For example, GMail has evolved into a very sophisticated AJAX app and the new Calendar and Spreadsheet tools (not covered in this March 2006 Second edition - shows how rapidly Google is throwing out services of late) are really sophisticated in many respects including shortcuts, toolbars, etc. You will need Sarah Milstein, J.D. Biersdorfer, and Matthew McDonald's help to really get the most out of not just searches - but the broad array of services that has already expanded to over 40 including some neato stuff in the Labs - or go here for download of Google Packs of software.
Now I will be the first to admit that some of Google's software and services are just "programma non grata" . And it is primarily due to some of Google's possessive practices in dealing with my data for their purposes and profit. Examples are all GMail is retained, even data that I think I have deleted or trashed. Likewise the Web accelerator and Google Desktop keep track of all my Web transactions except those that are SSL encrypted. However, many of Google's services are innocuous and so I have started to think of and work with Picasa, Google Earth, and Google Language tools as utilities.

However, the same cannot be said for Search, Calendar and GMail where I know that Google is retaining some portion of my transactions with the ability to link back to my identity. Although Google has pledged itself "to do no evil" in making a contrast with Microsoft(which publicly admits that it plays hardball), nonetheless Google's very ambitious plans leave me somewhat uncomfortable. This uncomfort increases with Google's inevitable and close brushes with "evil". Some would argue that surrendering to self-censorship in the Chinese search engine market is one of the more notable and egregious excursions from doing "no evil". But this reviewer finds the retention of private information culled from GMail, Web Acceleration and Google Desktop as even more troubling. However, this reviewer finds GMail and its associated Calendar so compelling - Web based, anywhere access to calendar and mail is quite compelling - I have surrendered for the time being. But I am on the look out for a Web-based mail and calendaring services that permanently deletes and gets rid of all the events and mail that I trash. On balance so far, Google in my books is doing much more good than evil; hence the interest in the Google Missing Manual.

Lots to Cover

76 pages of 450 in the Google Missing Manual are devoted to searching and that does not include Froogle or Google Maps. I didn't think more than 30-40 pages would be needed for searching. But this section is chock full with such insights as to how to use keywords like site:, intitle:, link: or filetype: which describe respectively:
  a specific site to search - site:nytimes.com
  whether the keywords are contained in a webpage's title - intitle:
  all the links to a specific webpage or website - link:sportpics.info/store/
  what filetype to search for - filetype:ppt
But what I found most helpful were the translation facilities and how they were tied into the search capabilities. If Google finds a page for which it has translation capabilities it adds a translate button to the results. But Google also provides translation services for phrases or complete paragraphs as well among all the major Romance and Germanic languages.

The few next sections of the book describes the related search engines - Google Images, Google News, Google Directory, Google Scholar, Google Print, Google Scholar, Google Map, Google Earth, Google Mars and Google Froogle. Here is where the technical excellence of OReilly Missing Manuals series stands out. First, the series does not scrimp on screenshots - and manages to use screenshots that tell a lot about how to use the Google service. This is especially helpful with such services as Google Maps, Google News, and Google Images among others.

The second feature in the Missing Manuals is their judicious use of side bars on relevant topics. For example, in Google Images there is a nearly full page sidebar on Using Images Legally - very helpful. The third feature of Missing Manuals is the peppering of the text with relevant URLs - for example, in the sidebar on Using Images Legally there are three relevant URLs on copyright and Fair Use included in the explanatory text. Also at the end of the manual there is a useful appendix that summarizes a number of special sites that use the Google Engine in novel ways or discuss Google technologies and services while offering useful news, tips, and tutorials.

Google offers a very wide set of specialized services that may come in handy for users from time to time. Here is a quick summary with links:
  images.google - images helpfully classified by keywords, generally small to medium-sized
  maps.google - maps in street form or satellite images are available - it is North American and Western European cities primarily - Tokyo and Melbourne are in but Cairo Egypt, Lima Peru, and Beijing China are not.
  earth.google - come here for a complete set of satellite images of Earth
  mars.google - and here for maps of Mars
  news.google - culls together daily news stories on key topic areas; very customizable
  directory.google - this is Google's Achilles heel, an antiquated directory, woefully out-of-date and poorly administered. Go to About.com and AskJeeves.com for much better services.
  print.google - ability to search a rapidly growing list of library books and their references
  scholar.google - educational and business institutions open up their archives; this is often a good place to go if regular search does not turn up technical papers you are looking for.

The Google Missing Manual certainly pays for itself in coverage of these tools and services by providing screenshot-based tutorials and lots of useful tips on how to get the most from each of these services. And there are actually more services covered such as Froogle, Google Wireless, Google Deskbar, Google Group, Blogger, and Google Answers with thoroughness in the book. The final section is Google for Webmasters.

Google for Webmasters

In a consumer oriented book, I was a bit surprised to see so many pages, 150 of 450 pages, devoted to the the Google tools like Adsense and Google Analytics, which are really of interest primarily to Webmasters and Bloggers. But then I found out that over 25% of web surfers in the US have either one or more websites and/or a blog. That is a substantial number of users. And because there is money of $200 to 2000++/month to be made through the use of Google's Adsense - an attractive inducement that will be off interest to casual as well as corporate headmasters.

Being in the former category, let me say that I found coverage of both topic to be invaluable. Google Missing Manual not only goes through all the details of signing up and setting in place your Adsense Google ads; but it also provides invaluable tips on how to optimize those for different types of websites and even web pages. The advice is really quite effective and confirms advice from third party sources.

Likewise the chapter on Google Analytics is just packed with useful information on how to get free web analysis on just about every aspect of your websites. The authors show how by adding simple JavaScript into your web pages you open up a huge number of tracking options for your website. Even better they go into detail explaining how to interpret the many different reports available that track how your website is being used. The information is invaluable in tuning the performance of your websites. For webmasters, the chapter on Google Analytics is worth the price of admission. In fact, three people who have borrowed my copy of the Google Missing Manual decided to buy it based on the Google Analytics chapter alone. But I could say the same about 5 or 6 other chapters in the Missing Manual. In short, at $25US, its easy to say about the Google Missing Manual - "try it, you may very well like it a lot ".
(c)JBSurveyer 2006