Google Squared Update: Smart Spreadsheets Get Smarter

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When Google Squared launched back in June, it was clear it was definitely a Labs product: promising, but a bit rough around the edges.

Though they’re not quite ready to take off the Labs training wheels just yet, Google’s “smart spreadsheet” product got a number of useful improvements recently.

Since Google Squared is all about understanding structured data, one of the best updates is better quality data.



Google upped the ante there in two ways. First, when the Square is first being built, an attempt is made to toss out attributes and rows without enough good facts to support them. Secondly, they built some self-learning mechanisms into the code so that Squared actually learns from user edits and corrections over time.

You can also simply store more data in a Square — it’s up to 120 facts per Square from a mere 30. You can also now export your data to Google spreadsheet, where other transformations and visualizations can be done with the information. Or, export to a standard CSV file and edit the data in a desktop or other spreadsheet application of your choice.

Lastly, Google added column sort to the mix so you can re-arrange attributes and line up your desired comparisons more easily. Squared will even convert units in the background to ensure that attribute comparisons happen properly.

It’s still not quite a game-changer, but these steps towards making use of the vast amounts of structured data that are out there on the web is admirable. And if they keep adding improvements like these, Squared could shortly become highly useful to researchers, writers and infovores alike.

Have you used Google Squared? If you’ve had a chance to try it both before and after the new updates, what are your thoughts on the changes?