Reactive Software Blog » Google

Understanding Google Communications Strategy

Eugene — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 19:25:38 +0000

Google’s email strategy with it’s Gmail is clear but what about voice? It is not very clear for someone outside Google what the plans are. Google Talk, the text and voice chat application has not been updated for ages; Gizmo5, another PC chat client, has been purchased Google; Google Voice (ex Grand Central) opened it’s doors to the public in the US, etc.
I have been observing what moves Google has been taking in the last couple of years and I think I can understand where Google is heading in the voice and communications space.

Google Voice - the communication platform

Google Voice (ex Grand Central), together with Gmail will form the basis of the future Google communications offering. Apart from replacing your telephone provider it will also be the base on which other communication applications are to be built. Google Talk, Google Chat (Voice and Video Chat plugin), Gizmo5 and others will all be based on this platform.

Google Talk and Google Chat, Google Talk Gadget (sometimes called: Video and voice plug-in, Video chat plug-in)

Google Talk desktop application hasn’t been updated for ages. The GTalk installation distributive does not have support for the latest Windows Vista and Windows 7. Google Talk team has not been blogging about the desktop application for more than a year. Google Talk Labs has been announced in June 2008 but we haven’t seen any updates since then.
In contrary, Google Chat, short for Google voice and video chat plugin (web version of Google Talk) has been getting a lot of attention. Google Talk blog is full of new feature announcements and tips.
From these observations one would conclude that Google decided to drop the development of the desktop version and dedicate GTalk team to the web plug-in. Why would they do that? Because there is no point to re-invent the wheel. Google already has a desktop app for Windows, Mac OS and Linux since they purchased Gizmo5. Gizmo5 is far more sophisticated and is backed up by the right infrastructure that could be successfully merged with Google Voice services.

Gizmo5 - Skype killer

Google filled the missing part of the puzzle with the acquisition of Gizmo5. Gizmo5 has all the necessary functions and features to directly compete with Skype. Together with Google Voice this extended offering will beat Skype - there are many tasty features that Google Voice has and Skype doesn’t.

Impact?

Over the next few years we should see Google Voice and Gizmo5 merged into a single service. The service will become available in more countries gradually opening its’ doors to users from around the globe.
Skype, current monopoly in VoIP services (currently most people use Skype to make PC-to-phone calls), will start losing share to their new competitor - Google Voice + Gizmo5.

A little update for Password Recovery for Google

Eugene — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:18:02 +0000

Our Gmail password recovery tool called Password Recovery for Google has been updated today. This tool recovers lost or forgotten passwords for Gmail accounts from various Google applications such as GTalk, Google Desktop and others (follow the link at the bottom to read more).

We have been getting numerous bug reports about the application crashing after a user has clicked on the Recover Password button.
We have pinpointed and removed the bug that causes this so you can now download the fixed version.

Watch this blog as we will be releasing a major update to Password Recovery for Google in the coming weeks.

Gmail Password Recovery - room for improvement!

Eugene — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:48:50 +0000

As stated on our program pages, we regularly test our software for compatibility.
Gmail Password Recovery needs an update on the following sides:

Add support for Gmail and Google passwords stored in new Firefox 3. It looks like Firefox password manager changed storage location every time the new version was released
Add support for Google Calendar Synch
IE6: there’s no need to update the algorithm for the new Internet Explorer 6. The current algorithm recovers these without a problem

(more…)

Gmail Password Recovery - St.Valentines update

Eugene — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 22:29:29 +0000

We’re happy to release a major update that indeed makes the program the best of its’ kind in terms of recovering your Google passwords. If a Google password is saved on your PC by one of the applications that use Google services the program will find and show this password.

What’s been added:

Support for Google Desktop password decryption (CryptProtectData algorithm is used to store the encrypted password)
Support for Google Photos Screensaver password decoding (Google Picasa Screensaver) (CryptProtectData algorithm is used to store the encrypted password)
Support for decoding passwords from various Firefox extensions that use Google accounts: Gmail Manager passwords, Gmail Checker passwords, Webmail Notifier passwords, Gspace passwords & Gmail Notifier passwords (not to be confused with a stand-alone Gmail Notifier application that is supported already)

Fixes:

Decryption algorithm now supports Firefox 2.x.
During an upgrade from Firefox 1.x to Forefox 2.x sometimes signons2.txt file is added without migrating the data from signons.txt. In that case signons.txt is left without usage on your PC and you don’t even suspect your old data is still there (Firefox shows only signons2.txt if it exists). Gmail Password Recovery shows passwords from both signons.txt and signons2.txt

Let us know if you’re running a blog and wish to review the new version. We’ll give you a code for the review.
Links:

Gmail Password Recovery - still room to go!

Eugene — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 19:14:07 +0000

Although we state that our Gmail Password Recovery is possibly the best tool on the net to recover any Gmail passwords stored on the system, the tool could have been even better.

As part of our continuous testing cycle to make sure our tools support the latest releases of the programs we have discovered some bugs and features that could be nice to have fixed in the new versions of Gmail Password Recovery:

The Firefox password recovery does not work on the recent Firefox version 2 and above.
It would be great to have the Gmail Password Recovery supporting Firefox Gmail-related Add-ons such as support for:
- Gmail Manager passwords
- Gmail Checker passwords
- Gmail Notifier passwords (not to be confused with a stand-alone Gmail Notifier application that is supported already)
- Gspace passwords (uses Gmail as a remote storage space)
- Webmail Notifier passwords
Support for Google Desktop passwords
Support for Google Screensaver passwords (access to Picasa web albums)

We’ll be releasing new versions to cover the fixes described above in the coming weeks, so watch out for updates!

Links:

Google Talk Password Recovery in the news

Eugene — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 21:44:27 +0000

Merry Christmas to you all!

Just wanted to say thanks to these guys who have announced the new version of Google Talk Password Recovery in their blogs:

There has been a substantial amount of downloads from these sites. Thanks a lot chaps!

Original GTalk Password Recovery description:
Google Talk Password Recovery is a utility for finding and decrypting Google Talk, GMail and Picasa passwords that are stored on your computer with a click of a button! This password decoder works when “Remember Password” checkbox is ticked in GTalk instant messenger. Passwords from multiple profiles can be recovered, all versions of Google Talk are supported. This password decoder will also find a saved password from Gmail Notifier & Picasa. Google services passwords from Firefox and Internet Explorer are recovered too. This is possibly the best password decrypter for Google passwords that you can find on the internet!

Links:

How to change Gmail password

Eugene — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 00:21:33 +0000

After analysing what our website visitors look for when they come to our site we have come up with a series of new pages/articles that offer solutions to the questions the visitors were trying to solve.

So, How to change Gmail password?

We have written a specific page on change Gmail password procedure.

Google Password Recovery update - Picasa recovery added

Eugene — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 08:20:19 +0000

After discovering that Google Account information (login and password) are stored by Picasa2 (current version), we have decided to update the Google Password Recovery to version 1.07.07.07. The new upgraded version supports recovery of passwords stored by Picasa2.

We keep our promise - our recovery tools are probably the most sophisticated on the net - Google Talk Password Recovery is a good example of that. If any Google Account password is stored on your PC, Google Password Recovery will find & recover it!

Some details about the encryption method used by Picasa2 (as our systems programmer tells us): The password is encrypted/decrypted using a unique key through the RC1 encryption algorithm. The unique key is produced by making SHA1 hash of the Picasa Web Albums username.

One thing, which we thought was not the best practice from Google though - Picasa version information is not stored in the registry. Instead, it’s directly embedded into the executable.

Links: