Mark this for future reference

Posted by Jenny Zhang, Software Engineer

Ever forget to return to a website you bookmarked? If you’re like me, the answer is "definitely." For those of us with more than a few neglected bookmarks, the enhanced search box in the newest Google Toolbar beta can help you rediscover them. Now when you start typing in the Toolbar's search box, relevant bookmarks that you’ve saved with the Toolbar will display in the list of suggestions.

And since bookmark negligence seems to be a worldwide phenomenon, the Google Toolbar beta for Internet Explorer is now available in 16 additional languages: UK English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Dutch, Brazilian Portuguese, Finnish, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, Korean, and Russian. So don't let your bookmarks fade away – install the Toolbar beta for IE today.

Update: Last sentence now specifies that Google Toolbar 4 is currently for Internet Explorer only.

About Me & Vega Strike

Me being the list, not the person. The addiction to updating this blog has been so overwhelming as to consume my person. I no longer function as an individual, instead serving merely to emit superlatives about the endeavours of a select few; the Free game programmers.

For those returning viewers, there has been ever more updates to the list. At this early point, the changes are so many that I can't really bring myself to remember them so you'll just have to have another look. In the future I will be noting additions rather than silently inserting them.

I was going to add Deadly Rooms Of Death (a.k.a. DROD) to the freeware list but it's website seems to have dropped off the edge of the Internet. Other references to the game cite charges, so perhaps it shouldn't be there anyway. What a shame, I quite liked that game. Back to Freer matters and I did discover that two seemingly dead projects, Adonthell and Egoboo (community), appear to have life in them. However they both have a long way to go before they can be considered revived. Another reality of open source gaming is that CVS activity is nothing without playable releases.

The last few months has seen a lot going on in the community of one of favourite projects; Vega Strike. There has been so much activity in the VS forums that it's a shame they don't have more structured development. The official release is so outdated. Here's a tip for game creators out there: if a mind-blowing artist rapidly produces commercial-grade art for your project, put it into your game immediately. Issues about whether it fits perfectly or needs placing properly are MOOT. VS would be the envy of the Free gaming world right now if the developers had reacted quicker. I was vocal enough at the time (sadly I shout better than I contribute). I would have posted more VS-specifc examples of his work but found mostly broken links - timerotted postings - although his website is more reliable (here and here). Fortunately his efforts were not forgotten and somebody is finally making use of his models. Still, luckily for them the VS forums has always been teeming with new talent.

There's a follow-up release for the fledgling Warsow, which seems to be winning over a lot fans after recent updates. This release (0.11) also raises a common issue afflicting Free Software developers - version numbering. There are those who interpret version numbers as outright numbers - 0.1 < 0.11 < 0.2 - and to them this will make sense. There are others who believe each point is it's own independent number - 0.1 < 0.2 < 0.11 (nought point eleven) - who will scoff at a 0.1 to 0.11 version jump. The latter is the most adopted in my experience, hence the typical X.Y.Z versioning system. In this sense, the Warsow team would have been better expressing their releases as 0.10 and 0.11 respectively (or 0.1.0 and 0.1.1) but their numbering system is their perrogative. I just hope they realise how many puppies they killed.

I could write an entire article on that; how unproductive.

Finally, a note on the future direction for this blog - it involves interviews and reviews galore, commentary on important Free game updates, as well as articles on Free Software game development. I hope that whets a few appetites.

Two more Gmail languages

Posted by Shanjian Li, Gmail Engineer

We've just launched Arabic and Hebrew language interfaces for Gmail, as well as several new features that will improve the Gmail experience for the people using those interfaces. (You can change the Gmail language interface on the Settings page in your account.)

This was my first project at Google, and I ended up learning a lot about Arabic and Hebrew by talking to native speakers. I'm really pleased to have worked on a launch that will help some of these folks use Gmail and make it available to even more users (we now offer 40 different language interfaces).

Map your way to greener travel

Posted by John Hanke, Director, Google Maps & Earth

Summer is almost here and the Googleplex is buzzing with travel plans. (Hey, even geeks have to play sometime.) We looked at all the great Maps mashup sites out there and thought, why shouldn't we have some fun too? So we started working on a Maps mashup that would highlight some fun summer activities that also respect the environment. The result is our Summer of Green travel mashup site. We've teamed with Earth Day Network to highlight some planet-friendly travel tips for top U.S. travel destinations as well as how to use Google Maps in your daily routine to find and support green activities.

Did you know you could go kayaking in Las Vegas? Or rent a hybrid limo service in LA? Or stay at a Disney hotel in Orlando that recycles its water? These are a just few of the stops documented in our video-enhanced Google Maps mashup.

Hope you enjoy these and maybe even find some fun -- and green -- destinations for your summer trips.

The Ascendency of OpenTTD

OpenTTD is, at the moment, not a Free Software game. However, there are significant efforts underway to address this whilst greatly enhancing the game at the same time. All the graphics are being replaced (and then more created) by high resolution, high quality renders. Looking at the Enhanced GFX wiki page, it is going to be beautiful when ready. I'm optimistic that, given the size of the TTD community, this will be approaching readiness by the end of the year. It's an exciting prospect.

Meanwhile the community effort to create the ultimate transport game seems to have died. Exhaustive planning and a lengthy design document has not inspired people to contribute to it. I told them years ago that without a playable game they will not attract interest. I was derided and ignored, my posts deleted. The open source reality is that working code attracts willing contributors.

In other news, Ascendency has appeared on Abandonia, making it officially freeware - as opposed to legally ambiguous term abandonware. (I wish companies would just release their abandoned games under a Free Software license.) You probably need dosbox to play it. I remember buying the game when I was younger and it was a decent but not spectacular game.

That just makes me look forward to FreeOrion even more.

On the map Down Under

Posted by Julian Sonego, Marketing Manager, Google Australia and New Zealand

Google Australia has officially come out of beta--we've recently launched our new Australian operation. While Google has had a presence Down Under since late 2002, we have only recently moved into our new digs, which have water views that are the envy of Googlers worldwide.

This new Googleplex in Sydney gives us the opportunity to scale our operation to support a growing band of users, advertisers, and partners. We have also invested heavily in local engineering talent to conduct original R&D work, underscoring Google's commitment to Australia and willingness to set up shop wherever there's talent.

To coincide with the grand opening of the office, the team recently released street maps for Australia and New Zealand so web developers can get a jump start on integrating Down Under maps into their sites.

If you're interested in becoming an Aussie Googler, take a look here. Who wouldn't want to join this team?

Empty Clip Still Full

A couple of days ago Warsow 0.1 was released. Being highly dependent on fast hardware, it's not a game to appeal to me and my ~5 year old workhorse. Still, it's got a very unique cel-shaded style among it's FPS fragfest contemporaries and appeals to the players who liked the physics-defying mechanics of older titles, bucking the recent trend in deathmatch gaming.

I saw Empty Clip 1.0.1 on the Game Tome and decided to check it out. Much to my consternation it required Fmod which is not directly available for Ubuntu. Search for help on the forums lead me straight to, typically, a request for testers for Empty Clips. So, other than manual installation of Fmod, I'm out of luck and out of time for today. This is the reason all game creators should investigate a proper installation tool other than simple pre-built binaries, such as Autopackage.

There was a new game announcement for an R-Type-like, called Level Shmup. The homepage link was broken and the download stalled for me. Not a good omen for a new game. Second time lucky with the download, it's a fairly basic affair and the gameplay is chaotic. I don't see much future for the game itself, although there's a few nice touches such as the parallax scrolling and adaptive difficulty. It is clear the author is talented and I hope he'll produce something of greater scope in the future.

I spotted X-Moto which was missing from the Free Gamer compendium - now rectified. I think X-Moto suffers from a common problem afflicting Free games; not enough level structure. Rather than a fairly easy tutorial and build up of difficulty, the levels quickly assume you have mastered the controls. There are many examples of this; ManiaDrive would be fantastic if it wasn't almost immediately impossible for all but the most experienced or skillful of players - even the first level requires a near-perfect lap to reach the goal time.

Up & Running

Well I've mostly finished tweaking the site. The next step is to work out a few organisational issues - probably using blogs to "store" articles that are linked on the front page and kept up-to-date.

I saw Formido 1.0.1 on Freshmeat and downloaded it. It had to be compiled. The compilation actually failed initially - you had to create a directory 'obj' first for it to perform the compilation.

$ cd formido-1.0.1
formido-1.0.1$ mkdir obj
formido-1.0.1$ make
formido-1.0.1$ ./formido

It's quickly apparent this game is a simpler version of Phobia III. Although not as polished, it's still fun for a few minutes.

Boson got another update. It is a good example of what it takes to create a successful open source game - long term dedication and steady contributions. Some people will do a lot in a short period of time; these projects usually fizzle out. The Free games that succeed are made over years, not weeks or months.

This game has a lot of potential and I wish I had a computer powerful enough to playtest the latest features. Instead I must make do with the screenshots on the web page. Check them out!

Taking Shape

The list of games is almost satisfactory (still more to come). Now I just need to sort out the layout so it's a little less tall and then start posting updates on major developments around some of the slower-to-release titles out there (you know who you are) who are lurking in the shadows and ready to strike out in the name of Free Software gaming!

Apparently good open source games don't exist. Obviously that person hasn't done much digging. I'm missing a lot of multiplayer games from the list (I don't tend to play them) such as BZFlag and Tremulus. They'll be added when it's more organised. Given I'm restricted to what can be done with a blogger template, I'm still working out how I can organise it better.

In the mean time, I'm just looking forward to Freeciv 2.1.0 since it has lovely new hi-res graphics.

Initial Games Added

I've added a bunch of games to the sidebar based on my bookmarks. There's a few missing, but it is a good start on some of the best Free Software games out there.

Welcome to Free Gamer

This blog will serve as a resource for collecting information on upcoming Free Software games. I have accrued a great deal of knowledge of the Free gaming landscape over the last few years and it's time to put it to use.

Picture this: Picasa for Linux

Posted by Chris DiBona, Open Source Programs Manager

Let's say you happily use Linux, but you sometimes find yourself wishing you had access to interesting new apps that launch for Windows but not Linux. And maybe, like a lot of us, you have a lot of photos stored on your personal machine, and you've read about or even tried Google's photo organizer, Picasa. But using it means switching to Windows, even temporarily. (We know--thanks but no thanks.)

Well, we've got you covered, because today we're launching Picasa for Linux on Google Labs. It incorporates nearly all the features of the current Windows version of Picasa, providing you with the tools you need to easily find, edit, and share the photos on your computer. And because it runs on a carefully tested version of Wine, Picasa avoids the slowing effects of an OS emulation or a virtual machine.

Have fun with it--and tell us what you think.

Attention all Pearl Jam fans

Posted by Eva Ho, Product Marketing Manager, Google Video

Pearl Jam's new music video "Life Wasted" is now on Google Video for free! Be sure to check it out now, as free streaming and download is available only until June 1.

And in line with the band's experimental personality, Pearl Jam released the "Life Wasted" video under a Creative Commons "some rights reserved" copyright license. What does all that legal gibberish mean to you? It means that you can download the video for free, share it with your friends, and even post it on your own site--provided you give the band credit and don't use it for commercial purposes. It's yet another example of Pearl Jam putting its fans first.

[UPDATE 05/25: The free streaming-and-download period was originally scheduled to end on May 24; due to popular demand, we're extending it until June 1.]

Never browse outdated posts again

Posted by Dave Weissman, Software Engineer, Google Blog Search

Today we launched a new feature on Google Blog Search that lets you narrow your search by date. Using this feature, you can track blog posts on your favorite topics according to when those items were posted. We've also incorporated some improvements in search quality that should make your blog-search experience even better.

Ever since Google Blog Search launched, we've noticed that the universe of blogs has truly exploded--our index is doubling every six months. Perhaps even more striking, though, is that there's no one region in the world that leads the growth of blogs. Self-publishing clearly has global appeal, and blogging makes it easy for everyone on the web to share their voices and connect. True, there continues to be blog spam (and we continue to fight it), but our blog search reveals the great range and quality of ideas and writing out there.

Take it for a spin and let us know what you think.

Google's "20 percent time" in action

Posted by Alex K., Technical Solutions Engineer, Partner Solutions Organization

I love what I do (I work for Google's Partner Solutions Organization, writing internal programs and tools to help better manage our partner relationships--check out our job listings), but Google's "20 percent time" recently came in handy. The 20 percent time is a well-known part of our philosophy here, enabling engineers to spend one day a week working on projects that aren't necessarily in our job descriptions. You can use the time to develop something new, or if you see something that's broken, you can use the time to fix it. And this is how I recently worked up a new feature for Google Reader.

I really like the keyboard shortcuts in Gmail, and they work in Reader too. But when using Reader, I found myself wanting to skip whole sections of stories, and I was wearing out my "N" key (which moves the browser down one item). There are buttons on the screen to scroll up and down a whole page at a time, but I thought it would be nice to have a keyboard shortcut too. I could have hacked something together with Greasemonkey or a Firefox extension, but that would've only helped me and the three other people who read my blog.

So I fired off an email to the Reader team, hoping that they'd be able to add a keyboard shortcut. The team got back to me right away, and they told me how easy it would be to add the shortcut myself. They were right--it was easy, because the internal documentation was good and the code was really easy to work with. Once my change had been reviewed, it went live.

And I have to admit--every time I use the new shortcut ("shift" and "N"), I get a little thrill at how easily I was able to get my idea implemented.
Hope you enjoy it too.

Ready, AIIM, Search

Posted by Matthew Glotzbach, Head of Products, Google Enterprise

Innovation shouldn't come at the expense of simplicity. That's the message this week as search takes center stage at the AIIM Expo in Philadelphia, where Google VP and GM Dave Girouard will deliver a keynote on how consumer expectations drive innovation in technology, and Google partners will demonstrate how search is changing the face of enterprise applications.

Check out the new partner announcements and conference details and see why more than 4,000 customers rely on Google enterprise search technology.

Instant gratification, Google Video style

Posted by George Strompolos, Content Acquisition, Google Video

Let's say you've just captured some incredible footage of what appears to be a UFO, and you want to share it online with the world before anyone can claim that you're crazy. Lucky for you, Google Video just made sharing your videos a lot faster and a lot easier (and yes, even a crazy person can do it).

With the launch of our new web-based uploader, you're just two clicks away from posting your videos online. Best of all, you can watch and share your videos with friends and family, and embed them on blogs and community websites immediately.

If you prefer stories of love and loss over aliens and tractor beams, Google Video and Universal Pictures encourage you to try Google’s new web-based uploader by sharing your break-up stories in honor of National Break-Up Day (June 2) and the new movie "The Break-Up," starring Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn.

In my day, we thought calculators were neat

Posted by Aidan Chopra, Program Manager, Education

The Maine Learning Technology Initiative is an innovative program that equips every one of the state's public middle-school students with a laptop computer. This fall, more than 36,000 students will receive brand-new Apple iBooks pre-installed with great software.

We think the whole thing sounds terrific, so we're donating Google Earth and SketchUp Pro to Maine for installation on every public-school computer in the state. They accepted, and now it looks like Maine will be the first state in the US to have Google Earth, SketchUp Pro, and the 3D Warehouse available to every student, teacher, librarian, and administrator who wants it.

Information about the SketchUp for Education program can be found here. Government agencies that would like to follow Maine's lead are welcome to drop us a line at education@sketchup.com.

Making AJAX development easier

Posted by Bret Taylor, Product Manager

AJAX has the power to make your site more compelling and more dynamic, but AJAX development is often complicated, with much of the development time spent working around browser quirks and the fragility of AJAX components. Trust us, we know--the development of our own AJAX apps, like Google Maps and Google Calendar, caused us no small amount of AJAX-induced frustration.

That's why we're bringing you Google Web Toolkit. GWT is a new publicly available software development tool that makes creating AJAX applications much easier. With GWT, you can develop and debug your own AJAX applications in Java code using the Java development tools of your choice. When you deploy your application to production, the GWT compiler simply translates your Java application to browser-compliant JavaScript and HTML.

Check it out over on Google Code.

Talking in tongues

Posted by Mike Jazayeri, Product Manager, Google Talk

Thirteen more, to be exact. Google Talk has just added some new language interfaces: UK English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, simplified Chinese, traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Dutch, Russian, and Turkish.

Check it out and talk amongst yourselves...

Note this

Posted by Bay-Wei Chang, Senior Research Scientist

Search is all about finding the answers you need. Unfortunately, some kinds of questions--like where you should stay and what you should do on your Hawaiian vacation, or what kind of digital camera you should buy, or what the latest treatments for arthritis are--can't always be answered in one sitting, or by visiting one site.

That's why we built Google Notebook--to give you an online "notebook" where you can organize all your research, add personal notes to it, and share it with others. Google Notebook surfs along quietly with you as you browse, letting you clip and annotate whatever text, images, and links that help answer your question, all without ever leaving the webpage you're on.

If this sounds like something you'd like to try, you can find it here.

Smile! Gmail now has pictures!

Posted by Vadim Spivak, Gmail Engineer

When Google Talk added pictures, you probably knew they were coming soon to Gmail. But we decided to add a little twist. You can now upload a picture for each of your contacts and display it instead of the one they chose, like I do for my friend with the ugly dog picture. Then, if your friends have Gmail addresses, you can send them picture suggestions so they can use them as their own (and everyone else can see the cool pics you found).

PS: Since Google Talk already has pictures, we decided to share them. So the picture you select in Gmail will appear in Google Talk and vice versa.

Stop, hey, what's that sound?

Terry Lucas, Gmail and Google Talk Engineer

It might be Gmail. Starting today, Gmail chat will play a little ping sound whenever someone sends you a new chat message (just like Google Talk). Now you can work in other windows or even sit back and watch some TV without worrying about missing a message from your friend. Check out the details.

Gmail chats in more languages

Posted by Aaron Whyte, Gmail Engineer

We're pleased to now offer Gmail Chat in 17 more languages: UK English, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Japanese, Korean and simplified and traditional Chinese.

Here's what some people have had to say about Gmail Chat:

"My sister & I love Gmail because it's so cool! We're 3,000 miles apart, but are SO connected now with Gmail Chat. And we love the rotating smileys!"

"Pretty cool--I just got my 70+ year old aunt to use IM through Gmail."

"I heart Gmail. The new chat option is marvelous. You people bring joy to my life."

Aww, shucks. Well, we heart you--and we hope lots more of you will now enjoy getting in touch instantly this way.

Yes, we are still all about search

Posted by Marissa Mayer, Vice President of Search Products and User Experience

We are often asked at Google what we are doing to improve regular web search. There's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes, but today, at our press event, we announced four new products that will give you a better sense of how all this work becomes reality.

Our new products offer a pretty wide range of services and capabilities, but they have one thing in common: They all enhance and improve the search experience for our users.

- Google Co-op is a way for users to help us improve search. It lets people and organizations label web pages and create specialized links related to their unique expertise. Whether it's information about a hobby, a profession, or an unusual interest, everyone can contribute to making Google search more relevant and useful for the entire community.

- Google Desktop 4 gives you another way to improve search, by personalizing your desktop. New "Google Gadgets" deliver an array of information--ranging from games and media players to weather updates and news--straight to your desktop.

- Google Notebook (which we'll be launching next week) is a personal browser tool that lets you clip text, images, and links from the pages you're searching, save clippings to an online notebook, and then share notebooks with others.

- Google Trends builds on the idea behind the Google Zeitgeist, allowing you to sort through several years of Google search queries from around the world to get a general idea of everything from user preferences on ice-cream flavors to the relative popularity of politicians in their respective cities or countries.

If you're interested in hearing what was said on stage today, check out the webcast of our press event at www.google.com/pressday.

Conference on automated testing

Posted by Allen Hutchison, Engineering Manager

Those who follow the world of automated testing may be interested in the call for papers for our upcoming conference on the subject. Deadline for papers: June 1.