Gmail encryption/signing

I spoke too soon as this signed email does not verify correctly. Google why can't we get this right?

GMail part deux

I haven't noticed a lot of changes with the new GMail interface that has been recently delivered, which for the most part is a decidedly good thing. However, I decided to test out Seahorse's Epiphany plugin with the new plain text entry box and was delighted when my test email was delivered and the signature was good and the decryption didn't have a problem with the word wrapping. This was a major thorn in my side; preventing me from using signatures with my sent mail. Thank you to whichever brave Googler purposefully or inadvertently fixed this featurebug.

Also, I would like to join the band wagon in thanking the crowd over at Nokia and Maemo for accepting my application for a discounted N810. It will probably lead to an increase in my Verizon tax, but will be worth it.

Google MyMaps

I've really been digging the new MyMaps feature of Google Maps. I even started working on a MyMap version of my university. However, I have a few suggestions/requests that would make this product even more useful for such a large and complicated area.

• Allow showing and hiding "overlays" based on the same color. Also, allow a key for what each colored area means. (Residence Halls, Academic Buildings, Parking Lots, etc.)
  
• Allow showing all areas and points of interest at once and not just those in the order they were created. Possibly allow sorting of the items allowing non-linear creation. (For instance, all buildings should be shown with their labels all of the time when the buildings overlay is shown)
  
• In their blog post, Google indicates making your map public includes it in the search results, but that doesn't appear to be happening at present. (For instance search for "googleplex building 43" which is clearly marked on their example map of the googleplex. Also searching for "Clemson Crew Boathouse" doesn't return my campus map or this one.

I think this product has a lot of potential and makes it easy to get directions for places that don't necessarily have physical addresses, like the boathouse, but I'd like to see a little more functionality for "power cartographers".

Google RFE

If anyone at Google is bored and needs ideas for their 20% time, look no further!

• Add the ability to poll confirmed guests to events in Google Calendar. This would be useful when ordering sandwiches or other food items for meetings or deciding where to go out to lunch.
• In the interest of indexing and making all information available, Google could run an OpenPGP key server that synchronizes with the key server network. When searching for a name with the main search app, a key could be returned as a search result. In GMail, signatures of messages could be verified and a UI element could be presented to the user.
• Add Google Checkout to Google Apps for Domains. This would allow groups to sell merchandise, collect money for events and trips and accept donations. Perhaps in the interest of not being evil have reduced or no fees for confirmed non-profit organizations as long as they use Google Words on their Google Pages site.
  

Those are a few of the ideas I have at the moment, but rest assured if I see any of them implemented I'll post more. :)