Addicted to Google Apps

My first PERSONAL (thanks, Susan!) Web 2.0 venture was del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us/derrylyons) at the urging of David Warlick last November. (I'd dabbled with Airset and wikis with Susan Brooks-Young in years past, played with Moodle, etc. but it never really "stuck" personally.)

After Jim Hirsch's IT Leadership Summit yesterday, I'm now an account-holding Google-r, and oh has my life changed.

(Patrick Crispin does some great workshops on using the Google Search Engine, and welcomes you on his site at www.netsquirrel.com)

I created my personalized home page (www.google.com/ig) and started adding "gadgets".

• Google Reader for my RSS feeds (reader.google.com)
• Had to add Dilbert and Weather.com
• Then Gmail
• Then Google Docs (docs.google.com)

...a new tab for mapping...

• Incidentlog.com for Seattle 911 dispatches
• Traffic for Seattle
• (Starbucks map not a gadget yet, but a link... www.findbyclick.com)

...a new tab for reference tools...

• Wikipedia
• Whitepages.com
• Document to PDF
• UPS Package Tracking
• Bible Verses
• Spell Check

...and a play tab for "gadgets" (AKA do-it-yourself plug-ins)

"Oh the places you'll go"...

ncce2007