Keyboard shortcuts in Google Sites

We’re big believers in speed and saving time, which is why we’re happy to announce that we’ve added keyboard shortcuts to common actions like create page and edit page for site collaborators using Google Sites. You can see a full list of keyboard shortcuts here, or simply type Ctrl / (⌘ / on a Mac) to open the shortcut help.You can disable keyboard shortcuts on the Sites user setting page. Are there other common actions that you’d like to see added...

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More tools for viewing document revisions

We’re happy to announce that a new revision history interface is now available in Google documents. To see it, go to File > See revision history.In the new revision history interface, you can see what changes were made at a glance.Click on a time stamp in the right column to see what changes were made at a given time or use the arrow keys to quickly scan through many revisions. Changes are color-coded based on each collaborator, making it easy...

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Import your files many different ways

A spreadsheet without data and numbers in it can get pretty lonely, which is why it’s important to be able to easily import files full of data. Today we’ve improved the import dialogue to give you a full range of options of where to put that data. You can get to the new Import dialog from the File menu.For example, when importing a .csv file, you can create a whole new spreadsheet, append to the current sheet, add a new sheet to your existing...

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What’s different about the new Google Docs: Making collaboration fast

This is the final post in a three part series about the collaboration technology in Google Docs. On Tuesday, we explained some of the technical challenges behind real time collaboration. Yesterday, we showed how operational transformation can be used merge editors’ changes.Imagine that you’re doing a jigsaw puzzle with a bunch of friends and that everyone is working in the same corner of the puzzle. It’s possible to solve a puzzle like this, but...

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What’s different about the new Google Docs: Conflict resolution

Editor’s note: This is the second in a series of three posts about the collaboration technology in Google Docs. Yesterday, we explained some of the technical challenges behind real time collaboration.Think of the history of a document as a series of changes. In Google documents, all edits boil down to three basic types of changes: inserting text, deleting text, and applying styles to a range of text. We save your document as a revision log consisting...

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A more fontastic Google Docs

Cross posted on the Official Google BlogDocuments without font choices are like photographs without colors. Just as shades of color can add depth to a picture, smart font choices give your text another dimension.For a long time, the set of fonts that you’ve seen when you browsed the web has been quite limited. That’s because you could only use a font that’s already been installed on your computer. So if a website designer wanted all her visitors...

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What’s different about the new Google Docs: Working together, even apart

Editor’s Note: In May, we walked through some technical details about what’s different in the new Google Docs. Beginning today, we’ll dive into the collaboration technology behind Google Docs in three parts, starting with a look at the challenges encountered when building a collaborative application. Tomorrow’s post will describe how Google Docs uses an algorithm called operational transformation to merge edits in real time. Finally, on Thursday,...

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Print your spreadsheets (and save ink) with more printing options

With the power of the cloud, you have access to and can share your files from basically any device without needing to print out anything. We understand that there are occasions when you still need to print, however, and that’s why today we’re happy to announce two new features for printing: selection printing and gridless printing. These two new options allow you to not only customize your printouts, but also save ink in the process. With selection...

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Back to School with Google forms

Cross posted on the Google Student BlogGuest Post: Emily is a senior at Emory University, majoring in Business and Biology. This summer, she worked as an intern on the Google Apps for Education team and here she shares her thoughts on using Google forms on campus.During the hectic first few weeks back at school – which can be the busiest time of year for a college student – one of the things that helps me get things done and stay organized is Google...

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Learn about Google Docs

Google Docs is more than just creating online documents, spreadsheets and presentations. With Google Docs, you can access your files from anywhere, share them with the people you choose, and work together in real time.To help those of you just getting started with Google Docs we have created a new series of videos. These videos give a high level overview and steps to get started. And since each video is focused on one feature, its easy to only learn...

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Easier site organization with drag and drop

Page organization is an important part of using Google Sites, especially when you want to make a lot of changes to your Site’s structure. To make it easier and save you time, we just enabled drag and drop functionality in the Pages area of site management. Site owners and collaborators can try it out on via Manage site > Pages in the tree view.We hope you like this little time-saver.Posted by: Santos Cordon, Software Engin...

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Trimming our privacy policies

Cross posted on the Gmail Blog and the Official Google BlogLong, complicated and lawyerly—that's what most people think about privacy policies, and for good reason. Even taking into account that they’re legal documents, most privacy policies are still too hard to understand.So we’re simplifying and updating Google’s privacy policies. To be clear, we aren’t changing any of our privacy practices; we want to make our policies more transparent and understandable. As a first step, we’re making two types of improvements:Most of our products and services...

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Drawing out ideas in documents

Have you recently toiled over instructions to assemble furniture? Now imagine the agony if you had no illustrations to fall back on. What’s the best way to teach kids about nutrition without a food pyramid?Sometimes when working with text you realize that words can only articulate so much. And that’s why we have drawings in Google documents. Drawings can be useful for things like diagramming processes in a flowchart or clearly articulating the relationship...

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