James Beswick - Google Apps Express: The Fast Way To Start Working in the Cloud

Google Apps is a comprehensive suite of applications built upon the technically sophisticated Google infrastructure. Yet despite the complexity behind the scenes, the speed and simplicity of using the products sets it apart from its desktop counterparts. There are millions of Google Apps users in the world, but this is a small number compared to how many businesses, groups or organizations could substantially improve their productivity and reduce costs by using the platform.

This book is about trying it out which, by the way, is about as informal as it gets when looking at technology, but its a core idea at Google. Their engineers basically look at problems, take user suggestions, and try a range of different approaches to see what works. The ones that arent so great get retired (remember Google Lively?), the ones before their time are semi-retired (Google Wave), and the hugely successful ones become production-ready products, such as Google Apps. This is why so many Google products are described as beta unlike traditional software, theyre continually refined and improved while in a production environment.

Obviously the beta approach isnt the most popular in corporate IT departments, and is certainly not a concept fully-embraced by many in the technology community, though its central to the Google method. The benefit of taking this informal approach is that it leads to iterative improvement, so that rather than building the final product from scratch based upon a prediction of what a customer wants, you build something that roughly approximates it, and then refine the product based upon user feedback.

The great part is that you can see how well Google Apps works for you without cutting any checks, setting aside any hardware, or really spending very much time at all. Its a great opportunity to see how good a fit this platform will be for your organization before you make any sort of commitment. Consequently, Ive written this book for the entrepreneur who wants to get Google Apps working in the fastest way possible. As we delve into the different parts of the suite, you can sign up for services for free and test-drive each application to see if it will improve how you currently do things. You also have the choice of using as much or as little of the Google Apps suite as you need, as well see in subsequent chapters.

Unlike many technical guides, I dont investigate every feature and button extensively. There are several reasons for this, the main one being that Google Apps software changes regularly, rendering any attempt to document it outdated fairly quickly, and also there are many useful and undocumented features which warrant more explanation than the simple ones. Rather than describe each part slavishly (details of which can be found in Googles excellent online help), Ive focused on the less obvious tips and tricks that often take a few months to discover. Also, since I cant predict how you intend to use this software, Ive created fictional scenarios that illustrate possible use-cases. And from my experience in helping companies deploy Google Apps, Ive included Frequently Asked Questions in every chapter to cover some of the issues that tend to reappear over and over.

Much of the journey here involves rolling up your sleeves and trying things out dont worry, you cant really break anything, but you can discover new and interesting ways of being more productive. This technology is founded on a relatively new paradigm where theres no installed software on your machine, and collaboration and teamwork are as important as the work itself.

In terms of getting Google Apps into your organization, you may find that one of the great challenges is social rather than technical. Trying to spur users into experimenting with new tools can be a challenge, and theres is a natural reluctance (and arguably healthy skepticism) to new technology when the old technology seems to work just fine. But I think this time its different. Google Apps is used by a growing number of individuals, companies, school groups, universities, church groups, Fortune 500s and start-ups. It is based upon a new way of looking at software, at group collaboration and the Internet.

In the next 10 chapters, I want to show you that not only will Google Apps save time and money, but the new model is nothing short of a revolution in the way we use software. Looking back in a few years, it will be clear that this was the starting point for a major change in software development and usage, and most major companies producing applications will trend in the same direction. So apart from getting in at the ground floor of this revolution, more importantly, it may well just be the most exciting upgrade you ever perform, and the first time your colleagues have used software that truly helps you work together.

At first, just a handful of employees at Sanmina-SCI began using Google Apps for tasks like e-mail, document creation, and appointment scheduling. Now, just six months later, almost 1,000 employees of the electronics manufacturing company go online to use Google Apps in place of the comparable Microsoft tools. We have project teams working on a global basis and to help them collaborate effectively, we use Google Apps, says Manesh Patel, chief information officer of Sanmina-SCI, a company with $10.7 billion in annual revenue.