This afternoon the Google Docs and Sites team announced some very useful enhancements to both products. To me, the most exciting news in the announcement is that you can now use custom HTML and Javascript in your Google Sites pages. I have long be frustrated by how difficult, impossible actually without a lot of work arounds, it is to use many custom widgets like some of these survey tools in Google Sites. Now if you want to use custom HTML, Javascript, or CSS in Google Sites all you have to do is select the “HTML box” from the “insert menu” then paste your code. Read Google’s directions here.

In the same announcement I learned that you can now search for, highlight, and copy text in the scanned PDFs that you have stored in your Google Docs account.

The comments feature in Google Docs is great for collaboration on documents and presentations. Now you can find all of the comments for a document or presentation in one column by clicking the new “discussions” button which is located just to the left of the “share” button on your documents and presentations.

Applications for Education
I am most excited about the custom html and Javascript option in Google Sites. That removes a major limitation to customizing the pages in websites built in Google Sites. Now you can add things like educational games, custom flashcard applications, survey tools and more to your Google Sites website.