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Google Brings Digital Doodling To Docs

Today Google announced a new feature in Google Docs: The ability to create and insert drawings into Docs, Presentations and Spreadsheets. Now your inner artist can get your Gaudi, van Gogh or Gauguin on in digital form thanks to Google.

I am no artist. I wish I were. Sadly, I can barely draw good looking stick figures. If you're not handicapped in the artist department, Google has a new tool to help make your Apps a bit more, er, artistic.

Tony Glenning, Drawings Team Lead, explains, "It's easy to create drawings using lines, free hand scribbles, text labels and a large choice of shapes that you can move, resize, rotate and adjust. Group, order, align and distribute and other features are available when you select objects you've drawn. You can also customize a range of shape properties, from line widths to fill color, and from arrowheads to font size, and much more. If you change your mind, there is undo and redo. You can collaborate with a friend or colleague on a drawing, or work alone, just as you can in Google Docs today."

I took the drawing software for a spin this morning. From my perspective, it is pretty basic, and reminds me of the simple drawing / sketching program that comes with Windows machines.

In order to get it all working, Google uses technology that it acquired from Tonic Systems in 2007. Scalable Vector Graphics and vector markup language are what make it all possible. These technologies permit for much faster rendering of graphics in browsers, especially in mobile formats.

For all you artists out there, the feature is already available within Google Docs. Feel free to check it out.

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