Hey everyone!

I'm happy to announce that we've recently completed a major upgrade to the existing 'scratchpad' gadget in our documentation. We've replaced it with the new version
here:http://www.google.com/apis/gadgets/gs.html#Scratchpad

The old scratchpad gadget was created in the hopes of making it easy for developers to experiment with gadgets. The old scratchpad allowed you to view/edit a gadget's XML and preview the gadget on the fly. It also contained links to popular gadgets that you could load into the scratchpad and modify. This has proven to be a great learning tool for developers.

The new version of the scratchpad is called Google Gadget Editor (GGE). Besides the change in title, we've added new features that we think will be useful to all gadget developers. All previous functionality from the old scratchpad has been kept intact with a few UI changes.

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Here's what's new:

-- Hosting

Yes, you can now edit your gadget XML and save it using GGE. To enable saving, you're required to be logged into your Google account. When you leave the page and come back, you can simply reload your saved gadget back into the editor and start working again. When you save your gadget, it's automatically hosted on our servers. GGE provides you with the link where you create an 'Add to Google' button, distribute it, etc. just like you would with any other gadget.

With the new save feature enabled, you can now create a new gadget, host it, and publish it all from within GGE!

-- Storing and Serving Files

In addition to gadget hosting, you can now upload files using GGE!

Gadgets frequently embed or reference other resources such as images, XML files, JavaScript files, CSS stylesheets, etc. Now you can simply upload them using GGE and reference them from within your gadget. In addition, you can use GGE to modify and save any text files you upload.

The ability to store and serve files using GGE is extremely useful because all uploaded files are hosted on Google servers. This relieves you of issues related to unreliable hosting and limited bandwidth in which you'll face with other hosting facilities. Instead, your files are reliably hosted with unlimited bandwidth for use anywhere inside your gadget.

-- New Editor with Syntax Highlighting

We want to maximize the use of GGE and make it a positive experience to build gadgets directly using the editor. To accomplish this, we've adopted the same style editor that's used by Google Mashup Editor (http://editor.googlemashups.com). The old scratchpad contained a simple plain text area that wasn't always easy to read. GGE, on the other hand, is equipped with syntax highlighting for increased code readability, and it also displays line numbers. GGE converts tabs into 2 spaces to conserve space and promote better code formatting.

By making the editor a bit smarter and more code-friendly, we hope to make it more fun to create and edit gadgets in GGE.

-- Modified UI

The UI is generally the same as the original scratchpad. However, we've added a new 'File' menu that contains commands for managing your files in GGE. These commands include 'Open', 'Upload', 'Save', 'Publish', and more. In the future, we may introduce additional menus as new features come along.

-- Publishing Made Easy

We've added a new 'Publish' command that allows you to easily submit your saved gadgets to the iGoogle directory. The 'Publish' submenu also includes commands for adding the gadget to iGoogle or to any other webpage using Google Gadgets For Your Page (GG4YP).

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More features are still in the works and we're constantly looking for ways to improve this tool. We're depending on *your* feedback and comments to help us scope out what the next set of features should be.

In particular, here's some things we'd love to know:

-- Scale of 1-5: How useful is GGE? -- Scale of 1-5: How intuitive is the new UI? -- Will you use GGE to write and submit gadgets? -- What features are most useful to you? -- What features are *not* useful to you? -- What additional features would you like to see? -- What limitations/annoyances did you encountered? -- Did you find any bugs?

Give GGE a spin and let us know what you
think:http://www.google.com/apis/gadgets/gs.html#Scratchpad

If you want to add GGE to your homepage, you
can:http://fusion.google.com/add?moduleurl=gge.xml

Have fun!!

Dann