Celebrating Data Privacy Day

Celebrating Data Privacy Day: "It’s become a welcome tradition: Today is the fourth annual Data Privacy Day. Dozens of countries have been celebrating with events throughout the week to inform and educate us all about our personal data rights and protections.

This is the first year I’ve marked this day as director of privacy across both engineering and product management at Google. I’ve chosen to spend the day in Washington, D.C., where there’s a been a lot of robust and productive discussion lately. People from Congress, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Commerce, and industry and consumer groups have been contributing to these important conversations about how to best protect people’s data, and we’re happy to be participating too. I’m doing my part by bringing my geek sensibilities into a public discussion that we’re hosting today. In fact, that’s what we’re calling it: “The Technology of Privacy: When Geeks Meet Wonks.” I’ll be joined on the panel by technologists from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Federal Trade Commission and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. If you can’t attend in person, don’t worry—we’ll be uploading a video of the event later in the day on our Public Policy blog and you’ll also be able to see it on the Google Privacy Channel on YouTube.

On this Data Privacy Day, a major focus for Google is on creating ways for people to manage and protect their data. We’ve built tools like the Google Dashboard, the Ads Preferences Manager and encrypted search, and we’re always working on further ideas for providing transparency, control and security to empower our users. For example, earlier this week we launched an extension for Chrome users called Keep My Opt-Outs, which enables you to opt out permanently from ad tracking cookies. And pretty soon we’ll be extending the availability of 2-step verification, an advanced account security solution that is now helping protect more than 1,000 new accounts a day from common problems like phishing and password compromise. Right now it’s available to Google Apps Accounts; we’ll be offering it to all users in the next few weeks.

Data Privacy Day 2011 reminds us that as industry and society are busy moving forward, we face new challenges that together we can tackle through conversation and innovation. We’re eager to be part of the solution.

Posted by Alma Whitten, Director of Privacy, Product and Engineering

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New in Labs: Unread message icon

New in Labs: Unread message icon: "Posted by Manu Cornet, Software Engineer

When you’re visiting sites other than Gmail, it’s easy to find out how many unread messages are in your inbox by glancing at the title of your Gmail tab or window. However, if you have a ton of tabs open, or if you use Chrome’s “Pin Tab” feature that hides everything except the tab’s icon, it can be tricky to figure out without switching tabs.

If you’ve ever found yourself in this situation, you may like the new Unread message icon we just added to Gmail Labs. It embeds the number of unread messages you have right into the Gmail icon itself, like this:


To turn it on, go to the Labs tab in Settings, enable this lab, and click the “Save Changes” button at the very bottom of the page. Note that it’ll only works in Chrome (version 6 and above) and Firefox (version 2 and above).

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Print from your phone with Gmail for mobile and Google Cloud Print

Print from your phone with Gmail for mobile and Google Cloud Print: "Posted by Tyler Odean, Google Cloud Print Team

Let’s say you need to print an important email attachment on your way to work so that it’s waiting for you when you walk in the door. With Gmail for mobile and Google Cloud Print — a service that allows printing from any app on any device, OS or browser without the need to install drivers — you can.

To get started, you’ll first need to connect your printer to Google Cloud Print. For now, this step requires a Windows PC but Linux and Mac support are coming soon. Once you’re set up, just go to gmail.com from your iPhone or Android browser and choose “Print” from the dropdown menu in the top right corner. You can also print eligible email attachments (such as .pdf or .doc) by clicking the “Print” link that appears next to them.


We’re rolling this feature out in U.S. English over the next few days, so if you don’t see it right away please check back. In the meantime, you can learn more in the Google Cloud Print help center.

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Gmail Cloud Print

Gmail Cloud Print: "Google has enabled Cloud Print in Chrome's Dev Channel builds for Windows, but the only option available was to print a test page. Now you can use Google Cloud Print from Gmail's mobile web app for Android and iPhone. The integration lets you print attachments without having to use a full-fledged computer. Since there's no printer with native support for Google Cloud Print, you still need a computer running Google Chrome.

Cloud Print is enabled by default in Chrome Dev Channel and it can be manually enabled in the other builds by typing about:flags in the address bar, clicking 'Enable' next to 'Cloud Print Proxy' and restarting the browser. To be able to use it, you first need to go to Options >> Under the hood >> Google Cloud Print and log in with a Google account.




Update: According to Google, this feature is also available in Google Docs. 'This feature will be rolling out for English speaking users in the US and will work on most phones that support HTML5, such as devices running Android 2.1+ and iOS 3+.'

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Google Groups Tests a New Interface

Google Groups Tests a New Interface: "Google Groups tests a new interface that seems to be inspired by Google Reader. There are a lot of great new features: keyboard shortcuts, infinite scrolling, search box autocomplete, a mobile version, integration with Google Profiles and a rich text editor for composing messages.

The new version of Google Groups hasn't replaced the old version because it's not finished and there are still many issues to solve. The right sidebar shows a lot of uninteresting information (announcements, recent searches), but doesn't list your groups. You need to click on 'my groups' to see this list and you can also add some of the groups to your favorites. Another issue is that the new interface no longer has a summary view that shows a small snippet from the first message of a thread.


'When you sign in to Google Groups, you'll see a link to preview the new Google Groups. Once there, you can make it your default view (and you can switch back to the old version if you ever need it). We're excited about sharing these improvements with you, but this is just a start; we're working on improved spam controls, moderation, search, and other freatures to make Google Groups the best way to engage in discussions. We also want to hear your thoughts, ideas, and any issues you encounter, so please contribute to our Product Ideas page,' suggests Google.

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Google Will Launch Chrome Web Store and Chrome OS Today

Google Will Launch Chrome Web Store and Chrome OS Today: "Today is an important day for Google Chrome: Google will launch Chrome Web Store, a marketplace for web apps, and Chrome OS, the first browser-centric operating system. Google has uploaded two introductory videos to the YouTube channel, but they're not yet publicly available. Here are some snapshots from the videos:

Chrome OS Tour

Chrome Web Store: Museum of Thieves (Flash game)

Chrome Web Store: Sports Illustrated

Google has already announced the launch event a few days ago: 'On December 7, we will host an event in San Francisco where we plan to share some exciting news about Chrome. The event will be webcast live on YouTube at: www.youtube.com/googlechrome. Mark your calendars for 10:30 a.m. PST and tune in.'

{ Thanks, Emanuele. }

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Google Cloud Print, Now Available

Google Cloud Print, Now Available: "Google Cloud Print is now available in the latest Chrome Dev Channel build for Windows. After installing Chrome 9.0.597.10, you'll be able to enable Cloud Print from Options >> Under the hood >> Google Cloud Print. Log in to your Google account and Google will connect your local printers with Cloud Print, so that you can print documents from other devices.

'Google Cloud Print is built on the idea that printing can be more intuitive, accessible, and useful. Using Google Cloud Print you can make your printers available to you from any Google Cloud Print enabled web or mobile app,' explains Google.

Since none of your printers is Cloud Print-enabled, you'll have to use a software that connects Cloud Print with your printers. Google Chrome 9 for Windows includes a Cloud Print Connector and you'll only be able to use Cloud Print while the connector is running.

At the moment, there's no mobile app that takes advantage of Cloud Print, but Google will probably release an Android app later today. You can manage your printers and their tasks from this page. To try the new feature, print a test page.






{ Thanks, François. }

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