The Google Stuff

FAQ - General
What is Google?
A web/internet/www search engine. Currently the most important and most widely used spidering search engine.
What's a Google?
A "googol" is a number - 10 to the power of 100. 1 followed by 100 zeros.
Who uses Google?
Google Zeitgeist
How do I get my site listed in Google?
Google is a crawler based search engine, spiders/bots crawl the web looking for sites to add by following links from sites currently in their database. There is no need to submit, ever. You can fill out the form on the Submit Your Site to Google page. I don't think it helps or hurts you to submit.
:::TIP::: Placing a link to your site from an often crawled existing site with a high PR (PageRank)can get your site indexed as quickly as 24 hours. Do not remove the link until you have received other links - your site could drop out of the index.
:::TIP::: The exact URL matters. http://www.thewebstuff.com and http://thewebstuff.com can have different results and different PageRank.

FAQ - Google Glossary
Google Bombing : manipulating Google to return a particular site in response to searching on an unrelated search term. (example: filling the web with references to the term waffles and the JohnKerry.com website.)
PageRank or PR :
Google's PageRank explanation
The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine
by Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page
The PageRank Citation Ranking: Bringing Order to the Web
by Lawrence Page, Sergey Brin, Rajeev Motwani and Terry Winograd
FAQ - Google Search
Are searches case sensitive?
All searches are presumed to be in lower case.
FAQ - Google SEO
How do I check my site PageRank value?
Download the Google Toolbar for Windows
Find out your Google PageRank Online
Look at the Google Directory (from dmoz.org - Open Directory Listing) listing for a small green bar at the right
What does Google advise?
Google Information for Webmasters
Guidelines : principles and guidelines on what to do and not do.
Facts & Fiction : dispelling the myths.
SEOs : what to know before hiring a search engine optimizer.

Google Penalties
Google penalizes sites for infractions. Noone knows all of the infractions nor all of the corresponding penalties. A site may lose one or more points of PageRank, a measure of the site's importance. A loss of all PageRank (0) is a pretty sure sign that the site has been penalized. A new site may show a PageRank of (0) while it is being indexed initially. A gray bar on site's PageRank is a serious penalty - and may even affect sites linking to the penalized site. A site may be dropped in position slightly or drastically, may be banned or dropped completely from the Google index. Penalties are typically for 1-3 months, and if you correct the offense(s) you will be re-indexed. In rare offenses a ban is permanent. If you are penalized, correct the problem(s), then e-mail webmaster@google.com with the subject line "reinclusion request". Include an explanation of your mistakes and what you have changed to rectify the site.

Avoiding Google Penalties
Some things that incur a Google penalty:

1. Violations of Google's Search Engine Terms of Service.
2. Link Farms
3. Hidden Text
4. Duplicate content
5. Doorway pages
6. Heavy use of keywords, that clearly do not belong in the context of the web page
7. Obvious over-optimization of site

Google Tools
Blogger : Express yourself online
Code: Download APIs and open source code
Desktop Search: Search your own computer
Hello : Instant message your pictures to friends
Keyhole : plore the world from your PC
Maps : powerful, user-friendly mapping technology–including business locations, contact information, and driving directions–to anyone searching for results in the United States, Canada, and the UK (more locations coming soon).
Picasa : Find, edit and share your photos
Sitemap : Google Sitemaps is an experiment in web crawling. Using Sitemaps to inform and direct our crawlers, we hope to expand our coverage of the web and improve the time to inclusion in our index. By placing a Sitemap-formatted file on your webserver, you enable our crawlers to find out what pages are present and which have recently changed, and to crawl your site accordingly
Toolbar : Add a search box to your browser
Translate : View web pages in other languages
Google Web Accelerator

Third Party Online Google SEO Tools
Google Dance Tool
Find out your Google PageRank
Google Rankings
Future PR lookup
Keyword Density Tool
RankPulse!Tracks Google Search Rankings for 1,000 keywords. Shows Google fluctuations and changes to algorithms.
Google Watch Tool (Dance)
Digital Point Keyword Tracker

Google SEO Forums
SEO Chat Forums Google
Webmaster World
User Support Discussion Forum : Find answers and discuss Google services in our Google Groups discussion forum.
WebmasterBrain Google Forum
WebProWorld Forum
Group: alt . internet . search-engines
Sitepoint Google
I Help You Google

Google IPO
Register for IPO : Prospective investors register to bid on this website.
Venturpreneur

Google Detractor Resources
Google Watch

Google Resources
Google Quick Reference Search Guide : by Peachpit PDF File
Google Site Map
Unofficial Google Weblog
Directory(DMOZ) list of Google resources
Google Weblog

GMail Resources
Search available usernames at GMailster
GMail Utilities : Nice list of links to GMail tools and utilities.
GMail Skinning

MISC
Google USPTO Filing
HousingMaps : Craigslist-GoogleMaps combo site