The Google Gadgets API group formally introduced the beta program called “PubSub”. TechCrunch only recently mentioned PubSub as a “Google internal project” in an article about the other PubSub… Interesting, no?

Well the “internal project” is now external, in the form of a beta program that will allow Google gadgets to communicate with each other.

“What is “Gadget-to-Gadget Communication”, a.k.a. PubSub?

PubSub allows multiple gadgets on the same page to send and receive
data from each other. In other words, you can now build a gadget that
communicates back and forth with one another. This introduces a brand
new concept and strategy involved when writing gadgets. Information
is no longer constrained to fit inside a single gadget. Instead, you
can now split up various pieces of information amongst multiple
gadgets and allow them to communicate with each other to paint a
bigger picture. Gadgets now have the ability to be more closely
integrated with one another and present a network of information to
users. If users only care about one particular segment, they can
simply remove or minimize any gadgets containing extraneous
information that they don’t care about.”

Gadget to gadget communication is yet another indication of the resources that Google is giving to the gadget world and iGoogle.

There is some new documentation as well, both a help page and an example gadget in the Google Gadget API, although as it states in the announcement “*Note:* As a beta feature, documentation on PubSub is not currently
linked to from the Google Gadgets API developer guide or anywhere \” else.

Let’s look at some examples…

Another example use…

These examples are simple, but the possibilities of this “pubsub” beta are huge.

It was great to meet with some of the Gadget engineers at the Googleplex this week, I just wish I had known about this when I had