blog how to, blog trick, blog tips, tutorial blog, blog hack

HEADLINE NEWS

Popular Posts

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Hide sites to find more of what you want

Over the years we’ve experimented with a number of ways to help you personalize the results you find on Google, from SearchWiki to stars in search to location settings. Now there’s yet another way to find more of what you want on Google by blocking the sites you don’t want to see.

You’ve probably had the experience where you’ve clicked a result and it wasn’t quite what you were looking for. Many times you’ll head right back to Google. Perhaps the result just wasn’t quite right, but sometimes you may dislike the site in general, whether it’s offensive, pornographic or of generally low quality. For times like these, you’ll start seeing a new option to block particular domains from your future search results. Now when you click a result and then return to Google, you’ll find a new link next to “Cached” that reads “Block all example.com results.”


As always, Matt’s been gracious enough to let us use him as an example. His site is awesome, though, and we doubt many people will want to block it!

Once you click the link to “Block all example.com results” you’ll get a confirmation message, as well as the option to undo your choice. You’ll see the link whether or not you’re signed in, but the domains you block are connected with your Google Account, so you’ll need to sign in before you can confirm a block.


Once you’ve blocked a domain, you won’t see it in your future search results. (Side note: Sometimes you may have to search on a new term, rather than simply refreshing your browser, before you'll notice the domain has been successfully removed.) The next time you’re searching and a blocked page would have appeared, you’ll see a message telling you results have been blocked, making it easy to manage your personal list of blocked sites. This message will appear at the top or bottom of the results page depending on the relevance of the blocked pages.


You can see a list of your blocked sites in a new settings page, which you can access by visiting your Search Settings or clicking on the “Manage blocked sites” link that appears when you block a domain. On the settings page you can find details about the sites you’ve blocked, block new sites, or unblock sites if you’ve changed your mind.


We’re adding this feature because we believe giving you control over the results you find will provide an even more personalized and enjoyable experience on Google. In addition, while we’re not currently using the domains people block as a signal in ranking, we’ll look at the data and see whether it would be useful as we continue to evaluate and improve our search results in the future. The new feature is rolling out today and tomorrow on google.com in English for people using Chrome 9+, IE8+ and Firefox 3.5+, and we’ll be expanding to new regions, languages and browsers soon. We hope you find it useful, and we’ll be listening closely to your suggestions.

Google at SXSW 2011: Austin here we come

SXSW begins Friday, March 11 and pretty soon Googlers will be touching down in Austin for the Interactive, Music and Film Festivals. We have a lot planned for the week, and we hope you’ll join us for some of the fun.

More than a dozen Googlers are speaking on a wide variety of panels, kicking off with a talk on Friday, March 11 by Marissa Mayer, our VP of Consumer Products. Google and YouTube panelists will cover topics as varied as Google doodles, electronic privacy, hybrid marketing, recommendation engines and beyond.

All developers are invited to join us at the League of Extraordinary H4ckers on Sunday, March 13. At this 1-6 PM event, attend 15-minute API briefings on Android, Chrome, HTML5, Blogger, Google TV, Google Maps, App Engine, YouTube, Web Fonts, Cellbots and Fusion Tables, mingle with our developer team or hang out in the YouTube Leanback lounge. If you stick around, that same evening we’re co-sponsoring SuperHappyDevHouse—complete with hacking and a LEGO® MINDSTORMS® sumobot competition. Be sure to RSVP for both events!


If you’re also attending the Film and Music portions of the festival, keep an eye out for screenings of Life in a Day, and check out the YouTube-sponsored NPR Music showcase on March 17 and the Other Music & Dig for Fire Lawn Party on March 17-18. We’ll be holding a meetup for Texas-area partners, too.

Of course, no SXSW is complete without a slew of parties, and this year is no exception. Here are a few of the places you’ll find Googlers unwinding:
Plus, from March 14-17, you can visit us at our booth for demos and presentations of Google products and features.

There’s a full list of Google/YouTube activities on our event site, and throughout the festival, we’ll post updates about all our events via @googlesxsw, so be sure to follow us and spread the word. We’re looking forward to seeing you in Austin!

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Happy 1st birthday to the Google Apps Marketplace

A year ago today, the Google Apps Marketplace launched with 50 web apps integrated into Google Apps, making it easier for organizations to customize web-based solutions for their specific needs.

We’ve come a long way since then, and now offer 300 apps across 11 categories, including a new set of education apps. Each web app in the Marketplace provides meaningful integrations that range from single sign-on convenience to contextual gadgets inside of a user’s Gmail inbox.

Read our post on the Enterprise blog or visit the Apps Marketplace to learn more—and join us in celebrating a year of expanded Apps functionality.



Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Instant Previews now available on mobile

(Cross-posted from the Mobile Blog)

Instant Previews provides a fast and interactive way to evaluate search results. Starting today, Google Instant Previews is available on mobile for Android (2.2+) and iOS (4.0+) devices across 38 languages. Similar to the desktop version of Instant Previews, you can visually compare search results from webpage snapshots, making it easier to choose the right result faster, especially when you have an idea of the content you’d like to see.

For example, if you’re looking for a webpage that has both photos and descriptions, you can use Instant Previews to quickly identify these pages by navigating across the visual search results with a few swipes of your finger. Or perhaps you’re looking for an article, a step-by-step instructions list, or a product comparison chart—with Instant Previews, you can see easily spot pages with the right content without having to navigate back and forth between websites and search results. And when the mobile version of a website is available, we’ll show you a preview of the mobile page.


To use Instant Previews on your mobile device, do a search on www.google.com and tap on the magnifying glass next to any search result. A side-by-side comparison view of the webpage previews for the first page of search results will appear. When you find a result you like, tap on the preview to go straight to the website. It’s as easy as finding a recipe for poaching an egg:


You can learn more about Instant Previews for mobile in our Help Center. We hope you enjoy finding the right result faster with Instant Previews!

 
My Ping in TotalPing.com