20 Useful and Fun Google Tools

There's more you can do with Google than just search the web. You can also access tools like a calculator, random number generators, weather, nutritional information and much more. You can even play a variety of games.
Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Let's take a look at some useful and some just fun Goggle tools. 
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Some most of the time when you use Goggle, either by going to the Goggle Home Page or just typing in the address bar in Safari, you just want to get search results. But there are a whole bunch of Goggle tools that can come up if you search for the right things. For instance let's say you just want to get some random numbers. You can type random numbers and the little random number generator tool will come up. It will start with a minimum of 1, maximum of 10 but you can change that to whatever you want and then click Generate and it will generate a new number. So you can generate as many of these as you want. But there's some variations on this. For instance, if you type Dice Roll then you get this little die roller here and you can keep rolling and select a different type of die. You can add a whole bunch to it and roll them all at once. You can click here and add modifiers to do lots of different things. 
Another thing you can do is simply flip a coin. You type that and you get this coin flip here and after each flip you can just click flip again. 
You also can bring up a Timer tool by typing Timer. It starts here at a 5 minute timer. You can stop it and reset it and then start again. You can also click in here and it's going to try to autofill. But you can just type in whatever you want. So if you want to do 9 minutes types just type 900 and you get a nine minute timer and you can start it. There's also a Stop Watch here that you can start and stop. 
Now you can also use Goggle as a calculator. So type any type of formula into Goggle's Search, like that, and then Return. Notice how it is going to warn me here that I'm leaving this Stop Watch page. You'll get the result here. The result is going to be shown in this Calculator Interface. So you can continue to use the Calculator here to get various results by typing on the keyboard or clicking on these buttons. If you ever just want to get straight to the Calculator just type Calculator.
You can also do Conversions. So you could type something like this into Goggle: Say 5 miles in meters and you're going to get the result here and then it is going to take you this tool where you can do conversions of all sorts. 
Now if you like math stuff you may want to try typing a mathematical formula into Goggle Search, like sine of x and not only will you get some information here but you're going to get a graph for it generated by Goggle and you can do things like zoom in on it and out and such. You can do more complex things. So, for instance, x I'm going to use the caret symbol to square it plus y like that and guess what. I'm going to get a  3 dimensional graph here. 
One last numbers one. If you type in a large number and you type equals English like that, it's going to spell the number out for you. So that could be handy because you can Copy and Paste this or for some people they are not sure exactly how to spell out a combination of numbers like this. 
Now there's a lot of information that you can get from Goggle without having to go to a specific webpage. For instance, if I just type weather then I can get the local weather here. It's going to ask to use my location and I get this cool little bit of weather here at the top and it has even got some functionality in it. 
Another one is Color Picker and you get this color picker here. You can make adjustments and everything and get, say, the hex value for certain colors. 
You also can get Nutritional information. So type something, like this, and then type the word Nutrition after it. Sometimes you'll get information here at the top that comes from different websites. But on the right you get all this information from Goggle about the nutritional values of the item. Sometimes you can modify what's in there. So, for instance, here I can change and pick a specific item and get the information about it.
You can also get Dictionary definitions. Now sometimes these will turn up if you just type a word. But to make sure you get the dictionary definition first type the word Define and then colon and then the word, like that. You're going to get the dictionary definition right here. You can even get a pronunciation.
Now a new thing Goggle has added is a Grammar Checker. I find this is kind of hit or miss but let me show you one example that definitely works. I'll type something here that has a grammatical mistake in it. Now the idea here is sometimes you'll get a grammar checker automatically. But to make sure that you get it, supposedly, type grammar check. Then Return. You're going to get this grammar check here and it is going to underline the problem. Note that if I were to change this and have it be correct I get a green checkmark instead. Sometimes I've found that even typing grammar check doesn't bring this up though. 
On one more informational one. If you type Fun Facts into Goggle you'll get regular search results down here but you will get a fun fact at the top. You can hit Command R for refresh in Safari and it will give you another one. 
Now a musical one. You can type Metronome into Goggle and you'll get a metronome tool. You can use that to keep time, maybe while you're playing an instrument in front of your computer, and if you click on this tool here to go down you'll see there's a Tuner Tool as well. So you would type Goggle Tuner to get to this. This allows you to use your microphone and tune your guitar. 
Also if you type Rockmore you're going to get a Goggle doddle. More on that in a bit. This is actually something that allows you to learn how to play the Theremin.
Here's another one that could some in handy. The Apple Watch has this great little kind of breathing exercise thing. You can do that with Goggle on your computer. So you can type Breathing Exercise and you come up with this tool here that you could use to take a break. 
Similarly you can type Spinner and you get this spinning tool which allows you to choose a random number. It's another version of the random numbers I was talking about before except there is a switch here and it becomes a Fidget spinner that you can just kind of spin there on your computer screen. Handy if you're on a boring zoom call and you don't have anything with you that you can fidget with, you can just bring this up on another window. 
Now like this there are tons of games that you can play that Goggle provides. Type Solitaire and you get a little solitaire game that you can play. 
Now a lot of these are part of Goggle's Doodles. Those are things that appear on the Goggle Home Page for just one day to commemorate a special event or anniversary or something. If you type Doddles here then you'll get a link right there at the top for Goggle Doodles. You can just go to Goggle.com/Doddles and you can search all the past ones. So there are tons and tons of different little tricks and fun things and games and everything in here. If you type Doctor Who 50th then you're going to come up with the Doctor Who Fiftieth Anniversary game which is almost ten years old now and you  can play this little platform or puzzle game right here and have some fun. Another really good one is a more recent game called Champion Island and you come up with a bunch of these. These are pretty comprehensive games with lots of graphics and gameplay and all of that. 
Outside of Goggle Doodles if you were to search for Conway's Game of Life you get a definition about Conway's Game of Life which is an early computer game, all the back from 1970, that basically generates patterns based on a simple mathematical rule. You can read about it. It is a fascinating part of computer history. But in addition to that if you notice on the right side of the page it's actually simulating this game and you can just watch it as the pattern grows and grows. 
Now I want to show you one last game. This is actually a really hard one to get to but it is kind of interesting how you get there. Type Text Adventure and now you get a search result and there doesn't see to be anything here to play. But, what you can do at this point is go into the Developer Tools. You do that in Safari by having the Develop Menu turned On. So in Safari Settings make sure under Advanced you've got Show Develop Menu in Menu Bar and then you can go to Develop Show Web Inspector. Once you're in the Web Inspector switch to Consul which shows you messages produced by the webpage. From All go instead to Logs and you're only going to see Log in Messages. You'll see here that the last message presented is Would You Like To Play A Game? Type Yes and now you're going to get this game here that you can play. You can read the messages here. Ignore the code that is generated. Just read the dark black text and you can play this Text Adventure Game that is hidden inside the code of the Goggle Results for the term Text Adventure. 
Now there are a lot more things like this in Goggle Doddles. For instance you can find hundreds of different things. There is a lot more information you can get from Goggle that may popup on the right side like those nutritional facts. I hope this video gives you some that you can use right now and encouragement to explore to find more on your own. Hope you found this useful. Thanks for watching.
Comments: 2 Responses to “20 Useful and Fun Google Tools”

Sury
8 months ago
Great, Gary. I never knew Google could do so much. Thanks for opening this adventure.
LopezBill
Gary,
Thanks for yesterday's 20 Google Items. I'm amazed. Bill Scherer (aka LopezBill)
20 Useful and Fun Google Tools

Comments: 2 Responses to “20 Useful and Fun Google Tools”

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