We’ve been keeping busy this year with over 85 new enhancements to Google Docs and Google Sites, making it possible for you to work, communicate and collaborate entirely in the cloud. We wanted to take a moment to share a few of the most exciting enhancements from 2010 that are making it easier for you to go “100% web.”In addition to some of the most requested favorite features like mobile editing, OCR, advanced sorting rules and a more consistent look, here are more of our team’s favorite things from this last year:A new Google Docs built from...
Wednesday, 22 December 2010
If you’re reading this post, you’ve probably seen your fair share of Google Docs videos featured on this blog. Well, we have one more to show you this year, created entirely with Google Docs, demonstrating the power of nothing but the web -- and it just might be our favorite yet.Google introduced Demo Slam in October 2010 as a way to turn traditionally boring tech demonstrations into out-of-this-world displays of technology. A couple of weeks ago, three animators worked together for three days in three different cities to create a Google Docs demo...
Thursday, 16 December 2010
Today we’re excited to announce that the new revision history view we added to documents is now available in spreadsheets. At a glance, you can now see all of the changes that collaborators have made cell-by-cell. Each collaborator is represented by a different color so it is easy to understand who made what changes.Changes made by collaborators are grouped into batches. To expand these batches, select “Show more detailed revisions.”Let us know...
Tuesday, 14 December 2010
With the new addition of connectors in Google drawings, it’s easier than ever to build anything from a family tree to a flowchart in just a few minutes.In honor of the holidays, we thought we’d create a bracket-style showdown between our favorite types of pie.Select Shape from the Insert menu, and you’ll see a variety of bubbles, arrows, and symbols to choose from. I used the rounded rectangle shape for this example, but you can select the shape...
Monday, 13 December 2010
Recently my dad, Eugene, asked me to help him backup all his pictures and files to avoid potentially losing important memories. The conversation that followed was interesting as I attempted to explain how great cloud storage was, but suffice it to say that my dad wasn’t convinced that sharing large files online was really that easy or seamless using just his Google account.I’m sure my dad isn’t the only one nervous about losing important documents. To help our parents better understand technology, a handful of us at Google decided to create a website--...
Thursday, 9 December 2010
A couple weeks ago, we made is possible to edit your documents on many popular mobile phones and on the iPad.The new mobile editor is fast and lightweight, but sometimes you want to make more style edits like changing a font, or center aligning a paragraph. If you’re on an iPad, you can do that by visiting the Desktop version of the document editor.If you want to insert formulas in a Google spreadsheet from your iPad, you can use the same trick....
Many of you have visited our Product Ideas page to let us know what features you’d like to see in Google Docs or what you think we’re missing. Your participation was astounding: we received over 165,000 votes on over 5,000 ideas from thousands of people around the world over the course of a year. Here are just a few of the things we launched in the last year that accomplish many of the things you’ve been asking for:Real-time collaboration. While we’ve had real-time collaboration in spreadsheets since 2006, we enhanced our collaboration in documents...
Yesterday we added a new import type for Google drawings: Windows Metafile (WMF) . It’s an image format that’s designed to be scalable. Unlike other image formats (PNG, JPEG, etc.) WMF files use vectors to represent pictures so that no matter how much you stretch an image, it will never look pixelated.To import a WMF file to Google drawings, start with a WMF file you own on your computer like this one:Go to the upload page in Google Docs, and select...
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
Ever since we launched the Google drawings, the most requested feature has been shape connectors. Well today, they’re here.From now on, when you add a new line in a Google drawing, you can connect that line directly to a shape (old lines will need to be replaced with new lines). Think of connectors as the glue that keeps your drawings together: no matter how much you move around or rotate your shapes, the lines attached to them will stretch so that...
Tuesday, 7 December 2010
From connectors in drawings to hidden controls, we have a lot of updates to share this week:Connectors in drawingsSince we launched Google drawings in April, the most requested feature has been line connectors. Starting today, all new lines can connect to shapes making it easier to create flowcharts and complex diagrams.Insert images directly from PicasaIf you’ve got images stored in your Picasa web albums, the image dialog will let you insert those...
The Chrome Web Store was announced at the Chrome event in San Francisco today, giving Chrome users an easy way to discover a broad range of amazing web apps. You can install our Google Docs web app by clicking Install on our store landing page. This will add a handy shortcut to your favorite web productivity app.In addition, at the event today, we were excited to demonstrate a feature that we expect to deliver early in 2011 -- the return of offline...
Tuesday, 30 November 2010
As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, you can now insert images into a cell. With the image() formula you can link to a publicly accessible image and control how it will look with optional parameters. This is useful for bringing a visual element to your spreadsheets for things such as a product catalog listing.For example the formula =image("http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/images/srpr/logo1w.png", 1) will scale the image down in the current...
If you’re interested in learning more about Google Sites, this cross post from the Google Enterprise Blog might interest you.Effective collaboration has become a key driver to improve team productivity. Project teams, often located across disparate locations and time zones, produce and distribute content in different formats and platforms. Teams need to consolidate relevant information in one place that’s easy to navigate and retrieve. Contributors and reviewers have specific needs to manage the creative process, maintain the project plan and...
Tuesday, 23 November 2010
We just launched a pair of features that can save you time and give you more room to work: drag and drop upload and compact controls.Drag and drop uploadA few weeks ago, we made it easier to add images to your documents using drag and drop. Today we’re extending that functionality to the file upload page, making it even easier to move your files into the cloud. Now if you’re using Chrome, Safari, or Firefox, you’ll be able to quickly drag files...
Monday, 22 November 2010
Cross posted on the Google Enterprise BlogTens of millions of people have moved to Google Docs because it’s 100% web: it provides real-time collaboration in the browser, with no software to install, manage or upgrade. Of course, we know that many more of you still use Microsoft Office, because until recently, there weren’t many tools to help you collaborate and share with others. Now there’s more choice.To help smooth the transition from Office...
Thursday, 18 November 2010
Yesterday, we announced mobile editing on Google Docs, which we've now rolled out to all English-language users.One of the new features that launched is creating new documents and spreadsheets on your phone. This is particularly useful to jot down quick notes on the run, whether it’s capturing that game-changing idea for your company while at the gym, or typing out your grocery list on the train ride home.Head to docs.google.com from your mobile...
Wednesday, 17 November 2010
Cross posted on the Official Google Blog, Google Enterprise Blog and the Google Mobile BlogWith Google Docs, we’re always trying to make you more productive—and part of that means making it possible for you to get things done from anywhere, at anytime. That’s why we’re excited that the new documents editor now supports editing on your mobile browser. We’re rolling this out over the next few days.That means that...You can work on that important memo...while...
With Google Docs we try to make writing a document as easy and as fast as possible. Yesterday, we added two new auto-correction features to speed up your document writing.LaTeX shortcuts in equationsUntil now, the only way to enter an equation in documents was to create the equation from the Insert menu, and then use the equation toolbar to choose your symbols.The toolbar makes it easy to discover which types of equations are possible.Today we’re...
Tuesday, 16 November 2010
If you’re looking for more ways to speed up your typing or have been craving images in your spreadsheets, we have something for you this week. Auto-corrections and LaTeX shortcuts to equations speed up typing and reduce editing while images to cells make it easy to add color to your spreadsheets. These features are rolling out over the next couple of days.We’ll be blogging about each feature in detail, but in the meantime here’s the quick digest version:Auto-correctionsWe’ve added a feature to substitute text automatically. For example,...
Thursday, 11 November 2010
About a year ago, I started scanning and uploading all the important papers floating around my house into Google Docs. It seemed like an obvious solution to three things that drove me crazy:Clutter (I believe papers not only accumulate but secretly multiply)Access (I always need that bill/file that is at home and not at the office with me)Sharing (It’s a common occurrence that I need someone else to also look at that file, and that person is hardly ever with me at the office either.)Scanning and uploading ended up being only half the battle. My...
Monday, 8 November 2010
Recently, we launched a rebuilt document editor from the ground up. Just like some colors stand out more than others, there are some features in the new editor that are particularly shiny. While features like real-time collaboration, more fonts, and an advanced revision history tool are like neon green, crimson red, and ultramarine, the ruler tends to be viewed more like a beige.But the ruler, like beige, can certainly have its charms. You can use...
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
A few months ago, my colleague Julia and I were at a technology conference for educators. Teachers were very enthusiastic when we demonstrated working together on documents at the same time and were really excited about how they could use it in their classrooms. What surprised us though, was how many of our favorite features - like working together at the same time - were brand new to them.We knew we wanted to share that same excitement with even more people. Inspired by the Search Stories videos, we set off to tell a story using Google Docs....
Two years ago, we created the Google Docs Community on YouTube as a space to feature user-created videos about Google Docs. Today, we’re reviving the channel with new life and new videos from the community and the Google Docs team.You’ll find videos ranging from helpful tutorials to creative testimonials in easy to browse playlists. On the channel, you can view Google Docs success stories:And learn how to use features in Google Docs and Sites, ranging from basic editing to features used by our most advanced users:You’ll even be able to check out...
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Guest post: Stephen Hind (commonly known as Steegle) has been a Top Contributor in the Google Sites help forum since its launch in January 2009. Top Contributors are Google-recognized participants of our help forums who exemplify excellent product knowledge, are consistently kind and respectful to others, and are helpful in the forum. He’s an avid user of Google Sites both professionally and personally, and creates and manages Google Sites for other...
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Two big advantages of building web applications are frequent feature releases and easier cross-product sharing. Today we have a little of both for you. This week, we are adding version history to uploaded files in the documents list as well as drop downs in horizontal navigation and a new sharing experience to Google Sites.Version history Earlier this year, we added the ability to “Upload any file” to Google Docs so that you upload, store, and share...
Monday, 1 November 2010
Guest post: November is National Writing Month and to celebrate, we’ve invited Dr. Steven Daviss to talk about how he used Google Docs to write a book with two colleagues. Dr. Daviss is currently the Chairman of Psychiatry at Baltimore Washington Medical Center in Maryland and has been increasingly leveraging his clinical and administrative experience towards a career merging health care policy, informatics, and health care reform.Two other psychiatrists...
Tuesday, 26 October 2010
Spreadsheet data can tell compelling stories when placed into charts and other visualizations. Today we’re excited to announce a new editor for charts, redesigned from the ground up as well as a set of new chart types. Check out our video to see these charts in action:New and improved chart typesWe’ve added annotated time-lines, organizational charts, gauges, our popular motion chart (which makes it easy to visualize data changing over time) and...
Thursday, 21 October 2010
Google Apps Scripts can save time by sending emails, scheduling calendar events and more with one click.We just announced on the Google Enterprise Blog that you can now create, edit, and launch Google Apps Scripts from any Google Site. For example, you can create a site to browse and sign up for training sessions. On a training site, you could have a “Register Now” button on each classes page that would automatically add users to the class roster, add the class to their Google Calendar, and email them to confirm enrollment.To learn more about how...
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
When writing a document, it often helps to augment text with images and diagrams. Google documents already has three ways to add images: you can choose them from your hard-drive, add them by URL, and you can find them using Google Image Search.But sometimes the exact image you need is on your desktop and you just want to add it to your document quickly. Starting today, you can drag images from your desktop directly into your documents.For now, you...
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