Google Buzz is live. It is still rolling out to everyone, so you should get your update soon. I am already seeing a Buzz tab in my Google Profile. Do you?

Google Buzz is a new way to start conversations about the things you find interesting. It’s built right into Gmail, so you don’t have to peck out an entirely new set of friends from scratch — it just works.

Although I still cannot see Buzz inside my Gmail or via my Phone I have to say that I am a little bit excited. Google Buzz APIs are already available here.

And here is a short video explaining what is Google Buzz:

What do you think?

Back in 2008, Google released a nice feature inside Gmail’s settings where you could opt to enable https throughout your session. That made you feel a little bit safer when browsing your emails using a public WiFi at your local coffee shop. However, the usage of SSL/TLS protocol has one main drawback which is imposing some extra overhead. Thus causing some extra latency. This latency could be noticeable a few years ago when the average broadband speed did not exceed 1 Mbps in contrary to nowadays. So after researching the security/latency tradeoff, Google decided to roll out default https for all Gmail users for the sake of security (you can still turn it off at any time but https will still be “on” when you login).

About two months ago, I came across with a couple of interesting articles at the h-online.com regarding a vulnerability in SSL/TLS protocol which could lead to password theft. It is surprising that something we used to trust for years now has been compromised. At first I thought “what the heck..?!”. Indeed, what’s the point of choosing to use https or not at all. Well, the truth is that if you are investing in 100% security you are wasting your money. Unfortunately there is no such thing as 100% secure (at least for the time being). The good news is that there seems to be a solution to the TLS vulnerability. According to H-online:

The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) has ammended the RFC 5246 specification (Transport Layer Security [TLS] Protocol Version 1.2) and introduced a new renegotiation_info TLS extension which will store a connection’s cryptographic information.

If you ask me, there is nothing even close to 100% secure. The harsh truth is even when quantum cryptography will be applicable somehow, end-to-end security will still suffer from various kinds of attacks. Still having second thoughts every time you try to login somewhere..? In that case you should check out ForceHTTPS (a Firefox add-on) which forces https “every” time you hit the enter button.

ForceHTTPS allows sophisticated users to transparently retrofit security onto some insecure sites that support HTTPS.

[ photo via anonymouscollective ]

This evening a weird message was floating above my email stating that Gmail was temporarily unable to access my Contacts and that I might experience issues while this persists. Chat was not working properly. The auto-complete feature was only working for a very few contacts. And though the contact manager wouldn’t load at all, I could access my contacts via google.com/contacts
You could also check the “Learn more” link which directs you to a Google Help sub page inside Gmail Help which includes the following reassuring message:

We’re working to fix the problem, and in the meantime, you should be able to continue to read and send mail as normal. Thank you for your patience.

The Google Apps Status mentions today’s issue as a Service disruption. The announcement found right now on the top right of Google’s Help pages, looks like this:

September 24, 2009 7:29:00 AM PDT

We’re aware of a problem with Google Mail affecting a small subset of users. The affected users are unable to access Google Mail, but we’ve provided a workaround below. We will provide an update by September 24, 2009 8:29:00 AM PDT detailing when we expect to resolve the problem. Please note that this resolution time is an estimate and may change.

It is also worth mentioning that this very specific Google Help page is not accessible/visible through the upper navigation menu, which is Managing Contacts.

UPDATE: A new announcement states the below:

September 24, 2009 8:29:00 AM PDT

Google Mail service has already been restored for some users, and we expect a resolution for all users within the next 1 hours. Please note this time frame is an estimate and may change.

Last night, while I was checking my emails I noticed that my Gmail’s embedded Google Talk IM Client was showing my chat buddies in a weird kind of way. Though usually, Gmail’s embedded IM Client organizes them alphabetically and by status, this time i could see all my contacts with gmail mixed up with my chat buddies. Maybe this way Google tried to tell us “Hey you! You could add this guy/gal as your chat buddy so you can chat online and make free internet calls with him/her“. I have to say I kind of liked that feature. Who knows? Maybe someday we will see that feature going live.

2. Use Gmail labels shortcuts. Mobile experience comes first for android operating system. With Gmail labels shortcuts, even if you are on the way running to catch the bus and you are wondering when your project deadline is, that John emailed you last night, you are one touch away from finding out when. Filtering your emails never was easier. All you have to do is press and hold in one of your home screens, then press to add shortcuts to your home screen and finally press the Gmail label. After that you will get a list of your system labels (Inbox, Starred, Sent, etc.) and of course a list of all your labels that you use everyday to filter, categorize and manage your emails. Finally, when you press the newly created gmail label shortcut you will be redirected immediately to a list of all your emails attached with that label.

3. Listen to the users. When you are about to download an android app from the app store you should always check the Comments. Just scroll down just a little bit and read what people are saying about that application. Don’t forget to also check the Rating. You may also view more application from the same developer to see what’s the overall quality of his/her applications.

4. Use Locale. Locale is one of the most promising apps in the Android market. It was one of the Top 10 finalists in the first Android Developer Challenge which took place in the summer of 2008. In a few words, Locale, lets you create situations specifying conditions under which your phone’s settings should change. For instance, you could set a situation that turns on the WiFi  when your are in a specific radius around your home or other WiFi spots so that you connect to that WiFi access points anytime you are around. Another possible situation, which I personally use, is the one I call “Energy Saver”. In this situation i have my phone’s display brightness level decreased to “2″, the wallpaper changed to another one and the auto-sync feature turned off during 8 pm and 7 am. Use your imagination and turn every feature of Locale into a handy tool.

5. Use the unlock pattern. I guess you wouldn’t like it if your e-mails, contacts, messages, photos, notes or even browsing habits were exposed, right? Well, using an android phone means that you carry a lot of sensitive data with you everywhere whether this is an important e-mail you received from a partner or an sms that contains password information for instance. So you better be careful the next time you leave your phone exposed to others. Another good practice is to disable the visible pattern while drawing it. This helps protecting your pattern from curious eyes. Even if you don’t have a sim password set, the unlock pattern is a good example for protecting your data.

6. Master the Sync. When it comes to using the Sync features of your android phone, the best practice is to enable both “Background Data” and “Auto-Sync” in the settings. By that you will utilize most of your phone’s capabilities. However there is a chance you might not want to have these two features enabled all the time. You could get an app to help you enable/disable connectivity to internet over 3G/EDGE/GPRS like APNdroid but in case these apps wont work with your telecommunications provider (i.e. Vodafone GR) you could set up a new empty Access Point Name (you will have to set a name in the APN field) inside Mobile networks settings and set this APN as your APN anytime you want to disable connectivity to internet over 3G/EDGE/GPRS.

7. Better WiFi settings. In case you have *unlimited* data plan or the limit of your data plan looks like a very distant number, there is a chance you are not an avid WiFi user when it comes to using your android phone. Instead, you could prefer sticking to the internet over 3G/EDGE/GPRS – which also saves more battery. If that is true, another option you should uncheck is the “Network notification” inside WiFi settings. By doing that your phone wont notify you anytime an open network is available in the area, which comes in handy when you forget your phone’s WiFi on.

8. 2G vs 3G networks. So, what do the options “Use only 2G networks” and “Use only 3G networks” do? Well, the first one, apart from saving battery it could also come in handy whenever you want to switch to a stable network connection without jumping from 2G to 3G and backwards depending to the network coverage. Similarly, the second option switches your phone to a high data transfer connection in case you need it.

Apart from that, Gmail introduced last night the contact chooser which allows you to scroll down your contact list in a pop-up window helping you remember all the people you want to include on your email. Just click on “To:”  when composing a message. And if you user Google Groups, you will be able to see your groups in the drop down menu.

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And secondly, if you haven’t noticed it, your Chat widget in your Gmail now has a scroll bar displaying all your chat buddies independently from your option on the size of chat list.