14 DAY TRIAL // Among the things unveiled today at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco are Google's Web Elements, which allow users to easily incorporate into their web pages various services like Google Maps, Google News feeds and YouTube videos. This could be done before, of course, but now it is as easy as copy/paste.
"Google Web Elements bring Google products to people's web pages using copy and paste," said DeWitt Clinton, technical manager of Google's developer relations team. "We've seen this for years with YouTube videos, with AdSense. But what we've done with this launch is do this across a broader range of products."
In essence, adding one of these features to your site should be as easy as embedding a YouTube video. Google's Custom Search Blog posted an example of how to embed the new Custom Search element. With it users will be able to search without leaving the web page. There are two ways of creating a Custom Search element; either with the Custom Search element wizard or by selecting it from the Custom Search control panel if you already have other custom searches set up.
The wizard can be found in the control panel, and it will automatically extract the relevant search engine information as you click trough it. After you are done you can preview the search results and the code you need to copy and paste to your site. The control panel has an updated Get code tab with a new option that you can also use to generate the new element code. The Custom Search element is designed to make it easier for users to have their own custom search but it is still very customizable being built on Google's developer APIs.
The introduction of web elements should make it easier for users to customize their site with Google services. There are eight web elements at the moment: Calendar, Custom Search, Maps, News, Presentations, Spreadsheets and YouTube News.