Six ways Google Wave will change your business, career and life

Recently, Google announced their most ambitious project today called Google Wave . According to Google, Wave is “how email would be if it was invented today.”
If you have not yet taken the time to watch the hourly video about Wave , then I would recommend that you do it today.

What's the point ?

I think there are at least six reasons why Wave will have a big impact on you. However, this and all the following statements are based on the massive use of technology. If no one uses it, then obviously it will not be able to change the world. But I'm pretty sure that Wave will be able to gain universal acceptance based on these factors:

1. Google has a worldwide audience.
2. Google has money to promote Wave and promote its benefits.
3. There is a greater financial gain in more efficient work. People using Wave will be able to work faster, it will leave behind those who get stuck on the good old SMTP.
4. Wave is open-source (more on this below). If you want, you can run Wave on your own internal corporate network without sending a single byte of information to Google.
5. You can run it in the cloud, which will reduce internal IT costs.

Now I want to explain why I think that Wave will have a huge impact on you and your business.

1. Extensions

Google allows you to increase the capabilities of Wave by writing Wave extensions . They are almost identical to Firefox plugins and are divided into two areas: robots and gadgets. Here is a description from the site of Wave extensions:

1. A robot is an automated subject in a wave. Robots are applications that run in the cloud and can change the state inside the wave. The robot can read the content of the wave in which it participates, modify its content, add or remove participants in the wave, create new impulses and waves. The robot takes certain actions in response to events. For example, a robot can publish wave content to a blog and update a wave with user comments. Check out the robot API review and the robot creation guide .
2. The gadget is a small application that runs on the client. The gadget belongs to the wave, and all wave members have the same gadget state. The only events that the gadget reacts to are changes in the state of its object and changes in the composition of the wave participants (for example, someone has joined or left the wave). The gadget has no effect on the wave itself. Wave gadgets are usually not full-fledged applications, they are simple add-ons that make a new type of communication available. For example, a wave can include a sudoku gadget that will allow wave participants to compete and determine who will solve the problem first. Here is a guide if you are interested.

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So why is Wave extension so important? I am sure that developers and designers will be able to sell extensions to their customers or to a wider audience, perhaps this will occur in the framework of a special extension store (Extensions marketplace). This suggests a large potential source of new revenue, of course, it will contribute to the massive use of Wave.

2. Embed API

Google has created a wide-ranging API for Wave, but one of the most interesting parts is the ability to embed Wave on any web page. Here is a great example of how it is possible to use in blogging. You can create a wave and post it on your blog. Then, when at any time someone leaves a comment on your blog post, it will appear as an answer to your wave in your Wave client - you do not need to visit the site.

This is a trump card, embedded waves eliminate the need to physically visit the site in order to interact with it. This is the foundation, and it is very interesting - to change the way we are now interacting with blogs and content.



Why is the embedding API for Wave important? This puts content at the forefront, and it becomes much easier to reach it. If you really understand this and adopt these advantages, you will become much more efficient in reaching your audience.

3. Interaction

The separation between documents and email will be completely eliminated from Wave. This will happen because the wave can be edited by more than one person. An example is making notes during a meeting. How it can work:

1. I am creating a wave with the name “Website Notes”
2. I add other people from the congregation as wave members.
3. Each of the participants of the wave can make notes simultaneously.
4. After the meeting, everyone receives a list of notes.

An additional advantage is that people can communicate during a meeting by creating private responses to notes right in the wave. The creator of the wave can decide whether or not to make this chat visible to other participants.

4. Open Source

Google does not intend to own Wave. They have open source technology and created Wave Federation Protocol . A brief explanation from Google:

Wave Federation Protocol is a protocol for exchanging waves between Wave providers.
Yes, between Wave providers: everyone can raise a Wave server and interact through it, just as anyone can start their own SMTP server. Wave protocol is open to change by the community in order to jointly improve the process of sharing information.
In order to help potential Wave providers, we plan to launch a high-quality open source implementation of the Google Wave client and server, as well as provide open endpoints in the federation by the time users start to access Wave.
This means that you can either use Wave hosted on Google servers, or hosted on your server, without the slightest interaction or exchange of information with the Google server.

This is completely different from Microsoft Exchange Server, and even from Google Apps (which you cannot host on your own server).

5. Google Web Toolkit (GWT)

Wave is written entirely in the Google Web Toolkit . GWT allows you to write HTML 5 web applications in Java, which are then compiled into optimized JavaScript. If you want to know more about this, then watch this video explanation .
I have always been wary of auto-generated code, but I think this example may be the exception to the rule (you can verify this - the provided HTML is available and compatible with the standards). All you need to do is look at the Wave demo and then realize that GWT is really powerful.
What does this mean for you? This means that if you are a web developer, then you should seriously look at the GWT and the potential benefits of this technology. Java programming gives you all the traditional advantages of breakpoints and the ability to step through your code.
Here is a plugin for Eclipse if you are interested.

6. "Rewind"

The wide interaction that becomes possible with the help of Wave, in reality, can embarrass someone who has been added to the wave after a lot of redcattings and responses. Enter in the search engine 'Wave Playback'. The best way to understand what this function is is to watch a video about the Wave presentation from 13 minutes .
This feature allows you to view, step by step, all changes in a wave over its entire existence.

What do you think about it?

Obviously, we think Wave is an important technology, but what do you think about it? We would love to hear your comments below.

If you are interested, here are two more videos that are worth watching:

1. Co-Editing : A short video that explains parallel control and real-time change in Google Wave.
2. Natural Language Processing : A short video that explains how Google uses a huge database of search queries to implement spell checking.