google

Here's an interesting alternative to Microsoft's Office and Sharepoint ecosystem: Socialwok. It's advertised as the "social layer for Google Apps", almost like Google Wave but better thought out. In short, you can share, edit and collaborate on Google Presentation, Google Spreadsheet, Google Doc, post messages, photos, emails and files with your co-workers or collaborators.

For your computer, it just integrates with your existing Google account. But now you can also use it on-the-go with Socialwok's mobile application, just released to the Marketplace for Windows Phone 7.

We loaded up the free app for quick tour and it's pretty straightforward: login in to your Google account, give Google permission to allow Socialwok access and that's it. Seems like a quick, painless solution for those who need to do this kind of work--in fact we may give it a shot here at WPCentral for a week to see if it helps us out.

Grab it in the Marketplace now. If anyone has experience with this service, hit us up in comments, because we're curious.

Now here's a bold challenge: Joost van Schaik has demonstrated how easy it is to code Google Maps into a Windows Phone 7 application (taking advantage of Bing Map Control to do so; The image above is a Google Map satellite layer on top the Street layer, done with actual coding).

He dares Google to make a Google Maps application, suggesting if they don't, someone else will and they'll do it quickly.

While the rest of the post is coding-nerd material, the gist is obvious: Google Maps, if that's your thing*, should come to Windows Phone 7 by choice or by force. So which will it be Google?

* Yeah, I know. Who would want to use Google Maps when Bing kicks so much butt? Actually, the one pro for Google doing something official is the promise of Latitude/Buzz, which Microsoft still needs a competitive solution for...

Source: .NET by Example; via @SilverlightNews

Microsoft's Bing search engine continues to do well, passing Yahoo! in July for the first time to be #2. Not bad for a market that really no one thought would change much, though we should point out Google is in no real trouble yet. Results are based on Chitika's web-ad network, similar to Google's AdSense.

Bing will also power Yahoo!'s search engine by the end of August, gaining them even more power, albeit hidden. Combined with their powering of Facebook's search, the upcoming Windows Phone 7 and maybe even Mozilla/Firefox (once their contract with Google expires), Bing could see some real growth in the next 24 months.

[via WebProNews]

While we've had Google Buzz available to us for quite some time via the mobile Google Maps application, the website was never fully optimized for mobile use (it was for the iPhone and Android).

Now if you browse over to buzz.google.com, you can login and see all your updates that way, sort of like a web-Twitter feed.

There's still no dedicated feed program for Google Buzz on Windows Mobile (that we know of), but then again since we're sort of creeped out by the whole thing and prefer Twitter, that's okay.

Read more here: Google Mobile Blog

Synerge Tech Solutions has released Google Analytics Mobile. As the name implies, Google Analytics Mobile allows you to access your web site's Google Analytic's data directly from your Windows Phone. For those not familiar with Google Analytics, it is a program that tracks your website activity ranging from the number of visits to where your site visitors are located (geographic regions).

Google Analytics Mobile connects directly with Google's servers and offers the data in table, chart or graph forms. The mobile app also has the ability to generate reports from the data in Google Analytics. Synerge Tech Solutions is offering Google Analytics for $4.99 and it is available at the Synerge website.

Read: wmpoweruser.com 

Google has given their mobile synchronization a little more gusto by adding the ability to remotely wipe all data from your Windows phone, lock idle devices, and password access for each phone. These improvements are only for the Google Apps Premier and Educational customers.  So those of us who use Google Sync won't be able to enjoy these features.

Google may very well be setting the stage for businesses to choose Google Apps over the more costly Microsoft Exchange. Google has even set up a costs savings calculator on the Google Apps website.  The administrative features are also available for those using iPhones and Nokia E series phones.

Read: googlmobile.blogspot.com

Has anyone else noticed that they can't sync Google Gmail via Activesync over the past few days? At first I thought it was just me but soon came to find that the "Error Synchronization" message was being displayed on other Windows phones.

The official error code is 0x8600050c (Communications Error) and in looking over at Google Mobile's Help Forum, there are a few solutions available.

The first suggestion is to delete the current Exchange Server relationship and re-create it. Another solution suggests to un-check the email option in Activesync, reboot the phone, re-check the email option and sync.  The latter seems to have the most success.

We couldn't find anything official from Google on the cause of these errors or of a "official" solution. If we hear of anything we'll pass it on.

We assume you've heard the whole China-Google-IE6 debacle that's going on, along with the the Apple-Google falling out, so it really comes of no surprise that Microsoft is using this opportunity to edge Bing over Google search.

In fact the rumor du jour is that Apple is seriously considering replacing Google search as their default search engine on the iPhone with Bing.  And why not?  Bing has turned out to be a big hit for Microsoft, which is no small feat considering the competition.

We expect as Google gets bigger and more powerful this will happen more often. How long do you think Firefox will continue their relationship with Google and Chrome? We've also heard recent inside report that some OEMs are not happy with Google and the Nexus One for obvious reasons.

Sure if Microsoft pulls this off, it's partially because they're a pawn, but a win is a win in business. Plus the better Bing does, the more money Microsoft can sink into fixing our Bing for Mobile 5.0 application, ahem.

[Businessweek via The iPhone Blog]

Google has once again taken the lead in innovation by rolling out their QR code based 'Favorite Places on Google'.

A QR code, seen above, is a 2D tag system that is gaining popularity as the standard for matrix codes.  Google is sending out decal codes to 100,000 local businesses that are the most searched on Google.  In turn, they can place these decals in their store front.  When a tech-savvy (and probably Android wielding) customer walks by, they can scan the code and pull down coupons, information, reviews, etc.

Pretty brilliant.

The question is where is Microsoft on this front? A few years ago they had a QR development program called 'Windows Live Barcode', later renamed 'Confucius'. It then vanished and presumably reappeared as 'MS Tag' which is now a proprietary matrix code system, albeit a very nice one. However, QR code support is gone.

There are really nice third-party alternatives right now for Windows phone, specifically 'BeeTag' (download here) which works flawlessly on our Touch Pro 2 (give it a shot, scan the above QR code). But in order for Microsoft to at least match what Google is now doing, they'll have to put QR code support back into MS Tag, something we hope they will do. Furthermore, can MS Tag survive up against QR now that Google is actually deploying it?

On another front, Google is also now offering 'Google Goggles': a visual identification and search program for Android (see demo here).  PC World has confirmed with Google that "other platforms" are planned but no time-frame is given. In the meantime, Microsoft and Bing, we await your response.