Google Talk Is Now Open For Public

Google recently announced that their flagship IM, Google Talk, is available for anyone to try. It used to be the case that only Gmail account holders can only try their Google Talk. But now they have opened that up for anyone with an email address. And the cool thing is you can login to Google Talk with any non Google accounts as well (of course, they say some of the features won’t work as expected if you don’t sign in with a Google account).

I really like the Google Talk client as I feel it is lightweight when compared to their competitor’s bloated IMs. Also its just so minimalistic and up to the task. I can’t wait for the day when MSN and Yahoo contacts can also be imported/collaborated with Google Talk. Microsoft have recently made a tie-up with Yahoo to collaborate MSN Messenger with Yahoo Messenger. Can they do the same with Google as well so that all 3 major IMs are collaborated to make the users life a lot easier? 

Can you guys here me? Hello!!!

Anyway’s, here is the link for you to download the latest Google Talk Instant Messenger.

Technorati tags: Google, Google Talk, Colloboration

Microsoft Releases Windows Live Writer 1.0 Beta Update

As soon as I started using the beta version of Windows Live Writer I was sold on this tool. It does what it says that it can do. And setting things up was pretty easy. Added to that is the cool thing of extending its functionality with plugins.

Now Microsoft has released an update to the earlier beta 1.0 version. Here are the list of enhancements in the latest update as per the Windows Live Writer team.

• Tagging support
• Support for Blogger Beta
• Categories are sorted by name and support scrolling, plus improved support for reading categories from your blog
• Improved startup performance
• Paste is enabled for Title region and TAB/SHIFT+TAB navigation between title and body supported
• Insert hyperlink added to context menu when text is selected
• Title attribute in Insert Link dialog
• Custom date support for Community Server
• Improved keyboard shortcuts for switching views
• Change spell-check shortcut key to F7
• Add ‘png’ to insert image dialog file type filter
• More robust image posting to Live Spaces
• Improved style detection for blogs 
• Fixed issues with pasting URLs and links
• Remember last window size and position when opening a new post
• Open post dialog retrieves more than 25 old posts

I especially like the new “Insert Tags” plugin which is a convenient way of inserting tags to your post. And you can pick and choose whom your tag provider should be. On top of that you can add any missing standard providers of your choice. That’s pretty neat. And so many other features that makes this tool from Microsoft stand out. Good job WLW team.

Get the latest Windows Live Writer Beta 1 Update here.

Technorati tags: Windows Live Writer, Windows Live Writer Beta 1, Windows Live Writer Beta 1 Update, Blogging Tool, Blog Writer, Best Blog Writer, Free Blog Writer