Friday, January 25, 2008

iGoogle


iGoogle is a really neat way to creat a your own personal Web home page. It provides the standard Google search bar at the top giving you easy access to the Internet, but also alows you to customize the graphics and choose tools that best suit what you do most often. For my iGoogle, I have a pet tiger, links to the Web sites I visit most, a quick search box to Dictionary.com, a to-do list, local movie listings, a box to learn Shakespearian insults, and more. If you have family or friends abroad, you can add a "world clock" so you always know what time it is where they are. If you have a G-mail account, you can preview your inbox right from your home page!

You can go to http://www.google.com/ig and login if you already have a Google account, or you can sign up for one very easily. It will remember you every time you use that computer if you request it to. Again, no need to know code, just click on the "Add Stuff" link and go through the thousands of games and tools available. With one click, you can add any gadget to your iGoogle page.

To set this as your homepage in Internet Explorer, click on Tools > Internet Options then enter iGoogle's Web address under "Home page". You cannot change the home page of public computers on campus, but you can sign into iGoogle from any computer.

The library will be exploring options for creating library tools for iGoogle to make using the Snowden Library even easier!

1 comment:

Kate M. said...

I agree, Igoogle is very fun! The only thing I'm not crazy about though is the Google Reader widget. You can keep track of all of your non-syndicated blogs that way, but you still end up having to navigate away from that page to post comments. It would be nice if Google Reader somehow let you comment without having to leave igoogle...like I'm doing to post this comment. But maybe this comment isn't relevant anyhow, because you are only talking about igoogle.)