fidzu : google

Even though Google Home is branded as a speaker, it couldn't do some things that a basic Bluetooth speaker could, like play music from your device. Yes you could stream from music services like Google Play Music, but you couldn't play those that are stored on your phone. But now, an update to Google Home […]

22 Aug 2017 4:00am GMT

Telltale Games are the masters of the story-driven episodic adventure game genre in Android, already coming up with huge hits such as Tales from the Borderlands, Minecraft: Story Mode, and Batman: The Telltale Series. These are simple games where you point and tap, but the stories they tell draw you in much more than the […]

22 Aug 2017 3:00am GMT

Google has confirmed what we've suspected all along: they planned this solar eclipse just so they can launch Android O. Okay, not really. But they did officially unveil the latest Android major update: Android Oreo 8.0. This is the second time that they have partnered with an actual snack brand (previously it was KitKat for […]

22 Aug 2017 1:45am GMT

Google is gearing up to drop the Pixel 2 later this year, but that's not all they're going to announce. A new rumor suggests a few other devices should be unveiled at a hardware event in the fall, including a miniature Google Home and a brand new Chromebook. The Chromebook is expected to replace the […]

Come comment on this article: Google plans to launch a new Chromebook Pixel and mini Google Home this year

21 Aug 2017 9:00pm GMT

A new Samsung wearable has leaked online, which may or may not be an accurate indicator that we're getting an upgraded Gear Fit 2. The image shows a device called the Gear Fit 2 Pro listed beside the current Gear Fit 2, but otherwise doesn't tell us much of anything about the tracker. The "pro" […]

Come comment on this article: Samsung Gear Fit 2 Pro may be on the horizon

21 Aug 2017 8:32pm GMT

You want Android 8.0 Oreo pretty bad, so Google is pushing its partners to get the latest version of its platform onto new and existing devices. It's typical for Google's in-house devices to get software updates first. That's why no one should be surprised that Oreo will be on the Pixel, Pixel C, Nexus 6P, […]

Come comment on this article: Google says its partners will have Android 8.0-flavored hardware by the end of 2017

21 Aug 2017 7:38pm GMT

Posted By: Dave Burke, VP of Engineering

After more than a year of development and months of testing by developers and early adopters (thank you!), we're now ready to officially launch Android 8.0 Oreo to the world. Android 8.0 brings a ton of great features such as picture-in-picture, autofill, integrated Instant Apps, Google Play Protect, faster boot time, and much more.

We're pushing the sources to Android Open Source Project (AOSP) for everyone to access today. Pixel and Nexus 5X/6P builds have entered carrier testing and we expect to start rolling out in phases over the next several weeks, alongside Pixel C and Nexus Player. Android Beta users will receive the update to the final version today and images are available to download and flash manually. We've been working closely with our partners over the last many months, and by the end of this year, hardware makers like Essential, Huawei, HTC, Kyocera, Motorola, HMD Global Home of Nokia Phones, Samsung, Sharp and Sony are scheduled to be launching or upgrading new devices to Android 8.0 Oreo.

What's in Android Oreo?

In Android 8.0 Oreo we focused on creating fluid experiences that make Android even more powerful and easy to use, such as:

• Picture-in-picture lets users manage two tasks simultaneously on any size screen, and it's easy for apps to support it. (Shown at right)
  
• Notification dots extend the reach of notifications and offer a new way to surface activity in your apps. Dots work with zero effort for most apps -- we even extract the color of the dot from your icon.
  
• Autofill framework simplifies how users set up a new device and synchronize their passwords. Apps using form data can optimize their apps for Autofill, and password manager apps can use the new APIs to make their services available to users in their favorite apps. Autofill will roll out fully over the next few weeks as part of an update to Google Play Services.
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We also invested in Android Vitals, a project focused on optimizing battery life, startup time, graphics rendering, and stability, while giving developers better visibility over the health of their apps:

• System optimizations: We worked across the system to help apps run faster and smoother -- for example, in the runtime we added a new concurrent compacting garbage collection, code locality, and more.
  
• Background limits: We added new limits on background location and wi-fi scans and changes in the way apps run in the background. These boundaries prevent unintentional overuse of battery and memory and apply to all apps -- make sure you understand and account for these in your apps.
  
• Complementary Android Vitals dashboards and IDE profilers: In the Play Console you can now see aggregate data about your app to help you pinpoint common issues - excessive crash rate, ANR rate, frozen frames, slow rendering, excessive wakeups, and more. You'll also find new performance profilers in Android Studio 3.0, and new instrumentation in the platform.
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For developers, Android Oreo includes many new capabilities to help you build better, more efficient apps. Here are just a few:

• Autosizing textview: Use autosizing TextView to automatically fill a TextView with text, regardless of the amount. You can create an array of preset text sizes, or set min and max sizes with a step granularity, and the text will grow and shrink to fill the available TextView space.
  
• Fonts in XML: Fonts are now a fully supported resource type. You can now use fonts in XML layouts and define font families in XML.
  
• Downloadable fonts and emoji: With downloadable fonts you can load fonts from a shared provider instead of including them in your APK. The provider and support library manage the download of fonts and shares them across apps. The same implementation also supports downloadable emoji, so you can get updated emoji without being limited to the emoji built into the device.
  
• Adaptive icons: You can now create adaptive icons that the system displays in different shapes, based on a mask selected by a device manufacturer. The system also animates interactions with the icons, and uses them in the launcher, shortcuts, settings, sharing dialogs, and in the overview screen.
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• Shortcut pinning: App shortcuts and homescreen widgets are great for engaging users and now you can let users add and pin shortcuts and widgets to the launcher from within your app. There's also a new option to add a specialized activity to help users create shortcuts. The activity is complete with custom options and confirmation.
  
• Wide-gamut color for apps: Imaging apps can now take full advantage of new devices that have a wide-gamut color capable display. To display wide gamut images, apps enable a flag in their manifest files (per activity) and load bitmaps with an embedded wide color profile (AdobeRGB, Pro Photo RGB, DCI-P3, etc.).
  
• WebView enhancements: In Android Oreo, we've enabled WebView multiprocess mode by default and added an API to let your app handle errors and crashes. You can also opt in your app's WebView objects to verify URLs through Google Safe Browsing.
  
• Java 8 Language APIs and runtime optimizations: Android now supports several new Java Language APIs, including the new java.time API. In addition, the Android Runtime is faster than ever before, with improvements of up to 2x on some application benchmarks.
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Learn more about these and other new features by visiting the Android 8.0 Oreo site on developer.android.com. Also check out the What's New in Android Oreo? video for an overview of new features for developers.

Make sure your apps are ready

If haven't already, take a few moments today to test your apps and make sure they offer the experience you want for users upgrading to Android Oreo.

Just install your current app from Google Play onto a device or emulator running Android Oreo and test the user flows. The app should run and look great, and handle the Android Oreo behavior changes properly. In particular, pay attention to background location limits, notification channels, and changes in networking, security, and identifiers.

Once you've resolved any issues, publish your app updates to Google Play in your alpha, beta, or production channels so that they're available as users start to receive Android 8.0 Oreo.

Speed your development with Android Studio

When you're ready to build with new APIs in Android Oreo, we recommend updating to the latest version of Android Studio 3.0, available for download from the beta channel. Aside from improved app performance profiling tools, support for the Kotlin programming language, and Gradle build optimizations, Android Studio 3.0 makes it easier to develop with Instant Apps, XML Fonts, downloadable fonts, and adaptive icons.

We also recommend updating to the Android Support Library 26.0.2, available now from Google's Maven repository, and to the latest SDK, tools, and emulator system images, available in the SDK Manager.

If you're just getting started building for Android Oreo, read the migration guide first. It gives you an overview of the process and the configuration changes you'll need to make.

To compile against the official Android 8.0 APIs, update your project's compileSdkVersion to API 26. We also recommend updating your app's targetSdkVersion to API 26 to opt-in and test your app with Android Oreo specific behavior changes. See the migration guide for details on how to set up your environment to build with Android Oreo.

Publish your updates to Google Play

Google Play is open for apps compiled against or targeting API 26. When you're ready, you can publish your APK updates in your alpha, beta, or production channels.

Make sure that your updated app runs well on Android Oreo as well as older versions. We recommend using Google Play's beta testing feature to get early feedback from a small group of users, then do a staged rollout. We're looking forward to seeing your app updates!

What's next for Android Oreo?

We'll soon be closing the Developer Preview issue tracker, but please keep the feedback coming! You can file a new issue against Android 8.0 in the AOSP issue tracker.

Thanks again to the many developers and early adopters who participated in the Android O Developer Preview and public beta. You gave us great feedback, and filed hundreds of issues that helped us to make the Android Oreo platform great for consumers and developers.

21 Aug 2017 7:27pm GMT

Android 8.0 Oreo: Picture-in-picture, Notification dots

Emoji in Android Oreo: a fully redesigned emoji set, including over 60 new emoji

Four Android Oreo superpowers to the rescue: Powerful, Secure, Fast, Smart & Seamless

Android Oreo

21 Aug 2017 6:50pm GMT

21 Aug 2017 4:00pm GMT

21 Aug 2017 4:00am GMT

Posted by Shailen Tuli

Today we're releasing the source code for the official Google I/O 2017 for Android app.

This year's app substantially modifies existing functionality and adds several new features. It also expands the tech stack to use Firebase. In this post, we'll highlight several notable changes to the app as well as their design considerations.

The most prominent new feature for 2017 is the event reservation system, designed to help save in-person attendees' time and provide a streamlined conference experience. Registered attendees could reserve sessions and join waitlists prior to and during the conference; a reservation provided expedited entry to sessions without having to wait in long lines. Reservation data was synced with attendees' conference badges, allowing event staff to verify reservations using NFC-enabled phones. Not only was the reservation feature incredibly popular, but the reservation data helped event staff change the size of session rooms both before and during I/O to adjust for actual demand for seats.

The reservation feature was implemented using Firebase Realtime Database (RTDB) and Cloud Functions for Firebase. RTDB provided easy sync across user devices - we just had to implement a listener in our code to receive database updates. RTDB also provided out-of-the-box offline support, allowing conference data to be available even in the face of intermittent network connectivity while traveling. A Cloud Function processed reservation requests in the background for the user, using transactions to ensure correctness of state (preventing mischievous users from grabbing too many seats!) and communicating with the event badging system.

As in previous years, we used a ContentProvider as an abstraction layer over all app data, which meant we had to figure out how to integrate RTDB data with the ContentProvider. We needed to negotiate between having two local caches for data: 1) the extant local SQLite database accessed via the ContentProvider, and 2) the local cache created by RTDB to facilitate offline access. We decided to integrate all app data under the ContentProvider: whenever reservation data for the user changed in RTDB, we updated the ContentProvider, making it the single source of truth for app data at all times. This meant that we needed to keep open connections to RTDB only on a single screen, the Session Detail Activity, where users might be actively managing their reservations. Reservation data displayed in other parts of the app was backed by the ContentProvider. In offline mode, or in case of a flaky or delayed connection to RTDB, we could just get the last known state of the user's reservations from the ContentProvider.

We also had to figure out good patterns for integrating RTDB into the overall sync logic of IOSched, especially since RTDB comes with a very different sync model than the ping-and-fetch approach we were using in the app. We decided to continue using Cloud Endpoints to synchronize user data across devices and with the web and iOS clients (the data itself was stored in Datastore). While RTDB provides out-of-the-box data syncing, we wanted to make sure that a user's reservation data was current across all devices, even when the app was not in the foreground. We used a Cloud Function to integrate RTDB reservation data into the sync flow: once reservation data for a user changed in RTDB, the function updated the endpoint, which triggered a Firebase Cloud Messaging downstream message to all the user's devices, which then scheduled data syncs.

This year's app also featured a Feed to apprise users about hour-by-hour developments at I/O (most of the app's users were remote, and the Feed was a window into the conference for them). The Feed was also powered by RTDB, with data pushed to the server using a simple CMS. We used a Cloud Function to monitor RTDB feed data; when feed data was updated on the server, the Function sent a Cloud Messaging downstream message to clients, which visually surfaced the presence of new feed items to the user.

In 2015 and 2016, we had adopted an MVP architecture for IOSched, and we continued using that this year. This architecture provides us with good separation of concerns, facilitates testing, and in general makes our code cleaner and easier to maintain. For the Feed feature, we decided to experiment with a more lightweight MVP implementation inspired by Android Architecture Blueprints, which provided the necessary modularity while being very easy to conceptualize. The goal here was both pedagogical and practical: we wanted to showcase an alternate MVP pattern for developers; we also wanted to showcase an architecture that was an appropriate fit for our needs for this feature.

For the first time, IOSched made heavy use of Firebase Remote Config. In the past, we had found ourselves unable to inform users when non-session data - wifi information, shuttle schedule, discount codes for ridesharing, etc. - changed just before or during the conference. Forcing an app update was not feasible; we just wanted in-app default values to be updatable. Using remote config easily solved this problem for us.

In the end, we ended up with a three-tier system of informing users about changes:

1. Conference data and user data changes were communicated via Cloud Messaging and data syncs (ping and fetch model).
2. Feed data changes were controlled via RTDB.
3. Changes to in-app constants were controlled via Remote Config.

Future plans

Even though we're releasing the 2017 code, we still have work ahead of us for the coming months. We'll be updating the code to follow modern patterns for background processing (and making our app "O" compliant), and in the future we'll be adopting Android's Architecture Components to simplify the overall design of the app. Developers can follow changes to the code on GitHub.

18 Aug 2017 4:20pm GMT

Posted by Jonathan Karmel

Since our public launch at Google I/O this year, we've been hard at work expanding the number of supported devices and the availability of instant apps, so that users can run your apps instantly, without installation. We're excited to announce that 500 million Android users now have access to instant apps across countries where Google Play operates.

A number of Google Play apps and games businesses across a range of industries have already started building with instant apps. Following the launch of their instant apps, they have seen strong results in engagement, acquisition and retention.

Vimeo: WIth more than 50M creators and 240M viewers worldwide, Vimeo has built a platform whereby people can easily share videos with friends. The company wanted to implement Android Instant Apps to enable their audience to easily immerse themselves in content through a native app experience. Vimeo increased session duration by 130% with their instant app. Discover how Vimeo drove increased engagement with their instant app.

Jet: Based in the US, Jet provides a shopping platform, using a real-time savings engine to surface opportunities for customers to pay less. The company wanted to expand the reach of their existing app, and updated their app in order to support instant apps. Following the launch of their instant app, Jet found that their conversion rate increased by 27%. Learn about how Jet launched their instant app.

NYTimes Crosswords: The NYTimes Crosswords instant app provides users with crossword puzzles as printed in the New York Times daily newspaper. Their aim was to create a more native experience for their audience, increasing app engagement. Instant apps have 2x the number of sessions per user. Based on early results, they are also seeing more effective acquisition, conversion, and long term retention. Learn more about how NYTimes increased app sessions.

dotloop: dotloop is a real estate transaction platform which makes it easier for real estate professionals to interact with home buyers and sellers, and for them to be able to sign documents anytime, anywhere. Their aim for instant apps was to provide more users a native app experience for the signing process of documents. dotloop increased their key metric with a 62% increase in users who sign a document. Discover how dotloop supported Android Instant Apps and increased engagement.

Onefootball:Based in Berlin, the app provides news, live scores, fixtures, results, tables and stats for over 230 leagues and 15 languages. Onefootball built an instant app by reducing its APK size alongside other updates. The number of users who read news and share content increased 55% in their instant app. Find out more about how Onefootball increased engagement following their launch.

Realtor.com: A leading online real estate destination that attracts nearly 60 million unique visitors each month to its desktop and mobile platforms. Realtor.com enabled Android Instant Apps support by modularizing its 12 MB app into instant app modules. With Instant Apps, Realtor.com increased their key conversion metrics having doubled the number of leads per property listing details pageview. Find out how Realtor.com reduced its instant app APK size.

Learn more best practices for managing your download size with Android Instant Apps, and also visit g.co/instantapps for more information on building instant apps and get started today!

17 Aug 2017 8:00pm GMT

April Fools' Day should probably be called Google Fools' Day, since there are so many Google hoaxes.

Google Japan developed a "bubble wrap" version of the Japanese keyboard. "The Google Japanese input bubble wrap version is a keyboard that realizes 'I want to press in my mind, I want to keep pressing'," according to Google Translate.

Another product for your smart home? Meet Google Gnome, "a voice-activated, hands-free tool designed to make backyard living effortless. Need to know what animal is squeaking in your bushes? Stay still and ask Gnome what sound an opossum makes. Running low on birdseed? That's where Gnome comes in. You can even use Gnome's proprietary high-intensity lasers to trim your hedges into whatever shape your heart desires."

The Chrome OS team brings the most popular mobile accessories to the Chromebook, which already blurs the line between mobile and desktop. Chromebook Groupie Stick, Chromebook Cardboard, Chromebook Workout Armband will soon be available in the Google Store. "To take advantage of beautiful, high-resolution displays, as well as great photo editing apps, we've carefully engineered the first Chromebook-sized selfie stick. Never again will you miss the perfect groupie."

Haptic Helpers make VR even more immersive. "We're taking VR to the next level with Haptic Helpers. Using a modest set of everyday tools, these VR virtuosos can simulate more than 10,000 unique experiences, all from the comfort of your own home. Smell the roses. Listen to the ocean. Feel a fluffy dog!"


You can now play the classic arcade game MS. PAC-MAN in Google Maps. "Avoid Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Sue as you swerve the streets of real places around the world. But eat the pac-dots fast, because this game will only be around for a little while." Just go to the Google Maps site or open the Google Maps app for Android or iOS and click or tap MS. PAC-MAN at the bottom.

Google Cloud Platform expands to Mars. "By opening a dedicated extraterrestrial cloud region, we're bringing the power of Google's compute, network, and storage to the rest of the solar system, unlocking a plethora of possibilities for astronomy research, exploration of Martian natural resources and interplanetary life sciences. This region will also serve as an important node in an extensive network throughout the solar system. Our first interplanetary data center - affectionately nicknamed 'Ziggy Stardust' - will open in 2018," mentions Google.

Google Netherlands came up with Google Wind, a machine learning technology that controls the weather. "The Netherlands has many windmills, some no longer in use, we can connect to Google Cloud Platform. So we use the existing Dutch infrastructure, machine learning, weather patterns to control the network of windmills when rain is approaching. The first test results are very promising: we seem to be able to provide sun and clear skies for everyone in the Netherlands," mentions Google Netherlands blog.

Google's search app for iOS is now optimized for cats and dogs. "On the Google app for iOS, you can now use 3D Touch on the app icon or head to settings and select I'm Feeling Woof or I'm Feeling Meow to let your dogs and cats get info on topics they care about-whether that means squeaky toys or a bowl of milk!"

Google also launched Google Play for Pets, a new category of Android games designed for cats, dogs and other pets.


Google Translate's Word Lens feature supports a new language: Heptapod B, the alien language from the movie "Arrival". "The challenge with understanding Heptapod B is its nonlinear orthography. Fortunately, Google's neural machine translation system employs an encoder/decoder system that internally represents sentences as high-dimensional vectors. These vectors map well to the non-linear orthography of the Heptapod language and they are really the enabling technical factor in translating Heptapod B."

01 Apr 2017 7:25am GMT

If you try to send a JavaScript attachment using Gmail or if you want to download a .js attachment, you'll get a new anti-virus warning: "Blocked for security reasons", "1 attachment contains a virus or blocked file. Downloading this attachment is disabled".

.JS has been added to the long list of file types that are blocked by Gmail for security reasons. The full list: .ADE, .ADP, .BAT, .CHM, .CMD, .COM, .CPL, .EXE, .HTA, .INS, .ISP, .JAR, .JS (NEW), .JSE, .LIB, .LNK, .MDE, .MSC, .MSI, .MSP, .MST, .NSH .PIF, .SCR, .SCT, .SHB, .SYS, .VB, .VBE, .VBS, .VXD, .WSC, .WSF, .WSH. "To prevent against potential viruses, Gmail doesn't allow you to attach certain types of files, including: certain file types (listed above), including their compressed form (like .gz or .bz2 files) or when found within archives (like .zip or .tgz files), documents with malicious macros, archives whose listed file content is password protected, archives whose content includes a password protected archive."

The GSuite Blog informs that "for inbound mail, senders will get a bounce message explaining why the email was blocked. If you still need to send .js files for legitimate reasons, you can use Google Drive, Google Cloud Storage, or other storage solutions to share or send your files."

You can still send JavaScript files using Gmail if you change the extension. What about downloading old .js attachments? Try the workarounds from this post.

19 Feb 2017 10:39am GMT

Google Image Search has a different way to display suggestions: it now shows a long list of colorful boxes with related searches. You can click one or more boxes to dynamically refine search results.

For example, when searching for [sportswear], Google shows suggestions like: [women basketball], [tennis], [badminton], [golf], [volleyball], [nike woman], [alexander wang], [adidas], [fashion], [performance], [vintage], [trendy], [urban], [school], [gym], [90's], [70's], [vogue], [luxe], [avant garde], [korean], [italian], [french] and more. It's interesting to notice that each category of suggestions has a different color.

Here's the old interface, which had fewer suggestions and displayed thumbnails next to suggestions:

25 Jan 2017 9:39pm GMT

A few months ago, I took a leave of absence from Google to do a stint with the US Digital Service. A lot of people know about the US Digital Service because they helped rescue the healthcare.gov website. But you might not realize that the US Digital Service has helped veterans get their health benefits, […]

19 Jan 2017 3:47am GMT

Over the last couple years, I've seen more and more people in technology trying to make government work better. They're idealists who are also making a large impact. These are people that I respect-some of them worked to fix healthcare.gov, for example. From talking to many of them, I can tell you that their energy […]

18 Jun 2016 1:57am GMT

Amit Singhal just announced that he's retiring toward the end of the month. Amit has been a formative part of Google's search team, but he's also a good friend. Last year, after he marked 15 years with Google, I wrote this about Amit's contributions: Amit Singhal, one of the unsung heroes of Google, just celebrated […]

03 Feb 2016 7:49pm GMT

The Emperor instructed the gardener to set up the new court's garden. "I want you to plant five trees growing the Crataan fruit," the Emperor said, "Because we asked people what fruit they like best, and most named the Crataan fruit!" The gardener replied, "Emperor, that is excellent thinking! But let me make some suggestions: First, how about we make one of the five trees bear the Muran fruit. Only one out of ten citizens loves it, but those peculiar citizens tend to love multiple times as much!" "Second," the gardener continued, "How about we make one of the five trees bear the Dratean fruit. No one loves it, but that's because no one knows it yet!" "Third," the gardener said, "How about we leave one spot in the garden empty. Who knows what new type of tree we'll discover that we can put there in the fut ...

26 Aug 2011 12:12pm GMT

For those of you who've been wondering whether I had turned to stone, fallen into a bottomless pit, or been climbing the Himalaya... no, none of that is true, even though you probably did notice I'm not actively blogging about Google here anymore*! Just now, a new iPad app I've been working on called Color Sound Machine went live, and this -- and all the other apps and games at Versus Pad** -- are actually what I am doing while not blogoscoping. *I've drafted unpublished posts explaining much more about past, present and future of Blogoscoped, and the history of Google news reporting, but ... oh, for now le ...

15 Aug 2011 4:00pm GMT

One of the earliest specialist services provided by Google was reverse phone number lookup. If you used the "phonebook:" or "rphonebook:" operators together with a 10-digit US phone number, Google would show you the owner of that phone number, unless the number was unlisted. Google no longer provides that service. Not surprisingly, there was no press release marking the closure, but Google employee Daniel Russell has acknowledged the closure of the service in his blog. He hints at the possible pressures leading to the shuttering of the service: "As you can imagine, this was an endless source of hassles for people (who were surprised to see themselves searchable on Google) and for Google (who had to constantly de ...

25 Feb 2011 11:23am GMT