A Dialogue with Allie from Grammarly

English Grammar is a vexing concept that comes into use at every turn in your digital life. It is here, you often encounter Grammar Nazis who would tear you limb to limb if you're found with a wrong grammar construct or a misspelled word. 

You just cannot afford the time and energy to check every comment and every blabber by copying and pasting it into Microsoft word, just to check for mistakes. It simply seems too much work.

Introducing Grammarly, a service that can correct you anywhere, from typing in the hostile depths of social networks chained within 140 words, or replying to a racist comment at Facebook to mailing your boss about why you didn't submit the report.

We have with us Allison VanNest, Director of Public Relations at Grammarly. She seems petrifying, but trust me, Allie is a really bright and considerate professional who agreed to take time out of her busy schedule to let us trouble her with our questions.

Let me start with Grammarly first. It is a really efficient service that helps you write correct grammar in your everyday communications. The service works on several platforms and instantly points you towards an incorrect grammar construct or a misspelled word. You can then use it to provide correct alternatives to your incorrect sentence.

Grammarly is renowned worldwide as the best grammar checker there is. It was founded in 2009 by two entrepreneurs. Brad Hoover the CEO holds the reins of the san fransico based web service giant. The service can chekc more than 250 different types of grammatical errors that users often  make. The website boasts more than 3 million users as of 2015 and has an alexa rank of less than 4000.

Grammarly has performed consistently well at its job and hence, won too many awards and accolades to even mention here. However in august 2013, Grammarly was ranked number 344 on Inc. magazine’s 32nd annual Inc. 500 list, an exclusive ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies. It was also the finalist in the “Best Bootstrapped Startup” category in the 8th Annual Crunchies Awards in Feb 2015.

Introduction

Mohit: Tell us about the story of Grammarly, How did the idea take flight?

Allie: Grammar rules can be confusing, and they are constantly evolving. Grammarly was founded in 2008 by Alex Shevchenko and Max Lytvyn, both English language learners, to instantly and accurately provide written writing assistance to the more than two billion native and non-native English language speakers worldwide. The automated proofreading tool provides an easy way for students, professionals, job seekers, and English language learners to become more accurate English language writers.

About the Team

Mohit: Online service based companies are often depicted as geeky heaven with chocolate fountains, free food to sleeping pods. How is the work environment and culture at the offices of Grammarly?

Allie: At Grammarly, we codified our culture profile with one word -- EAGER. The goal is to have a memorable, understandable, and actionable company culture. While EAGER describes the attitude of Grammarly's team members, it’s also an acronym:

Ethical: Be honorable to earn trust. Do the right thing, even when no one is watching, without exception.

Adaptable: Embrace change, and learn in order to evolve and succeed. Apply a positive, problem-solving attitude.

Gritty: Demonstrate passion and perseverance for long-term goals, since persistence drives achievement. Do whatever it takes to get the job done, whenever it is necessary.

Empathetic: Treat others as you want to be treated, so we can work well together. Actively listen and put yourself in others’ shoes, and then respond accordingly.

Remarkable: Be recognized as exceptional yet humble, because talent drives impact. Seek out those who are exceptional and learn from them.

Although we have remarkable benefits at Grammarly – yoga, catered lunch, and more – we feel like the most important aspect of our work environment and culture is each other.

Tackling Competitors

Mohit: I'm sure you're aware that some websites have performed tests on Grammarly to check its accuracy. Some have found promising results (like me) but some (mostly rivals) have not. What is your opinion of such usage tests performed by individuals and rival firms on Grammarly?

Allie: We’re pleased you’ve found our product promising. The fact is that Grammarly’s ever-evolving algorithms work to accurately catch English spelling and grammar mistakes based on deviations from baseline grammar standards. For each potential issue flagged by Grammarly’s algorithms, users receive a detailed explanation so they can make an informed decision about how, and whether, to correct the mistake. While Grammarly’s algorithms are very powerful and constantly improving, they are not a replacement for a teacher or proofreader. Grammarly is an automated, cost-effective, and always-available tool to improve users’ English writing and skills.

On Social Networks

Mohit: You have a thriving Facebook community, which provides a platform for grammar discussions. With more than 4.5 million fans at facebook and nearing 2 million at Google plus, describe the challenges faced by your social media team in increasing and maintaining fans.

Allie: We actually don’t emphasize growing our social media fan base. It has been a fun thing for the team to watch, but it was never a sign of our success. Instead, Grammarly emphasizes engagement rates and reach. This has been the greatest challenge—to test, optimize, and adjust to make both our fans happy and the social algorithms. We’re just getting to know our audiences and responding. It’s just a conversation. Sometimes we say something wrong, but it informs how we say things moving forward.

On Business

Mohit: Cloud-based processing is often an advantage when you have exceedingly large algorithms to process the users' input. But this system often takes a hit in countries with no reliable internet connection. How do you propose to solve this?

Allie: Interestingly, some people who do have reliable access to the Internet are not able to make use of certain cloud-based tools for monetary reasons. That’s the first problem that the Grammarly team is tackling. Grammarly believes that quality writing improves confidence and credibility, and we know that everyone should have access to these personal and professional tools, regardless of income. 

Through the launch of Grammarly’s Chrome extension, we’re now offering our quality spelling- and grammar-checking tool for free to users of Google Chrome. We hope to extend this functionality in 2015 to other browsers so that any writer with a reliable Internet connection can improve their credibility and communication style.

Mohit: Note. For those without Chrome, Grammarly services can be accessed from various portals including the Grammarly Plug-in for Microsoft Office Software or Grammarly Words, a contextual online thesaurus or the Grammarly Editor at Grammarly.com

Here we conclude this interview. Allie, I would like to thank you for taking time out of your schedule to help us understand the nitty-gritty of a service-based business and introducing us to Grammarly, which quite simply is an exceptional piece of work.

Our readers can pitch questions to Allie through the comment section and I'll make sure the questions reach Allie.

Related Reading

You know we have our share of interviews with really successful entrepreneurs like the one we've discussed here. For example, you should read about one of my local we designers, i.e. Jetbro from The Den. Just like Alex and Max, we also have the geniuses at Degoo.com and at RescueTime who have developed a service of similar standards.

This was,

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An Interview at RescueTime

Do you know you could increase your productivity up to 80% if you could assess and remove your most distracting activities from your work schedule?

With an ever increasing dependence on computers and PDAs for fulfilling our work and entertainment requirements, it is hard to keep track of when you digress and spend your precious time on unproductive activities. RescueTime literally rescues your time from the clutches of monsters like non productivity and gently nudges you towards more productive and gratifying activities.

RescueTime tracks your digital activities and shows you through interactive graphs the amount of time spent on different types of activities. It helps you point out which activities are given larger share of your time and which of your daily activities need more time to help you stay productive. 

I've used rescue time and can boast that I've spent most of my time in productive activities (proof attached :-p), but enough of me, lets haggle Robby Macdonell, the Head of Product Development for RescueTime.

An Introduction

Mohit: Okay Robby, our readers have a fair idea of RescueTime, but they'll be thrilled to hear it from you. How does it work?

Robby: RescueTime helps people understand how they really spend their time when they are in front of a computer or mobile device. We do this by keeping an accurate log of the different applications that a person is engaged with, then categorizing and scoring that time to help people get a richer picture of where their time is actually going.

Often, once someone understands where their time is going, they want to optimize it in some way. They may want be to be more productive, or simply more balanced. We have a bunch of tools to help people change their behaviors. There’s no one method that works for everyone, so we give people several options to choose from.

Customer Support

Mohit: We've seen dozens of services created by startups which often delegate the responsibility of customer support to other firms. But you actually have yourself responding to queries and making help pages. How does that turn out?

Robby: I can’t imagine ever outsourcing our support. We’re lucky to have a lot of people that use RescueTime, and they generate a fairly large volume of support and product discussion. It takes time to deal with, but if we didn’t do it, we wouldn’t really understand the problems that people were running into. I’m not just talking about problems with RescueTime. It’s important to fix bugs of course, but understanding what someone is personally trying to accomplish or overcome when choosing a tool like RescueTime is one of the most important things for us to hear about.

Mohit: Sure Robby, in the beginning stage every firm must have a firm understanding of what people want from your product, which can very well be understood by answering questions through customer support. But what if, in the near future, you become something short of an internet giant. Would you still go forward with answering such plethora of questions with an ever increasing user base?

Robby: Well, I've worked at some of those "internet giants" before. In the most successful one, the CEO made it a point to speak with at least one customer a day. Obviously you have to structure things differently when working at a larger scale like that, but like I said before, I can't imagine ANY scenario where we would choose to completely cut ourselves off from that feedback channel. It's just way too valuable.

The Business Part

Mohit: First time users often take a shot in the dark when they use RescueTime. How do you encourage new users to try your service?

Robby: We've been really fortunate to have had a lot of people say nice things about us, so that certainly helps. We work really hard to give people a good experience and actually solve problems, and if we’re doing that correctly then our users become the best amplifier of who we are and what we’re doing. If I’m having a one-on-one conversation with someone, I tell them to think about the last time a manager or colleague asked them what they've been working on lately. Was it a struggle to remember? Did it feel awkward? That feeling was the reason we built RescueTime in the first place. We were sick of tripping over our tongues looking for answers when people asked us things like that.

The Technical Part

Mohit: It is awfully difficult to integrate one service into so many environments like PC, Android, iOS etc. But for RescueTime you have to do it for efficiency's sake. What were the challenges you faced when you try to integrate a service in several environments?

Robby: The big challenge is figuring out how to manage the data across different devices. We chose early on to go with a cloud-based approach, largely because we were all better at building web applications than we were at native apps. It turned out to be a really good decision, because it means that to support a new platform, all we have to do is write a relatively lightweight client that tracks data and sends it back to the server for further processing. It’s helped us stay focused on the overall experience.

Mohit: Talking about receiving data, you must receive a huge amount of data from an equally large number of users. How do you ensure that the personal data you receive from the users are stored safely and cannot be hacked by or leaked to other parties?

Robby: That's not really my area, so I'm light on the details, but we use industry-standard secure data practices to isolate the data in a private network, and control access to it through authenticated and encrypted trails with an audit path.

On RescueTime Blog

Mohit: You also have a RescueTime Blog where you often discuss its applications. What role does a blog play in creating a positive image for RescueTime?

Robby: It gives us an outlet to tell the story of RescueTime from our perspective. Working with this type of application, we get to explore a lot of interesting things, and we love sharing what we find. Sometimes it’s a new way to use RescueTime. Other times it’s interesting things we’ve learned from researchers studying attention and productivity. We don’t have a structured content strategy. We just post the things that we feel like sharing with our users.

Conclusion

Mohit: I have been using RescueTime for quite some time and let me tell you, it has shown me ways to shut non productive distractions and focus on the rewarding ones. Visiting your testimonials confirmed that this view was shared by many. Did you envisage your service to be so popular and utilitarian?

Robby: When we started building RescueTime, we thought it would only appeal to complete nerds like us. But when we started telling people about it, we found that the problems we were working on are pretty universal. People spend a LOT of time in front of a computer (or some other digital device), and there are so many competing things going on, all vying for our time, that it’s REALLY easy for it to start to feel like a black hole. RescueTime gives people a way to feel more in control over their time, and that’s something that it turns out a lot of people can appreciate.

That’s all for today, I on behalf of our readers would thank Robby for taking time out of his busy schedule and answering our questions.  Do you know he battled blizzards (and emerged victorious) at his town to send us his answers? But that is for another time. 

If our readers have some questions that they would like answered; add it to the comments below and I’ll make sure it reaches Robby. The last interview was made interesting by one of our readers who added an insightful question, which was answered gracefully (have a look at the interview with the geniuses at Degoo.com).

Also you can find them at their twitter handle or at their facebook page too.

This was,

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Interview with the geniuses at Degoo.com

Today we have with us the founders of a really interesting cloud based service, degoo.com. Often users face problems when they try to back up their computers. 

Some suffer due to lack of processing power. But, our Dynamic duo Carl Hasselskog (CEO) and Mattias Nylitz (Co-Founder) worked upon their master's thesis and created degoo.com, a service that lets you automatically back your computer on the cloud by sharing your unused hard drive space. What’s more? You can get up to 100GBs of Back-Up space for the same! 

You just need to select the folders you want to back-up and whenever changes are made, they will be backed up. The space you designate will be used for storing the back up of other users. The files are compressed and stored with 128-bit AES encryption which reduces the safety concern substantially.

Degoo is also currently working on another service which personally interests me more, i.e. Processor time sharing. A concept, which can very well be a stepping stone in the world of computing. But enough of that let’s hear it from Carl and Mattias the founders of Degoo.com!

An Introduction

Mohit: Alright Carl! Here’s the first question. How did you start degoo and what does the word 'degoo' signify?

Carl: Hi! Degoo started off as my Master’s thesis at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. I felt that there was great demand for a backup but that the current solutions were too hard to use and expensive.

About the Team

Mohit: We'll be delighted to know about you and your team. What functions do you handle and how do you delegate responsibilities to the team? 

Carl: When working at a start-up you have to be prepared to do pretty much anything. One day I could be optimizing a compression algorithm, the next day I might be pitching to investors or answering support tickets. Lately we’ve been growing very rapidly and we’re therefore in the process of delegating some of the support work to an outside firm. However, we will never outsource all support. I think it’s crucial that the founders always stay very close to the customers to really understand their needs and struggles. Doing support is a crucial part of that.

On the Cloud Storage

Mohit: Though I have mentioned the workings before, I'm sure the readers would be thrilled to understand degoo's workings in the words of its creator.

Carl: There’s so much very highly technical stuff going on that it’s hard to describe everything in detail. My own Master’s thesis was written in Swedish but we have published some work in English. For instance this paper describes how we measure the online time of each computer.

Mohit: If you store all data on the computers of your own users, none of the data is actually stored on any of your servers, is that true?

Carl: Since we’re still in beta we actually store an extra copy on servers, in addition to the copies stored at users computers (just to be safe). 

Mohit: You call users providing storage space as 'subcontractors' and further add that the 'subcontractor' and not degoo is responsible to any damage to users' data stored on its computer. What if someone successfully hacks the user data stored on its PC and proceeds harm the owner of the data? Will degoo not be responsible? 

Carl: Before uploading any data the files are encrypted and then split into small fragments. You therefore only store a very small encrypted fragment of the file. We can also detect if someone tries to tamper with a fragment and if that happens we will just ignore that fragment and just one of the fragments that we’ve replicated to other users (we have lots of redundancy in place here).

On Processor Sharing

Mohit: Tell us something about how degoo shares processor time among users. 

Carl: The idea is that you will get more storage in exchange for sharing some of your processor time. This is an optional feature that you can opt-out of at anytime you like. Our long term goal is that this processor capacity will be used to create a giant virtual super computer.

Mohit: A virtual super computer sounds awfully futuristic! Do you envision your technology to be used for research and industrial applications in the future?

Carl: Yes, our long term goal is to create a super computer that drastically reduces the cost of computing in the world. We’d love to give researchers, corporations and hobbyists access to the vast amounts of computing power this would provide.

On Customer Support

Mohit: Why do you choose desk.com to be your front end for customer support instead of using degoo itself?

Carl: Desk.com is a great way for us to stay productive and keep track of all support tickets coming in. The support portal that we can create with Desk.com allows us to rapidly improve our support articles whenever we feel that they need to be made clearer. 

We give up some flexibility compared to doing it ourselves but we think the productivity gains outweigh that.

Question from our Readers

Recently one of our readers asked a really insightful question. Something that can be viewed both as a technical and a moral one. So, Carl here's a question from Rachel.

Rachel: Interesting concept. I hope my hard drive is not being used to store pirated or risque content of other users. How do you ensure that my hard drive is being used for legitimate purpose?

Carl: Before the upload all files encrypted and split up into tiny fragments. The data stored at each hard drive is therefore just a tiny encrypted fragment of a file. You therefore never run into the risk of storing some illegitimate content on your hard drive.

Lastly

Mohit: A large project entails gigantic problems. What was the biggest difficulty or setback that you encountered in the project?

Carl: The biggest challenge so far has been to make the system reliable and easy-to-use despite the very complex technology going on behind the scenes. P2P makes everything much more challenging. 

Security, performance and reliability all become much more difficult when the underlying hardware can be unreliable and slow. Handling all of that complexity without confusing the user is very difficult.

That’s all for today folks, codemakit would like to extend its heartiest congratulations on the success of degoo.com and would hope for more innovative surprises from the firm. 

Thank you Carl and Mattias (Whose photo can be seen at the right), you've been a true sport answering every question with utmost zeal. If our readers have some queries or suggestions for degoo.com, put them in the comments section and I would make sure that they reach Carl or Mattias.

Related Reading,

You know we have seen some coding experts in the past too, have a look at An Interview with Metin Saylan from Shailan or Jacob Gube from Six Revisions.

The interview with JetBro wasn't too bad; you can check them out too.

This was,

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An Interview with JetBro from 'The Den'

Today we have a web design company which has crossed the boundaries of simple web design/ app creation. A company which has defied the conventional methods of professionalism and created an atmosphere which reeks of productivity and creative enthusiasm.

Jetbro is an Ahmedabad based company specializing in IT services and digital solutions. It's motto “Art with sense. We deliver what your mind thinks.” creeps up into the mind when you see its main/portfolio/about page.

I would not delay the imminent anymore. Let us see what 'The Den' has to offer.

The Story

Mohit: Let’s Start with the history of JetBro. How did you start? How did the group form?

Jetbro: Ours is a young team of passionate and dedicated coders, developers, designers, artists and professionals. Jetbro started its operation way back in the January of 2011, with a team of three including our two founders (Mr. Ishit Jethwa and Mr. Sharva Jethwa) who operated it from two separate countries, UK and Australia along with an intermediary in India to take care of the local business. 

Jetbro was self-funded by the salary that Sharva (Founder) earned then, working as a lone developer in an Australian firm. Ishit (Founder) in the meantime took care of the marketing and finally flew down to India, in the June of 2011, to set across a fully functional operational market that we claim today.

The initial days were rough, where we had to convince our clients on the market possibilities of getting online, while Ishit went on foot from one organization to other, understanding their business issues and offering them with digital solutions. Today, the Jetbro family banks on happy clients and a self-motivated team, proud of their work and projects and beaming with future possibilities of working towards to a digitally advanced tomorrow.

Mohit: You started in 2011, and some of your initial projects were Blue Lotos, Dakara Dirt etc. As a start-up how did you manage to bag the initial projects?

Jetbro: Finding good and exciting projects is difficult for a startup. We accepted that early on. But, we knew that nothing would come easy, unless you prove your worth.

The solution was to accept that and keep looking for opportunities, that justified what we stand for and striving across, to address issues in firms and organization that seek digital solutions. Our initial projects were those that we applied to and claimed online through leads available on several web portals.

The Den

Mohit: I reckon that from your website and the company profile, people see you as a hip, carefree group. Is it a mirage or is your 'den' actually as cool as it sounds like?

Jetbro: Cool? Well, we have so far refused to put any label on us. But yea, if “Cool” is something you feel that relates to us, then we’d rather go for the “Bloody Cool!” tag. We have always been like that. Bold and staying true to our professional values and what we believe in.

The Den is a special place. It isn't the usual corporate environment. It’s young, alive, brewing with ideas and rocking on some pretty heavy music. The Den is where the artists within our coders, designers and professionals come alive to stir across innovations that bank on futuristic digital solutions. 

On Works

Mohit: I especially found your BRTS app really useful. How important is making applications for mobile environment? Do you think that the future is slowly moving towards a world with "Lesser websites and more apps"?

Jetbro: Catering to the mobile environment is extremely important. But the notion that “the future is slowly moving towards a world with lesser websites and more apps” is untrue. The future isn’t restricted to mobile phones; it relies on a technology that caters to all devices.

Being a digital agency we believe any digital service that is futuristic should cater to every kind of audience and on every available platform. Be it on the web or the different kinds of mobile devices. Developers should never shy away from making their services adaptable to every screen in order to deliver universal digital solutions.

Mohit: Now a question regarding your website. Usually service websites are filled with information and data (including pricing, detailed description of works done etc), your website on the other hand focuses entirely on the aesthetic aspect of web design. Customers are supposed to extract this information from you through your contact page. Do you think aesthetics are better than functional information?

Jetbro: Aah! We are so glad you asked. We do showcase our work, but here’s why we haven’t put up any functional information.  Putting up a price on our solutions is another thing the Den refrains from, which has been discussed in our blog where we elaborate on why it’s a dilemma to put a price on the websites we build. Here’s the link to the same, How much does a website cost? We don’t want to be conventional and neither do we want our clients to expect “the conventional” when they approach the Den. 

Defining the services and putting a tag on them, makes them conventional. 

Defining the kind of solutions we offer, means the client already has a line of thinking on how things will get done and they’ll want us to stick to that routine. However, at Den we vouch for challenges and not routines. Every client project is tackled with a fresh set of ideas, designs and a whole new approach.

We might have done the same kind of project earlier but we don’t want this one to be a repetition of our earlier work. For us every new project demands a fresh zeal of enthusiasm and innovative outlook and that’s the reason we don’t define our ways. We love clients who are equally experimentative and looking to invest in “New Ideas”.

Mohit: Tell us something about your recent apps.

Jetbro: We pride ourselves on being the first ones who launched a BRTS app for Ahmedabad, while the rest followed. And as has been the tradition now, we've strived ourselves to deliver yet another app - Ahmedabad Otlo, dedicated exclusively to the beautiful city and people of Ahmedabad. Our goal has always been to make the lives of an everyday citizen easier using technology.

What makes us so proud with Ahmedabad Otlo is "Show Love", where we encourage users to share concerns regarding problems in their local area in Ahmedabad that needs immediate attention and garner "supports" for their cause among fellow Amdavadis and help us build a beautiful Ahmedabad. 

You can download our app Ahmedabad Otlo. We would love to know, what our fellow Amdavadis think of the app through this platform and encourage feedback from them, to help us improvise and deliver the best, to a city, that we love and cherish so much!

On Setbacks

Mohit: As a standalone firm offering variety of services to a variety of customers, you are bound to have some depressing days. How do you deal with them and how do you keep the morale of your employees high?

Jetbro: Yes! We all have those moments. But sulking ain't our style. We re-group, re-assemble, conduct brain-storming sessions with our clients and work on weekends if we have to; unless we are sure that the project has truly accomplished our client’s purpose and motive behind the same.

Client satisfaction is our ultimate “high” and burning midnight oil to serve that kind of satisfaction is just something that our professionalism calls upon. Ours is a bunch of self-motivated and driven individuals and that’s the reason why we never fail to triumph and find solutions even amongst utter chaos.

Read More..

Domain & server, Web design, Content creation in web Sphere; Tablet specific design, Branding & Logo in Design Sphere; Online and viral marketing; customized crm, data analysis, mining and modeling, phew! the list goes on but thankfully not the article. Visit Jetbro's website (At-least to see the about page section). Like them at Jetbro's original Facebook Page or follow them @jetbroden at Twitter.

Technomugs, The Official Blog at Jetbro, Young ideas, recent trends and everything from their coffee conversations to their new launches gets talked about there. 

Update

Though no one has ever attempted such a valiance before, but JetBro was the first firm, which actually took the liberty and the pains of writing an article about codemakit on their own blog. Take a look at this graceful Technomugs Article which depicted codemakit in a new way.

Further

An interview with an Indian firm is really interesting, but if you need something about an Indian web design personnel you can read an interview with Vinay at TechPrevue.

This was, 

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What is Google Drive?

Google Drive is a file storage and synchronizing service that was released by Google on April 24, 2012. Google Drive is an extension of Google Docs, allowing users to store all types of files on the Google servers.

Google Docs came from two separate products, Writely and Google Spreadsheets. Writely was a web-based word processor created by the software company Upstartle, whereas Spreadsheets, launched as Google Labs Spreadsheets on June 6, 2006, originated from the acquisition of the XL2Web product by 2Web Technologies. Writely's original features included a collaborative text editing suite and access controls. Menus, keyboard shortcuts, and dialog boxes are similar to what users may expect in a desktop word processor such as Microsoft Word or OpenOffice.org Writer.

Google Drive can be anywhere you want, It can be stored on the web, in your home PC or at the office and even on your phone. So wherever you are, your things will be ready for you at a remote server. Use it, share it with your friends. Initially, you get up to 5 GB free. Google Drive lets you do more than just store your files. You can even share and edit files with your friends together, from any device.

If you see it carefully, You will find that the dashboard of Google Drive is highly similar to that of Google Docs. Thus helping the end user to understand it easily.

Here is the official video floated by Google on Google Drive.

Now you know,

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Create and use a dropbox for your website

Dropbox is a free online storage service that lets you bring all your pictures, documents, and videos anywhere. This would mean that any file you save to your Dropbox folder (in your computer) will automatically be saved to all your computers, phones and even the Dropbox website. 

Dropbox also makes it easier to share files and folders with others, whether you're a student or professional, though the concept of dropbox is not new, there are tons of websites which provide free hosting, like mediafire, fileshare, filestube etc.

But the difference is for your eyes and fingers to feel.
Here is a screenshot of the dashboard of one popular file storage website, Mediafire.

Once installed, The folder has been designed as, just another folder in windows, or any other OS. Now you may edit your website on the move, why, because you have all the precious graphics and video files with you, without which you cannot, edit your website with full functionality. Dropbox enables you to safegaurd your data against power failures and hard disk crashes.

The owner and CEO of Dropbox service Drew Houston graduated from MIT and wrote the first lines of code for Dropbox while at a train station in Boston. These days he's usually out and about running Dropbox's business affairs, but he still contributes a lot to Dropbox's client software.

The dropbox comes with 3 choices as bellow.

Installing a dropbox is very easy, just follow the steps and you'll have a folder installed on your computer in no time.

Go to https://www.dropbox.com/

Also You may start working on a computer at your workplace, and finish from your home computer. Never email yourself a file again! Download Dropbox for your phone to simplify your life even more — flip through all your photos or review that spreadsheet even while on the road. Dropbox lets you work from any computer or phone with the confidence that you'll always have everything you need. 

Using it is a lot more easier then installing it, Just drag and drop the file need to share to the dropbox.

The file you've just dropped, will bear a blue circle to it, signifying synchronizing process.

So, this is how you,

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How to create a form using Google docs?

Google docs has always enjoyed a huge consumer base. The reason for such success is always attributed to the versatility and the ease through which a normal end user can perform his tasks through Google Docs.

Google’s entry into enterprise computing began nearly six years ago with the launch of Apps for Your Domain, now known as Google Apps. Since then Google has offered the product for free to businesses, and educational institutions. 

 

According to Wikipedia "Google Docs is a free, Web-based office suite and data storage service offered by Google. It allows users to create and edit documents online while collaborating in real-time with other users."

Google Docs have many advantages, (Discussed Earlier). Though the following article is about creating a form, You can always create different documents through Google docs.

We will learn, How to create a form using Google Docs?

Here we'll learn by example.
Here is an example on the use of Google Docs to create a Research paper review form.
Firstly go to https://docs.google.com/

1. Click on the Create button on the top left section of the page.
Click on form.

2. You will be redirected to a screen, whose portion looks like this.

 

In the Question Title, Write down the question which you would like to ask.
In the Help Text, Write down some text, which would be helpful in understanding the question.
The third Option, i.e. Question type gives you a variety of options to choose from, Ranging from text, multiple choice, Check boxes etc.

3. After you've entered a few questions, and you're happy about it. The form will look like this

 

4. Once this is over, chose a theme from the top left corner.
The answers to your form sent over to your friends or colleagues, will be stored in a Google spreadsheet, which may look like this.

5. Again if you are not sure with the final result, you can always come back and edit your form.

 

6. Once everything is finalized, You will receive a link to your form, from Google.

So you don't have to worry, where did your form went, after you've closed your browser.

  

From there you may select some recipients to your form

Just type in their email addresses and click on send.

If you are still unclear at some point, Here is a Video depicting the previous steps, with helpful subtitles

This is an awesome way of getting information through web based surveys and marketing studies. You can even embed the form in your site, which will be discussed later.

Now you know

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What is the new google play button?

You must have seen a little button above your google mailbox, which reads like 'Play(new)'

What is it and how is it going to affect you?

Google Play is a new digital content experience from Google where you can find your favorite music, movies, books, and Android apps and games. It’s your entertainment hub: you can access it from the web or from your Android device or even TV, and all your content is instantly available across all of these devices.

Google Play is your one-stop shop for all your favorite entertainment. With over 450,000 apps, millions of songs and books, and thousands of movies, Google Play has something for everyone. Before you decide what you want, sample a song or book for free, view app ratings, reviews, and 

screenshots, or watch a movie trailer. Google Play is a more connected, powerful experience. 

How cool would it be if your entertainment was just available anywhere? Now it is. Buy a book on your Android phone (Find out which android devices are supported) and read it on the web at play.google.com. Buy a new album on your Android tablet and listen to it on your desktop at work. Rent a movie online and watch it anywhere on your phone. That’s the beauty of the cloud. You can read, listen and watch all your favorite content anywhere you want. No software required and no wires or syncing needed, and the best part - Google Play cloud is free to use. 

 

Discover, shop, enjoy, and share music, movies, books, and apps anytime, anywhere. When you discover an amazing song, a nail-biting thriller or memorable movie, the first thing you want to do is share it with your friends. On Google Play sharing your favorite entertainment just got easier. You can easily share posts about your favorite books, music, movies, games or apps to your circles on Google+, email, or text message in a single click. Google Play has hand-picked rising artists and great bands from your favorite genres. With music on Google Play, you’ll get personalized recommendations based on what you listen to most. And when you're not shopping for new music, rediscover your library by creating an Instant Mix. Discovering your favorite books and authors has never been easier.

With Google Play, shop the world's largest selection of eBooks - from thrillers to comedy, cookbooks, bestselling fiction, and everything in between - find over 4 million books to choose from, including millions of free titles. With Google Play, your next great read is always at your fingertips. With Google Play enjoy seamless syncing and easy access across your devices. All your books are stored in the cloud, so your entire library is always with you, accessible from any connected device. And with offline reading, it’s never been simpler to dive into your favorite books when you are offline, out of range, or in the air. Start reading on your tablet, continue on the web, and finish that chapter on your phone. You’ll pick up the story just where you left off, always on the right page. 

Now that you've read this article, you know everything about,

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