Google Calendar Labs and our first Gmail Labs graduate

Over the last year, Gmail Labs has let Apps early adopters try out a range of experimental instantly translating emails in other languages to undoing send on a potentially regrettable email, Gmail Labs provides a home for features that aren't quite ready for prime time, and gives the Gmail team an opportunity to get users' feedback on different features, quickly iterate on feature designs, and see what's popular with users. One feature that's been popular with users is about to graduate from Gmail Labs today: Tasks.

Using Tasks no longer requires enabling from the Labs tab. Now, just click "Tasks" under "Contacts" in the left nav of your Gmail account. To learn about the latest updates to Tasks, check out the Gmail team's announcement.

Given the success and popularity of Gmail Labs, we're now making Labs available in Google Calendar. Google Calendar Labs will not only make it possible for us to release experimental Calendar features early and often to users, but the new Calendar API will also let Google Apps enterprise customers extend calendaring capabilities in highly specialized and custom ways that meet the needs of their business and employees.

For Apps domains that have the "Turn on new features" option checked in the Google Apps Control panel, users can see the new Labs page in "Settings" upon logging into Google Calendar. Today's launch of Calendar Labs includes six new features, and as with Gmail, there is a feedback link to discuss these features and suggest new ones.

Both Tasks and Google Calendar Labs will be rolling out to Google Apps domains throughout the course of the day, so if you don't notice these features now, you should see them later today.

Posted by Ken Norton, Calendar Product Manager, Google Apps team

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