When Recent Searches Change Your Google Results

Google uses your search history to personalize the results for your future queries. That's not a new feature, but it was only used to disambiguate queries and to change the order of the results.

Now you might also see a small message next to the snippet which explains that the result was picked because you've searched for a different keyword before. For example, if you search for [tablet] and then search for [asus] Google will include some tablet-related search results and even highlight a page about the Asus Transformer. Right now, this feature is only available in the US.

Sometimes this could be useful. Google connects the dots and tries to provide better results by using keywords from your previous searches. But that's not always a good idea because two consecutive queries aren't necessarily related. You could search for [html table] and [blackberry] and the second result for [blackberry] will be:

Google's algorithms aren't perfect and Google should provide an obvious way to hide the "enhanced" results. You can scroll to the bottom of the page, click "view customizations" and then click "without these improvements", you can also "disable customizations based on search activity" if you aren't logged in, but these options are cumbersome.

{ Thanks, Nick. }

Continuous Mode in Google Goggles

Google Goggles for Android has a new mode that lets you find information about objects without manually taking pictures. Just enable the continuous mode and Goggles will automatically analyze the scene, upload the photos to Google's servers and show the results at the bottom of the screen. "Continuous mode is a quick and easy new way to use Goggles. You can now get results instantly without having to take a picture - no shutter press required! Goggles will scan the scene continuously so you don't need to worry about taking multiple pictures. The new continuous mode works best with books, products, artwork, and landmarks," explains Google. For now, Goggles can't detect text in the continuous mode, so you need to switch to the snapshot mode to translate a text, find an address or call a phone number.

The "live" mode is useful if you want to scan many barcodes or if you want to find information about many objects without spending a lot of time taking the perfect photos. Goggles is still far from perfect, so it will sometimes detect a lot of incorrect objects. You'll need a fast Internet connection, good lighting and an Android phone with a decent camera. Unfortunately, the application doesn't save its findings. While it's obvious that cluttering the history is not a good idea, saving the list of detected objects to a temporary page would be really useful.

Google Goggles 1.7 also adds a feature that returns pages which include the text you've scanned, even if it's a long text. This is especially useful for news articles. Now you can quickly find the online version of the content you're reading.

You can improve Goggles by adding information about the objects you know. Tap "can you suggest a better result?", draw a box around the object and describe the object. "To date, hundreds of thousands of submissions have been made to improve Goggles. Starting today, if you choose to suggest a better result or submit a new object altogether, your suggestion could become a result for the next user who searches for a similar object with Goggles," informs Google.

If you have a device that runs Android Gingerbread, Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich, install Goggles from the Android Market or update to the latest version. According to Google, about 50.6% of the Android devices run Gingerbread and 2.4% of the devices run Android Honeycomb.

Google Remembers Your Old Passwords

If you change your Google account's password and you try to log in using the old password, Google shows a special message: "Your password was changed X days ago. Didn't change your password?" and links to this article.

It looks like you've attempted to sign in using an old password. If you remember changing your password, just sign back in using your most recent password. If you remember changing your password but have forgotten your new one, you can regain access to your account by going to our password assistance page.

If you don't remember changing your password, someone else might have accessed your account and changed your password. In some cases, your previous recovery email or phone might be available on the password assistance page for resetting your password. If that's not the case, you'll have the option to fill out our account recovery form to verify your identity and reclaim your account.

To show this message, Google needs to store your old password (actually, a password hash, since Google doesn't store the actual password). This is probably useful if someone managed to access your account and changed the password. Obviously, you'll still try the old password and you won't understand why it no longer works.

{ Thanks, Venkat and Brandon. }

Google Image Search Tests a New Tablet Interface

Google tests a new tablet interface for the image search engine. The new UI uses a carousel that lets you browse through the image results, just like the search app for iPad. Google no longer loads the corresponding websites and only focuses on the images.

A similar slideshow is available in the smartphone interface and it will be interesting to see if it will be added to the desktop interface.

10 Billion Downloads in the Android Market

Google announced that the Android Market "exceeded 10 billion app downloads". The number is impressive, considering that the number of downloads was 1 billion in July 2010, but it's still lower than the number of downloads from Apple's App Store. In January, Apple announced that over 10 billion apps have been downloaded from the App Store. In July, the number grew to 15 billion downloads and it's likely that Apple will soon announce 20 billion downloads.

Google will celebrate the milestone by offering many popular apps for only 10 cents. "Starting today for the next 10 days, we'll have a new set of awesome apps available each day for only 10 cents each. Today, we are starting with Asphalt 6 HD ($6.99), Color & Draw for Kids ($0.99), Endomondo Sports Tracker Pro ($3.99), Fieldrunners HD ($2.99), Great Little War Game ($2.99), Minecraft ($6.99), Paper Camera ($1.99), Sketchbook Mobile ($1.99), Soundhound Infinity ($4.99), Swiftkey X ($3.99)," informs Google. Probably the most useful app is Swiftkey X, a really smart virtual keyboard, but you can download all the apps for only one dollar.

Google's Graphing Calculator

Now you no longer need to use Wolfram Alpha to plot Math graphs. Google shows an interactive graph when you search for a Math function or a list of functions separated by commas. "You can zoom in and out and pan across the plane to explore the function in more detail. This feature covers an extensive range of single variable functions including trigonometric, exponential, logarithmic and their compositions, and is available in modern browsers," explains Google.

For example, you can search for [sin(x)/x, 1/x^2] to see this beautiful SVG graph.

You can also search for [sin(x) from -pi to pi] or add extraneous words like "plot", "graph" to the query (example: [graph ln(x)]).

{ Thanks, Arpit. }

More About YouTube's Latest Experimental Interface

A week ago, I reported that YouTube tests a new interface based on Cosmic Panda. The most important feature is the redesigned homepage that helps you find new channels and explore the videos from your subscriptions. YouTube started to post additional information about the new interface and it's now obvious that it will replace existing UI in the near future (the link only works after you've enabled the new interface).

"We've given YouTube a refresh. When you login, you'll be greeted with recent activity from your subscriptions. You can also browse and add new Channels to your homepage. Connect with Google+ and Facebook to share your favorites with friends. There's plenty to discover, so login and give it a spin."

There's also an article about the new interface for channels.

This new look and feel makes it easier for viewers to to find and watch content. It also makes it easier for Channel creators to organize and showcase exactly what they want. We incorporated your Feedback from the "Cosmic Panda" Channels and Watch experiment, and are excited to present:

* A more streamlined and consistent design
* An easier way to find and view videos
* New, more flexible layouts for featured content, and
* A way to keep your audience engaged even when you don't have new uploads

It's interesting to notice that the new homepage and the new channels are built around feed views and activity streaming to make YouTube even more social.

The new channels are less customizable: you can only choose an avatar, a background image, a background color and a template (creator, blogger, network, everything).

Update: The new interface is available for everyone.