Google Adds Widgets to Homepage

Panaphonix writes "Google announced that their personalized homepage now has an API for developers to add their own modules. Samples are available in this directory."

Comments

Ooh, ooh, me too!

[BandwidthHog]

Odd to see Google doing the me-too thing. As soon as I saw the clock widget I knew the API was gonna be the now-standard HTML/XML/Javascript format used by Konfabulator/Yahoo, Apple and (I assume) Microsoft. So what does Google bring to the party? I guess these widgets live on web servers rather than users’ hard drives, but that of course ties them into the browser window. Perhaps we can expect them to put out an executable soon that will let them exist outside the browser (and thus be fully useful), but that puts them at merely the same point the others are at.

Why the hell is everybody so hot and bothered about Widgets all of a sudden? I bought a Konfabulator license way back when, and pressing F12 brings up Apple’s Dashboard, yet I still check wunderground.com to see if the weather will be cooperating with my athletic endeavours a few hours into the future. Granted, I was one of those who thought the iPod was no big deal, but Widgets have been with us in their modern incarnation for a few years now, and world+dog still doesn’t seem to give a damn. Makes me think they really are just trying to keep up with the rest of the pack on this one.

Google platform/portal?

[l2718]

With this Google is continuing to move in the all-the-info-you-need-in-one-place direction, also known as a web portal. They are doing it in their cool and effective ways, but that's where they seem to be going.

good idea but...

[endrue]

wait until you have better things than a clock and "ColorJunction". Everyone's personalized google homepage will look like a webdesign 101 student who just learned how to cut 'n paste javascript.

Teaching basic programming

[l2718]

\begin{rant}

Call me an old-fashioned nit-picker, but I still think that for people who will need to write serious programs, writing 20-line programs in C is the right way to learn basic programming skills. User-interface design etc can wait until people understand how to interate over a table, how to do arithmetic, and most importantly how to convert ideas about solutions to computer code. I've seen CS students who were started on OOP in Java (or C++). Of course the Profs found OOP cool and important, but this meant the students had to deal with software design issues (which is what OOP is all about) before they understood how to write a function that accomplished something. Once you've learned how to program (in C, Fortran, or LOGO for that matter), you can start thinking about user-interface issues, program design issues, efficiency of algorithms, etc. But the bottom-up approach to learning how to programming works better than the top-down style.

\end{rant}

Re:Teaching basic programming

[m50d]

C is a bad way to start - you need to learn how to do such grungy programming at some stage, but it can wait until you've done something nicer. Also, it's good to be able to introduce OO without switching languages. I recommend python for learning to program - simple syntax, enforced good indent style, language doesn't get in your way when you're doing simple things, but the advanced things including both OO and functional concepts are there for when you want or need to learn them. Only downside is many other languages are horrible by comparison - one advantage for learning C first is it makes you appreciate what you have with a modern language.

Re:Teaching basic programming

[hey!]

There's only one important skill in programming, which is this: minimizing what you need to know in order to know everything you need to know in any given context.

However, it occurs in many levels of organization, in infinite combinations, from crafting expressions (reorganizing conditionals using DeMorgan's law) to functional decomposition to object oriented design and beyond.

User interface design is not a good thing to mix up with basic programming skills when teaching, simply because it is a complex subject in itself. Doing so defies the above principle on a meta-level: you're asking your students to master two subjects at once. However, I'm not against GUI programming provided problems are sufficiently simple, and scale in programming difficulty as the student acquires mastery. How many kids learned to program because they wanted to create games?

Mathematics is still a good field to get beginning programming problems because you can assume that the students (at least at a U level) have basic algebra, and it provides a rich field of problems to solve. However variety is the spice of life, and it doesn't hurt to have a little fun too. Sometimes when I'm coaching an athlete, I will recommend a change in his program because he's not getting enough stimulation to achieve his best. In athletics, you have to trade of repetition of a program, which builds a base of skills, with a bit of novelty, which motivates him to try harder. Learning anything else is no different.

Re:i hope this doesn't slow down the search engine

[infinityxi]

The keyword here is optional. For anyone who has setup and checked out the personalized google page, they will notice that nothing on these page is forced upon the user. You have the preference to put as much or as little as you want on the personalized portal. I've been hearing the same concerns and exaggerated worry since google started implementing this feature. Doesn't seem like much has changed and while I agree with your sentiment that a lot of google's appeal is in the simplicity of their search page, as http://search.yahoo.com/ and http://search.msn.com/ have thankfully modeled, I don't believe this will be the turning point of seeing a flood of html and javascript on google's page forced upon anyone.

"Grungy programming"? "Low level"?

[morgan_greywolf]

Most people who think that C is low level, grungy programming language haven't written a lick of C code and couldn't write anything significant in C if their life depended on it.

C has very simple syntax. The language doesn't get in your way, and once you want to start doing OO, you can pick up C++ fairly easily once you know C.

One of the problems of learning a language like python first, is that it doens't teach you anything about proper dynamic memory allocation, the use of pointers, the use of operating system APIs, etc.

Scripting languages like Python are nice, but you'll never learn anything about systems-level programming writing things in Python, so, for example, your hands will be tied when new hardware comes along until us C programmers come along and write a library for you to access its driver.

Re:Copying Dashboard

[k_187]

portability. This way you can get your widgets on whichever platform you're using, even if its not your normal one.