Shanghai Tech WriterTechnical Writing, Technology, Web2.0, Google, Shanghai, China

I am a big Google fan! I love Gmail. I love Picasa. I love Google Earth. I love Google Sketchup. I love Google Chrome. And when Google Wave comes out later this year, I know I am going to love that too!

What is Google Wave?

Google Wave is a communication and collaboration tool that combines aspects of emails, wikis, instant messaging, social networking, web chat, and project management right inside your browser. Simply put, Google Wave is a wiki version of instant messaging that allows collaborators to organize thoughts, ideas, and conversations in real-time.

Google Wave Video Demo

If you have not heard of Google Wave or seen the demo video, I’ve embedded the video below. If you live in China, YouTube is blocked. Try using a personal VPN access like Witopia or YouTube proxy to view the video. (Direct video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQ)

Several weeks ago, I watched the entire hour and a half video demo of Google Wave. I was completely blown away by the innovative ways in which Google Wave can facilitate better and improved communication and collaboration on the web. As I watched the demo, I could immediately relate to the difficulties and challenges of project collaboration using today’s tools, especially with people across the globe. I can’t wait to try out Google Wave!

All-in-One Platform

What’s game-changing about Google Wave is not so much that Google came out with a new product. Google basically combined every useful communication and collaboration tool we use today, streamlined all common day-to-day tasks, and packaged the tools together in an all-in-one communication platform. It’s like Apple coming out with the iPhone. Why didn’t anyone think of that before?

Actually, many did. But none achieved the innovative, simple, and easy-to-use platform that are consistent with Apple and Google products.

I was reading The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman for a book club at work. The book, written in 1988, talked a lot about the psychological aspects of human interaction with products/design. Norman pointed out the paradox of technology—that while new technologies and added functionality simplify a few things, they also add to the complexity and difficulty of learning how to use them. It takes a really good design (and a brilliant team) to come up with innovative technology that combines many things, but without the complexity. iPhones and Google Wave are perfect examples of such innovative technology!

Transforming Communication and Collaboration

Google Wave combines many tools that are already being used in the workplace today.  Let’s take a look at how some of these same tools used inside the Google Wave platform streamline the way we communicate and collaborate.

1. Email Organization

The Old: I use Lotus Notes at work. I think Notes is a horrible email application. I’ve also used Microsoft Outlook before, and I don’t think Outlook is any better either. I often get 5-10 emails about a particular subject. They take up a lot of lines in my inbox, not to mention the difficulty of organizing emails by folders. Which folder do I file to when the email is about both Work and Personal? And of the 10 emails about troubleshooting a broken link, which one was it that contain the solution? Searching for old and archived emails in Notes is a nightmare.

The New: With Google Wave, the inbox looks similar to a Gmail inbox. Instead of having individual or threaded emails, the entire conversation between collaborators is contained in a wave, shown as one item in the Google Wave inbox. And just like Gmail, you can label, archive, and search waves.

2. Wikis for Internal Collaboration

The Old: Many companies are adopting wiki as a tool for internal collaboration. With wiki, everyone can contribute new content or edit existing content. Wikis help facilitate collaboration within and across groups, departments, and centers. Since wikis track revision history, it’s easy to see what changes are made. However, if a page contains numerous revisions, it’s not always clear which changes were made when, why, and by whom. Comparing revisions is a cumbersome task.

The New: Google Wave allows you to edit emails and conversations like a wiki page! Rather than having a string of emails that you read and reply to from top to bottom, Google Wave allows you to organize thoughts, conversations, and ideas in a more logical fashion, that is, wherever they are relevant in a wave. In addition, Google Wave has a playback feature that allows you to view the entire conversation, or wave, from start to finish. This features is very useful for collaborators that joined the conversation later. The playback helps to simulate the entire thought process. Why didn’t anyone think of that before?

3. Instant Messaging

The Old: Got a quick question for Bob Smith in the IT department? That’s what instant messaging is for! Open the instant messaging application, find his name, send him a message, then wait for his reply. Instant messaging transformed communication in the workplace. No more walking over to Bob’s cubicle to get the answer. You could just pick up the phone and call him, but then you wouldn’t have any record of the conversation in case you need to reference it later. 

The New: A wave is like a wiki version of instant messaging. You can insert and edit your replies wherever and whenever they are relevant, instead of just sequentially by timestamp. Every conversation also takes place in real-time, like an instant message. Online collaborators are able to see your replies as you type each character!

4. Social Networking

The Old: Found something interesting on the web? Email it. Share it. Blog about it. Digg it. Tweet it. There are so many different social networking sites out there. Somewhere I read a quote from a geek, if you didn’t stick it on the Internet, it didn’t happen.

The New: Soon, people will be saying, if you didn’t wave it, it didn’t happen. You can add extensions, gadgets, and robots to Google Wave to include or embed various social media contents to your waves. Google Wave is an all-in-one platform!

Looking Forward to Being Part of the Wave

The Google Wave demo video also showcased many other cool features like natural language spellchecker, drag-and-drop file sharing, embeddability, gadgets, robots, and extensions that keep you wandering, why didn’t anyone think of that before!

Well, that’s Google for you, always coming out with cool new technology and innovation!

I can think of a number of ways in which Google Wave can make great improvements, not just in our documentation process, but throughout the course of LabVIEW software development. I’d like to take a detailed look and analysis at how Google Wave can be used in our day-to-day tasks, but that’s another post for another day.

Meanwhile, I look forward to the release of Google Wave. I’ve already signed up for updates, so the moment Google Wave becomes available, I’ll be one of the first to try it out!  And geek speak, that makes me the Innovator, or the technology enthusiast, in Geoffrey Moore’s Technology Adoption Lifecycle. I am a 100% pure-bred geek.