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iGoogle Launches Developer Sandbox

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Mon Apr 21, 2008 05:52 PM
from the another-star-in-the-googleverse dept.
Businesses Google The Internet Technology
gurubaba writes "Google has announced the launch of iGoogle Developer Sandbox, which will allow developers to build and test applications. The Sandbox provides support for building social applications using the OpenSocial API. 'The iGoogle OpenSocial container will allow developers to build full page applications, just like the ones on Facebook, using the Canvas View. The applications built using the developer Sandbox can display profile information, post activity updates, send messages and gadget invites and add friends. The developers will also be able to monetize the applications through ads.'"
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Submission: iGoogle Turning Into Application Dev Platform by gurubaba (1269020)
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  • Please, please please... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Mateo_LeFou (859634) on Monday April 21 2008, @05:58PM (#23152258) Homepage
    Don't do another pseudo-open API like Android. I had been all excited about the prospect of playing with that (woot, an Eclipse plugin already!) until I read about its licensing.

    • TOS here, btw.. (Score:4, Informative)

      by Mateo_LeFou (859634) on Monday April 21 2008, @06:09PM (#23152358) Homepage
      http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS [google.com]
        • Certain warranty disclaimers must be in larger text in order to be valid. So that you can not disclaim a warranty of fitness for a particular purpose then bury it in the middle of a eula. Of course I don't think it counts when you make the whole damned eula caps but thats the theory anyway.
      • Thats very inter...yawn, i skimmed through all of that non of that really limits what you can do with their API (theirs a limit that you wont be allowed to reproduce/redistribute their SDK or their services, but that doesn't mean you cant open source a project developed using it). Theres also a bit about the use of adverts, but unless i misunderstood that only applies to their tool kits, your ap doesn't have to have ads

        Have i missed something or is this pointless google bashing.
        • Just posting the TOS in case anyone else was interested in this question. IANAL, but this TOS seems pretty acceptable to me.
          • It is acceptable, yet you were excited about the prospect of playing with it (word, who cares) until you read about its licensing? So...the license is acceptable, yet reeking with contagious apathy? I don't get it.
              • Hmm, funny because it's quite clear he's saying he WAS interested until he saw the licensing, implying the licensing was in some way bad. He then proceeds to say the licensing is fine. Either irony or stupidity and regardless the joke went way over your head. Peace

                --beckerist
                • "he WAS interested until he saw the licensing"

                  yes. That part of the story was about Android. I am hoping not to be thusly disappointed again w/r/t igoogle. so far am not

  • ads (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Frac O Mac (1138427)

    The developers will also be able to monetize the applications through ads.
    Google ads of course.
  • From TFA:

    "1.5 If there is any contradiction between what the Additional Terms say and what the Universal Terms say, then the Additional Terms shall take precedence in relation to that Service."

    My brain....

  • Finally somebody makes sense of it all (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Shux (5108) on Monday April 21 2008, @07:44PM (#23153162) Homepage
    Opensocial is not just some gimmick. It is good and useful technology. No more logging into some annoying website so I can communicate with my friends. No more damn silos scattered everywhere under control of some fly-by-night company that might get scooped up by you-know-who anyday. Thanks Google.

    Google makes stuff that geeks appreciate, apps that are simple and easy to use that make us remember that computers are not supposed to get in our way. They don't keep our data locked up if we don't want them to. Let me explain...

    Let's start with their first product: search. Do you even remember how much that kicked ass back in the day? I started using Google almost immediately after hearing about in on slashdot because I really got the best search results and it was so beautifully simple. Some us may have thought, "Wait, no annoying ads or styling or anything? Just this simple page? Yeah, try selling that to somebody". But look now, all these years later they are the darling of the tech industry, all because of that drop-dead results page powered by a massive network of Linux boxes.

    Then came along gmail. I had an early invite and started using it about 3 or 4 years ago (if my memory serves me). I admit it took a long time to ween myself off the traditional email app (Thunderbird) but I will never look back. I can still remember the days of manually filing emails in folders and I laugh at the time I wasted. I chuckle when my coworkers (who do not use gmail) struggle to find an email containing some piece of information from long ago. It is a new way to do email that is hands down better than the previous way. And it seems young people love it too. All my friends use it, not just the geeks.

    As if that wasn't good enough, they gave us iGoogle. At first I thought, "Yeah this is lame like every other "portal" site. But now I have three tabs full of RSS feeds from news sites, deal sites, and programming blogs. I cut my daily browsing time in half (probably more than half) and have saved hundreds of dollars. I actually don't use my computer when I get home because I don't feel like I have to search around for something I may have missed.

    All this stuff is based on open standards and open technology. But really, I just love to use their apps. They are the closest thing to a command line for the web. Could all their financial success AND geek love actually have something to do with their philosophy of openness and the famous "don't be evil(tm)" slogan?
    • http://yubnub.org/ [yubnub.org] is sort of like a command line for the web.

    • Re:Finally somebody makes sense of it all (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AnyoneEB (574727) on Monday April 21 2008, @09:16PM (#23153784)

      I disagree on Google's openness. Google certainly is a big supporter of open source (SoC, etc.), but their core business is intrinsically closed: they want you on their site looking at their ads. Search is at least understandable as it requires a lot of work to spider, index, and cache any significant portion of the web, but GMail is not open. It ties you to Google and Google's ads instead of, say, Microsoft's OS, so it is more accessible, but it still holds the same problems: you do not really control your e-mail.

      To use GMail's features, you have to let Google have all of your e-mail to scrape for information about you, and, because it is closed-source, certain features which are not in Google's interest like easy encryption support will likely never get implemented and minor interface tweaks/extra preferences are difficult or impossible to get added.

      That said, I am also a GMail user because it simply is far more convenient than the alternatives, but nothing made by Google is going to be truly open unless it is a side project they cannot make money on. As soon as a libre webmail client reaches GMail's usability (at least for the subset of its features that I use), I will switch.

      • Regarding email, the completely free POP/IMAP support in Gmail removes most of the restrictions you mentioned.
      • Closed source yes, but they do produce academic papers on most of their stuff, and work to open specifications (like actual html or at least good enough for cross browser, long before ms). Minor interface tweaks are fairly easy a quick search gives better gmail [mozilla.org] ( bunch of userscripts [userscripts.org] ) , gives encryption. [mozilla.org]

        Your email is still on their server, if they give you a millions options it costs them lots of money, and at heart they are still a company, if you want more customisation that gmail offers, you can alw

      • I agree with most of what you say, I just take a small exception to:

        [...] certain features which are not in Google's interest like easy encryption support will likely never get implemented [...]

        It's actually quite easy to use encryption while reading your email. Go to https://gmail.com/ [gmail.com] to log in, and the entire session will be https. If you go to http://gmail.com/ [gmail.com] then only the login page is encrypted.

        Hope this helps your experience!

        • Thank you, but I meant encrypted e-mails, which other replies addressed. I already do use the https version.
          • Now it makes sense, and you're right that's something Google would have to code (perhaps this Summer?).

    • They are the closest thing to a command line for the web.

      Yubnub [yubnub.org] is a command line for the web. It rocks.

  • This is simply Metcalfe's Law [blogspot.com] reloaded Web 2.0 Style.

    • The "dept." line made me think (as intended?): this is a big Katamari-style competition between Microsoft and Google.
  • The developers will also be able to monetize the applications through ads.

    Back in the day, we used to say "profit from" instead of "monetize".


  • For those of you stuck in setting up the iGoogle sandbox due to broken links in the Getting Started [google.com] Guide:

    After signing up for iGoogle sandbox access [google.com], you need to add the developer tools tab [google.com] to your sandbox page. Then, read the developer guide [google.com] to get started. If you already have an OpenSocial app, you can add it using the "My Gadgets" gadget included with the developer tools.

    And if you're looking for an OpenSocial app to try out, feel free to try ours [amnestywidgets.com].
  • If iSee one more product name with an 'i' in front of it, iThink iWill have to stab my left iOut then my right iOut.
      • Nice try. Only the must gullible of readers are going to continue to fall for these redirects.
        • you'd think that by now, that troll would at least switch the yahoo link.

          I guess people still fall for it :/
          • Well, considering that the goatse trolls are still around, posting what Slash clearly labels are goatse links, I think you are overestimating the intelligence of the average Slashdot troll.

            Some of these trolls even link to goat.cx, which isn't even a goatse mirror anymore.
        • I was browsing on a new, clean machine, so I decided to try the link. Noscript worked perfectly. No apparent problems, nothing reported by AVG. Of course, I din't get the dancing windows, either...
      • There's a virus of sorts on the embedded yahoo link. Don't click.

        Any word if said virus works on Linux? (I'd rather not test it myself ;) )

      • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        With all the cool CSS/JavaScript navigation whatnot on Slashdot, i'd like to know why Slashdot is displaying [yahoo.com] on this trolls link:

        http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0oGklwoIg1InYYBns5XNyoA/SIG=127o7c63n/EXP=1208906664/**http%3A//slashblog.notlong.com/story%3Fid=32432423432

        A simple phishing check should be in order.

        And also on the goatse.ch link below:
        http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=529844&cid=23152310
        I'd be happy if Slashdots's default behavior would be to block these links by default,( you
        • It displays [yahoo.com] because it is using the yahoo.com domain (specifically the host rds, which according to a quick Google search is for "redirect script")

          My recommendation as a systems admin, is to add an entry to your host files setting "rds.yahoo.com" to map to "127.0.0.1" Doing this will prevent any links using rds.yahoo.com (which is a known cross-site scripting vulnerability)

          While I harbor no ill will towards Yahoo, unless they clean this up, it will be blocked on my machines.
          • Adding a hosts entry for rds.yahoo.com pointing to the localhost address is a hack.
            Better to block it with a proxy (or there's probably a Firefox extension that can do it), or if it has a different IP you can block it with a normal firewall.
        • I guess if slashdot was a browser, it would be blocked by paypal :)

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