10 of Google's Most Useful Internet Tools

Did you know that there's a lot of things you can do with Google Services aside from it's well know search engine? We usually neglected some of these tools and we go Gaga over Google's Youtube and Google Search. Google is a Big-Good-Guy Company - Most of it's tools are useful to online users in accordance to "No Evil Rules" of the company, and to make life gets easier specially in using the net. Makes use of Google to the fullest by using it's worthy services such as the following. Make most out of Google Search. (See Top 10 Google Tricks which Usually Neglected)

Here's the top 10 of Google's Most Useful Internet Tools

1 - Gmail, Google Mail.

For me, this is the best email client ever. The interface is quick and reactive and there are many interesting features. The spam filter is really powerful, i have no more spams since i’ve switched to GMail a long time ago. The storage capacity (~7.4 Go) is also totally enough. Moreover, this client is totally integrated with the other tools of the Google network (Documents, Buzz, Agenda, …). With the plugins, you can also add several others features to GMail including integrating with other tools like RememberTheMilk by example.

The included chat is also a great functionality. I use it everyday.

No more spam with : Google Mail

2 - Google Chrome

Certainly the most efficient browser. The performances of this browser are simply amazing.

There are perhaps less plugins now that in Firefox, but it’s a lot more lighter than the others browsers. The tab system is really well done. If a site crashes, you can simply close the tabs ands that’s fine. You can also move a tab to an other window with drag&drop facilities.

In the last months, the number of modules tend to grow quickly and provides the more useful plugins that we could have used in other browsers before switching to Chrome. And Google Chrome support without plugins the synchronization of bookmarks and execution of GreaseMonkey scripts.

And last but not least, this is the most simplistic (not pejorative at all) browser i use and really easy and comfortable to use.

Try it and why not like it : Google Chrome

3 - Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a really great web analytics solution. This is the most used solution. This tool is free for website with less than 5 million page views by month or for those who have an AdWords account. The interface is really simple to use but powerful. All the stats are displayed with number metrics and graphs. And, really important, the traffic analyzer is powerful and light. You can even use an asynchronous JavaScript code to produce less overhead on the page load time.

You can create scheduled reports and email it at a specific time rate. You can also analyze only a fragment of the traffic and follow accomplishments of objectives. You can also use Google Analytics from other languages like PHP.

For me, as a webmaster, this tool is completely essential and I cannot live without it (exaggerate, but I use it everyday).

If you try it, you will not regret : Google Analytics

4 - Google Reader

Google Reader is a web aggregator to read RSS and Atom. This web application can work in offline mode accessing all the previously downloaded articles.

More to be an aggregator, Google Reader has also social network features. In fact, you can share you favorite articles and comment them. You can access to the shared articles of your friends.

You can create folders to sort your subscriptions by theme (or any kind of sort you like) and quickly find what’s new in any folder. Google Reader can also give you a list of subscriptions take can interest you based on your current subscriptions themes.

Aggregate your RSS and Atom : Google Reader

5 - Google Webmaster Tools

Google Webmaster Tools is an essential tools for all webmaster. With it, you can manage all your websites.

First of all, you can verify how your site is referenced on Google Search Engine. You can see in which position you are for the most important query for your website. You can see which keywords are the significant for your pages, you can obtain the number of links pointing to your website and to which pages there is the more links. You can also notify Google for updates in your sitemaps. Your internal links are also displayed. You can even consult the Google Reader subcribers to your feeds.

Next, you have also diagnostics about your site. The available diagnostics are the malware detected by the Google robots, crawl errors and crawl stats. Google Webmaster Tools give you some suggestions about your HTML pages.

Webmasters will love : Google Webmaster Tools

6 - Google Documents

Google Documents is an online documents sharing application. In that application, you can create and share documents, presentation, spreadsheets, forms and drawings.

More than creating and editing the documents, you can sharing them to anybody that have a Google Acount. The documents are saved by revisions and you can come back to an older revision or merge some revisions. This a really powerful feature when several persons work on the same documents.

All the type of documents can be edited in Wysiwyg way with powerful editors. You can also upload any files you want to your Google Documents account.

Store your Docs, Try : Google Documents

7 - Google Agenda

Google Agenda is a simple tools to keep appointments in mind. You have recall for your events.

You can create events and share them to any other Google contacts.

Organized Schedules, Take a look : Google Agenda

8 - Google Friend Connect

Google Friend Connect is web tools to add social networking features to a website. You can create a community around your website. The visitors can register to your site with simple widgets and no registration using their Google, Facebook or OpenID accounts.

You can add a lot of widgets to your website, by example to give the users the possibility to rate your contact, ask questions to your visitors or send newsletters to them.

Give it a try : Google Friend Connect

9 - Google Adwords, Keyword Tool

Keyword Tool is an application uuseful to get ideas of keywords for your website or to compare some keywords by Advertiser Competition and Search Volume. That can really help you to choose the keywords you will to focus on to improve the referencing of a website.

You can directly give a page of your website to the program. The page will be inspected for keywords and the tool will give you a list of keywords ideas based on the content of the site. Or you can give a list of keywords you’re interested in and the program will compute a list of other keywords based on yours.

I think it’s an essential tool for all webmaster that like to improve its websites referencing.

Find the Right Keyword, Try it : Google Adwords, Keyword Tool

10 - Google Translate, Language Tools

Google Language Tools is a simple set of tools to translate text from a language to another. You have several choices : translate some search results, translate a complete web page or translate a given text. There is a lot of available languages. The page give also an access too Google Homepage in all languages. You can note that this tool is integrated with Google Chrome in which you can translate (automatically or manually) pages to your languages with actions in the browser.

Yes, this very simple, but that works well and that’s really useful.

The most reliable translator, Try it : Google Language Tools

• Reference/Source: Baptiste-wicht.com by Baptiste Wicht [ April 16, 2010]
About

Google



When you visit www.google.com or one of more than 180 other Google domains, you can find information in many different languages, check stock quotes and sports scores, find news headlines and look up the address of your local post office or grocery store. You can also find images, videos, maps, patents and much more. With universal search technology, you may see all of these items combined in one result page for your query, and services such as personalized search help you find even more information tailored to your interests. We’re also working to digitize some of the world’s information that until recently hasn’t been online, like books. Search is how Google began, and it’s still at the heart of what we do today. We devote more engineering time to search than to any other product, because search can always get better and faster at helping you find what you want, when you want it, where you want it.

"Organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful."

10 Safe and Smart Hacks for Google Reader

Google Reader is a feed reader. It allows you to subscribe to RSS and Atom feeds. You can manage feeds, label them, and even share your feed collection with others.

Google reader is extremely powerful and has a very clean interface. Google Reader allows you to read your favorite blogs in much the same manner as you would read your email.
Some of it’s many features include tagging, folder-based navigation, Firefox integration and the ability to import and export subscription lists as an OPML file. You can also star items for easy access, share your favorite items, and save your favorite items to del.icio.us.
All of these features have come to make Google Reader a dream machine for the productivity enthusiast.

Here are 10 Smart tips for getting the most out of Google Reader. Remember Google Reader is a powerful tool you've just got to know yet.

1 - Sort your feeds by priority.

Google Reader makes it easy to organize all of your feeds by topic. However, I would also suggest that you categorize
your feeds by priority as well. This way, you know which items are “Must Read” and which items “Can Be Skipped” on days that you’re busy.

2 - Use Keyboard Shortcuts.

You can’t become a Google master without learning the keyboard shortcuts for Google Reader. These little tweaks can save you a good bit of time in the long run.
Some of the most common shortcuts include:

j/k: item down/up
o: open/close item
s: toggle star
m: mark as read/unread
t: tag an item

For a complete list of Google Reader shortcuts, grab this Cheat Sheet.

3 - Optimize your feed reading time by combining certain feeds into one large master feed.

This can be done using FeedShake. Feedshake allows you to merge, sort, and filter multiple RSS feeds. You can also use filters and tags to create a more customized feed.
For a more advanced solution, you can try Yahoo Pipes. Yahoo Pipes is a very powerful RSS feed remixer that gives you the ability to create web mashups that combine a variety of data from different sources. Yahoo Pipes takes web aggregation to an entirely new level.

4 - Add tags to your feed items.

Google Reader lets you organize all of your feed items by tags. This is one of the best features for those who are
looking to optimize their time.
To add a tag to a post, simply click “add tags” and enter the relevant tags.

5 - Search your feed items.

The only feature that I would really like to see in Google Reader that is currently missing is a search feature. Fortunately, there are ways to work around this.
You can use Google Reader Custom Search to search your feeds using Google Co-op inside Google Reader.

6 - Star items for future reference.

Google Reader enables you to quickly star items for future reference. This can come in handy for items that you want to refer to later.

7 - Smart Google Reader Subscribe Button

The Smart Google Reader Subscribe Button makes it easy to subscribe to a site’s RSS feed while also letting you know if you’ve already subscribed to that site. If you subscribe to a lot of feeds, this kind of tool is very handy.
Another great way to add RSS feeds on the fly is with the subscribe bookmark. This tool enables you to quickly
subscribe to any site that you find interesting while surfing the web.
To access the subscribe button, click on Settings on the top right-hand corner of the Google Reader interface and
then click on Goodies. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and you will see detailed instructions on how to use the subscribe bookmark.

8 - Use Expanded View.

For optimum productivity, use expanded view. Expanded view makes it very easy to scroll all of your feed items and
scan for interesting posts.
However, I don’t suggest that you simply scroll down the page. You can go from one entry to the next simply by
pressing the “J” key. Whenever you want to go backwards, use the “K” key to return to the previous post.

9 - Do a weekly or monthly cleanup.

Over time, there are certain feeds that you simply don’t read anymore, or read very infrequently.
These feeds should be dumped on a regular basis to keep your feed reader under control.
Google Reader has an excellent feature known as Subscription Trends that keeps track of where you do the majority of your reading. This will help you to quickly identify any feeds
that need to be dumped.
If your subscription trends reveals a feed that is read less than 5%, then it’s probably time to delete it. Fortunately, you can delete any feed directly from the Trends page.

10 - Dedicate a certain time of the day for reading your feeds and stick to your allotted times.

If you allow yourself 30 minutes to read through your feeds each day, then stick to it. Believe me, everything will still be there tomorrow.

• Reference/Source: Lifehack.org by KimRoach
Kim Roach is a productivity junkie who blogs regularly at The Optimized Life.