09 Mar 09 Import & export those Gmail filters

So you go to all the trouble of creating a large & perfectly-customized set of filters for Gmail, and you’re worried that they might get confuzzled somehow so you want a backup, or you want to copy them to a new Gmail account. Now thanks to the magic of Gmail Labs, you can export – and import – your Gmail filters. Information about this new feature can be found at the following articles:

Import and Export Your Gmail Filters
Lifehacker

http://lifehacker.com/5164463/import-and-export-your-gmail-filters

New in Labs: Filter import/export
The Official Gmail Blog

http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/new-in-labs-filter-importexport.html

Export Gmail Filters
Google Operating System

http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2009/03/export-gmail-filters.html

Tags: Gmail, Gmail Labs, New features

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09 Mar 09 Sync contacts and calendars with your smartphone

This is great news – Google has now made it possible for you to sync your contacts & calendars with your smartphone. I’m using it with my iPhone, in fact, and so far it’s been great.

Basically, I sync Google Contacts & my Google Calendars with my iPhone over the air using Google Mobile Sync, but I also sync Contacts and Calendars with my Mac’s Address Book & iCal using Spanning Sync. That way, everything works together seamlessly, which is just the way I want it.

You can read articles about how to enable Mobile Sync for your smartphone, as well as how it all works, in some of the following:

Google Sync for your mobile phones
Google Tutor

http://www.googletutor.com/2009/02/12/google-sync-for-your-mobile-phones/

Google beta of Sync for mobile contacts & calendar is live
The Unofficial Apple Weblog

http://www.tuaw.com/2009/02/09/google-beta-of-sync-for-mobile-contacts-and-calendar-is-live/

Finally: Google Sync Comes to iPhone and Windows Mobile
Mashable

http://mashable.com/2009/02/09/google-sync/

Google Mobile – Sync
Google [the official pages & instructions]

http://www.google.com/mobile/apple/sync.html

Tags: Contact Manager, Google Calendar, New features, Smartphones, Spanning Sync, Synchronization

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21 Nov 08 New UI & features for Presentations in Google Docs

In early September 2008, Presentations turned 1 year old. Long the furthest behind of any of the Google Docs triad, the UI was spruced up a bit to bring it more in line with the other Google Docs family members. A unified interface is nice, and I must say, the user interfaces have gotten much better in the last several months.

In addition, some new features were unveiled as well:

Undo

Well, it’s about time! Ctrl-z undoes your latest booboo.

Zoom

Need to zoom in on a particular detail of your slide? Got a tiny monitor? Eyes getting worse as you age? You have two choices:

Slide > Zoom
Ctrl-Shift-Right arrow to zoom in, & Ctrl-Shift-Left arrow to zoom back out

Reveals

In other words, you can specify the order in which objects appear on your slides. I use these all the time in Apple’s Keynote; it’s nice to see Presentations get them as well. To use this feature, right-click on an object and choose Incremental Reveal.

Small features, small steps. Progress is good.

Tags: Google Docs, New features, Presentations

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