Oct 27
Google just announced today (or yesterday?) that you can now have Google Voice’s voicemail replace your cell phone’s voicemail.
http://googlevoiceblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/google-voice-with-your-existing-number.html
What this means is you can now have all of your voicemails handled by one service provider. This feature only works with cell phones (most US carriers supported) but not landlines, VoIP or SIP phones yet.
I switched my iPhone voicemail over to Google Voice today for a trial period. I’ll see if I like it and report back. My first attempt wasn’t perfect – it took nearly four additional rings after I ignored a test call for Google Voice to pick up. A total of eight rings is way too much for most callers to wait to leave a message.
One important thing to note – you will most likely have to pay airtime for the call while it is RINGING and inside of your Google Voice mailbox. You’re not going to get something for free 
.
Apr 24
So I’ve spent a few days going over Google App Engine for Java. So far, I have to say, I’m impressed. Google has created a really cool service that lets anyone write a Java web application and host it on their multitude of servers. This is all for free, I might add. You have to be aware of a number of limitations including no threading and you’re limited to their data store for persistence. Once you get over that, you’ll see the advantage of it:
- Reliability
- Durability
- Security
- Scalability
So I got a little overwhelmed with the “ity” words, but it’s very appropriate. App Engine for Java will take the “cloud” by storm, I think. I have been looking for a Java web host and am always discouraged by the price and the limitation on memory and disk space. With Google, you can get a decently sized application running for free and they provide all the nuts & bolts.
Nice, Google. Computing in the cloud isn’t such a farce as I thought it was.
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