Google has launched a simple but very useful app for computer nerds everywhere: GoogleCL, a command-line tool that allows users to do everything from upload folders to Picasa to adding appointments to a Google Calendar.

Google CL is a Python application that makes Google Data API calls through the command line. A command-line interface (CLI) is an interface where the user can tell the computer to perform specific tasks by typing commands. You’ve probably seen them before, most likely via the MS-DOS command-line interface. The CLI is in contrast to the mouse-based interface that we all use today, known as the graphical user interface (GUI). [more...]

Google scheint sehr daran gelegen zu sein, die angeschlagenen Beziehungen mit Verlegern zu verbessern. So zumindest muss man Pläne interpretieren, über die das Blog Paid Content in Bezug auf einen Artikel der italienischen Zeitung La Repubblica berichtet: Demnach hat Google vor, Ende des Jahres unter dem Namen “Newspass” ein Bezahlsystem für Onlineinhalte einzurichten, an das sich Medienanbieter anschließen können.
 
Nutzer von Newspass erhalten der Meldung zufolge die Möglichkeit, sich bei teilnehmenden Sites mit einem universellen Zugang einzuloggen und Inhalte käuflich zu erwerben. Contentanbieter sollen frei über die Preisstruktur entscheiden können. [Weiterlesen...]

First, a quick refresher:  URL prettying and 301 redirection can both be done in .htaccess files, or in your 404 handler.  If you're not completely up to speed on how URL rewrites and 301s work in general, this post will definitely help. And if you didn't read last week's post on RewriteRule's split personality, it's probably helpful background material for understanding today's post. [more...]

Google Earth's iPhone application has just been updated with iPad support, allowing you to now touch and swipe your way through the high-resolution satellite and aerial imagery available in the desktop version of Google Earth and its prior mobile counterparts. [more...]

Robert Scoble sieht gute Chancen für ein Comeback von Google Buzz. Zwar sei der Start alles andere als glücklich gewesen und viele der anfänglich begeisterten Nutzer hätten zwischenzeitlich das Interesse an Buzz verloren, doch es mehren sich seiner Meinung nach die Anzeichen für eine Kehrtwende. Im Vergleich mit Twitter und Facebook bekommt Scoble sogar schon mehr Interaktionen über Buzz.
 
Insgesamt hat Robert Scoble neun Argumente für ein erfolgreiches Comeback von Google Buzz gefunden: [Weiterlesen...]

We'd like to highlight three best practices that address some of the most common problems found when crawling and indexing video content. These best practices include ensuring your video URLs are crawlable, stating what countries your videos may be played in, and that if your videos are removed, you clearly indicate this state to search engines. [more...]

After years of having its news generated by algorithms, Google News is testing a new “Editor’s Pick” section with publishers, enabling them to select and promote specific content to users.

The new feature — a module of content that is hand-picked by editors at partnering news organizations — with a “small percentage” of users, according to report by Megan Garber of Nieman Lab. Partners include less than a dozen publishers, such as Reuters, Slate and The Washington Post. [more...]

When you're covering poppin'-fresh, trending, news-worthy content, there's no time to sit around whittling miniature canoes and waiting for Google to come crawl your site and index your new content. That sort of passive attitude will allow your competitors to dominate all of that awesome Query Deserves Freshness search traffic and make enough money to go buy real, full-size canoes whittled by fine Native American craftsmen.  You'll be poor and jealous, and we just can't have that. Watch this week's video to learn several near-magical strategies to get your fresh content indexed faster than meth-fueled panther (that's fast, people)! [more...]

Apple hat die Entwicklervereinbarungen für das iOS überarbeitet und erlaubt nun bei den Werbediensten auch unabhängige Drittanbieter. Bislang wurden solche Dienste von Apple mit dem Hinweis auf die Sicherheit für die Nutzer grundsätzlich ausgeschlossen. Ein kleiner Passus verhindert aber trotzdem die Nutzung von Googles AdMob. [Weiterlesen...]

Today, we're announcing the completion of a new web indexing system called Caffeine. Caffeine provides 50 percent fresher results for web searches than our last index, and it's the largest collection of web content we've offered. Whether it's a news story, a blog or a forum post, you can now find links to relevant content much sooner after it is published than was possible ever before.

Some background for those of you who don't build search engines for a living like us: when you search Google, you're not searching the live web. Instead you're searching Google's index of the web which, like the list in the back of a book, helps you pinpoint exactly the information you need. [more...]

Apache webservers have a really cool and useful little feature called RewriteRule.  It's sometimes referred to as the Swiss Army Knife of URL manipulation, because it's got two very important, often-used abilities:

• URL rewriting: turning dynamic, parameterized URLs into readable, keyword-loaded URLs
• 301s: to tell the browser (or search bot) that a page has been moved

These are VERY different tasks, with VERY different results sent to the browser or search bot. [more...]

Today we’re releasing a feature to help you discover if your site serves undesirable "soft” or “crypto” 404s. A "soft 404" occurs when a webserver responds with a 200 OK HTTP response code for a page that doesn't exist rather than the appropriate 404 Not Found. Soft 404s can limit a site's crawl coverage by search engines because these duplicate URLs may be crawled instead of pages with unique content. [more...]

Positiv finde ich daran, dass alles auf einen Blick verfügbar ist und auch gleich die Deeplinks zum Ändern der Einstellungen mit dabei sind. Es hat also jeder selbst in der Hand, was man nutzt und welche Daten man freigibt. Fazit: Ich weiß jetzt, dass Google weiß, was ich letzten Sommer getan habe. ;-)

The history of Google is also described:

Back in January 1996 Google began as a research project for Larry Page, a PHD student at Stanford, who was working on the Stanford Digital Library Project (SDLP). It was his aim “to develop the enabling technologies for a single, integrated and universal digital library.” In his search for a dissertation theme, Page considered exploring the mathematical properties of the web, understanding its link structure as huge graph. His supervisor at the time, Terry Winograd encouraged him to pick up this idea, and Page was later quoted as saying this was “the best advice I ever got.” [...]

Read the full article at Meet the Boss.

In that case, you may not need to wait for my workshop to build a web controlling desktop., to have the informations fast. There are several excel-solutions out there (at least down to Excel 2003) you can use to get the data quick & dirty.

Check out this article on SEOmoz.

Does that mean, we now can drop this field? I don´t think so. Since there are other search-engines outside (such as Bing), that still use them, or the opposite is not known.

I still recommend the use of the keywords field in the CMS of big companys, because it´s easier for an search engine optimizer to see, what keywords are relevant for the given article (or which the writer had in mind) and to monitor, if this article ranks for the keywords. The alternative would be, to use the tagging of the article for the keyword meta-tag. Or to use the field for tagging, if the CMS does not have this field. ;-)

And? I gives you insights in the behavior of your users. You can use it to optimize the workflow, or just to measure, if an action on your website works and how often it has been used. I just started a workshop to setup a “KPI-desktop” were I will implement an example for this event-tracking in a later part of the series.

Want to know more about implementing this tracking-method:
-> Read the full article at the Google Analytics Blog.

Screenshot : Google Analytics

What you will need

You should have a webhost-account, where to put some PHP-pages (Version 5 is required), a mysql-database (later in the workshop) and the CURL-extension must be installed on the server, to retrieve the data from the API. And, of course, a text-editor and for the start, the Google Analytics PHP-Class from Electrictoolbox.

And now?

Get your hands dirty and start some programming. :) Don´t be afraid. The first steps are pretty simple. It will become more complicated later, but I will provide you with the scripts you need, to build up an “ugly”, but working “KPI-desktop”.

What means KPI?

KPI = Key performance indicators. Or: The data, that is relevant for you, to make decisions for the development of your website / online-shop / business.

Ready to go?

Here is a link to the first simple PHP-pages:
-> Google-Analytics API : First Step : Getting the Account-ID

Erweiterung der Sitelinks in den Google-Suchergebnissen um Sprungmarken (Verweise/Textanker)

Diese Sprungmarken können nun in den Sitelinks der Suchergebnisse (SERP´s) mit einfließen. Hier der entsprechende Beitrag im Google-Blog.

Der Google Webmaster-Blog weist gleich darauf hin was zu beachten ist. Wer nicht mehr weiß, wie man solche Sprungmarken umsetzt, der sollte sich das Beispiel auf Selfhtml nochmal anschauen: Verweise definieren (passender Weise natürlich mit einer Sprungmarken-URL verlinkt. ;-)

Wie funktioniert Doubleclick Ad-Exchange?

Wirklich gewundert hat mich die Nachricht nicht, dass Google nun ins Display-Ads-Geschäft einsteigen will. Wer es nicht weiß: Das ist “Banner”-Werbung, also alles was “nicht-Text”-Werbung ist. Die offizielle Ankündigung auf dem Google-Blog listet dann auch gleich die Vorteile auf:

1. Vereinfachung von Kauf und Verkauf der Display-Ads
2. Verbesserte Performance und Messbarkeit der Banner-Auslieferung für die Werbekunden/Agenturen
3. Öffnung des Marktes

Den letzten Punkt halte ich für einen Witz, aber das ist ganz klar der Autakt zum Angriff auf die etablierten Werbevermarkter. Der Original-Artikel enthält noch einige Verlinkung zu weiteren Informationen und ein Video. Hier noch eine Aufbereitung des Themas auf den Seiten der FAZ.