Aug 24th, 2008
Free Software From Google Saves Time and Money
I’ve written about free software before, but the past few months have brought this subject back to the front of my mind again, particularly when thinking about Google.
Despite concerns that Google knows just way too much about each of us, there’s no question that it provides some great–free–services. While just about everyone uses the Google search engine, the tech giant provides us with three other applications that I find at least as essential: GMail, Google Reader, and Google Calendar.
In short, for those who don’t know, GMail is Google’s free Web based (but also POP3 and IMAP accessible) electronic mail service; Google Reader is a Web based RSS feed reader; and Google Calendar is, well, a Web based calendar. Notice a trend here? They’re all Web based, meaning they’re usable on any computer with a relatively modern Web browser, yet they’re very much like applications you’d expect to be available as standalones on your computer.
Besides the fact that they don’t cost anything, their Web homes are their great strength. I can use them from the Web browser on my MacBook when I’m on the road, my desktop OS X machine when I’m downstairs in my house, and the Windows 2000 machine on the road. The Google team has also provided great mobile versions that work wonderfully with my iPod touch and amazingly well with Opera Mini on my awful Samsung phone. I can check my calendar while walking to my office from work; I can read my RSS feeds over lunch; I can see if email has come in anytime I’m at a Internet connected computer with a browser.
I find the fact that all of these things are accessible on pretty much any computer (or my phone or my iPod touch) to be adding greatly to my productivity. No longer must I keep a meeting listed on a Post It while I wait to get home and add it to iCal; I just enter it on my iPod touch and sync it up with my MacBook, which syncs up its iCal calendar with Google Calendar and I’ll know about it as long as I can access the ‘Net. No longer do my read RSS feeds get mixed up with unread ones; if I’m reading anywhere I’m in sync. And of course, Google Mail lets me check email anytime, anywhere, but more importantly, it lets me get to a piece of mail to retrieve some lost bit of information I forgot last month from anywhere on the ‘Net.
I highly recommend these three applications, particularly if you have a decent Web browser on your mobile device–and this includes the free Opera mini on a lot of different phones as well as the iPhone and iPod touch versions of Safari. It’ll cost you nothing to use them and you may find that they’re just what you needed.
I love all of Google’s products. Google Docs is especially great and one of the few online office suites in existence (along with Zoho and Microsoft Live Office).
Could not agree more, and I second the mention of Google Docs. I started transitioning everything I do from Microsoft Office products to Google Docs, so the next time I purchase a computer I’ll save hundreds of dollars by not having Office installed.
[...] not an unreasonable question. For instance, not long ago I discussed Google based applications, and while there are few tech companies as profitable and large as Google, it’s clear that [...]
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