> yes-- this is the obvious design and we started with this originally.
>    Unfortunately, the problem is that authors would each pick
>    different names, and ultimately not be able to communicate with
>    each other.  In the long run, we wanted to develop a community
>    of gadgets that can actually communicate in practice, but where
>    the authors did not know about each other's gadgets.

> in this regard, Google is acting as a clearinghouse-- we understand
>    that this is role comes with the responsibility to listen carefully
>    to channel name proposals and quickly get these into production.
>    In the meantime, the 'testNNN' channels are available for testing
>    purposes.

> so: go ahead and flesh out your style name proposal, try to build
>    consensus with other gadget authors, and we'll add this to the
>    official list of channel names and values.

> hope this helps,
> adam
> Architect, Google Gadgets

> On Aug 31, 5:21 am, thampan <tony.tham...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > Hey,
> > I was wondering why you choose to control the channels ? A more
> > flexible approach could have been to let the publisher declare a
> > channel along with its properties and subscribers can subscribe to
> > particular publisher channels.

> > This way developers could come up with interesting gadgets more
> > easily. Like, there could be a gadget (style controller) which takes
> > user colour schema preferences as input and all the listeners can
> > update the style when style controller announces that the style is
> > changed.

> > regards,
> > Tony

> > On Aug 24, 4:52 am, "Dann (Google Employee)" <d...@google.com> wrote:

> > > Hey everyone!

> > > I'm proud to announce "Gadget-to-Gadget Communication", otherwise
> > > known as PubSub, which is a killer new beta feature that's currently
> > > available for you all to try out!

> > > ====
> > > 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.

> > > ====
> > > How does PubSub work?

> > > PubSub is a new framework which allows 'publisher' gadgets on iGoogle
> > > to communicate changes to 'subscriber' gadgets that have declared
> > > interest in those changes.  This is currently available only on
> > > iGoogle and publisher/subscriber gadgets must be on the same page.
> > > For a list of current issues and limitations, see more information
> > > below.

> > > Here's documentation on how to get to started:http://www.google.com/apis/gadgets/pubsub.html

> > > Here's an iGoogle tab you can add to quickly see some simple examples:http://www.google.com/ig/sharetab?source=stb&atr=PubSub&n_32=url%3Dht...

> > > *Note:* As a beta feature, documentation on PubSub is not currently
> > > linked to from the Google Gadgets API developer guide or anywhere
> > > else.

> > > ====
> > > What's a BETA-feature?

> > > It's an early release of a feature in order get valuable feedback from
> > > real gadget developers (all of you) about the current design along
> > > with some ideas on how to make it better.  We can't promise that you
> > > won't encounter any bugs since it's still a beta.  However, when any
> > > changes arise, we'll notify everyone about the change by posting it to
> > > this thread.  We're thrilled to hear your opinions on the design as
> > > well as any creative ideas on how to use it.  If you have any
> > > questions or comments, please let us know.

> > > In the meantime, here's the current list of limitations and known
> > > issues:
> > > -- Need more practical examples.  Coming soon.
> > > -- Does not work in Safari.  Works correctly in Firefox and IE.
> > > -- Only works in iGoogle.  Does not work on third-party websites or
> > > other container pages such as Google Desktop.
> > > -- Only available to type="html" and type="html-inline" gadgets.
> > > -- Does not work consistently when multiple inlined (type="html-
> > > inline") "subscriber" gadgets exist on the same page in iGoogle.
> > > -- Moving (drag/dropping) a "subscriber" gadget to a different
> > > position in iGoogle creates an error.  PubSub ceases to work
> > > afterwards.
> > > -- The "finance_symbol" channel described in the documentation is
> > > currently broken.
> > > -- Publisher gadgets cannot pass empty strings to subscriber gadgets.
> > > -- JavaScript error is sometimes thrown when loading gadgets on
> > > iGoogle.
> > > -- Browser 'Stop' buttons sometimes have strange flickering behavior.

> > > ====

> > > As always, please reply back with any feedback or comments you may
> > > have.  We'd love to hear from you!

> > > Have fun!

> > > Dann