(Cross-posted on the Green blog)
This is the first in a short series of posts and videos spotlighting our efforts to make Google greener. In this post, we give you a glimpse at our green buildings. -Ed.
When it comes to greening our office buildings, we apply the same focus that we use for any of our products: put the user first. We want to create the healthiest work environments possible where Googlers can thrive and innovate. From concept through design, construction and operations, we create buildings that function like living and breathing systems by optimizing access to nature, clean air and daylight.
Since I arrived at Google in 2006, I’ve been part of a team working to create life-sustaining buildings that support the health and productivity of Googlers. We avoid materials that contain volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and other known toxins that may harm human health, so Googlers don’t have to worry about the air they’re breathing or the toxicity of the furniture, carpet or other materials in their workspaces. We also use dual stage air filtration systems to eliminate particulates and remaining VOCs, which further improves indoor air quality.
Since building materials don’t have ingredient labels, we’re pushing the industry to adopt product transparency practices that will lead to real market transformation. In North America, we purchase materials free of the Living Building Challenge Red List Materials and EPA Chemicals of Concern, and through the Pharos Project we ask our suppliers to meet strict transparency requirements.
We also strive to shrink our environmental footprint by investing in the most efficient heating, cooling and lighting systems. Throughout many of our offices, we’ve performed energy and water audits and implemented conservation measures to develop best practices that are applied to our offices worldwide. To the extent possible, we seek out renewable sources for the energy that we do use. One of the earliest projects I worked on at Google involved installing the first solar panels on campus back in 2007. They have the capacity to produce 1.6 megawatts of clean, renewable electricity for us, which supplies about 30 percent of our peak energy use on the buildings they cover.
With a little healthy competition, we’ve gotten Google’s offices around the world involved in greening our operations. Our internal Sustainable Pursuit program allows teams to earn points based on their office’s green performance—whether it’s through green cleaning programs, water efficiency or innovative waste management strategies. We use Google Apps to help us track progress toward our goals—which meet or exceed the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED standards—and share what we’ve learned among our global facilities teams.
We’re proud of our latest LEED Platinum achievement for the interior renovation of an office building at the Googleplex. While we have other LEED Platinum buildings in our portfolio, it’s a first for our headquarters and a first for the City of Mountain View. The interior renovation was designed by Boora Architects and built by XL Construction, using healthy building materials and practices. In fact, we now have more than 4.5 million square feet of building space around the world on deck to earn LEED Certification.
Looking ahead, our team will have many more opportunities to redefine how we green our buildings and workspaces. It’s a win for Googlers, our business and the environment.
About Me
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
The evolution of sitelinks: expanded and improved
(Cross-posted on the Inside Search blog)
When you’re searching, you often have a specific task in mind, like figuring out which exhibits are showing at a nearby museum. Despite this narrow goal, people often start with a broad query, like [metropolitan museum of art], with no mention of exhibits. For these searches, the first result may include a list of links to specific sections of the site, which are called “sitelinks.” Today, we’re launching several improvements to sitelinks, including the way they look and are organized in search results.
Sitelinks before today’s changes
As it became clear how valuable sitelinks were, we continued to improve their appearance and quality. We rearranged them into a column of links to make them easier to read. We doubled the number of links, creating direct access to more of the site. We started showing sitelinks for more results and we continuously made improvements to the algorithms that generate and rank the links. With each of these changes, people used sitelinks more and more.
Improved sitelinks with URLs and snippet text
In addition, we’re making a significant improvement to our algorithms by combining sitelink ranking with regular result ranking to yield a higher-quality list of links. This reduces link duplication and creates a better organized search results page. Now, all results from the top-ranked site will be nested within the first result as sitelinks, and all results from other sites will appear below them. The number of sitelinks will also vary based on your query—for example, [museum of art nyc] shows more sitelinks than [the met] because we’re more certain you want results from www.metmuseum.org.
These changes will be rolling out globally over the next few days in all supported languages to anyone using a modern browser, such as Chrome, Firefox or IE 7 and above. We hope these changes make it easier and faster for you to reach the information you need.
Find more while you browse with Google Related
(Cross-posted on the Inside Search blog and the Chrome blog)
Almost every time I go online, I come across some new topic or item that I’d like to learn more about. Sometimes it’s as simple as the latest buzz on the new shop down the street. Other times it’s something more significant, like a counterpoint to an opinion piece I’m reading. While the answer can be just a simple search away, we wanted to find a way to get some of those answers to you even faster. Now with Google Related, a new Chrome Extension and Google Toolbar feature, you’ll automatically see interesting content relevant to what’s on the page you’re viewing, right where you’re viewing it.
Whether you’re reading a news article, shopping for a new pair of shoes or visiting your favorite musician’s website, Google Related works in the background to find you the most interesting and relevant content on the topics you’re currently viewing. For example, if you visit a restaurant’s website, Related can show you a map, reviews from Google Places, mentions from across the web and other similar eateries that you might want to try.
Results will display in a thin bar at the bottom of your screen, and will remain minimized until you hover over them with your mouse. Once selected, they'll open up immediately in your browser window, saving you the trouble of having to open multiple new windows or tabs. If Google Related shows you something you’re interested in, you can let others know using the built-in +1 button.
In order to offer you relevant suggestions, Related sends the URL and other available information about the pages you visit back to Google. If you’re interested in how that data is used and stored, you can learn more here and here.
If you decide you’d rather not see the Related bar, you can easily hide it for specific pages and sites through the Options menu. If you use Related as part of Google Toolbar, you can disable Related entirely through the Options menu as well.
Google Related is available both as a Chrome Extension in the Chrome Web Store and as a new feature in Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer. Visit www.google.com/related to learn more and to get Google Related today.
Almost every time I go online, I come across some new topic or item that I’d like to learn more about. Sometimes it’s as simple as the latest buzz on the new shop down the street. Other times it’s something more significant, like a counterpoint to an opinion piece I’m reading. While the answer can be just a simple search away, we wanted to find a way to get some of those answers to you even faster. Now with Google Related, a new Chrome Extension and Google Toolbar feature, you’ll automatically see interesting content relevant to what’s on the page you’re viewing, right where you’re viewing it.
Whether you’re reading a news article, shopping for a new pair of shoes or visiting your favorite musician’s website, Google Related works in the background to find you the most interesting and relevant content on the topics you’re currently viewing. For example, if you visit a restaurant’s website, Related can show you a map, reviews from Google Places, mentions from across the web and other similar eateries that you might want to try.
Results will display in a thin bar at the bottom of your screen, and will remain minimized until you hover over them with your mouse. Once selected, they'll open up immediately in your browser window, saving you the trouble of having to open multiple new windows or tabs. If Google Related shows you something you’re interested in, you can let others know using the built-in +1 button.
In order to offer you relevant suggestions, Related sends the URL and other available information about the pages you visit back to Google. If you’re interested in how that data is used and stored, you can learn more here and here.
If you decide you’d rather not see the Related bar, you can easily hide it for specific pages and sites through the Options menu. If you use Related as part of Google Toolbar, you can disable Related entirely through the Options menu as well.
Google Related is available both as a Chrome Extension in the Chrome Web Store and as a new feature in Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer. Visit www.google.com/related to learn more and to get Google Related today.
Shop your favorite catalogs with Google Catalogs
(Cross-posted on the Commerce and Mobile blogs)
For years, shoppers have enjoyed flipping through glossy print catalogs to be inspired, discover new trends and find great products. Today, mobile technologies can make catalog shopping more engaging, social and creative. With that in mind, we’ve created Google Catalogs—a free app for tablet devices that enables you to browse all of your favorite catalogs and interact with new layers of rich-media content.
The Google Catalogs app features digital versions of catalogs across many popular categories, including fashion and apparel, beauty, jewelry, home, kids and gifts. We’ve partnered with a variety of top brands including Anthropologie, Bare Escentuals, Bergdorf Goodman, Bloomingdale's, Crate and Barrel, L.L. Bean, Lands’ End, Macy’s, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Pottery Barn, Saks Fifth Avenue, Sephora, Sundance Catalog, Tea Collection, Urban Outfitters and Williams-Sonoma, just to name a few.
With Google Catalogs, you can:
To download the app on your iPad, visit the App Store. Visit www.google.com/catalogs/about/ to learn more, and stay tuned for Google Catalogs for Android tablets, coming soon! If you’re a merchant and would like to participate in Google Catalogs, tell us about your catalog by filling out this form on our website.
Happy shopping!
For years, shoppers have enjoyed flipping through glossy print catalogs to be inspired, discover new trends and find great products. Today, mobile technologies can make catalog shopping more engaging, social and creative. With that in mind, we’ve created Google Catalogs—a free app for tablet devices that enables you to browse all of your favorite catalogs and interact with new layers of rich-media content.
The Google Catalogs app features digital versions of catalogs across many popular categories, including fashion and apparel, beauty, jewelry, home, kids and gifts. We’ve partnered with a variety of top brands including Anthropologie, Bare Escentuals, Bergdorf Goodman, Bloomingdale's, Crate and Barrel, L.L. Bean, Lands’ End, Macy’s, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Pottery Barn, Saks Fifth Avenue, Sephora, Sundance Catalog, Tea Collection, Urban Outfitters and Williams-Sonoma, just to name a few.
With Google Catalogs, you can:
- Interact: Zoom in to see products up close, tap on tags to learn more about an item or, in some catalogs, view inspiring photo albums and videos.
- Find products in nearby stores: When an item catches your eye, instantly find it in a store near you or tap “Buy on Website” to visit the merchant online.
- Express your creativity: Create a collage of your favorite catalog pages and products. If you need inspiration, you can check out collages created by others.
- Share with friends: Email a product or collage to all your shopping buddies.
- Get instant access to new catalogs: Add catalogs to your Favorites and get notified each time a new issue arrives.
- Discover new products and brands: Search for products within or across multiple catalogs to find exactly what you’re looking for.
To download the app on your iPad, visit the App Store. Visit www.google.com/catalogs/about/ to learn more, and stay tuned for Google Catalogs for Android tablets, coming soon! If you’re a merchant and would like to participate in Google Catalogs, tell us about your catalog by filling out this form on our website.
Happy shopping!
Monday, August 15, 2011
Fast-tracking young web developers at CSSI
Every summer, we run a range of educational outreach programs designed to get students of all ages excited about technology. Our Computer Science Summer Institute (CSSI) is focused around incoming college freshmen who are considering a computer science major, particularly those groups traditionally underrepresented in the field. Last year the program was so successful that 24 of 29 students declared a major in Computer Science. So this year we decided to run CSSI twice.
For each session, we invited nearly 30 young developers with little to no prior programming experience to the Googleplex for an intense three-week course in web application development. Unlike traditional introductory computer science programs, which are largely theoretical, CSSI enables students to gain a better understanding of software engineering through immediate participation. The goal is to give the students the tools they need to create exciting technical solutions now, which in turn gives them the confidence to take their ideas and turn them into reality.
We wanted to equip students with a comprehensive toolset to tackle the world of web and mobile applications. In the first two weeks of the program we introduced students to App Inventor for Android, HTML, CSS, Javascript, Python, Django and App Engine. That sounds like a lot, and it is, but the students far surpassed our expectations and demanded more. In the final week of the program, they built some spectacular web applications, inspiring us with their passion and their enthusiasm for experimentation. They wrote online games, embedded Google Calendar's self-scheduler onto their websites and built blogging services. Some even began exploring the nitty-gritty details of computer graphics. Every one of our 56 students had the satisfaction of developing a publicly-available service on the web, hosted on Google’s servers.
Moreover, the development process was deeply social: we emphasized and facilitated group work, helping students build a network of peers with a shared passion for technology. Google engineers served as mentors, and when we discovered that the students were so excited about their lessons that they continued to work on their projects in the evenings, mentors teamed up with them on Google+ Hangouts, using video conferencing and Google Docs to debug programs collaboratively online.
While both sessions of CSSI 2011 are now over, we’ll be accepting applications for the 2012 sessions early next year, so stay tuned! Our goal with our education programs isn’t just to strengthen the study of computer science—we also want to enable rewarding collaboration among Google’s engineers and usability researchers, educators and the community at large. CSSI is one way to show young people how valuable teamwork can be and encourage them to take that spirit of cooperation back with them to their personal and academic lives.
How do we know we’re on the right track? Not even three days after the end of the first session, a student posted the following message on Google+: “Five weeks before school starts, anyone interested in starting up a new web project?”
She had six eager recruits within the hour.
For each session, we invited nearly 30 young developers with little to no prior programming experience to the Googleplex for an intense three-week course in web application development. Unlike traditional introductory computer science programs, which are largely theoretical, CSSI enables students to gain a better understanding of software engineering through immediate participation. The goal is to give the students the tools they need to create exciting technical solutions now, which in turn gives them the confidence to take their ideas and turn them into reality.
We wanted to equip students with a comprehensive toolset to tackle the world of web and mobile applications. In the first two weeks of the program we introduced students to App Inventor for Android, HTML, CSS, Javascript, Python, Django and App Engine. That sounds like a lot, and it is, but the students far surpassed our expectations and demanded more. In the final week of the program, they built some spectacular web applications, inspiring us with their passion and their enthusiasm for experimentation. They wrote online games, embedded Google Calendar's self-scheduler onto their websites and built blogging services. Some even began exploring the nitty-gritty details of computer graphics. Every one of our 56 students had the satisfaction of developing a publicly-available service on the web, hosted on Google’s servers.
Moreover, the development process was deeply social: we emphasized and facilitated group work, helping students build a network of peers with a shared passion for technology. Google engineers served as mentors, and when we discovered that the students were so excited about their lessons that they continued to work on their projects in the evenings, mentors teamed up with them on Google+ Hangouts, using video conferencing and Google Docs to debug programs collaboratively online.
While both sessions of CSSI 2011 are now over, we’ll be accepting applications for the 2012 sessions early next year, so stay tuned! Our goal with our education programs isn’t just to strengthen the study of computer science—we also want to enable rewarding collaboration among Google’s engineers and usability researchers, educators and the community at large. CSSI is one way to show young people how valuable teamwork can be and encourage them to take that spirit of cooperation back with them to their personal and academic lives.
How do we know we’re on the right track? Not even three days after the end of the first session, a student posted the following message on Google+: “Five weeks before school starts, anyone interested in starting up a new web project?”
She had six eager recruits within the hour.
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