Google Chrome: icon-only bookmarks

Google Chrome does it again with awesome icon-only bookmarks for the bookmarks bar:




When I saw them on my friend's computer, I couldn't delete the text labels from my bookmarks fast enough. Yet another unheralded, minor but valuable improvement from the Google Chrome team. Now if they could just fix the pdf viewer (by adding print and save buttons).

Update: This appears not to work with Xmarks. Every time I synch it restores the text to my shortcuts (acting like I'm a fool for wanting it the other way). For now I'm just going with short names like "fb", "tw", "reddit".

Google Chrome PDF Viewer - this is beta software we don't want

A friend of mine downloads PDFs for work. Of course I suggested he use Google Chrome because not only does it load fast, it loads pages fast and the interface is more refined than the console of a BMW.

However they recently removed the old Acrobat PDF reader and replaced it with an in house Google PDF reader. The only problem is, it's missing buttons BADLY. Buttons that define the functionality of a PDF reader and sent my friend running back to Firefox.

The missing buttons: SAVE and PRINT

What could be more vital to a PDF than save and print. Normally I'd at least expect to find them in a righ click context menu, but as it is now, it really is just a PDF "viewer", a horribly deformed one that lacks the ability to save or print.

(also attempted the usual shortcuts, thinking that Google mighta been clever and just included it without including it, but CTRL-S saves it as a webpage, not a PDF and CTRL-P prints, but it prints like a webpage, showing only part of the PDF and only the first page of a three page PDF)

Blogger - missing twitter and facebook integration

Allright. I've set up my new blogs. They look awesome, the content is awesome, everything is awesome. Now how do I share my blog posts with my twitter followers and my facebook friends? I don't want to follow complicated instructions, I want real Twitter and Facebook integration right here at home in blogger. I already have it in Tumblr, but they had downtime and don't have the brilliant staff of Google Engineers behind them. So why not blogger? Why not grow a pair of twitter and facebook integration, rise up and crush Tumblr once and for all? As one of the first major blogging platforms, wouldn't you like to be the last? Get with it google. Get with twitter/facebook integration or fade away.

Google Notifier - black button mode for Mac

one of these things doesn't belong. can you guess which one?

Dropbox has an option to turn their bright teal notification icon into a gorgeous black button. I'd like to see Gmail and Gcalendar notifiers have the same option.

Chrome Notebook - The Google Button

Google is missing a serious opportunity here. We've had the apple key, the windows key, will we now have the google key? I know the CR-48 design is all about beautiful black and grey sleekness, but in future versions of the Chrome netbooks, why not just use the Google logo for the key, creating a "Google Button". Just Push Google. You don't see Kleenex calling themselves facial tissue, do you?

Chrome Notebook - and it comes in a cool box

As you can see, you put the helmet on the mouse. Not the mouse on the helmet. Good tip.

Chrome Notebook - Replacing Caps Lock with Search

In a word brilliant. Take a worthless waste of space key and put a useful brand new key there. Incredible.

Full disclosure - I desire a chrome netbook

It's one of the reasons I started this blog. I signed up for the pilot program the other day and was hoping to use this blog to write about Chrome OS. We'll have to see. A friend of mine just got one and I'm mad jealous. Especially because it doesn't have any goofy logos or stickers, just an awesomely monolithic black rectangle.

Blogger is much improved

Been a while since I used blogger. I quite like it. Was able to reconfigure this blog in no time at all. Still gotta say, the preview button in the upper right corner seems like it would be more at home at the bottom near the "Publish Post" button.

Gmail - Chats - the case of the multiple reply buttons

A friend of mine uses talkatone on the ipod touch almost exclusively to communicate, the rest of the time he uses hand signals similar to those of the bonobo monkey. When I receive a message from him, it pops up on my google notifier. I then am sent to Gmail, where I click on Chats. The next step gets me every time:

I want to reply to him, so I click reply. The app then starts a reply in Gmail. This is not the behavior I expect, so I then try to click on the user name. Still no option to chat. Then I finally retrace my steps. notice the two reply buttons, shrug my shoulders and reply to the chat.

If I'm already in Chats, shouldn't I be defaulting to replying in chats?

And who's idea was it to have two reply buttons anyway? I can only hope he's working on his follow up, the dual send button.