Google Wave extensions : Do More With Google Wave
As Google wave gets popular and increases its customer base , more additions will come on from Google’s
side. In continuation to some of the earlier posts on Google Wave , here is another one which provides extension list for Wave.
Wave extensions are a way to augment the functionality of waves and the wave client. The extensions are broadly categorised into two categories namely Robots and Gadgets.
Robots: Robots are applications which can be added to waves as automated wave participants. Robot extensions commonly automate tasks, but can also participate in the wave as a participant, interacting with the conversation based on their capabilities.
Gadgets: Gadget extensions provide a shared program which runs within the wave, and to which all participants have access.
The summary of differences between Robots and Gadgets are given as follows :
| Robot | Gadget |
|---|---|
| Runs on application servers (currently AppEngine) and interacts with the wave over a protocol. | Runs within the wave client itself. |
| Each robot may instantiate at most one instance per wave. Remember that a robot is like a participant on a wave, so each participant/robot is a unique instance, but a wave can have many participants/robots. | Each gadget may have multiple instances per wave, one for each participant interacting with the gadget. |
| Robots may modify a wave and perform the same operations as a human participant. | Gadgets are not able to modify a wave, and have limited visibility into the wave. A gadget is only able to detect changes in the wave’s participants. |
| Robots can modify a gadget. | Gadgets have no way to know that a robot exists, and thus are not able to modify a robot. |
ROBOTS
To use robots, add them as contacts , then add robot-contact to a wave
Chatbots
- Eliza – ogenex@appspot.com : An implementation of Eliza chatbot borrowed from NLTK
- Rude chatbot- notatory@appspot.com : Another chatbot borrowed from NLPT
- TooAngel Wave – tooangel-wave@appspot.com : it is a self learning robot that will respond to a reply in more humanoid way
Conversation
- BotURL – boturl@appspot.com : A URL lnker which replaces full URLs with shortened URLs.
- Calclbot – calcbot@appspot.com : This bot will perform in place calculations for simple mathematical expressions and allows users to use user defined variables.
- Flippy – flippy-wave@appspot.com : Turns text upside down.
- Shortee : changes chat lingo to full phrases like changes ‘c u later’ to ‘ See you later’.
- IPA bot – ipa-bot@appspot.com : Changes normal letters to special characters used for phonetics.
- Wikify- wikifier@appspot.com : Replaces specified markup text with a link to wikipedia or a description relevant to marked text.
Games
- Hangman – wavehangman@appspot.com : For playing hangman
- Roshambo – roshambowave@appspot.com : For playing Roshambo ( Rock/Paper/ Scissor)
Groups
- Groupy – groupy-robot@appspot.com : Robot to manage groups
Integration
- drop.io – mikeswaverobot@appspot.com- Creates a drop and puts the info into the wave whenever the robot is added as a participant
- Poppy – poppywave@appspot.com : Helps in bridging Google Wave onversations to email users outside the wave.
- Rssybot – rssybot@appspot.com : Turns Google wave into a rss reader.
- Tweety the Twitbot – tweety-wave@appspot.com : You can acess your twitter account.
- Wave-Email – wave-email@appspot.com : Provides an Wave extension which lets you to receive and send mails through Wave
Language
- Rosy Etta – rosy@wavesandbox.com : Translator with 40 language capapbility
Polling
- Polly the pollster – polly-wave@appspot.com : A bot used for Polling.
Search / Aggregation
- Dr Maps – dr-maps@appspot.com : Inserts a map associated with the address on a Wave
- Dr Weather – shiny-sky@appspot.com : Gives the weather for a city
- Embedded search results – wave-sandbox@appspot.com : Web and images searches inline
- Wavethingy – wavethingy@appspot.com : Searches amazon for DVDs and books , and gives the author a cut of any purchases made through the link
Utilities
- Bit.Iy bot – bitly-bot@appspot.com : shortens the URL using Bitly
- CountColon – countcolon@appspot.com : Adds text statistics to your blips ( words.lines etc)
- Natural Language Processor – knowledge-books@appspot.com : Adds blips with NLP analysis
- Nokar – lab2market@appspot.com : Has many features such as translation, image insertion , tweet insertion etc
- Smiley – smiley-bot@appspot.com : changes the smiley symbols to smiley images
GADGETS
To use Gadgets , once editing a blip , just click on green puzzle piece , and enter the url into the bottom text box
Utilities
- Bidder – http://wave-api.appspot.com/public/gadgets/bidder.xml : Simple auction
- Checky – http://wave-gadgets.appspot.com/checky.xml: Checklists with drag and drop
- Click me – http://wave-api.appspot.com/public/gadgets/hellowave.xml : Shows a button with a counter which increments a counter each time the button is clicked.
- HTML – http://wave-ide.appspot.com/html.xml : Embeds any html into the wave
- iWave – http://gadget.wave.to/iwave/iwave.xml : Allows you to create a profile on the wave to make it more personal. Uses facebook connect to retreive your details.
Games
- Connect 4 – sdunster@wavesandboxes.com : http://sdunster.com/wave.four.xml
- Floodlit – http://gadget.wave.to/floodlitgame.xml- 2 players race to fill the board with colours
- Sudoku – http://blah.appspot.com/wave/sudoku/sudoku.html : Play sudoku
Earlier Google Wave posts :
Share , View or Edit Google Docs in Google Wave : A step by Step Guide
Keyboard shortcuts, searches and making public waves in Google Wave




