Cool Google Talk Gadget Features

January 27, 2008 by Ricardo Lee
Filed under: Google Talk, iGoogle 

I began using Gtalk only recently, because only a few of my friends and contacts use it. I began to see its potential when my brother from abroad contacted me through it. I also noticed that those few Gtalk friends I had were usually online, so I too began to use it frequently and invited some other friends to use it. This being said, my friends all agreed that the Google Talk is a lot more convenient to use than other instant messenger clients. And there is even a more-advanced version of Gtalk, which is the Google Talk Gadget. And like Gmail chat it doesn’t require any installation. All I have to do is add the Google Talk Gadget on my Personalized Homepage of Google. And as one thing leads to another, every time I open my iGoogle, I am automatically logged into Gtalk and into my Gmail account at the same time (since I also added the Gmail Gadget).

Early last year, Google added cool features which includes:

  • a “Popouts” system which will pop out your Google Talk once you click the link located at the uppermost right corner of the gadget.
  • additional button onto own your web page, like the one in the sidebar of The Google Maven. If you want to put the same button on your site, all you have to do is copy a code for the button and just paste it on your site’s HTML. When your visitors click this button, the Google Talk Gadget will be launched in a new window. Get the code here.
  • displays the title and thumbnail of a video in the chat window. These are shown when your Gtalk friends send you a link to a video. And you can even watch the video inside the chat window!
  • view photos from Flickr or Picasa Web Albums

Another feature, which I like most and was just recently added by Google, is the Group Chat. I can start a chat with one of my friends and if I want to include another, say about 2 or more of my friends, I just change the status to group chat then invite them to chat.

As an added bonus, Google Talk Gadget has also provided us with emoticons in 3 different skins, we can choose between the classic black-and-white, the round emoticons, or the rectangular emoticons for the ultimate chat experience.

Tags:

Comments

Tell me what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!