How to Embed a Web Page into Google Wave

Google Wave gadgets add increased functionality to Wave. The “<iframe>” gadget allows you to embed a web page into Google Wave.

This can be helpful if you want to share a website with participants in a wave without the extra step of having to click an external link outside of Wave. I also know some people will create a public wave around the topic of their website and then embed their website into the public wave as a form of sharing it with others.

In order to embed a web page into Google Wave, you’ll need to click the “Add Gadget by URL” button in the toolbar of the wave.

Unfollow, Archive, & Trash Explained

In Google Wave, you have a variety of choices for how you want to organize the waves you’re interested in and not interested in. It’s helpful to be able to make the distinction between unfollowing a wave, archiving a wave, and moving a wave to the trash.

Unfollow or Follow a wave

When you are added as a user to a wave or participate in a wave, you are set automatically to follow that wave. A followed wave is one that remains in your inbox and any updates to the wave are reflected in your inbox.

If you’re searching for public waves, and you find one that interests you, you can open that wave and read it without following the wave. In order to follow the wave you must have the wave opened and then click the “Follow” button in the toolbar of the wave.

Video: Exploring Maps in Google Wave

Google Maps has been powerfully integrated into Google Wave. Like everything else in Wave, maps can be edited and manipulated in real time and all other members of the wave will be able to see your changes instantaneously. Thus, the Maps gadget in Wave is useful for, again, collaboration; this time, you can share locations, routes, and points of interests, all inside the beautiful Google Maps interface. Watch the video below for a brief, complete rundown of the Maps gadget.

How to Use “Aunt Rosie” the Google Wave Translation Bot

Google Wave largely appeals as a collaboration tool. This is really helpful for businesses and organizations who need to brainstorm, communicate, and bounce ideas off of each other in real-time. Thankfully, Google Wave promises to have a variety of tools available to make collaborating as easy and natural as possible.

One of these tools is “Aunt Rosie” the translation robot. Aunt Rosie gives you the ability to communicate with someone who might even speak a different language than you. Whatever you type is translated into the language of your choice. Here’s how you can do it.

How to Create a Public Wave in Google Wave

As a new waver, one of the first things you might have done was search for public waves to join in and participate. A public wave is a wave that is open for anyone to join. Some are dedicated to listing your favorite recipes, others in order to play a public game of Sudoku and then others are created for intense philosophical and theological debate.

You too can create a public wave for people to join in on. It’s really easy to create your own public wave.

5 Things to Do When You First Get Google Wave

If you are lucky enough to get an invitation to Google Wave, you are probably pretty excited to get such a sought after prize, but now that you are logged in to Wave, what do you do now?

At a first glance in Google Wave, you’ll notice there is a navigation box in the top left corner of the interface, a contacts list in the bottom left of the interface, a listing of waves in the middle of the interface, and to the very right of the interface, waves are displayed.

Make Your First Wave

If you click the “New Wave” button at the top of the middle column, a new wave will appear in the right column. At the top of the wave, there is a “+” sign right by your name. If you click this, you can add more participants to the wave.

In the wave, you can add rich-text, pictures, maps, and other media. You might want to learn some helpful hotkeys and keyboard shortcuts too.

Google Wave Hotkeys & Keyboard Shortcuts

Hotkeys or keyboard shortcuts perform certain functions within Google Wave so you don’t have to take your hands off of the keyboard. These can really help speed up the way you work in Wave.

Here are some simple hotkeys and keyboard shortcuts that I’ve found very helpful as I’ve worked in Google Wave. You’ll want to use these.

Navigation Shortcuts

Up/Down Arrows – scroll through messages in a wave

Home – takes you to the first message in a wave

How to Add Twitter to Google Wave

You can even integrate your Twitter account into Google Wave by using a Twitter extension. It’s really easy. Here’s how.

First, you’ll need to add tweety-wave@appspot.com to your contacts.

Secondly, you’ll need to create a new wave and add Tweety to the wave. When you do this, you’ll want to make sure that your pop-up blocker is turned off because the Tweety extension will be added to the wave and a window will pop-up asking you for your Twitter login details.