I had forgotten the command to rename a Git Branch. I’ll put it here for myself and anyone else looking for info on it.
git branch -m old_name new_name
Enjoy!
Note: This will overwrite the branch: new_name if it exists. So beware!
Most of the people I know who have gotten onto Google+ are enjoying the experience so far. While a bit confusing at first, the idea of Circles is gaining popularity and seems to work pretty well. Moving forward, Google needs to be adding features to Google+ to keep the excitement about it high. Here are some ideas on how to make Circles even better.
Putting everyone into a Circle can be a hassle. As people I know are joining Google+, I am adding people to my Circles multiple times a day. While it is quick and easy, I get the feeling that eventually I will give up, say “to hell with it” and throw everyone into the same Circle. To remedy this, Google should add a feature that allows you to create a new Circle of people already in your Circles, on the fly by specifying certain criteria. Here are some examples of groups of people I will want to create circles of:
By being able to create circles based on certain criteria, we can share with people in the same way that we can make an iTunes playlist.
Allow people to sign up for a certain circle. If I am enthusiastic about Web Development and Skiing and share about both of them, I am only sharing to the public or to people who I think are interested in those topics. By allowing people to sign up for a public circle, people can say that they want to specifically see my Skiing posts or Web Development posts. If Google adds this, I can share content with people who have expressed that they want to see it. People want to get their content out, especially to people who want to read it.
As a recent Computer Science Graduate of the University of Vermont, I know a bit about the technology underlying Google+. I don’t know specifics, but I know that a graph of the social connections could be created if it hasn’t been already. I will try to put this in layman’s terms. By creating a directed graph of all the connections on Google+, we can begin to cluster groups of people by which Circle they are in. Clustering by Circle, Google+ can enhance its friend recommendation engine, add automatic circle suggestion, and create clustered circles.
Circles are really cool and time will only tell what Google+ ends up doing with them. I am just spit-balling some ideas and if Google takes them to heart, awesome. If they want me to help them make it a reality, even more awesome.
I like Google+ a lot because it offers some good, direct competition with Facebook. As the numbers on Google+ increase, it will be interesting to see Facebook’s reaction. Competition is healthy and will provide the best final result.
Thanks for reading,
- Matt
Google+ is Google’s newest attempt at Social Networking. It has some really nice properties including being built with some user friendly elements, having a minimal, very eye-pleasing design, and freedom from the Facebook Jail. The features have been thought of carefully and implemented properly. Sharing feels safer right it’s not to everyone, you can choose which circle of friends your raunchy secrets will get shared to.
Google took the best parts of the most popular social networks to create their own. On Twitter, we can post up to a 140 character text for everyone to see. Everything that is posted is public and really represent your brand. Facebook allows you to share more rich media like pictures or video and does not limit the amount that you can send. You can also share the media with your various groups and create internal discussions about it, private to the group. With foursquare, people can find and check in at various locations.
Google+ allows you to share rich media, with location data to everyone, just certain “circles” or individuals.
Circles are a great idea, I don’t know how new it is though. It is really just attaching some labels to someone, similar to how I can tag a blog post. The process of friending in Google+ involves adding someone into one of your circles. Friending + Labeling. Growing up, we were told not to label people! Circles are great for the sharing side. When it comes to sharing, you want to only share with particular people and circles lend themselves to that. I can feel free to share something with a certain Circle, without concern that connections through business will see it.
Circles are cool, however, they are not perfect for the conversation part. Putting someone a label on someone and not telling them what it is probably will be confusing. For most posts I see, I want to know who else can see it. Anyone who this person originally shared it with. This goes back to the way that Facebook is. I thought Google was trying to do something new with Circles.
To do this properly, Google will have to have both Circles and Groups… which is a bit redundant.
I like Mobile a lot. I like the Android Platform a lot. My main interest in programming lies in a mixture of Social and Location Data. Having Google+ running well on my Android is a very nice treat for me. Similar to foursquare, I can share a location with people right from my phone.
Do you know how many times I made an early, witty comment on Facebook, only to get 12 emails about how some other idiot made a witty comment as well. I don’t care about that. With “Mute This Post”, located in the notifications area, I can tell Google+ to just leave me alone. If this exists on Facebook, I have not been able to find it.
Google+ has arrived late to the social network game, there is no doubt about that. While this does make it difficult to succeed, Google+ has the advantage of being built from the ground up to match and be better than Facebook. Facebook is probably so full of patches, plugins, extra features and legacy code that it is having difficulty staying afloat. Over the past month or two, I have noticed a severe decrease in Facebook’s Quality. The wrong things load, there are errors and things on screen are duplicated. By introducing a new system that is built around the features, Google+ may be able to provide a cleaner, more reliable, quicker social network. The one downside to being late is that Facebook has 750 million users and Google+ has probably not broken 100 thousand yet.
i got my invite
I got the “long awaited for” invite to Google+. It was only announced the other day and it feels like everyone who is into social media or is a Google fanboy wants to get in on it. Well, I suppose I fit both of those descriptors because I wanted in on it. I got my invite through a friend. Excited, I took the plunge, checking out the features of Google+ and watching the videos.
circles
Awesome. Finally someone hit the nail on the head with this one. Let me try to explain my views about and understanding of Circles. You want to share something, whether it be an idea in the form of text, a pretty picture or a funny video. This something is only really relevant to some people. You don’t need or want your all your co-workers, family or girlfriend’s dad reading about your plans to drink on the beach all weekend. But maybe you want some of your co-workers to know… and even join you. Google+ has introduced the idea of Circles. We have different circles of friends. Work friends, skiing friends, my goon friends. People can belong in any amount of circles. So I can shout out to all of my goon friends, “hey, want to play skizball on the beach?” and they will know what I am talking about. No worries about seeming like a goon to my boss or family.
I have no friends yet... people need to get on this so I can use it.
I really see the circles as just another term for tag or label. Facebook has it so sharing is allowed to different permission levels. A flawed system. With circles, we can label people, similar to our email, documents, and blog posts. We can share to just people with that label or in that circle. Makes sense.
My real issue with Facebook isn’t that I share stuff that other people see. I am pretty good about what I release to people and I recognize that what I send represents me. There is not much you can do on Facebook without everyone of your friends finding out. My biggest issue is that I see news from absolutely everyone. I don’t care that you have changed your status 10 times in the last 45 minutes as you explain how hungover you are. I also don’t need to know everything before I am told in person. The Facebook news feed is creepy. I end up knowing stuff that I should just not know. I am not proud of it.
One point of confusion for me… maybe on Google to advise or still figure out. If I share something with my co-workers circle and we start a discussion about it, who is able to see that discussion? My whole original circle that it was shared with? Any of their circles? Can more people be invited in on this group for this shared object? Does the person responding have the option to make their conversation private between them and the sharer? Many questions… still too new to know.
sharing
With circles, I already like sharing more. You can share with the public… just like twitter and work on your personal branding, for anyone to see. People can put you in their circle and then the follow you, very much like twitter. Or you can share it with just people who are relevant. Sharing is easily fixed too. You can delete or edit your share. You can also link directly to it for other people to see. And, finally, you can restrict resharing (retweeting) and comments on something. Well done Google!
design
The look of the sight is beautiful, I think. Kept very simple, Google+ shows off plain pages, feeling very similar to the new Google search interface. Going back to Facebook (to find a profile picture for Google+) felt like a trip walking through a sketchy part of town, covered in ads and blue paint. Google is sporting a much less colorful theme. I hope Google+ is themable, I have a feeling you will be able to customize the look for yourself, but not how other people see it. Colors are reserved for pictures and calls to action.
feedback system
The first thing I noticed was a design error on the page. As a web developer, these things bug me. The issue was that on a certain type of button, the cursor was not turning to a pointer. This is important to do on a hover state. Everything that can be clicked on a website should have the cursor change to a pointer. So I saw a “Send Feedback” button on the bottom.
This was hands down the best experience I have ever had submitting an issue or getting in contact about the company about something being down. First, Google+ analyzes the page. I am sure they are getting a dump of all information. JavaScript states, the event stack, CSS files that have loaded, etc… A window pops up and gives you some tools to get the job done.
Also, loving the Black Out tool. When submitting feedback, we send the picture of the screen. With the Black Out tool, we can cover things as easily as we highlight things. Makes it more trust worthy. A thing that Google values very much. Both Blackout and Highlight are super easy to use, by clicking an element or by dragging over an area.
It lets you review all the information you are sending before you send it. What a nice, painless process for those of us who like to help. Not Microsoft’s Site. Parts of their recruiting and job site is so poorly put together that it puts ASP to shame. Finding who to contact was even worse. Tried to “bing it” but that got me no where… shocker. I gave up… sorry Microsoft.
final thoughts
So I am fairly impressed with what Google has done… once again. I have not checked out hangouts, pictures, videos, huddle, or any of the other features yet, but I like what I see. It will be exciting to see where this goes and how Facebook will react to this, I think they should be scared.
I have not seen a way to create the original idea of groups. I think that groups are important. I do not want to have to add 50 people to a circle, and have everyone in the circle have everyone else. There should be a shared circle, that can be private or public and everyone in the circle is in on the discussion. This may exist, but I cannot seem to find it and have not heard of it. I know you’re trying to be revolutionary, Google, but stick to the basics, it does some good things right. Call it a special kind of circle though and pretend to be original about it.
I am wondering how Google+ plans on incorporating Places and Google Maps. With foursquare just hitting 10 million users, they are certainly pulling ahead of the pack for small business owners. Businesses in the service or entertainment industry are starting to realize that people are letting their decisions be driven by social networks. A popular place on foursquare or a highly ranked place on Google Places will likely get the business of a tourist trying to get the most out of a new place. People want to maximize their free time, ShoutPlans hopes to solve this problem by assisting people in making plans. By engaging people at a earlier stage of the planning process, ShoutPlans will help arrange plans between people, so everyone comes out a winner, doing a great thing at a great place, with some great people.
How Google+ integrates locational data is what interests me the most. As people go more mobile, the importance of data in the real world will sky rocket. Most people don’t want to exist in a computer, in the internet (I don’t think so at least). We want to get out, go do something somewhere. The future of mobile and locational data is something that I am very passionate about.
I am thinking about how the advertising will go. Will they target and just recommend, similar to Facebook? Will they try something even newer and better? I’ll be honest, I like that ads for me are highly targeted. I would much rather see ads for geeky stuff, ski equipment and dating sites than for something completely unrelated to me, like tampons. Google already is my one stop shop for finding something on the web, why not let it recommend stuff to me as well? Google AdWords and Content Network deliver ads based on whats being searched. Google will likely create a new avenue for advertising, parallel to the others. Whether Google copies Facebook’s model or tries to one-up them is the question. I hope for the latter.
Will there be an API? Probably, I hope so. They want to see developers create applications that utilize Google+ like they saw for Facebook. APIs are the future of services, allowing your service to exist and be used independently of direct traffic. This is a huge advantage as it allows you to serve and gather data from more sources, for little extra cost. Other developers do the work. How many successful and popular services can you think of that don’t have an API?
How will Google Calendar and Documents integrate with this? All of the Google Apps for that matter. This could be a huge opportunity for Google to allow organizations to create networks within the Google+ infrastructure. Circling people, sharing documents, events, schedules, the possibilities are endless. There is a ton of potential by incorporating the other Google Apps that people already know and use. By thinking broad about a Social Network, we can see that it is really just assisting and managing human to human relations. An organization or business is a cluster of people who have grouped themselves together and share interactions. By assisting in the inner-workings of the business, Google+ can recommending business to business sales and promote networking, giving a huge area for revenue. Google should allow their business accounts to have a place on the site. Users can like +1 the company’s brand, or view press releases and public content. Business can get in connection with other businesses and new people, possibly customers.
That’s my take on Google+. Definitely some exciting stuff. I think I have some great ideas about where it all may go, but I could be completely wrong. Only time will tell. I just try to code the future the way I best see fit.
What do you think? Leave a comment!
- Matt
Wow… it’s about time I started this blog. I’ve only been talking and thinking about it for a year now! Decided on building this on WordPress instead of building my own CMS… I know, shame on me. Welcome to my blog.
This is really just an introduction… no tips or tricks… just rambling.
I wanted to create this blog to showcase my interests and portfolio as well as create a place where I can get my message out to anyone who cares to follow me. I want to make this place a repository for useful tips and tutorials for anything that I have fumbled over in the past.
So… a bit about me. I graduated from the University of Vermont in December 2010 with a degree in Computer Science and am now working as a Web Developer at Brandthropology, a marketing firm located in Burlington, VT. I also work with my friends at Social Logic where we are building a new social planning tool, ShoutPlans.
I enjoy all things code, especially if it involves using advanced topics I learned in school and trying to tackle a new problem. Consider me a nerd, I go onto every website and look at the source for hints on how it was made. My eye for design isn’t the keenest, but I’m working on that. Front End to Back End, I like coding the whole process. I never thought I would end up as a Web Developer, but I get a lot of pleasure in creating something that millions of people may see. Always thinking of my next Million Dollar Idea, I have a bunch of projects I am very excited about starting someday.
I like to use JavaScript with jQuery and Ajax, working with a LAMP system. JavaScript is my favorite language because of how it has revolutionized the web. It’s interactivity creates endless possibilities and a much better user experience. I am looking forward to seeing the things that myself and others manage to create with the ever-evolving web. HTML 5 is very exciting, especially as browser adoption increases. Eventually, I won’t have to hold on a great idea because “it doesn’t work in ie7″. Few things annoy me more… go update your browser. I use Chrome. I’ll save my code rantings for many… many other posts.
Get me some fat twins and a bit of fresh powder and I’ll make a day of it… I love to ski. In the winters I work as a Freestyle Coach for the Loon Mountain Freestyle Team. I have grown up skiing at Loon and have been with the team for the past 12 years. Competing in Big Air and Mogul competitions in my high school years were some of the most exciting times of my life. Now, I keep to the woods and back-country terrain when I free-ski.
The great outdoors! I can’t spend enough time outside. This probably stems from the face that I work in a field that keeps me inside, on a chair, in front of a screen for 8 hours a day. When It’s warm enough, I do cliff jumping whenever I get the chance. I’m working on a video with my buddy, Greg. Should have it on the tube before the end of the week.
Music has become a pretty important thing to me over the years. There are few greater pleasures than putting on “that perfect song” when it’s needed. I listen to music when I ski, when I work, when I drive. Music has some power to it that really gets to me on an emotional level. I’ll listen to anything, from Classic Rock to Hip-Hop and Classical to House. Check out my profile on Last.fm. I like internet radio because of the variety it offers. Recently, I have been using turntable.fm (listening as I write). You should check it out.
I try to live life to its fullest and share it with as many fun and interesting people as possible. I hope to continue posting a lot, making this the first of many posts.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter, I’ll be tweeting awesome stuff as well as letting my followers when I get a new post.
Thanks!
- Matt
In May of 2011, Lake Champlain was higher than it had been since 1869. I had recently received a new digital camera and decided to test it out taking pictures of the flooding at the Burlington, VT waterfront.
These pictures were taken at the park at the bottom of College Street, by the Aquarium.
