Blog Archives

Google Calendar’s New Smart Rescheduler Finds a Time that Works for Everyone [Scheduling]

Google Calendar just launched a new feature into Google Calendar Labs called Smart Rescheduler that uses a scheduling algorithm to suggest “best candidate dates and times” for scheduling meetings. More »






Googsystray Notifies You of New Activity Across Google Services in One System Tray App [Downloads]

Windows/Linux only: Google has so many different services these days that installing a notification app for each one gets cumbersome quickly. Free system tray utility Googsystray watches Gmail, Google Voice, Calendar, Reader, and Wave so you can set it and forget it.

After installing Googsystray, you can configure which services you want it to watch and what you want it to do for each—upon receiving a new email, SMS, calendar alert, RSS article, or wave, you can have it play a sound and even run a command. The icon of the given service will also pop up in your system tray. Right clicking on it gives you a Growl-style popup with more detailed information about the notification, such as email subject or SMS content. You also have limited actions you can take depending on the service.

Google Voice is the most feature-filled, allowing you to send SMS messages with a hotkey and read voicemail transcripts. You can have Gmail monitor your inbox or specific labels for new messages, as well as mark messages as read, spam, or delete them. Google Calendar support is limited to alerts on upcoming events, and Google Reader can notify you of new RSS articles, although you can tell it to stop notifying you when the number of unread articles reaches a certain point. Google Wave support merely notifies you of new and unread waves, along with a preview.

Googsystray is a free download, works on Windows and Linux (Python and pygtk required for Linux). Thanks, Aldeniszen!

Googsystray [Sourceforge]






How to Integrate Your Google Apps

Google apps piecesThe information you keep in Google apps like Gmail, GCal, Reader, and Voice doesn’t just live in one place. There are a few easy but non-obvious ways to plug different Google apps together and share their data and features.

Thanks to things like Labs and gadgets, you can get your Calendar in Gmail (and vice versa), Docs in Calendar and Gmail, Profile info in Google Reader, Google Voice SMS in your Gmail, and just about everything on iGoogle. Here’s how.

Read the rest at Lifehacker »

Seven Easy Ways to Integrate Your Google Apps [Google Apps]

The information you keep in Google apps like Gmail, GCal, Reader, and Voice doesn’t just live in one place. Check out a few easy but non-obvious ways to plug different Google apps together and share their data and features.

Get Your Calendar in Gmail

One of the most useful integrations available for Gmail and GCal users, the Google Calendar gadget puts upcoming events on your email sidebar. To turn it on, just enable the Google Calendar gadget in Gmail Labs. Click on the Options link to configure which calendars you want to display events from, and schedule events directly from Gmail using the gadget’s Add link. (Gmail Labs offers lots of other app integrations, like YouTube previews in Gmail, the ability to create a Google Doc from an email conversation, Picasa image previews, Google Docs as well as a Google web search gadget.)

Put Your Gmail Messages on Your Calendar

Gmail Tasks’ killer feature is how it can act as a bridge between your email inbox and your calendar. If you add a Gmail message to your Tasks list (just choose “Add to Tasks” from the “More Actions” drop-down) and add a due date, that task shows up on your Google Calendar on that date. Even if Gmail’s Tasks module isn’t your primary to-do list app, this is an easy way to “schedule” email you don’t need to deal with right now but does have a deadline in the future.

Get Google Docs in Your Calendar and Gmail

Courtesy of Google Calendar Labs, you can easily attach Google Docs to any event—like the batting lineup for the company softball game next week. In GCal's Labs area (in Settings), just enable the "Attach Google Docs" feature.

Gmail has had built-in integration with GDocs since back in 2006; any time you have a Word document or spreadsheet email attachment in a message, Gmail gives you an “Open as a Google Document” link next to it. You can also convert an entire Gmail conversation to a Google Doc by enabling the Gmail Labs’ “Create a Document” feature.

Get Google Profile Feeds in Google Reader

Google’s newish Profiles tool offers an interesting integration into Google Reader: the ability to associate people with the feeds they create. When you configure your Google Profile and enter the web sites where you've set up shop, the feeds available for those sites appear on your profile—as well as in Google Reader. When you're following someone in Google Reader, you can easily see their blog and social network feeds alongside their photo and bio thanks to Google Profiles. From the ever-so-specifically-labeled "Browse for Stuff" section in Google Reader, click on the "People You Follow" tab to browse the folks you care about and subscribe to feeds they're creating.

Get Your Google Voice Text Messages via Gmail

Just this morning the Google Voice team added email integration with your text messages. As Kevin reported, you can now get your GV text messages forwarded to your email (Gmail or not) and respond to them from there, without ever touching your Google Voice tab or your phone.

Get All Your Google Apps on iGoogle

You can't mention integrating Google apps without giving iGoogle a nod. GApps addicts' homepage of choice, iGoogle offers Gmail, Google Talk, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Gmail Tasks, and Google Voice gadgets for the ultimate, all-in-one, Google apps jumping-off spot. (In fact, last week during the Gmail outage, iGoogle's Gmail gadget was still working—even when the proper Gmail webapp was down.)

…Not to Mention Integration Add-ons and Your Browser Sidebar

Beyond in-webapp ways to access Google apps data across products, you can also hook up browser extensions like Integrated Gmail or iGoogleBar for Firefox. Alternately, for easy Google apps access no matter what web site you’re on, put your browser’s sidebar to good use.

What other ways do you use one Google app’s data in another? Shout it out in the comments.

Gina Trapani, Lifehacker’s founding editor, likes finding new ways Google Apps inform one another. Her weekly feature, Smarterware, appears every Wednesday on Lifehacker. Subscribe to the Smarterware tag feed to get new installments in your newsreader.






Supercharge Google Reader with Send To Links [Feeds]

Google Reader recently added custom “Send To” controls to its feature list, and we’ve been looking for the most useful links to feed it. Here are 11 excellent send-to tools you can add to Reader, with more on the way.

“More on the way” because, despite trying to keep our eyes and feed readers in as many places as possible, we’re guessing there are a lot of other great URL-friendly webapps that can be hooked into Reader, as these crowd-sourced examples have already proven.

To install one of these Send To items in your own Reader, head to your Settings link from Reader’s main page, click the “Send to” tab, then hit the “Create a custom link” button at the bottom. You’ll be prompted for a Name, URL, and Icon URL, which you can simply copy and paste from these entries.

Know of a web service, a bookmarklet, or any other webapp that can accept text or items through its URL? You can easily set up a Send To item to feed items from Reader to that webapp. Reader lets you automatically include URL-friendly variables from feed items:

${source}The source of the item
${title}The title of the item
${url}The URL of the item
${short-url}A shortened URL that redirects to the item

So if you knew, for example, that MyAwesomeLolcatApp can re-write the text on any web page with deliberate-but-cute misspellings, you could create a Send To item that has myawesomelolcatapp.com/url=${url}, and it’d work just gangbusters.

If you make your own Send To discoveries, by all means, drop them in the comments, or send them to tips at lifehacker.com with “Google Reader” and “Send To” somewhere in the text or subject. Now, onto the neat hacks to make all your RSS items easier to print, save, share, calendar, and even translate:

  • Name: Email
  • URL: mailto:?subject=${title}&body=%0A<${url}>
  • What it does: Activates whatever default mail client you have installed on your system, and auto-fills the subject with the title and the body with a link. (via Google Operating System and AmaraMetellus)





Google Apps Will Soon Support Outlook Sync with Email, Contacts, and Calendars [Downloads]

Windows only: Google Apps Sync is a new free utility from Google that syncs your Google Apps (Premier or Education edition) email, contacts, and calendar directly with Microsoft Outlook.

With this move, Google’s looking to compete more directly with Microsoft Exchange, the business standard for syncing Outlook’s email, calendar, and contacts via the web. Features include:

  • Email, calendar, and contacts synchronization. For email, the plug-in uses the offline Gmail protocol, which is much faster than IMAP or other methods.
  • Free/Busy lookup and Global Address List functionality, which makes it easy to schedule meetings with your colleagues, regardless of whether they use Outlook’s calendar or Google Calendar.
  • A simple, two-click data migration tool which allows employees to easily copy existing data from Exchange or Outlook into Google Apps.

The plug-in isn’t yet available for download, but the download page claims it will be soon. Update: It’s now available at the link below. Whether you’re the person in charge or not, could you see your workplace using Google Apps over Exchange? Let’s hear your thoughts in the comments.





GMinder Puts Google Calendar in Your System Tray [Downloads]

Windows only: System tray application GMinder gives you quick offline display of multiple Google Calendars—and even alerts you of upcoming appointments.

The application was created by reader Greg Todd, who wrote the application for his own use—but decided to release it for the rest of us to enjoy. Using the application is simple—just enter in your Google account information, click the Download button to get your list of calendars, and then select the ones you want to display. The only small issue is that Windows Vista users will need to select a different sound file in the options panel since the default one doesn’t exist on Vista—a small price to pay for an excellent application that bridges the gap between Google Calendar and your Windows desktop. Thanks, Greg!

GMinder is free and open source, available for Windows only. Google Desktop users can also check out the powerful Google Calendar gadget, and readers using Firefox should check out our own Better GCal extension.

Offline Google Calendar Goes Live for Everyone [Offline Access]

Roughly one month after Google Apps users got it, Gears-powered offline access comes to all Google Calendar users. The same limitations apply, but it’s not a bad way to ensure access to your agenda.

Head to your calendar page and hit the “Offline (beta)” link to start the syncing process. If you don’t have Google Gears installed, you'll need to do so, and you'll be prompted to install shortcuts to GCal on your computer. The first sync only applies to your primary calendar, though—click the green checkmark in the upper-right and hit "Offline Settings" to bring more of your calendars offline. I didn't notice any kind of limitations, but Alex at Google Operating System wrote that his calendar only synced Feb. 4 through June 4 of this year when he synced his calendars today.

The big missing Feature Elephant in this online room is that you can’t create new events while you’re offline to sync up later. How will GCal offline be useful to you? Tell us your take in the comments. [via]





Floola Syncs Music, Google Calendars to iPods Without iTunes [Downloads]

Windows/Mac/Linux (all platforms): Floola, the go-anywhere, no-iTunes-required iPod manager, has updated with some nifty new features, including the ability to natively sync your Google Calendars to your iPod.

We’ve been into Floola for some time now, ever since discovering that it was the ultimate solution for adding music and movies to your iPod from any computer, whether or not you were down with iTunes. The latest versions for Windows, Mac, and Linux (GTK2 required) add Google Calendar importing, plus a few bug fixes and optimizations sprinkled throughout.

As with previous versions, Floola 4.7 is a stand-alone app, and its best used by stashing it in the disk storage of your iPod to be run from any system. It doesn’t support iPhones or iPod touch models, however. It’s free to download.






Google Calendar Desktop Gadget Released [Featured Download]

Windows/Mac/Linux (All platforms): Google Desktop’s gadgets are looking more helpful these days, with the addition of an official Google Calendar gadget that puts your appointments at your fingertips.

Like the previously mentioned Gmail gadget, Google's own Calendar gadget offers quick access to straight-up GCal or Google Apps calendars, and allows for multiple instances if you're on lots of different schedules. Pull it up with the Shift-Shift tap for Desktop gadgets, and you can view your appointments in day-by-day, monthly calendar/agenda, or agenda-only view. Here's a full shot of what it looks like—while Google's blog post shows a map being drawn for location-specific items, it wasn't drawing on my screen for some reason.

Unlike the Gmail gadget, the Google Calendar Gadget runs on Google Desktop 5 for Macs and Linux, as well as Windows. It’s free, requires Google Desktop 5 and a Google Calendar account.






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