Student Window

Google Chrome is a web browser designed to load web pages and web applications at lightning speed. Whether it’s searching directly and quickly from the browser’s address bar when you need to do some intensive research, or getting to the websites you rely on quickly at the click of the mouse , Google Chrome is just fast. Google Chrome celebrated its first birthday just over a month ago with a brand new stable release, which means even more speed improvements, as well as a fresh redesign of some of its most loved features . More recently, we introduced Artist Themes for Google Chrome. We invited leading artists, architects, musicians, illustrators, filmmakers and fashion and interior designers from across the globe to create artwork for an unusual canvas: the modern web browser. Since then, we’ve enjoyed hearing thoughts from our users on these designs and how they’ve used them to personalize the browser. We’ve also been intrigued by the ways in which these themes have had interesting and unusual cultural resonance with people around the world. To continue celebrating this collaboration of engineering and art, we’ve collaborated with our friends at YouTube to launch a new video (with a surprise ending) that we hope showcases the full beauty of these themes. Check it out at youtube.com/googlechromethemes or click the image below. And if you haven’t tried Google Chrome recently, download the latest version and give it a whirl. Posted by Min Li Chan, Google Chrome Team

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Fast, simple and stylish: Not your typical web browser

It could be argued that the evolution of internet memes can be largely attributed to students. It all started with forwarded links and emails (”OMG, have you seen this?!”), and has now developed into a set of online tools and sites designed specifically to help people consume and share lots of information. But, as we all know, there are too many blogs and sites to possibly keep up with everything. So the real question is how to find the right sources to read or follow. I only followed a handful of blogs when I first started using Google Reader to track my favorite sites. Over time, I started incorporating recommendations from my friends, and my reading list quickly grew from 4 blogs to 34. The Reader Team has worked hard to launch several sharing features that make it easier to find and subscribe to blogs that your friends like. But we thought we’d take it one step further by adding recommendations from some of the web’s most prominent bloggers could to help take the stress out of the challenge of finding good stuff to read. First we asked leaders across a variety of fields — journalism, tech, fashion, and food — what they read online. Then we compiled their responses into our second edition of Power Readers , which we’ve expanded from last year’s Power Readers in Politics . Curious where Arianna Huffington goes to get different perspectives on the news? Ever wonder what other food blogs Mark Bittman reads? Visit www.google.com/powerreaders to explore and subscribe to recommended reading lists from all of our power readers, or to any individual blogs they like. Posted by Zach Yeskel, Product Marketing Manager

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Finding great stuff to read online

Salone is a rising senior at Stanford University and has spent her summer interning with the Search Marketing team in Mountain View. As summer jobs wrap up and stores abound with “Back to School” sales, the end of summer vacation is imminent. For me, the end of August means registering for classes, endless packing sessions, shopping trips to buy a growing list of “essentials,” and the inevitable jitters that accompany the start of a new academic year. Whether you’ve been dying to get back to school or suffering from the end of summer blues, we at Google put together some study tips to help you jumpstart your school year. From getting a head start on your reading and research interests with Google Books and Google Scholar to slicing and dicing your research with timeline or wonderwheel, we hope these tips help you stay on top of your classes and get the most out of Google. But don’t fret – we know that back to school is also about catching up with your friends after a long summer. So take some time out of your busy class schedule and plan some downtime with Google, too. Good luck and here’s to a great first semester! Posted by Salone Kapur, Associate Product Marketing Manager Intern, Search Marketing Team

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Jumpstart your school year with Google

Stephanie is interning with the Google Docs Marketing team this summer and surveyed students to find out about how you’re using Docs on and off campus. Last month I asked you how you use Google Docs on campus. After hearing from over 50 students, I wanted to share some highlights of what we learned from you along the way: How do students mainly use Google Docs? Brainstorming Whether it’s taking notes during a group project brainstorm session or outlining a research paper, Google Docs helps you get your thoughts down quickly and allows you to access them from anywhere later. Group work Many of you use Google Docs to contribute your part to a group project, but just as many use it outside the classroom. Student groups are collecting RSVPs with Google forms, taking meeting minutes with Google documents, and balancing budgets with Google spreadsheets. Personal record keeping Have a to-do list or want to keep a weekly budget? Many of you are using Google Docs to stay on track with daily tasks. Your favorite thing about Google Docs? Collaboration Backing up important work is great too, but far and away students enjoy being able to contribute to the same document with friends and classmates. And it’s not just about the class projects. For instance, Students for Obama used Google spreadsheets to tell each other who had participated in phone banks, who was going on certain trips, and who would complete certain tasks. Most creative uses we heard from you: “Two of my friends used Google spreadsheets to play Dungeons and Dragons with each other.” – Chris, Worchester Polytechnic Institute, Computer Science “We used Google Docs to plan a spring break trip for Habitat for Humanity. It helped us keep track of phone numbers, dinner menus, etc.” – Jacinda, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science “Our club leadership used Google Docs for everything from constitution-writing to picking the new board, and during interviews, we would take notes on interviewees in the same doc.” – Justin, Harvard University, Anthropology Thanks to everyone who volunteered your time; it really helps the Google Docs team key in to what’s important to students so we can continue to make the product better for you. With back to school right around the corner, I’m interested to try out some of your ideas in my own campus life, and I hope some of these ideas may inspire you to get started with Docs as well. Posted by Stephanie Vezich, Google Marketing Intern

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The results are in – how students like you use Google Docs

In the spirit of graduation season, we’re doing a series of posts every Friday throughout the summer that provide tips for graduating seniors, so stay tuned for more! It wasn’t until after my friends and I had graduated and left the bubble that was our college life that I realized how much I’d taken our years of proximity for granted. For four years, we were never more than a 10 minute walk or a quick bike ride away from each other. And now we’re in all parts of the world, in different time zones, and sometimes separated by long flights. If you and your friends are scattered across cities too, you should try keeping in touch with voice and video chat in Gmail . You can either make a voice call (pretty much a phone call, but it’s free and you don’t have to use up your cell phone minutes!), or if you have a web cam, you can make a video call to chat with friends “face to face.” To make use of this free service in Gmail: Download the voice and video chat plug-in. Log back into Gmail. Make a voice or video call to any friend that has a camera icon next to their name in your chat list by selecting their name and clicking “Video & more.” So even though graduation may make you feel far away – now you can stay close with Gmail! For more Apps news Did you know that Google Docs is just one of several products in Google Apps? To get updates and news on all the Apps products, check out the Google Apps Blog ! Posted by Joyce Sohn, Google Apps Marketing Manager

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Grad tip: K.I.T. using Gmail’s voice and video chat

Back when I was in college (which wasn’t all that long ago), we used a command-line program called Pine to check our email. It was much faster than the school webmail, but you had to learn all these keyboard shortcuts just to get anything done. I remember sitting around the dorm, eagerly sharing tips with friends (like “Did you know that ^Y sends you to the previous message?”) Those days are over for most folks, and my friends and I now share tips with each other about how to be more efficient with Gmail. We thought lots of people would be interested in these kinds of tips, so we asked Googlers for their best tips and tricks on how they use Gmail, and put the best of these into a guide at www.gmail.com/tips , entitled “Become a Gmail Ninja.” We even made a printable version of the guide that you can pin to your wall or keep on your desk. And for the first 1024 of you who want them, we’ll send a limited-edition, laminated guide for free. Just fill out this form with your address. Sorry, we can only ship to addresses in the US. If you’re not one of the lucky 1024, don’t fret because you can still buy a laminated guide at www.barcharts.com/gmail . If you’re already a Gmail ninja and have your own tips you’d like to share, let us know and we’ll add the best ones to the online guide. *Our lawyers asked us to make sure it was clear that your contact information won’t be maintained in any way and this offer is “void where prohibited and only while supplies last.” Posted by Zach Yeskell, Gmail marketing manager

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Are you a Gmail Ninja?