Author Topic: Google demonstrates new communication platform "WAVE": mail, chat , wiki, .. (Read 59494 times)

PPLandry · « **Reply #50 on:** November 26, 2009, 11:50 AM »

Could we make a list somewhere of who is already on it (and the corresponding email if they want connecting) and who might still want one?
-iphigenie (November 26, 2009, 08:57 AM)

I've created this WikiSpace for this purpose:
http://dcwaves.wikispaces.com/

Welcome to a Wiki for DonationCoders interested in Google Wave!

Getting Started

* Interested in Google Wave, but don't haven't yet been invited? Click here to put you on a list. We're a generous crowd, so it should be long before someone invites you!
* Just got a GW account and wondering "Now what?" Checkout this page (in construction) about tips and tricks
* Don't have anyone to Wave with? A list of "volonteers" can be found here

Deozaan · « **Reply #51 on:** March 24, 2010, 03:38 AM »

Anyone try out Wave recently?

I just did and it has improved a lot. It still has some speed issues, but they implemented Ctrl-Z to undo, and you can make sure your replies appear the way you want them to from the drop down menu of a blip. Select "Continue Thread" to reply below, or select "Indented Reply" to indent.

You can also get notifications in your e-mail inbox about Wave updates. That is, when a Wave you are in updates, you can be notified. There's also a feedback survey I'd encourage everyone to fill out who would like to give some feedback. Oh, and the feedback survey definitely highlights the Firefly^w/Serenity^w influences.

If it's been a while since you last tried Wave, it might be about time to poke your head in there and see what's changed. It's still not anywhere near ready for primetime, but it's nice to see the progress it has made in the past couple of months.

jomanlk · « **Reply #52 on:** March 24, 2010, 04:20 AM »

hmm, it's been a couple of months since I last used it. The bigger problem for me is none of my circle actually use it since the initial buzz after the launch. Maybe they'll integrate all of this into Gmail?

Deozaan · « **Reply #53 on:** March 24, 2010, 04:26 AM »

hmm, it's been a couple of months since I last used it. The bigger problem for me is none of my circle actually use it since the initial buzz after the launch. Maybe they'll integrate all of this into Gmail?
-jomanlk (March 24, 2010, 04:20 AM)

I don't really think that's a problem at this time, since Wave is pre-beta (they call it Google Wave Preview). I wouldn't expect the everyday PC user to want to use Wave right now. Heck, I don't. It's just not fast enough yet, but the stability seems to have improved. Anyway, my point is that it's in the very early stages of development, so right now for the average person it's just something to take a look at for a bit, get an idea of the potential it may have, then check back in on the progress every so often.

I think once they allow you to integrate Waves into other websites (including Gmail) it will become a lot more ubiquitous.

jomanlk · « **Reply #54 on:** March 24, 2010, 04:32 AM »

Yeah, I see what you mean. I liked the fact that you could embed it into blogs and other sites. It has some great use cases when collaboration comes into play. I'll give it a look and see what's changed since last year, thanks

JavaJones · « **Reply #55 on:** March 24, 2010, 01:02 PM »

While the performance issues and other little bugs previously were an annoyance, I think what stopped me from continuing to use Wave is 1: nobody I know is using it or has interest in or need to use it (not to say that people I know don't need/want collaboration platforms, just that Wave didn't *appear* to fill their needs at the time) and 2: when I did try to use it for serious work, while the results were ok, they didn't seem to be particularly better than say working on a Google Doc with someone else, or using Redmine for that matter. It's supposed to be better than those systems with large numbers of concurrent users, but I just found it scattering and overwhelming with anywhere above 2 or 3 people, especially since replies/changes could be made anywhere. At least in e.g. IRC, even if there are 20 people actively chatting, the messages are sequential and I can pay attention to them all in one place and reply as needed. It's less organized theoretically, since you can't thread conversations and whatnot, yet somehow it seems much less chaotic and difficult to manage. One could argue that you don't *need* to keep up with every change *as it's happening*, but if that's true then what's the point of the "realtime" part of collaboration?

All that being said I think with some more education on how Wave works it would be easier and more pleasant. But I have existing tools that I find more functional for the purposes it supposedly exists to fulfill, e.g. Redmine, and even though they may not be as "slick" or full featured (in theory), Redmine at the least is somehow infinitely more intuitive to me. Maybe it's because it uses familiar tools, just in a well integrated way, so I don't have to change the way I work for it to enhance my workflow. Whereas Wave seems to require re-learning some skills and changing work habits. Now, like the Dvorak keyboard layout, it may be better in the long run, but I think few are going to want to re-learn how to type (in a manner of speaking) just to get their planning work done e.g. 25% faster (made-up percentage).

I'll keep watching Wave and if anyone I work with has any enthusiasm for experimenting with it I'll gladly participate. But I don't have any such enthusiasm personally at this point.

- Oshyan

Deozaan · « **Reply #56 on:** May 19, 2010, 01:02 PM »

Google Wave is now open to all. No invitation needed.

PPLandry · « **Reply #57 on:** May 19, 2010, 02:11 PM »

But still no printing, export or even copy/paste

Deozaan · « **Reply #58 on:** May 19, 2010, 02:18 PM »

But still no printing, export or even copy/paste
-PPLandry (May 19, 2010, 02:11 PM)

Not sure what you mean.

You can print any website with File -> Print.

True you can't export the wave, but you can embed waves into other websites. Besides, how many websites let you export their content? I don't see that option on the forums here at DC. I don't offer that option on my websites.

Copy and paste works like anything else. Just select the text you want to copy and paste it somewhere else.

So I think I must be misunderstanding you, since I don't understand why you are having problems with printing, and copy/paste or why you expect to be able to export data.

PPLandry · « **Reply #59 on:** May 20, 2010, 08:08 AM »

Hi,

1- I haven't tested it in Chrome or IE, but in FF, printing is more of a screen capture, so if your wave is more than a screenful, you won't see it all.
2- True you can link and embed a wave, but if you email the link to someone which is not a participant (i.e. you want them to view the content, but not participate), he/she cannot view it.
3- Copy/paste of a wave to an email client sort of works (formatting is just OK, outlining is lost)
4- There is no export (XML or OPML) to transfer the wave to an outliner

IainB · « **Reply #60 on:** May 20, 2010, 12:55 PM »

@JavaJones:

I'll keep watching Wave and if anyone I work with has any enthusiasm for experimenting with it I'll gladly participate. But I don't have any such enthusiasm personally at this point.

What you said is pretty much the conclusion I had arrived at.

It's as though Wave is a really neat solution looking for a problem, or like the Onceler's "Thneed" in Dr Seuss' "The Lorax": "It's a scarf, it's a hat, it's a bicycle seat cover. A Thneed's a fine-something that all people need!" (or words to that effect).

Stoic Joker · « **Reply #61 on:** May 20, 2010, 01:17 PM »

@JavaJones:
I'll keep watching Wave and if anyone I work with has any enthusiasm for experimenting with it I'll gladly participate. But I don't have any such enthusiasm personally at this point.
What you said is pretty much the conclusion I had arrived at.

It's as though Wave is a really neat solution looking for a problem, or like the Onceler's "Thneed" in Dr Seuss' "The Lorax": "It's a scarf, it's a hat, it's a bicycle seat cover. A Thneed's a fine-something that all people need!" (or words to that effect).
-IainB (May 20, 2010, 12:55 PM)

I agree ... but am also at the same time rather frightened - $:-\$ - and have no real clue as to which order those two points go in...

JavaJones · « **Reply #62 on:** May 20, 2010, 02:53 PM »

Funny, I just had a discussion about Wave at work due to it now being available to Apps customers. My comments in that email discussion were the same as here basically, and we decided against recommending it as a solution for project management, though we'll be allowing users to test it out and see if they like it. But personally I'm still waiting for a compelling use case for anyone but really savvy, high-tech users.

- Oshyan

Deozaan · « **Reply #63 on:** May 21, 2010, 03:06 PM »

Hi,

1- I haven't tested it in Chrome or IE, but in FF, printing is more of a screen capture, so if your wave is more than a screenful, you won't see it all.
2- True you can link and embed a wave, but if you email the link to someone which is not a participant (i.e. you want them to view the content, but not participate), he/she cannot view it.
3- Copy/paste of a wave to an email client sort of works (formatting is just OK, outlining is lost)
4- There is no export (XML or OPML) to transfer the wave to an outliner
-PPLandry (May 20, 2010, 08:08 AM)

1. I haven't tested printing either, but you're right, it probably only prints what is viewable on the screen at one time.
2. You can now invite people to waves and give them "read-only" access so they can't edit it. So instead of linking them, just invite them and make them "read-only". Especially now that Wave is open to anybody, this shouldn't be a problem.
3. Isn't that how it works when you copy from a website and paste to an e-mail client? I wouldn't know for sure since my e-mail client is set to compose in plain text.
4. Do all other websites offer export to XML/OPML for an outliner? If not, then why do you expect Wave to do so?

JavaJones · « **Reply #64 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:07 PM »

On point 4, Wave is not just like a regular website. It's a collaborative tool for creating documents and discussion. So yes, I do kind of expect it to be exportable, if they want it to be useful for more than just casual discussion.

- Oshyan

Deozaan · « **Reply #65 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:12 PM »

On point 4, Wave is not just like a regular website. It's a collaborative tool for creating documents and discussion. So yes, I do kind of expect it to be exportable, if they want it to be useful for more than just casual discussion.
-JavaJones (May 21, 2010, 08:07 PM)

I think that destroys the point of Wave. The idea is that in e-mail and other collaborate tools, you get multiple copies which can become outdated or conflict when one person misses the e-mail and joins in on a later one where some information was left out.

Wave stays as a single wave so that all data are always up to date and current for everybody. It's an online web app, so you should expect to have to be online in the browser to use it.

With that in mind, being able to embed Waves into other sites seems (IMO) to be a sufficient replacement for export functionality.

JavaJones · « **Reply #66 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:15 PM »

Well, that pigeonholes Wave's functionality pretty tightly then, and I thought Google had bigger ambitions for it (see all the widgets/apps/whatever you can embed in a Wave for example). But if all Wave is intended to do is replace email and IM, then I'm definitely not going to bother. It has some small efficiency gains over both, but also some drawbacks, and overall is not the solution I'm looking for to the issues of either IM or email. To each their own, of course.

- Oshyan

Deozaan · « **Reply #67 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:22 PM »

You shouldn't take my example as the all-inclusive uses for Wave. I think this video explains my point pretty well:

parkint · « **Reply #68 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:37 PM »

I have been using WAVE for quite a while now for:
Collaboration
Brainstorming
Archive of images/ideas
Maintaining personal notes and TODO lists

Now, I admit it is NOT the perfect tool for every job. I use Tungle.me to schedule meetings and RememberTheMilk.com for TODO lists with deadlines/notification and git for archive/retrieval.
But I do find more of my data stored "in the cloud". Google Docs provides an outstanding alternative to [overpriced and overrated] MSOffice. I have even drifted away from OpenOffice in favor of GoogleDocs.
Picasa provides a great alternative to Photoshop; with online storage built-in

One day I will wonder how I can survive without an Internet connection (and Google).

JavaJones · « **Reply #69 on:** May 21, 2010, 08:41 PM »

Ok, so they've got this nice doc with a title, bullet points, images to illustrate, etc. Let's say we want to show this to the corporate CEO to get the "rock project" approved. Do we just have to share the wave with him, with all its messy chat and everything? Can I perhaps export it somehow? Oh, no, I can't do that. How about printing it? No. Can I eliminate all the unnecessary chatter that lead to the final doc? Maybe, yes, if I manually delete it all (and rely on history to reference any of it if I need it still). But that's laborious, and doesn't it just make the whole point of using Google Wave, er, pointless anyway? How is this *that* much better than e.g. Google Docs with notes and chat? A Google Doc which I can save, export, print, etc. with no problems at all...

Fortunately the fix is easy and Google can make Wave a lot more useful very quickly. Just give us export and print. Oh, and the ability to suppress pieces or whole *types* of content for printing and export (e.g. discussion vs. final content).

It seems odd to me that you're arguing against these features, or at least against their necessity. Do you just not care, or do you actively think they're unnecessary? Have you actually tried to use Wave for the kinds of activities Google claims it's useful for? Because I have. And it's not. IMHO.

- Oshyan

Deozaan · « **Reply #70 on:** May 21, 2010, 09:09 PM »

It seems odd to me that you're arguing against these features, or at least against their necessity. Do you just not care, or do you actively think they're unnecessary? Have you actually tried to use Wave for the kinds of activities Google claims it's useful for? Because I have. And it's not. IMHO.
-JavaJones (May 21, 2010, 08:41 PM)

I wasn't intending to argue against an exporting feature. Wave has always seemed to be marketed as a solution for the inherent problems of separate hard-copies of documents, so to me taking a wave and turning it back into a piece of paper or a static document seemed to defeat the purpose of putting it on Wave in the first place.

I have not used it on a collaborate project, and I don't have to submit reports to a CEO (or anyone) for approval for what I do, so there were many things which I didn't consider. With your help, I now understand that there are cases where a hard-copy would be extremely useful, though I think part of the problem may be trying to adapt new technology to old ways, instead of creating new ways to use new technology. After all, there may be a solution that neither of us have imagined yet that doesn't involve exporting or printing.

When you present a project for approval to your CEO, do you show him all your notes and recordings of brainstorms and things like that? Of course not, hence the desire to eliminate the extra chatter, etc. And you don't expect your chalkboard or your (paper) notebook to export only the relevant information to a PowerPoint. So what do you do in a real-world environment when you're ready to turn the brainstorming notes and ideas into a presentation to get your project approved? My guess (since I haven't needed to do this, myself) is that you prepare a separate document for him which highlights the relevant information he needs to know to make a wise decision on whether or not to approve the project.

It might not be that difficult to have a brainstorming wave and then an official presentation wave. Or as the case may require, a brainstorming wave and then an official presentation document, such as PDF or PowerPoint. That's not so different from a real-life situation, is it?

Again, I'm not saying that I'm against the option to print or export. I just think since Wave is so new (and early in development) that we may not have fully considered what it was designed to do and how to properly use it.

I know I haven't.

Deozaan · « **Reply #71 on:** May 21, 2010, 09:20 PM »

I've been thinking about it and I've come up with more solutions to the "presentation for a CEO" problem.

You could create a wave and then anything that isn't part of the "final document" would be inside private-replies (in the wave) that everybody except the CEO could see. Thus when the CEO opened the wave, all he would see is the clean project information.

If they implement a printing function, then this would be handy too, because then you could just have a "PrinterAccount" that never gets invited to the private waves, and you could just log in as the PrinterAccount to view the clean stuff and print it or make a presentation with it projected on the white screen.

Admittedly it's a bit of a hack, but it seems easier than having to deal with printing copies or exporting info that could be updated at the last minute, or having to create a separate document from scratch.

EDIT: I bet you could even get a bot that you invite to the wave (but not the private replies) which can parse all the information and export it to another document that's fit to print.

JavaJones · « **Reply #72 on:** May 25, 2010, 10:12 PM »

Yes, that would be workable (private replies). But, as you said, a bit of a hack.

But my real point more is that I don't see it as being enough of an improvement over e.g. Google Docs with notes and chat to justify the necessary hacks... at this time.

- Oshyan

lanux128 · « **Reply #73 on:** May 29, 2010, 10:30 AM »

Downloadsquad.com has a story on Google Wave's 1st year blow-over.

• http://www.downloads...first-birthday-fail/

IainB · « **Reply #74 on:** May 29, 2010, 12:43 PM »

I have been wondering why I get a sense of déjà vu about this discussion. So, I:

reread all the posts in this discussion;
took a look at: Welcome to a Wiki for DonationCoders interested in Google Wave!; (As an aside: Why would you have a Wiki about Wave? Why not use Wave itself? We can, now that it is "open to the public".)
read the Google blog post Happy 1st birthday, Google Wave!;
watched the vid Google Wave at Google IO 2010 Keynote;
reread the few waves that reflect my own use of Wave;
did some thinking.

During the thinking part, it dawned on me: the discussion in this thread and all of the things referred to are rather like the discussion between the two characters (Vladimir and Estragon) in the play "Waiting for Godot". At one point they discuss what Godot (who, though he is the central subject of most of their discussion never actually appears) is going to do for them when he arrives. Vladimir, who is usually pretty sharp, struggles to remember and then says, "Oh ... nothing very definite."
When we try to establish what Wave is and what it is good for, we arrive at "nothing very definite", yet we are apparently allowing this indefinite/undefined THING to occupy a good deal of our cognitive surplus. Why is that?

Indeed, in the vid clip above, Lars Rasmussen (Manager, Google Wave) starts off by saying how "...today Google Wave is a product that people are using to get productive work done all over the world...we are going to show you that today with a 90-minute video...I'm just kidding, we're not going to do that." In fact, Lars leaves us none the wiser as to exactly what concrete use Wave is for anything at all, though it seems that "everybody's interested in using it" - or words to that effect. That looks like an appeal to the consensus - a logical fallacy that proves nothing.

Like I said in an earlier post in this discussion, Wave seems to be a really neat solution looking for a problem - it's a Thneed.
I suppose it could also be a modern version of the emperor's new clothes. Because those terribly clever people over at Google have invented something that neither they nor us seem able to define, we are perhaps reluctant to admit - for fear of seeming stupid - that we can't actually see any value in it. So we don't state the obvious, and instead settle for obligingly discussing around the nebulosity of the thing, in the hope that perhaps it will become clearer to us and then perhaps our limited intelligences will be able to comprehend.