Google+ Plus Hashtags

Google+ Twittering

I expect to be reading in all the various Negative Nancy articles about Google+ of how it’s copying Twitter now. Well perhaps Google Plus is, in a way, but a good idea is a good idea. Just ask Facebook about all the things they’ve copied from Google+, Twitter, MySpace and some of the other outside of the U.S. social networks they’ve copied from.

Does Google Plus Need Hashtags?

The short answer is no, Google+ does not need hashtagging. The Search Google+ box does just fine. That being said, I still think it’s good idea. Makes it a lot easier to find topic chains and has the potential to inspire some people to dig deeper in the topic chain.

How Does Google+ Hashtags Benefit a Designer?

Internally, perhaps it doesn’t benefit a designer inside of a typical company. Outside though, now that’s a completely different situation.

Here’s a what if

You have a project that you’re sharing publicly through Google+. You want a way to not only keep it organized but a way for those folks who have you circled to be able dig down deeper and follow your topic thread. Even better, someone new comes along and thinks your project is just the ultimate spiffy wow. Now, instead of using one of the alternative methods all they have to do is click on the #hashtag and they can follow the topic chain you’ve conveniently set up for them.

So no, Google Plus doesn’t need Twitter style hashtagging but it’s a damn good idea and very useful.

Update: Got word from Altay Akgun that the hashtag link conversion doesn’t work on the iPhone ap. You can still use the hashtagging like targeted keywords for the iPhone ap though.

Search Google Plus – How You Can Use It

By now you’ve probably heard about Search for Google+. You’re also probably familiar with hashtagging. You’ve also most likely heard about the one-upmanship FaceBook has been attempting to keep pace with Google Plus features. You also are most likely painfully aware of the lack of business pages on Google+, currently my only real complaint about Google+.

What This All Means

FaceBook – suck it up and keep on using the crap they are pushing out to fast to try and keep up with Google+. Hopefully FaceBook will get it right and the people that are going to stay will benefit from the Google+ innovations that FaceBook is copying.

Lack of Google+ Pages – create profiles as real people and interact with your potential clients as people instead of just leads. I’ve interacted with people as just a normal person sharing conversational stuff as well as about 42wd Publishing. Until the business pages come this is the best we can do for now while staying within the Terms of Use.

Search for Google+ – love it and embrace it. I’ve been doing some of my own experiments with it and talked to others who have been experimenting with it as well. Here’s what I’ve come up with. Take it, use it, make it better and then share it with me and others.

Mobile JavaScript Summit

As I write this I’m attending the Mobile JavaScript Summit and unfortunately I can’t give it the glowing recommendation that I gave CSS Summit 2011. While I left CSS Summit 2011 feeling educated I can’t say I feel as such with Mobile JavaScript Summit. Unfortunately, it felt more like the majority of the speakers were pimping their particular product. I understand that they need to do so but I really expected to see some good coding.

Who was Informative

Josh Clark provided some very good information about The New Rules of Designing for Touch.

Steven Gill moderately pimped PhoneGap but he did it in an informative and useful way – and he was entertaining.

Marc Grabanski really showed some of the power of jQuery Mobile. I thought he did an excellent job of giving voice to the wonderful things jQuery Mobile can do.

This is just my observation but it seemed that there was a lot of down playing of jQuery Mobile. It’s really to bad because out of all the offerings it is the only one that I saw that was capable of graceful degradation across multiple browsers and multiple platforms.

Don’t take my word for it though, one of the products might be the right one for what you’re trying to do. Check out the site here.

CSS Summit 2011

I had the great opportunity to attend the CSS Summit 2011 and I have to say we’ve come a long way.

I’m not sure what resources will be available after the summit is over but head on over to CSS Summit 2011 and see what you can scavenge up.

I like to believe I’m pretty educated in CSS manipulation, I’ve come up with some pretty interesting semantic CSS, but the speakers showed me a bunch of stuff I hadn’t even thought off. I’m excitedly waiting for them to release the recordings and transcripts so I can go back through them and harvest lots of good code nuggets and best practices I probably missed in all the cream goodness of info they shared.

Seriously, go check it out and see what you can get.

Sketchbook Pro for Android – Tablet

Autodesk is at it again. If you’re like me, you sketch all over the place. I was using Autodesk’s Sketchbook Mobile. This version is designed to work on smartphones and not tablets; so of course I had challenges. Now there is Sketchbook Pro for the Android Tablets and so far it seems to integrate well with the desktop version as well as with Photoshop. To the bottom is a quick 30 second sketch to test just how good it worked with a stylus so I’d know if I should kick it back to the market.

Lots to learn with this new version. I’m actually pretty excited about it. Going to play with the Sketchbook Pro trail for the PC and see just how art like these programs combined together really are.

My two biggest complaints is the inability to change canvas size and to make groups. Haven gotten used to grouping in Photoshop I pretty much expect it in Sketchbook. We’ll see if it comes out in an update.