Archive for October, 2009

We are pleased to announce that the Internet Explorer Administration Kit (IEAK) 8 now supports creating custom Internet Explorer 8 packages in a total of 43 languages. IEAK8 can be downloaded from http://ieak.microsoft.com.

Custom Internet Explorer 8 packages can be created in the following platform and language combinations:

Windows XP SP2 or SP3 x86:

• Total languages:
  • Arabic, Bengali, Bulgarian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hong Kong Chinese, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Kannada, Korean, Lithuanian, Latvian, Malayalam, Norwegian Bokmal, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Telugu, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian
• New languages:
  • Bengali, Bulgarian, Croatian, Estonian, Hindi, Hong Kong Chinese, Indonesian, Kannada, Lithuanian, Latvian, Malayalam, Punjabi, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Telugu, Thai, Ukrainian

Windows XP SP2 x64 and Windows Server 2003 SP2 x64:

• Total languages:
  • Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), German, English, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian

Windows Server 2003 SP2 x86:

• Total languages:
  • Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Czech, German, English, Spanish, French, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Dutch, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Russian, Swedish, Turkish

Windows Vista x86, Windows Vista SP1 x86 , Windows Server 2008 x86, and Windows 7 x86:

• Total languages:
  • Arabic, Bengali, Bulgarian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hong Kong Chinese, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Kannada, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malayalam, Norwegian Bokmal, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Telugu, Turkish, Thai, Ukrainian
• New languages:
  • Bengali, Bulgarian, Croatian, Estonian, Hindi, Hong Kong Chinese, Indonesian, Kannada, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malayalam, Punjabi, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Telugu, Thai, Ukrainian

Windows Vista x64, Windows Vista SP1 x64, Windows Server 2008 x64, and Windows 7 x86:

• Total languages:
  • Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian Bokmal, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Hong Kong Chinese
• New languages:
  • Bulgarian, Croatian, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Thai, Ukrainian, Hong Kong Chinese

To create custom packages in these new languages, you’ll need to install the latest version of IEAK8.

Thanks,
Jatinder Mann
Internet Explorer Program Manager

Last night at the TechFlash: Women In Tech event we were able to meet some great women in the tech industry. Bing was there in full effect giving away all sorts of Bing goods and chit chatting in the hallways.

After a jammed packed social hour of eating, drinking and mingling we all headed into the main room where a panel of very talented and insightful women continued the discussion. Shahla Aly, vice president at Microsoft kicked it off talking about the declining number of women in the tech industry and what we as a community can do to help spark interest in the younger generation. She highlighted some of the work Microsoft does with high school girls through a program called Digigirlz and really called on us to help change the declining trend of women in tech. The panel of women then discussed the importance of mentoring and sponsorships for those of us already in the tech to help sustain the current employment numbers as well as the need to early education for young girls in middle   school and high school.

It was a great event to recognize the 100 top women in tech (waaahooo Betsy!) and to discuss some of the issues surrounding being a woman in the technology industry.

I am looking forward to the next event already!!

Kristin Meldahl – A woman in tech :)

 

If you are interested in the next TechFlash events:

PSBJ’s Women of Influence Awards on Nov. 19, 2009; register here.
TechFlash Holiday Party & Birthday Bash on Dec. 9, 2009; register here.

We're pleased to announce a new feature that will allow Google Checkout merchants based in the U.S. to create and to run their own Checkout promotions at any time.

Starting today, you can sign in to your Checkout merchant account, go to the 'Tools' tab, and click the 'Promotions' link to create a Checkout promotion in less than a minute. You'll be able to specify the date and time you'd like the promotion to run, as well as choose from a variety of dollar-off discounts to offer your buyers.

Whenever you run a Google Checkout promotion, the standard Checkout button on your website will be automatically updated to display the discount amount and cart minimum. Additionally, for AdWords advertisers, we'll change the standard Checkout badge appearing on your AdWords ads to a Checkout badge that includes the discount amount as shown below. These promotional badges have been introduced to enable shoppers who search on Google.com to easily identify and take advantage of promotional offers.


Checkout promotions are a great way to attract new buyers, and we're excited to make this functionality more widely available. Please visit our Help Center for detailed instructions on setting up your own Checkout promotion. Thanks for using Google Checkout!

Posted by Gina Del Vecchio, Google Checkout Specialist

by Mike Krumboltz

There's a photo making its way around the Web. Maybe you've seen it. It features a chimpanzee being prepared for burial as a group of chimps look on, some attempting to comfort each other. The photo was featured in November's issue of National Geographic. Ever since it hit news stands, its been the target of Web searchers and bloggers.

National Geographic hosts a blog on the suddenly famous photo. The 40-year-old chimp who passed away was named Dorothy. Monica Szczupider, who snapped the photo, explains that Dorothy died of congestive heart failure. Because of her popularity with the other chimps, the caretakers at Cameroon’s Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center decided to let the group watch her being prepared for burial in the hopes they might understand that Dorothy would not be returning.

Ms. Szczupider explains that the reaction was not typical for a group of normally raucous chimps. As Dorothy was wrapped up and taken away, a silence fell over the group. There was some hollering, but for the most part, the chimps seemed to understand and respect the gravity of the situation.

Web searches on "chimp funeral" are climbing steadily. Additionally, blogs throughout the Buzz are picking up the story. Australia's Perth Now writes that the grief that the chimps seem to be experiencing can serve as additional evidence that "higher emotions" aren't just for human beings. You can see the photo here.

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On October 17th, YDN sponsored yet another grassroots (un)conference, this time BarCamp Blackpool. I went along to talk and mingle and talk some more.

Blackpool is a great place for an event. For those who don't know, it is a seaside tourist town in the North of England. It is known for its yearly illuminations, tower and amusement park. This explains why directly outside my hotel room window was the UK's largest roller coaster.

There was a good turn out, but as usual with free events many people who asked for a place didn't come along. If you are one of these people and you didn't let the organisers know then shame on you! Seriously, people who don't get paid put a lot of hard work in to organising these events. We need to fix the problem of non-attendance somehow. </rant>

There was a nice variety of subjects covered on the day, from the non-technical but geeky talk on Geocaching from Alistair MacDonald to the more hardcore techy Amazon EC2 and Mono framework talk from Tim "tagwalk" Hastings. Rich Quick gave some useful advice on HTML emails in a typically entertaining fashion.

Probably my favourite session was an introduction to British Sign Language by Lalita D'Cruze. After some encouragement at the BarCamp, she has created a blog about learning British Sign Language, which I think will be an interesting read as Lally continues her training.

Evening entertainment was provided by the hilarious Paul Sylvester and a game of Werewolf, rounded off a great day.

Many thanks to Gemma Cameron for organising the event, and to everyone who attended and talked.

Ian Pouncey
Web Developer, Yahoo! London

We've posted a couple times about how the Custom Search Element can help provide a more customized search experience for your users while enabling you to earn money. Today we're excited to announce two new features for the Custom Search Element that will enable you to further customize your website search to the look and feel of your site: themes and rich snippets.

Themes

You can now customize the layout and styles of your Custom Search Element. To select a theme for your Custom Search Element, just go to your Custom Search Engine account at http://www.google.com/cse/manage/all and click Control panel. On the Control panel page, in the left-hand menu, click Look and feel.


You can now choose from a number of layouts and color styles for your Custom Search Element. You can also preview your selected theme. Here's an example of the 'Shiny' theme:


If you'd like to tinker further with the look and feel of your Custom Search Element and you're familiar with CSS and JavaScript, take a look at this Custom Search Control documentation.

Rich snippets

Rich snippets are another new feature that allow you to customize the actual Custom Search Element search results with additional relevant content, like thumbnail images and actions. We like to think of rich snippets as a way to add more flair to your Custom Search Element search results.

Here's an example of search results from a Custom Search Element which uses both themes and rich snippets. The thumbnail image next to each search result shows rich snippets in action.


Rich snippets require you to mark up the page with metadata. For more information, check out the Custom Search Developer's Guide.

If you have any feedback for us on either of these new features or on the Custom Search Element itself, please leave a comment. We love hearing what publishers have to say about Custom Search!

Posted by Christine Tsai, Google Web Elements team

Today we're excited to begin testing a new feature of AdWords called AdWords Comparison Ads, which lets users compare multiple, relevant offers more easily. Comparison Ads is part of our continuing effort to make ads more relevant and useful to our users and to help you, our advertisers, reach the people who are most interested in your products and services.

AdWords uses a host of targeting and relevancy signals to determine the best ads for each query. However, sometimes a user's query doesn't provide enough information for us to confidently predict what they want. Take, for example, users who search for "mortgage." Do they want a new home loan or a refinance? Do they want a fixed rate or an adjustable rate loan? Comparison Ads improves the ad experience on Google.com by letting users specify exactly what they are looking for and helping them quickly compare relevant offers side by side.

With Comparison Ads, you can also target your offers at a more granular level, leading to more valuable, qualified leads. To see how it works, let's use our mortgage example. Users searching for "mortgage" on Google.com may see a promotion from Comparison Ads prompting them to select the type of loan they are looking for and to compare various rates.


If they click the promotion, users are taken to a page with more detailed sponsored results. They can choose directly from the offers listed on that page, or they can further refine their search by providing additional information like income and home value. By giving users the ability to refine their search on a number of relevant attributes, we are able to show more targeted ads and provide you with more valuable leads.

Once users find an offer that matches their specific needs, they can either call you directly or request a quote. If a user requests a quote, Google automatically anonymizes the user's phone number and sends you a unique code that you can use to contact the user. You only pay if a user calls the phone number on your offer or fills out a form to request a quote.


While Comparison Ads is still an early-stage feature, we've focused on a number of ways to enhance the user experience:

• Speed -- Comparison Ads shows targeted offers in less than a second. There are no long forms for users to fill out - Users see specific offers immediately and only need to fill in additional information if they wish to further refine their results.
• Transparency -- Comparison Ads only shows real products. There are no teaser rates, or bait and switch offers. Comparison Ads also standardizes the information presented to users, making it easy for them to sort and compare offers on a side by side basis.
• Privacy -- Comparison Ads won't send advertisers any user information, including anonymized phone numbers, unless the user explicitly requests more information about an advertiser's offer.

At this time, Comparison Ads will only show to a small number of users in select U.S. states and is only available to a limited number of advertisers in the mortgage/refinance space. Over time, we'll increase the number of users who see Comparison Ads offers as well as the number of advertisers able to participate.

Posted by Dan Friedman, Inside AdWords crew

In addition to the thousands of companies and schools that go Google every day, more and more non-profit organizations are choosing Google Apps to help remove the cost and complexity associated with traditional IT, which can often challenge the limited resources of 501(c)3 organizations.

Learn more about the special discounts available for accredited organizations with Google Apps for Non-Profits and read about how USA Water Polo made the switch to Apps and was able to provide 35,000 staff, volunteers, and players with improved email and collaboration tools while re-allocating costs toward funding for their players, teams and members.

Google Apps helps organizations of all kinds improve the way they work by minimizing on-premise hardware, increasing uptime, and making it easy for users to get productive fast. This is especially helpful for non-profit organizations, who can direct their focus away from IT maintenance and put their talents toward what they do best: doing good.

Posted by Miriam Schneider, Google Apps for Education and Non-Profit teams

by Claudine Zap

Our top picks from the day's hottest searches.

1. Corey Feldman (Searches increased by 1,198%). The '80s star says he is devastated by his wife's desire to divorce.
2. Michelle Obama (+559%). The First Lady is being honored by Glamour for her tutoring work, and appears on the cover of the women's mag.
3. Levi Johnston (+497%). The baby daddy of Sarah Palin's grandchild continues to shock and awe the former VP candidate with his plans to publish a tell-all book.
4. San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge (+387%). The monster connecter for Bay Area commuters is still closed to traffic for repairs.
5. World Series Game 1 (+270%). The Phillies take New York in their home town.

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Posted by Hicham Alaoui, Associate Product Marketing Manager, Google Books

Following our first announcement this week, here is the second set of winning entries for the 10 Days in Google Books contest. As a reminder, to enter the contest users had to submit a short essay describing what the experience of reading will be like in 100 years.

"It's Earth Memorial Day. Under the Martian sunset's romantic glow, Janet removes her shirt. "What's on your back?" her boyfriend Carl asks. "Part of a book. Did you know books once were printed on murdered biomatter? Isn't that awful? I temptatooed myself in memory of the trees..." "Um," says Carl."

"Although I've been dead for 35 years, in 2109 my great-great-grandson and I read stories together through our telepresence system. He wrinkles his nose when I bring up a favorite story from my boyhood, leading me to chastise him, "don't judge an ebook by its icon."

"We almost returned to paper, when the oil ran short and dear. The technologists saved us again, folks said they wouldn't, but their eink, memristors and led lamps take less power than their solar cells and thermal engines make. We don't read by candlelight. But we almost did."

"I placed my book on the nightstand next to me and turned off the light. Then in a soft voice, my book picked up where it had left off earlier in the evening. Bookmark it please, I asked the book, and it hummed in quiet, literate, satisfaction."

"I pause, run my thumb across the pages and smell the paper. Tonight a classic. Finding it on the shelf, I gently tap my book to its spine. Pages dance and the cover transforms, firmware upgraded so embossing works nicely. Rewrite complete. Config loaded, coffee brewed. Call me old fashioned."

"7/27/2109 - Dear Diary, "Someone" swiped my reading glasses today and I had to use the PUBLIC glasses at the libary. Disgusting! The ancient things didn't even accept retinal commands so I had to use the 'page' button. My brother is SO dead!"

"Even my great-great-grandchildren will still need paper books to read, because somehow 'Goodnight Moon' is not the same unless the child can take it to bed and slowly love the book to death. Every child who has this experience will never stop loving physical books as mementos of childhood."

"She was late for class, stuffing books into her bag: biology, chemistry, the complete works of Shakespeare, the English dictionary, the every language everywhere dictionary, the Galactic Encyclopedia. As she strode out the door, ping! A newly discovered chemical element had been added to her chemistry book."

"Reading (PA city, Monopoly railroad, ESL) will (intention, testament, onomastics) no (negative, nitrous oxide, kana) longer (Dan Fogelberg, unrequited love, anatomy) be (degree, copula, beryllium) linear (y = mx + b, Cretan script, asteroid detection)!"

"Power: ON Resume: The Great Gatsby page 17 Activate reader theme: Classical 20th Century--Gilded Age. Music: ON Contextualizer: ON [..her eyes moved gradually out into the velvet dusk]. User-initiated Query: velvet dusk. Accessing Wikipedia: Dusk "Dusk is the beginning of darkness in the evening." End query. Resume reading."