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I always learn a lot from “Go Live” week – the first days of deployment, when users start to discover Apps’ features and capabilities. But for me, the real “aha” comes a month or so later, when users are familiar enough with Apps that they want to dive in and do more. I often see people beginning to seek out and share power tips and tricks for using Apps around that time.

To help with that sharing, we’re announcing a new addition to the Google Apps Deployment Site: a center for Google Apps Tricks and Tips. This center contains a collection of ideas and suggestions that that users can try to take their Apps use to the next level. The first collection of tips focuses on Gmail, but insights on using Docs and other features are in the works.

View this image in detail here.

The tips are short, easy to understand, and incorporate step-by-step graphics to walk the user through the tip. They’re designed to encourage users to discover features of Google Apps they may not have known existed, and to educate them when new functionality is incorporated into the products.

We’ve made it easy for Google Apps administrators to use these resources. Our Tips and Tricks Getting Started Guide walks you through the process of incorporating the tips and tricks in your training site. (If you haven’t created a launch or training site, check out our support site templates for an easy way to get started.)

Give Google Apps Tips and Tricks a try and watch how quickly your users become more collaborative, productive, and proficient as they incorporate the newly learned features into their daily routine.

Posted by Gary Giurbino, Google Enterprise Training team


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Today, we’re pleased to introduce a new edition of Google Apps designed specifically for the needs of U.S. government entities. It’s called – appropriately enough – Google Apps for Government. This new edition is available now to federal, state and local governments in the United States.

Google Apps is also the first suite of cloud computing applications to receive Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) certification from the U.S. government. With this federal government certification of our security controls, government agencies can use our cloud services with confidence.

A wide range of U.S. government customers are already taking advantage of Google Apps, from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Berkeley Lab to the U.S. Navy’s InRelief program, to the City of Los Angeles, to smaller governments across the country like Panama City, Florida and the City of Wooster, Ohio.

You can learn more about how U.S. Government customers can benefit from this new edition in today’s Official Google Blog post.

– Kripa Krishnan, Technical Program Manager, Google Apps for Government

Posted by Dan Israel, Google Enterprise team
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Spam and virus volumes this year have continued their upward trend. Q2’10 has seen a sharp 16% increase in spam volume over Q1’10. Virus traffic has moderately increased 3% increase this quarter, however Q2’10 virus was 260% higher than Q2’09. These trends tell us that the spammers are still extremely active, and their botnets produce high levels of spam and virus traffic.

By the by numbers
Spam volume shot up 16% from Q1’10 to Q2’10. Overall, however spam levels are down 15% from Q2’09.

Virus volume grew quickly at the beginning of the quarter, shooting up 90% from March to April, but then quickly dropped off. We saw only a modest 3% uptick from Q1’10 to Q2’10 at the aggregate level. Compared to Q2’09, this represents a 260% increase.

One interesting trend we noticed is size of individual spam messages rising 35% from Q1’10. This points to the fact that spammers are sending more image-based spam, as well as viruses as attachments.

New methods of attack
We have also seen a recent surge in obfuscated (hidden) JavaScript attacks. These messages are a hybrid between virus and spam messages. The messages are designed to look like Non Delivery Report (NDR) messages, which are legitimate messages, however they contained hidden JavaScript which in some cases tried to do things the user may not have been aware of.

In some cases, the message may have forwarded the user's browser to a pharma site or tried to download something unexpected, which is more virus-like. Since the messages contained classic JavaScript which generates code, the messages could change themselves and take multiple forms, making them challenging to identify.

Fortunately, our spam traps were receiving these messages early, providing our engineers with advanced warning which allowed us to write manual filters and escalate to our anti-virus partners quickly. In addition to this, we updated our Postini Anti-Spam Engine (PASE) to recognize the obfuscated JavaScript and capture the messages based on the underlying code to ensure accuracy.

The classics
Although they’ve added a few new tricks to their bag, spammers continue to exploit tried and true techniques, including:

• False Social Networking Messages
Social networks continue to be one of the most frequently spoofed domains for the purpose of spreading phishing scams and virus downloaders. These messages do not actually come from social networks but look similar to legitimate social networks messages. Such messages often contain links to external websites which contain malicious content and/or attempt to harvest user login information. The Postini Anti-Spam Engine is very good at detecting such messages, but users should always be cautious when handling messages from popular social networking sites.

• Current events
As always, spammers continue to spoof major news stories, and this quarter, we saw an increase in spam involving the World Cup. Here is one example of a virus downloader that our spam filters caught:

• Shipping scams
The shipping scam is a favorite of spammers. This quarter we saw a more wide spread outbreak of messages claiming to be from major shipping companies because spammers get a higher success rate with these type of scams. The subject for the message made it look like an invoice and the message body contained random text such as news stories that did not look particularly "spammy." Each message had an attached zip file that presumably was intended to contain some sort of virus payload; however, the data was corrupt and did not pose any actual threat.

Stay safe from phishing scams
With the global economy continuing to lag, we have seen a continued upswing in “friend-in-need” phishing attempts, where hackers break into the email account of unsuspecting users and then hand-type a message to send to the victim’s email contacts.

The most common message told a story of the person being mugged while traveling abroad and requesting money to be sent to them in order to help them get home. The hacker is preying on the generosity of the victims friends in the hopes that one or more of them will send money to them. These messages can be difficult for spam filters to identify since they are hand typed and not sent in bulk. It goes without saying, but be wary of emails requesting money – regardless of the sender.

In response to these outbreaks, our engineers have released several updated filters to combat new spam waves.

Conclusion
Spam volume fluctuates in the short term, but overall, for the last 3 quarters spam volume has been relatively flat. Spammers continue to exploit techniques that have proven results, but as we have seen with obfuscated JavaScript attacks spammers are always experimenting with new techniques to stay ahead of security measures. Google Postini Services customers are protected from the brunt of these increases in spam volume.

For more information on how Google’s security and archiving services can help your business stay safe and compliant, please visit www.google.com/postini.

Posted by Adam Hollman and Gopal Shah, Google Postini Services team

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We're particularly excited that Dave Girouard, president of Google Enterprise, and Randi Levin, the Chief Technology Officer for the City of Los Angeles, will be sharing the stage for this event’s keynote. Titled "Cloud Computing Services: Finding a Solution for Over Budget, Understaffed Agencies,” this conversation, moderated by conference chair Tim O'Reilly, will explore Los Angeles’ decision to move to the cloud and adopt Google Apps – and what’s happened since.

If you’ll be at Gov 2.0, watch for Dave and Randi on the main stage at 8:50 a.m. EDT. Afterwards, stop by the Google booth to learn more about how Google Apps is helping government agencies of all sizes provide secure, modern collaboration tools to their employees, while at the same time allowing them to realize significant cost savings.

If you can't be at Gov 2.0 in person, we invite you to tune in live to Dave and Randi's presentation on the Gov 2.0 site (note: online registration required). Watch this space for more about Google Apps and the work we're doing with our government customers.

Posted by Dan Israel, Public Sector Marketing Manager, Google Enterprise
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Geoffrey is a frequent contributor to business periodicals and a speaker at industry conferences. He is also a venture partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures, providing strategy advice and consulting services across MDV's entire portfolio of early-stage investments.
Please join Geoffrey this week at a live webcast this Thursday, May 27, at 2:00 p.m. EDT, 12:00 noon CDT, or 11:00 a.m. PDT. Register today.

Tectonic shifts are occurring in today’s enterprise IT environment, powered by mega-forces such as globalization and commoditization—and also driven by consumer technologies like social networking, video, and mobile devices. In enterprise IT, static databases and servers no longer suffice, and it really makes no sense to build another data center.

So what’s next? How do you thrive in the brave new world of enterprise IT?

Many enterprises are holding their own by consolidating, virtualizing, and attempting to do more with less. But over the next few years, enterprise IT will have to adapt more dramatically, and do so quickly and nimbly. Whether dealing with huge volumes of transactions in a business-to-consumer environment or handling lower-volume, more complex operations in a business-to-business situation, enterprise IT professionals must understand that consumer technologies are now in the driver’s seat.

Fortunately, there are many insights and tools you can use to guide your infrastructure in the right direction. By making shifts in your IT strategies, you have the opportunity to increase profit margins while providing advanced services and systems that are truly user-centric, beneficial to the business and more secure than ever.

Join me in a lively discussion to share insights and actionable tips about how to turn your IT challenges into competitive advantages and thrive in an era of disruptive yet ultimately beneficial technology change.

Geoffrey Moore

Geoffrey Moore on the New Face of Enterprise IT
Thursday, May 27, 2010
11:00 a.m. PDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 p.m. GMT



Posted by Serena Satyasai, the Google Apps team

Do you have an informative and fun Google Apps story to share? Please submit it here.
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Back in 2008, Adobe began to use the power of Google Site Search to “plug the whole community brain trust right into the Creative Suite,” as we liked to say.

Now with the launch of Adobe® Creative Suite 5, we’ve taken that brain trust to a whole new level with the introduction of our new Community Help application. It’s an Adobe AIR®-based companion that’s automatically installed as part of any new Adobe CS5 product.

Launched directly from the Help menu of any CS5 product, the Community Help application enables customers to:
  • find fast answers with powerful new search options that let them focus results to just Adobe content, community content, developer resources, or even code samples
  • download core Adobe Help and language reference content for offline viewing (thanks to the Adobe AIR runtime)
  • see what the community thinks is the best, most valuable content via ratings and comments
  • share their expertise with others and find out what experts have to say about using their favorite Adobe product
Google Site Search: integration and innovation
Under the hood of the Community Help app lies our Google Site Search engine. This search engine searches across about 3000 sites – content such as product Help, language references, Tech Notes, Developer Connection articles, and Adobe TV videos as well as the best online content from the Adobe community. Content is chosen by experts at Adobe and in the design and developer communities, meaning customers find the answers they need faster.

Thanks to the robust Google Site Search APIs, the development team was not only able to easily integrate search results but also create unique innovations such as our new Code Search functionality. Formerly known as Blueprint, this new search option allows Adobe Flash® and Flex developers to search for relevant code samples so that they can write better code, faster.

A new definition of Help
By combining the best community content with the definitive reference that customers traditionally expect from Adobe, Community Help allows us to expand the definition what help means. Now users can tap into an entire ecosystem of content — one that can dynamically adjust to changing user needs and provide a much richer set of resources over the lifetime of the product.

Community Help can also be used as a standalone application. To give it a try, you can download it from adobe.com.

Mark Nichoson, Product Manager at Adobe Community Help

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If you’d like to learn more about what Google Site Search can do for your website, join us for this upcoming webinar:

Google Site Search: an introduction
Thursday, May 13, 2010
11:00 a.m. PDT, 2:00 p.m. EDT, GMT 07:00
Register here
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Along with this update we've launched the popular "Report a Problem" feature that's used in the United States to our Canadian users, too. It's recommended that you re-geocode all of your data to take advantage of the update.

Learn more about the Google Maps API Premier at google.com/enterprise/maps.

Posted by Dan Chu, Product Manager, Google Enterprise team

Editor's note: Updated the post to say postal codes instead of zip codes. Thanks to our sharp-eyed readers for catching that!
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Since our launch last month, we’ve been pleased by the great success our customers have seen with Marketplace apps, and by the constant stream of innovation coming from our Marketplace vendors.

Next Wednesday, April 28, we're hosting a webinar about extending Google Apps with web-based applications from the Google Apps Marketplace. You’ll get a general overview of the marketplace, see a demo of how to find and install apps, and learn about applications – many of which are free – that you can start using right now for your business. Please join us!

Extending Google Apps with the Google Apps Marketplace
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
11:00 a.m. PDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT / 7:00 p.m. GMT
Register here

Posted by Chris Kelly, the Google Apps Marketplace team
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In the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake, an urgent need for geospatial data sharing arose. As aid organizations and governments rushed to help, the collection and sharing of large amounts of geographic information among many sources and users presented a daunting challenge.

In response, the United States Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM) made information and tools available through an interactive mapping website which they call a User Defined Operational Picture (UDOP), built on the Google Earth Enterprise platform to make visualizing the map and overlaid data easy and clear. Public sites are now available both for the Haiti earthquake and the Chile earthquake, where thousands of users can view, create, and edit spatial data (please note that you will be prompted to download the Google Earth plugin to view this data through these links.)


The system was rapidly deployed using an enterprise geospatial framework called iSpatial, which provides an open platform for the integration of dynamic data and the development of interactive applications. The data is displayed using the Google Earth browser plug-in and API, which enables the visualization of geographic data layers in the rich, 3D Google Earth environment, on any web page.

The breadth of data sources and content producers contributing to and making use of the UDOP reflected the global community supporting the relief effort. The combination of participatory geospatial content, the collaborative nature of the UDOP and the ability to integrate mobile applications as direct content producers is available for ongoing relief efforts. This is an evolving capability within SOUTHCOM as we break new ground in providing collaborative tools for humanitarian aid and disaster relief efforts.

Note: to see imagery and maps in Google Earth, you can also download the Google Crisis Response KML files for Haiti and Chile.

Posted by Jeff Martin, Google Crisis Response team
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The Apps Marketplace YouTube channel showcases videos from Marketplace vendors. Ranging from funny to informative, from cartoons to screencasts, these videos are meant to convey the benefits of extending Google Apps with integrated apps that work seamlessly with Gmail, Calendar, Docs and more. We're happy to already have more than a dozen videos in the channel and over 60 integrated app vendors in the Marketplace, and look forward to more great things as the Marketplace grows.

Please enjoy these examples of our Marketplace vendors' hard work. Thanks for the videos, guys!

Aviary:


ScheduleOnce:


MindMeister:


To get started using great apps like these, visit google.com/appsmarketplace, or watch our own short demo video explaining how the Marketplace works.

Are you a developer? Visit developer.googleapps.com and start building.

Posted by Chris Kelly, Google Apps Marketplace team
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First, we very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that China could at any time block access to our services in mainland China. We will be carefully monitoring access issues and we have created this new web page, which we will update regularly each day, so that you can see which Google services are available in China.

Note that you can continue to view performance information for Google Apps services outside of China on the Google Apps Status Dashboard.

Second, it is important to know that there are several networking configurations and associated technologies available to help ensure ongoing access to your critical business services such as Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Docs. These network configurations, such as a Virtual Private Network (VPN) connection, secure shell (SSH) tunneling, or using a proxy server, are already in place by many businesses with worldwide operations who serve their users from various locations. Companies should consult their own technical, legal and policy personnel to find a solution that works best for them.

Finally, we do not host any Google Apps services, or your data, in mainland China. Moreover, Google employees in mainland China do not have access to any Apps systems or customer data.

We recognize that these issues are not unique to Google; many technology companies serving users in China face challenges in providing access to their services, and we don't see yesterday’s news changing how we serve you moving forward.

Feel free to contact us with any questions via our support channels. Thanks for reading.

Posted by the Google Apps team
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