android kindle

One of the most requested features we’ve seen so far for Google Calendar on Android is the ability to customize event and calendar colors directly from your device. Today’s update allows you to do just that. Now you can highlight those super-urgent meetings and important birthdays, or just switch up the color of your calendar whenever your heart desires.


Adding events is now easier and more fun with our redesigned date and time pickers, which let you schedule your special dinner date or the start of your well-deserved vacation in a snap.


For all of you world travelers, our redesigned timezone picker makes it simpler to find the region that you’re looking for, whether you’re in San Francisco, Tokyo or Zurich.

Finally, it’s easier to schedule repeating events. You can now set events to repeat every Tuesday and Thursday, every month, or every 7 weeks, it’s completely up to you.

The latest version of Google Calendar is built for devices running Android 4.0.3 and above (Android 4.1 or higher for custom event colors). Get it on Google Play, rolling out over the course of the day, and let us know what you think.

Posted by James Kung, Software Engineer

I've previously posted about Google's experimental app launcher that replaces the black navigation bar. It's the perfect fit for the Chrome integration with Google search, which also removes the search box from Google SERPs.

Google tests a new version of the app launcher in Chrome: it's huge and you can click "more" to see other Google services. I've managed to get the new interface using this URL in Chrome.



If you think "huge" is an exaggeration, take a look at this screenshot and compare it with the screenshots from this post:



{ Thanks, Silviu. }

Gmail has a lot of cool features that let you organize mail, but not many people use them. Creating filters is complicated and manually labelling messages is time consuming. That's why Google added features that automatically classify messages: Priority Inbox finds important messages, Smart Labels categorizes messages and lets you find notifications, bulk messages or automatically archive them. Gmail also has different inbox styles that prioritize important messages, starred or unread messages.

Now Gmail's inbox started to include a few tabs powered by Smart Labels, a feature from Gmail Labs. "On the desktop, the new inbox groups your mail into categories which appear as different tabs. (...) Your inbox is organized in a way that lets you see what's new at a glance and decide which emails you want to read when. You can easily customize the new inbox - select the tabs you want from all five to none, drag-and-drop to move messages between tabs, set certain senders to always appear in a particular tab and star messages so that they also appear in the Primary tab."


There are tabs for social updates from sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Google+, promotions (newsletters, offers and other bulk messages), notifications/updates (confirmations, bills, receipts), forum messages (online groups, discussion boards, and mailing lists) and a primary tab that shows all the other messages. This way, you can focus on important messages and read everything else later. The Smart Labels feature also has a checkbox that allows you to automatically archive messages, so that notifications, newsletters and social updates skip the inbox.


A similar feature will be added to the mobile Gmail apps for iOS and Android.


The nice thing is that inbox tabs are customizable, so you can hide some of them or even all of them.


The new feature will roll out in the coming weeks, but the updated mobile apps should be available sooner. Until then, try Smart Labels.

{ via Gmail Blog. Thanks, Mike. }

Several weeks ago, I had the honor--and yes, privilege--to be the "Celebrity Judge" at this year's FIDM National Scholarship Competition. Open to all High School Seniors, Graduates, and College Transfer
Students, FIDM's National Scholarship Competition (also known as The
Designer of Tomorrow Scholarship Competition) looks for students who are
creative thinkers and have an eye for unconventional thinking. To
enter, entrants are asked to submit a project according to the
guidelines set within each category:

• Fashion Executive of Tomorrow


• Interior Designer of Tomorrow


• Graphic Designer of Tomorrow


• Fashion Designer of Tomorrow


• Visual Designer of Tomorrow


• Digital Media Artist of Tomorrow


• Trend Spotter of Tomorrow

A
winner and three top Finalists from each category are chosen based on
creativity, thoughtfulness, presentation, and promise. The top winner will get a full one-year scholarship to attend FIDM.

Celebrity Judge Project Runway Star, FIDM Grad & FIDM Instructor Nick Verreos is the celebrity judge for our scholarship competition.

I went to the Downtown L.A. Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising/FIDM campus to judge these categories and see for myself all the wonderful--and very creative--boards the students created...

Here are some "Sneak Peak" pics of what I had to judge:











After my judging--which took several hours--I headed downstairs to the ground floor "rotunda" area to head home--but then I was stopped by all the commotion that was happening. As it turned out, it was also the day of the FIDM Graduation "Grad Carnival" in Hope Park:







Graduating FIDM students--and their friends and families--were enjoying a bunch of fun activities as well as lots of great food (corn dogs, sliders, pizza!) at this fun FIDM Grad Carnival. Even though I am not a 2013 Grad, I sneaked in and took in some of the festivities.



Best of Luck to all the 2013 FIDM National Scholarship applicants!

*Contact your FIDM adviser for results.

YouTube has a cool feature that generates a playlist of 10 recommended videos. Make sure you are logged in and visit this page.


There's even an experiment that places a "play" button next to the YouTube logo, so you can quickly generate the "I'm Feeling Lucky" serendipitous playlist. If you don't like the playlist, click "play" again.


Here's how you can enable the experimental button. If you use Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari or Internet Explorer 8+:

1. open youtube.com in a new tab and log in

2. load your browser's developer console:

* Chrome - press Ctrl+Shift+J for Windows/Linux/ChromeOS or Command-Option-J for Mac

* Firefox - press Ctrl+Shift+K for Windows/Linux or Command-Option-K for Mac

* Opera - press Ctrl+Shift+I for Windows/Linux or Command-Option-I for Mac, then click "Console"

* Safari - check this article

* Internet Explorer - press F12 and select the "Console" tab.

3. paste the following code which changes a YouTube cookie:

document.cookie="VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE=LVXsOMb_c_g; path=/; domain=.youtube.com";window.location.reload();

4. press Enter and close the console.

To go back to the standard UI, follow the same steps, but use the following code:

document.cookie="VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE=; path=/; domain=.youtube.com";window.location.reload();

{ Thanks, Yu-Hsuan Lin. }

Yesterday...on the "Today Show"...style expert Jene Luciani wore my NV Nick Verreos "Gemma" green draped jersey dress! I was so excited to wake up and see this--Jene was part of a "Today's Style" segment on NBC's "The Today Show"; the segment was "Picking the Perfect Bathing Suit Online"...









Here are a couple of more screen caps form today's segment and Jene wearing my FABULOUS "Gemma" dress...











Click Below for video of the NBC "Today Show" segment: