George's Technology Blog
» Smart Phones, Web Design, Google or whatever
Priority Inbox, a New Gmail Feature
Aug 31st
Gmail’s new Priority Inbox is a great new feature posted earlier today on Gmail’s blog. It was interesting for me to note that I have a personal email account and a newer work email account and I can use Priority Inbox on my work Gmail account. On this subject their post says:
Priority Inbox will be rolling out to all Gmail users, including those of you who use Google Apps, over the next week or so. Once you see the
“New! Priority Inbox” link in the top right corner of your Gmail account (or the new Priority Inbox tab in Gmail Settings), take a look.
… so you might not be able to use Priority Inbox yet, but watch for it during this coming week.
PRIORITY INBOX SETUP SCREEN
Google Calendar gets cool Scheduling Options
Aug 27th
Google Calendar is getting some cool scheduling options over the next day or so according to their Easier event scheduling in Google Calendar post. Finally, we’ll be able to choose to repeat an event on a Friday, every 2 weeks. From the screenshot (provided by the folks at Google) we can also choose how often the even recurs, ends never and it displays a summary of your choices (as on the screenshot: Weekly on Wednesday).
I’ll appreciate seeing this feature go live, its one of the things I’ve actually been waiting for to hit the Calendar… My geeky mind is happy!
Their post also notes that they’ve redesigned the interface and moved more used options closer to the top.
Trying Mystique Theme for a Day
Aug 27th
I thought I’d try out a new theme for a bit, any feedback would be appreciated, and make sure to let me know if this is your first visit or not.
Mystique 2.4.2
Feature-packed theme with a solid design, built-in widgets and a intuitive theme settings interface… Designed by digitalnature.
Tags: light, white, two-columns, three-columns, one-column, fixed-width, flexible-width, right-sidebar, left-sidebar, theme-options, threaded-comments, translation-ready, custom-header, editor-style
So, drop any comments below…
Call Phones in Gmail
Aug 26th
Filed under ‘new and cool things you can do with your computer’ Google has rolled out an improvement to Gmail voice and video chat that lets you call regular phones (with your headset/microphone).
Call Phones in Gmail
According to Robin Schriebman a Google Software Engineer:
Calls to the U.S. and Canada will be free for at least the rest of the year and calls to other countries will be billed at our very low rates. We worked hard to make these rates really cheap (see comparison table) with calls to the U.K., France, Germany, China, Japan—and many more countries—for as little as $0.02 per minute.
Just click the new “Call phone” button ion your chat window, and search contacts or dial a number on the keypad window and you can start enjoying this new feature.
You can also get phone calls in Gmail (just click the link to see how)!
How to add a new user to Windows 7
Aug 20th
This info applies to Windows 7, and I understand it also works in Windows Vista.
Click Start > Control Panel > under User Accounts and Family Safety, click Add or remove user accounts.
Next, type in your new account name (John, The Laptop, etc…) and choose the account type “Standard user” (see note below). Now click the Create Account button. At this point you can add a password to your new account, or there are other options like managing other users. When you are done close the window and you’ve created your new user. Next time you start or reboot your computer, it will stop and let you choose which profile you wish to login with.
NOTE: Only choose an Administrator if you need to, and you understand exactly what that means. Otherwise you can end up with big trouble as you accidentally leave your computer less secure than it could be. If you needed a user with Administrator privileges you probably wouldn’t be reading this unless you need a refresher.
Outlook 2010 users get Google Calendar Sync (32-bit only)
Aug 17th
For Outlook 2010 users out there (with 32-bit systems) who want to sync with Google Calendar your prayers have been answered…
FROM THE” GMAIL BLOG:
Google Calendar works with a number of desktop applications and mobile devices including iCal, iPhone and iPad, Blackberry, Android, Nokia/Symbian, and Windows Mobile phones. Google Calendar Sync for Outlook is also available, but one thing was missing — until now.
Now take the power of Outlook’s Calendar and sync with Google Calendar to get maximum flexibility and usability by extending yourself to the web – easily.
Share Your Calendar (GCalendar)
MORE
HTML5 Gmail Video Game
Aug 16th
Play Galactic Inbox, a free, keyboard-based fun game by Creative Technologist Paul Truong. No sound, and its not going to replace your favorite video game, but its a fun play, blast-from-the-past for those old enough to remember Space Invaders or Asteroids.
As the post says “make sure you’re using a modern browser that supports HTML5 first”. Not sure if your browser supports HTML5? Try this test:
http://www.html5test.com/
I’m using Firefox 3.6.8 which scored 139 of 300 points and it plays the game.
Internet Explorer Crash and Other Fixes
Aug 12th
As a user of Microsoft Internet Explorer for years, a computer enthusiast since before the days of Windows, and a web designer I figured if my Internet Explorer 8 had any problems it would be easy enough for me to fix using my current knowledge.
If you are having problems with Internet Explorer, you may be reading this in another browser, and I will assume so below. If you can’t get Internet Explorer running try “Get it Running” below.
My issue with Internet Explorer 8 appeared earlier today while trying to check out a web page I was working on that popped up a notification that Adobe Flash Player had to be updated. I clicked the install button and got an error that boiled down to 2 choices – debugging Internet Explorer’s error or closing Internet Explorer. Following common sense choices (clicking Update Flash followed by closing Internet Explorer) the browser would crash and then restore the previous page, and repeat. On the third time instead of trying to restore the previous page I got a message that it could not be restored. After a couple of times of going through this cycle I went to Google for help. I even clicked on an Adsense ad that promised an IE fix and landed on an attractive page letting me know that Softpedia certified their download as 100% Free, and having no spyware, no adware and no viruses. However checking SoftPedia for their Perfect Optimizer product did not yield any links to the site, so I got discouraged and went back to Google.
Depending upon your Operating System you can try one of these pages. If you have Windows XP, try either and follow instructions as closely as possible. If you can’t get Internet Explorer to run right try this (first option on both of the pages below):
Get it Running
Click Start > click All Programs > click Accessories > click System Tools > click Internet Explorer (No Add-ons) and hopefully this will fix or get around your problem for the moment, now visit one of the links below.
RECOMMENDED INTERNET EXPLORER FIX LINKS
Fix Internet Explorer in Windows 7
Fix Internet Explorer in Windows Vista
