CallCenterTechs

What's different with Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook

We built Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook to make it as easy as possible for people who love Microsoft Outlook to continue to use it when their company switches to Google Apps. In developing the feature, we focused on allowing Outlook users to connect to Google Apps for business email, contacts and calendar. But we also recognized that many people add plug-ins to Outlook for additional features. For that reason, we worked to ensure that as many plug-ins as possible continue to work, like salesforce.com and WebEX.

Unfortunately, some plug-ins don’t yet work with Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook, and we wanted to take this opportunity to highlight a few of the more common ones:

• Microsoft Office Outlook Connector
• Acrobat PDF Maker Toolbar
• Outlook Change Notifier

If you would like to continue to use these plug-ins, uninstall Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook, and the uninstaller will re-enable the plug-ins.

We’d also like to highlight another known issue that may be of interest. Programs that interact directly with the Outlook data file, including Windows Desktop Search and PGP.com’s encryption plugin, don’t currently work well with Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook.

Google Voice’s Secret Weapon: Number Portability

Google Voice, formerly GrandCentral, is a seriously heavyweight product. When it relaunched in March, just a couple of months ago, we gave Google Voice a glowing review.

Once you’ve jumped in head first to the product it will straighten out your phone life forever. You’ll never have to worry about figuring out which phone numbers to give to different people. Give them one number – your Google Voice number – and then use rules to determine where your calls go based on who’s calling and what you are doing.

There are significant switching costs, though. You have to tell everyone your new phone number and get them to start using that, instead. New business cards have to be printed, which is another cost. For most people, that’s just too much heavy lifting to fully embrace the service. And there’s the additional problem of your outbound calls and outbound text messages showing the phone number of the device you are calling from instead of your Google Voice number. Your friends need to store that number or they won’t know who’s calling. And once it’s stored, they’ll use it, bypassing all the great voicemail and call routing features of Google Voice.

But Google has a plan to deal with all of these issues, we’ve heard. And it starts with Number Portability.

Today you are issued a new phone number when you sign up for Google Voice. But we’ve confirmed that a very small number of people have ported their existing numbers to Google (Google uses Level3 to handle phone numbers). In the U.S. it’s possible to port any phone number to another service provider – even a mobile number to a voip provider like Level3.

Google is only testing the service for now, but we’ve heard from a source inside Google that they plan to roll out number portability as a general feature later this year. Once that happens, users will be able to move the phone number they’ve had forever to Google, and avoid the switching costs.

That means you can switch your mobile number to Google and then just use whatever device you happen to have in your hand to receive calls. That’s an extremely powerful feature for Google Voice.

Outbound calls from those devices will still show whatever phone number is assigned to it, though. But Google has that covered, too. We’ve learned that they are preparing to launch apps for the major smartphone platforms that will automatically route outbound calls through Google Voice. That means whoever you call will see your Google Voice number as the caller.

I’m banging on every door I can find to get Google to let me port my mobile number over to them as soon as possible. I’ll have to pay a $175 fee to AT&T to switch away, but it’s worth it. As long as Google is around I won’t have to be shackled to any of the ridiculous U.S. mobile carriers. I can just use whatever device I’m testing at any given time as my main phone. And I won’t have to ask people to call me at my home VoIP line when I’m here just because my iPhone doesn’t work at all at my house. Instead I can just switch my inbound calls to Vonage. Callers won’t know the difference.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

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New in Labs: Automatic message translation

Posted by Darren Lewis, Software Engineer

Back in the early days of human existence, before language had fully developed, our caveman ancestors probably did a lot of grunting. Language, and thus life, were pretty simple: watch out for that saber-toothed tiger (“Blorg! AIYA!!!”); stop riding the wooly mammoth and help me pick some berries (“Argh. Zagle zorg!”); man, it’s cold in this Ice Age (“Brrrr.”).

Somewhere along the line, all those grunts diverged into thousands of distinct languages, and life became both richer and more complicated. And for the last few eons or so, we’ve struggled to communicate in a multilingual world. Which brings us to today. Since the heart and soul of Gmail is about helping people communicate, I’m proud to announce the integration of Google’s automatic translation technology directly into Gmail.

Simply enable “Message Translation” from the Labs tab under Settings, and when you receive an email in a language other than your own, Gmail will help you translate it into a language you can understand. In one click.

If all parties are using Gmail, you can have entire conversations in multiple languages with each participant reading the messages in whatever language is most comfortable for them. It’s not quite the universal translators we’re so fond of from science fiction, but thanks to Google Translate, it’s an exciting step in the right direction. I use this feature everyday to help me work with teammates around the globe (they think my Japanese is much better than it really is…shhhh!).

Whether you’re reading a family update from inlaws on the other side of the world, working with a multinational team, or just trying to

Sent from my 3.0 iPhone 3G – Yes it works

Gmail users can be a passionate bunch. Many of us have, at one time or another, encouraged or cajoled friends and family to join us @gmail.com. But switching email accounts can be pretty painful. It’s like getting out of a relationship. You have so much baggage — years of emails and contacts, memories of past Christmases and Valentine’s Days — so the easier your new email account can make it, the better. My wife flirted with the idea for two years before she finally took the plunge with Gmail. The reason she finally made the switch might also convince your friends that it’s a good time to adopt a shiny new Gmail address.

Gmail now migrates email and contacts from other email providers, including Yahoo!, Hotmail, AOL, and many more. It’s much easier to make the transition now that you can bring along all your old email and contacts. You can even have your messages forwarded from your old account for 30 days, giving you time to take Gmail for a test drive while you make up your mind.

This new feature is available in all newly-created Gmail accounts, and it is slowly being rolled out to all existing accounts. It’ll take longer than the few hours or days that most Gmail features take to get out to everyone. You’ll know it’s on for your account when you see the Accounts and Import tab (formerly just called Accounts) under Settings. Sorry, businesses and schools using Google Apps won’t see these new migration options.

Everyone can still use POP3 mail fetching and upload your contacts in a CSV file, but this new way is much simpler for basic imports. And we like it when you can access and move your data the way you want — it’s been easy to auto-forward all your Gmail messages to any other service, and now it’s a little easier to go the other direction too.

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OffiSync Brings Microsoft Office And Google Docs Together At Last

Google Docs has been around since 2006, offering a powerful and free alternative to Microsoft’s dominant productivity suite. But for many people, it remains something of a novelty – it’s there, but they don’t use it regularly. This is in part because of the inherent security issues with Cloud-based services, which make businesses hesitant to upload their confidential files. But the biggest reason? Google Docs and Microsoft Office simply don’t play nice.

OffiSync, a new plugin for Microsoft Office, is looking to change that. The application, which supports Word, PowerPoint, and Excel documents, is launching in a private beta (you can request an invite from its homepage), with support for Office 2003 and 2007 on Windows. Mac users are out of luck for the time being.

There are already a few options for syncing files from Microsoft Office with Google Docs, but these typically involving syncing your ‘My Documents’ folder rather than the individual files, and aren’t as deeply tied into Office. Alongside basic file syncing, OffiSync also integrates a number of features from Google Docs to actually improve Office. One of these is integrated Google search, which allows you to search through all of your Google Docs files directly from your Office toolbar.

[YouTube Video]

The service also has support for Google Docs collaboration, though it isn’t as complete as I’d like. Using OffiSync, multiple people can edit the same file without having to worry about overwriting each other’s changes. But if you want to see real-time edits (which is one of the more powerful features of Google Docs), you’ll have to use the browser-based interface. Founder Oudi Antebi says that real time edits are in the works, and will be included in an update over the summer.

Even Google, while not directly involved with building OffiSync, is optimistic about the service. Google Docs product manager Jonathan Rochelle says that his team thinks the app is “great”, and that it will appeal to a large audience, though he notes that the app is “still pretty early”.

But even if it works, it might not be so easy to make money – a company called DocSyncer with a similar premise entered the Deadpool last summer. OffiSync will be free for individuals, with plans to release an enterprise version in the next 6-9 months, which will help large businesses work in a mixed environment. Of course, OffiSync is going to be racing against the clock to some extent, as Microsoft has made it…

Sent from my 3.0 iPhone 3G – Yes it works