Sunday, July 31, 2011

Navigating the clumsy inconsistancies of Google

I am a daily user of many Google services: Gmail, Calendar, Voice, Music, Plus, Picasa, Blogger, etc.  My home page is iGoogle and I like being able to customize my news feeds. I like the new understated color scheme. I like the idea of the new navigation bar at the top of each Google property, but it is completely flawed because of the tchotchke integration of each service. While I like the idea of "beta" services, Google has a way of not changing the UI. I'm going to talk about the bar. Some people don't like that it's black and there are ways of changing it to other colors. As long it's not pink, I don't care.

On my iGoogle home page I have this:


Before I had a Plus account it simply said +You as if to taunt me. Now Google legitimizes me because of my membership. Thanks.

The next entry tells me that I'm on the "web" with an orange highlight. OK. I think telling me this is like having a "start" button when it should say "menu", but there are a lot of grandmas out there and this is their maiden voyage.  Here's the problem, it's not a "home" button that will take you back to iGoogle. If you navigate away from your home page, this button will take you to a blank Google search page. For those folks that don't utilize iGoogle, this will seem normal. For those of us that know how to design a website, this is stupid-easy to fix.

The next entry is actually an "image" search button, not a link to Picasa. At first I was under the impression that this was a Services Navigations bar because of the Plus and Gmail links, but whatever. An easier way of doing this would be to place a button below the search box that says, "Image Search"  This button actually takes you to a blank Google page where you enter your search in a box. Isn't that the same as entering your criteria in the box afforded and then selecting "images" (on the left side) once the results come back?


Look at the listings here. Don't they seem eerily similar to the ones in in my bar?  Wouldn't it be more useful to have this on every page (especially iGoogle) instead of on the quick launch bar?

The next entry has the same problem as Images. First, it should be called YouTube and not Videos. Second, it should take me to YouTube and not a blank search page.  Does Google not have a marketing department?

"Maps" could be eliminated by adding it to the afore mentioned left side list. Why it's not there is a mystery to me.  I usually punch an address into the browser search bar and it gives me a map and other listings.

The News button is broken in so many ways. First, it should be called iGoogle because it's a news feed.  Second, if there is anything left over in the search bar, clicking this button will give you all of the news pertaining to the address you just looked up on Maps.  In my case, I would have thought that there would be more articles about homicidal maniacs in my apartment building, but there were no search results.

Good ol' Gmail.... For most people it's the only useful link featured.  Let's click on it and see what happens!


Normally I would truncate an expletive to declare my confusion, but in this case... What The Fuck????

Not only has it changed colors, but it now lists some services that were useful from the beginning like, Calendar, Documents (Google Docs), Photos (Picasa) and Reader (which should be a part of iGoogle).  Web has completely traversed the menu and is as ineffective as before simply because almost every browser has a search bar.

Now I'm going to click on the "more" button and see what I get.

I've spoken my peace regarding YouTube (Videos) and Picasa (Images).  But look at the order in which these services are listed.  Now go back to your home Google page and click on "more".


Again!!!  What The Fuck?  Everything is in a different order and segmented without rationality. Shouldn't Reader be next to Books?  Shouldn't Books just be called Reader?  Translate is more important than YouTube?  Really?

Google is now going to confuse you even more.  Go ahead and click on "even more".  WHAT THE FUCK? What happened to the Navbar? Also, remember when I told you that I use Voice and Music?  Well, there's a link to Voice, but not to Music.  Since I use Voice for EVERYTHING, wouldn't it be grand to have a link to that in the Navbar? Instead, I've made links to them in my Firefox Bookmarks toolbar.

Because I want my Home button in Firefox to be on the left side near my navigation buttons, I had to make a link to it as well.  I would switch over to Google Chrome simply for the Voice extension and the Home/refresh button locations, but it lacks a search bar. This is another Google rant all together. The point is, the only way I can tell if I have a text or VM is to always have my Gmail open and then switch over to Voice, or use a desktop tool that Google recently put the kibosh on.  I still have it and won't ever give it up unless something better comes out.


But wait!  There's more!  Since I spend so much time on Google and have this nifty little bar, wouldn't it be great if all of my notifications of texts, voicemails, emails, + responses, and the such were delivered in one convenient location?  It could look something like this:


Well, this works great if you have a + account, but for the other services that you use.... you're out of luck. Instead of showing me a picture of myself, give me separate notification boxes for the various SOCIAL TOOLS I use, like email and voice.  I write this blog and it would be great if I was notified of any comments made to it.

I have many points to make about Google and the way they seem to fall ass-backwards into success. I think the problem here is that Google is simply so big that the different departments never talk to each other.  When I log into Google, they should know exactly what I use and with what frequency.  I should be able to customize the bar to fit my needs, in the order that makes sense to me. Google has always tried to keep it simple by delivering text ads, but they never thought about integration of the many pet projects they roll out.

As a final example, I want to show you what I get when I go to Picasa.


I've been with Google since the Popup Blocking Toolbar and I just became +You again.  Thanks.

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