labs: Gmail Sneak Peek. The feature, as the name suggests, allows you to get a preview of the message you’ve currently got selected, without actually opening it (it reminds me a bit of the preview pane you get in Mac OS X when you hit the spacebar).

After activating Sneak Peak in Labs, either right click on a message or use the handy keyboard shortcut ‘h’, and the preview pane will pop up. You probably won’t be able to see the entire message you’re looking at, but it’s definitely enough to figure out if the message is important or if it should promptly be sent to your archive. You can use the ‘j’ and ‘k’ shortcuts to scroll through your list of messages, looking at a preview of each. My only gripe (and it’s a fairly significant one) is what Sneak Peek does when you actually act on a message.

Gmail junkies will know that ‘y’ is the shortcut for ‘archive message’, and it’s key for anyone who is sifting through a lot of Email. Unfortunately, hitting ‘y’ while you’re using Sneak Peek will archive the message as it should, but it also closes your Sneak Peek pane, so you have to hit ‘h’ again. This may not sound like a big deal, but when you’re adding an extra keystroke to an action you have to make a few dozen (or more) times a day, it gets tedious fast.

Alongside Sneak Peek, Labs is also launching a feature called Nested Labels. This allows you to put your labels in a hierarchy, which excites me less, but apparently is oft-requested. Here are the instructions Google offers for using the feature:

If you think this might be useful to you, go to the Gmail Labs tab under Settings, look for “Nested Labels,” enable it and click “Save.” You’ll then need to name your label with slashes (/) to make it the child of another. For example, let’s say you wanted to create a simple hierarchy with a “Home” label, and inside it a “Family” and a “Vacation” label. Just create three labels with the following names:

Home
Home/Family
Home/Vacation

You can then create “Home/Family/Kids,” “Home/Pets,” etc., to get something like the screenshot on the left. If you had the parent label “Home” before you don’t have to create it from scratch.

(from techcrunch)

Zoho Invoice

The productivity suite empire Zoho launched a simple invoicing tool, unsurprisingly called Zoho Invoice. Now, the startup is releasing a new version of its Invoice, dubbed Invoice 2.0, that has a fresh user interface and provides a more open application.

The fact is that over the past two years, there have been a plethora of online invoicing startups that have popped up and Zoho is catching up to its competitors with version two of its offering. With this update, Zoho has redesigned its UI making it easier to navigate and customize to fit the look and feel of a business’ design. Zoho Invoice will also allow users to record separate expenses they incur while serving particular clients (like travel, material etc).

The version also has full organization, multi-user support so that several employees can access and collaborate on invoices for a particular account. And Zoho has opened up the API for Invoices to that developers can integrate the application into their own applications. Additionally, Zoho features useful bells and whistles such as multi-currency support and email history which tracks your email exchanges with your clients and other users.

The plus of using Zoho’s invoicing application is that it ties into its other productivity applications seamlessly. And its affordable, with a free version and the most expensive version coming in at $35 per month. Last year, we wrote that Zoho has continued to implement an intelligent strategy to launch new products and add-ons to its existing offerings, partly to keep users from flocking to Google Apps and Microsoft’s Web-based version of Microsoft 2010. It looks like Zoho is continuing this strategy in 2010.

Last year, startup unveiled a new version of Zoho Reports; launched a deeper integration with Google Docs; rolled out Zoho Discussions, a online forum tool for businesses; and debutedZoho Recruit.

And over the past two years, Zoho has added support for Sharepoint, mobile, Google and Yahoo IDs and group sharing. According to out latest states, Zoho has definitely reached over 2 million users is even catching the attention of its competition. Hopefully, 2010 will be as fruitful as 2009.

(from techcrunch and zoho)

Google Officially Launching Chrome Extensions

A couple weeks ago, Google unveiled its Chrome Extensions site after clues began popping up that a full-on push for extension support in their browser was imminent. Unfortunately, that site was only meant for extension developers who were allowed to upload their creations to Google. On the page, Google promised that end users who were looking for these extensions would have a way to do so “soon.” That will happen next week, we’ve learned.

Two sources close to the situation say that Google plans to unveil its Extensions Gallery at some point next week, probably in the middle of the week. This makes sense since Add-on-Con 09, a conference devoted to browser add-ons, is taking place next Friday, and Google Chrome is a Gold Sponsor of the event. Obviously, Google will probably want to have something they can actually show off at the event, rather than just a developer dashboard.

Apparently, the Extensions Gallery will be much like the Chrome Themes Gallery. It will be a page that lists a bunch of extensions and has a button to one-click download the ones you want. Presumably there will also be a link to learn more about what each extension actually does.

Several developers already have their extensions ready to go for Chrome. We’ve profiled Aviary’sand Shareaholic’s recently. And actually, there have been hundreds of extensions unofficially available for Chrome for some time via sites like Chrome Extensions. This morning we profiled 11 of the best ones found there.

Initially, Extension support will only be for the Windows-based version of Chrome. Even thoughthe launch of the beta version of Chrome for Mac is imminent, that version will not have extension support built-in. However, the latest builds of Chromium (the open-source browser that Chrome is built off of) for Mac does support extensions, and even has an extension manager that works. It would appear that the Linux build of Chrome will support extensions whenever that beta is available.

Extensions will be very important for Chrome as it attempts to hit Google’s stated 10 percent market share goal in the next couple of years. Extensions have been one of the keys to the success of Firefox, as it continues to steal market share from the once utterly dominant Internet Explorer.

(from techcrunch)

Gmail Supports Attachments Even When You Are Not Attached To The Internet

Gmail is furthering its offline strategy today with the announcement of the ability to include attachments in composed emails when offline. Google says this was one of the most requested features for Offline Gmail and starting today, you be able to attach files in offline mode the way you would in online Gmail.

You’ll be able to attach all types of files except inline images, which are images in the body of the email. When you have Offline Gmail enabled, Google says that mail now goes through the outbox when you’re online or offline, allowing Gmail to capture all attachments regardless of internet connections.

Earlier this year, Google rolled out a Google Gears version of Gmail, which detects when you are offline. It caches your e-mail so that you can read it, respond to it, search it, star it, or label it. When you are connected to the Internet again, it sends all the messages. Google also introduced an offline version of Calendar.

Offline access is a big part of Google’s strategy to chip away at Microsoft’s Outlook’s hold on business email. For promotional purposes, Google now wants Gmail users who are using Offline features to take pictures of themselves while accessing their email from an unusual place, such as a submarine, without internet access. Google will post the most interesting photos on the Gmail Blog. I guess a picture is worth a thousand words.

SharedDoc Launches Document Commenting Platform

SharedDoc is an online document platform that lets anyone upload a document online and then share the file to a community, so they can add comments.

Once you upload a Word or Google Docs document to SharedDoc’s platform, you can send email invites to a friends or colleagues to comment on the document. In order to comment, a user needs to set up an ID. Users can then highlight portions of the the document where they’d like to leave a comment and post their input.

Comments can be seen by by everyone invited on the document and commenters can respond to others comments. Each comment carries the ID of the user, and the date of posting. SharedDoc also creates a permanent record of the comments by saving or printing the document with the comments as footnotes.

The idea of commenting about documents isn’t new. SharedDoc will face competition from startups Etherpad,DocStoc, and Scribd, to name a few. And SharedDocs will compete with the collaboration features of Google Docs (and perhaps Microsoft Office soon).