Google’s latest improvement now allows users to save bookmarks to specific Google services directly on the desktop of their iPhone as icons. Rather than stand-alone applications, however, these are just links to the web-based services. Also, ever mindful of how fast its services are, Google has picked up the pace a bit.

I am glad Google took this step to speed up the time it takes to reach certain Google services. Previously, you had to open a link to Google.com. Once that page loaded, you could use the tabs at the top of the page to jump to the Calendar, Gmail, Reader and More screens.

Now, if you want to go straight to Google Reader — or any over the others — you can jump there from your iPhone’s home screen. As long as you are signed in to your account, it will bring up your information right away. Google writes:

“We’ve created cool new icons for all the applications. Simply go to www.google.com in your browser, tap on any of the application tabs, click the ‘+’ button, and select ‘Add to Home Screen.’ The icons will appear on your iPhone Home Screen allowing you to go directly to the application with a tap of your finger.”

It’s simple to set up, but I am still disappointed that Google has not created on-board applications for the iPhone that provide more robust features than those that are available via the online versions.

Google also says it has sped up page load times for the main search site:

“At Google, improving the speed of our applications and user experience is a top priority. The new Google.com for the iPhone browser now loads twice as fast as before — and not just over 3G or Wi-Fi but also EDGE. We’ve optimized the page for fast searching, while still providing easy access to other Google applications. We also improved the user interface so that there’s more room on the page for search results.”

I timed it. The home screen loads in 6 seconds via EDGE, 4 seconds via 3G, and 3 seconds via Wi-Fi. The expanded real estate on the the search results page is also nice to have, as you can view more results at one time.

Source: Google Mobile Blog

Today marked the official launch of the Opera Mobile 9.5 beta browser. I have been waiting for this beta program for a long time now, and as soon as the beta became available, I rushed to the Opera web site to download the browser.

From today’s press release, we know that Opera Mobile 9.5 beta now defaults to page overview mode, allowing the user to view the entire Web page and instantly recognize the Web site. With panning and zooming options, the user is able to focus on specific page content. Opera also introduced a new user interface for easier navigation.

Here’s a list of some of the improvements you’ll notice over Opera Mobile 8.65:

1. Faster – Opera Mobile 9.5 beta continues this fine tradition with improved performance over Opera Mobile 8.65.
2. Pan and zoom – Just like Opera Mini, Opera Mobile 9.5 beta defaults to full Web page viewing and allows users to pan and zoom into their desired content easily.
3. Improved user interface – Opera has completely renovated its mobile UI. Cleaner and more intuitive, the new UI is designed for quick and easy navigation.
4. Opera Dragonfly – Use your Opera desktop browser to debug sites on your mobile phone through the Opera Mobile 9.5 debug menu.
5. Improved standards support – Opera Mobile 9.5 is the most standards compliant browser available, and the company remains steadfast in its commitment to make the Web accessible for all.
6. Save pages and/or images – With a click, simply save pages to your phone.

This last point is a nice touch to add. I often want to be able to save images I see on the Web. Being able to do so on your phone (where I happen to spend a lot of time browsing) is an unexpected added bonus.

Yep, you read that correctly. It isn’t officially available through iTunes yet, but the file is out there and can be downloaded and installed on your iPhone.

In order to snag the file to update your Apple iPhone’s firmware, go to MacRumors for the download.

MacRumors reports:

“In order to install the firmware, you will have to do it manually by pressing the Option key when pressing the ‘Check for Update’ button in iTunes. Then select the .ipsw file manually. If for some reason your download is a ‘.zip’ file, rename it to ‘.ipsw’ before proceeding.”

The Apple iPhone firmware update is a 225 MB file, so it’s going to take a while. You can also grab the iPhone1,2_2.0_5A347_Restore.ipsw firmware from here. Enjoy.

Setting up services for your mobile phone often requires you to perform some configurations via the Web.

This is true for a number of Google services, and apparently people didn’t think it was easy enough.

Google listened to all the feedback and launched a new mobile site today to help make it easier to set your phone up with Google services.

Man, did Google dumb its mobile Web site down. It is so easy to get started, there’s no reason you won’t have your Google services configured in no time.

Going to http://mobile.google.com brings up a landing page. On that page is a list of the major phone manufacturers, along with pictures that resemble those manufacturers’ devices.

Select the choice that most closely resembles your phone, and it whisks you to a page customized for your type of device.

This next page lists all the services that your phone (or platform) supports.

For example, here is the page for BlackBerrys. It has a tool so you can send a link via SMS to your phone that leads directly to Google’s mobile services.

Simply enter your phone number and the link will appear in a few moments. You can also just type m.google.com directly into your phone’s browser.

Additionally, there’s a help center and explanations for everything. Not that it was difficult before, but now it is really easy.

So if you’re a Google user and haven’t set up Google services on your phone because you thought it would be a pain, take heart. What are you waiting for? Get started!

Starting today in the U.S., users of BlackBerry smartphones should begin noticing a number of improvements to their Google search results. Google has tailored its software to better accommodate the BlackBerry Web browser.

Google has been on a roll lately with customized phone support. It goes to greater and greater lengths to make sure each mobile phone platform has what it needs to view and use Google’s mobile services better.

Google has, for example, rolled out some seriously customized versions of its services for the iPhone, which has different usability characteristics than many other phones.

Now, Google has turned its attention to BlackBerry users, specifically the browser.

The Official Google Mobile Blog spells out what it has done:

1. Improved comprehensiveness: Our mobile search now incorporates results from Product Search, Blog Search, News archives search, and more.
2. Blended results: Instead of showing you web, image, local and news results in separate sections, we now combine them to improve relevance. We’ve also made it easier for you to focus your search on any one of these categories — notice how the links are now placed at the top of the results page.
3. Longer snippets: Web results include longer snippets so that your answer may be right on the results page.
4. Related searches: At the bottom of the search results page, you’ll find a list of related searches to help you refine a query.

According to Google, these changes reflect its desktop search results pages. I was not able to test the new enhancements on my BlackBerry to confirm that.

Feel free to check it out for yourself and share your experience in the comments below.

You may also watch a video demonstration here.

Wow. That’s all I can say right now. It’s been about nine months since Mozilla promised to “rock the mobile Web” with its forthcoming mobile version of the Firefox browser.

If the final product bears even the slightest resemblance to the browser demonstrated in this video, every other mobile browser out there has a lot to worry about.

Aza Raskin, head of user experience over at Mozilla Labs, posted a video demonstration on a potential candidate for Firefox Mobile.

He also writes in detail some nice explanations on why Mozilla has taken this direction with mobile Firefox.

The browser seen in this demo is not a final release candidate, but it should be:

Based on using a touchscreen device, Mozilla has solved all the navigational pains associated with mobile browsing by using simple panning gestures.

Need to access the control buttons or URL bar? Pan in any direction. Most of the time, 100% of the phone’s pixels are being used to display content, not navigational controls. You only see the nav controls when you want to.

Secondly, it uses a zoom effect to control tabs. You can zoom way in and out, and set up groupings of tabs in clusters of associated content, such as communications Web sites, and so on.

Being able to cluster tabs like this is just plain cool. Because the display is a 2-D plane, you can arrange the tabs and documents in any way that you want.

I can’t wait for this to be released. Again. Wow. Lots of wow.