Favorite Hidden Google Features?

fredtheshingle asks: "Google now seems to allow you the option to track your FedEx and UPS shipments! Search using the tracking number for either carrier and a page that offers to track the package appears. Simply follow that link and the carrier's current status report is displayed. Nice! So what's your favorite hidden Google feature?"

Spell Checker

[globalar]

I know I'm not alone here. Everytime I punch in a commonly misspelled word, dictionary.com, hyperdictionary, etc. is in the first couple links.

It's probably so often used, it's practically overlooked as feature.

Re:Reverse Phone Lookups

[rlowe69]

It's a little picky on format (you have to do [phone], not 5555554444 or 555-555-4444)

It's probably really picky because of the Google calculator [google.com]. The other versions of the phone number you have there are valid mathematical expressions.

Re:Fave "hidden" feature

[Anonymous Coward]

Because heaven forbid that you get caught if you do something illegal.

Seriously people, lighten up, you got nothing to hide, right.

Evil Cookies

[fm6]

What's the issue with cookies? Obviously, you want to block most 3rd-party cookies. But to uniformly refuse to use first-party cookies is silly. Unless you don't trust anybody to keep track of when you're visited their web site.

Oh, you don't want anybody keeping track of your activities and transactions? Then you can't use a credit card, you can't write checks, you can't ever show anybody your driver's license or social security card. Which means you can't legally hold a job in the U.S.!

I think cookie-phobia is a sort of an inverse example of what Bruce Schneir calls the Line-Item Fallacy of Security. He's refering to people who think the solution to their security problems is to just buy a bunch of magic technology that will solve their problems for them. But there also seems to be an attitude that some technology is tainted by the evil anti-security/anti-privacy boojum, and by avoiding it you also solve your security problems. Not true. As Schneir keeps saying, security is not a product, it's a process. And of course privacy is an aspect of security.

Cookies are presumed to be evil because they can be used to gather information. But you can't avoid giving out information. The best you can do is avoid giving information to people you don't trust.

What, you don't trust Google? Fine, then configure your browser to only allow cookie settings to trusted sites, and don't add google.com to the list. That way you can at least use Slashdot without logging in.

What, you don't trust Slashdot? Then why are you even using it? They're perfectly capable of tracking your activities on their site without using cookies.

You don't trust your browser to enforce your cookie policy? Then you're already screwed, cause you've been trusting your browser not to not use cookies at all.

It's not about what technology is evil and what isn't. It's about who you trust and who you don't.

Re:Fave "hidden" feature

[cicho]

I wish people would stop with the "you've got nothing to hide" argument. There are legal things which are immoral and there are moral things which are illegal. Then you must also ask "legal - where?" and "moral - where, when and to whom?"

Things once legal tend to become otherwise. If you feel you've got nothing to hide because you've never done anything illegal, you better pray that none of the things you've done ever becomes illegal. Or even immoral, especially if you might one day run for public office or be involved in a lawsuit.

Me having sex with my SO is legal. That doesn't mean I want information about it out in the open.

Me buying large numbers of left-wing books from Amazon is also perfectly legal, but could put me on a no-fly list if I ever travel to the US.

But above all - YOU will not decide what I should or should not hide, nor will any company or any government. That choice is mine.

Re:Fave "hidden" feature

[JoeBuck]

This is just stupid. X-No-Archive tells Google not to archive it, but anyone who gets a full Usenet feed the old-fashioned way is fully capable of archiving it, without any help from Google. Same with anything else on Usenet. You young 'uns seem to think that Usenet is a Google facility. The way Usenet works, there is a Path: header on every post that allows the post to be traced back to the point where it entered Usenet. The government does not need to subpeona Google to get a copy of everything on Usenet, all they need is to find peers who will feed the whole thing to them, completely in the open. If you post to Usenet, you are giving your posting to the world, including to the governments of the world.