Tag: Google

After five years of virtually no updates or improvements, the all new Google Voice experience launched today.  The new 5.0 build of the app brings a Material Design look and feel to the Android app as well as an improved Web and iOS interface.  Functionally, there isn’t much new as far as what you get with Voice.  The apps however are a big improvement.

The new Google Voice apps has the more contemporary three-tab navigation with a FAB (Floating Action Button) for various activities in the app.  The app’s tabs are for messages, Calls and visual voicemail.  The new web interface has a similar design with the different tabs being accessible on the left side of the screen.  It is a vast improvement over the clunky KitKat-style previous build.

With the election of the 45th President tomorrow, now is a great time to check out the White House.  Can’t make it to Washington, D.C.?  No problem.  Google Street View has added a wall through tour of the residence of the President that allows you to explore all the different rooms of this grand house.

The tour of the White House is available in Google Maps online but if you have the Street View apps on your Android Phone, you can just search for White House and it will get you there, complete with a wall through that you can do at your own pace.  And the best part is, there are no queues to enter.

Users of Google Docs, Sheets and Slides on Android will find minor updates rolling out for each of the productivity apps.  For the most part, these updates are bug fixes and performance improvements but in the case of Google Docs and Google Slides, there are new features in each.  For Docs, you now have the ability to add page numbers to a document from the app.  You have been able to do this in Docs on the web for a long time but it has finally made its way to the Android app for the sake of feature parity.

For Google Slides, the ability to import and export OpenDocument formatted files (.odp) has been added to the presentation app.

It looks like we could see the budget friendly Android One phone here in the United States by mid year.  A report in The Information suggests that Google is planning on launching the phone at a $200-300 price range that will give branding recognition to Android in addition to giving uses a true Google Android experience.  Further, like the Nexus and Pixel phones,they would get updates and security patches for two years meaning they would more-or-less be the most up to date.

For those who may not know what Android One is, it was a low budget phone that was launched in India back in 2014.  The idea was to give a Google Android experience at a $100 price range.  It didn’t do well as it didn’t get the marketing support it needed and the phones were under powered and under featured compared to similar phones in India at the time.

Google has announced a raft of changes that are coming to Google+ for the web and for Android.  While there are several things that were highlighted, perhaps the two biggest have to do with Events and the old G+ layout.  One is returning and one is going away for good.  Events went away from Google+ during the revamping of the app and the web site last year and it was one of the feature that many users had requested Google to get back into it.  That will be happening starting January 24th.

Finally (drumroll please!), we’re bringing Events over to the new Google+. While there’s more to be done to improve the experience, beginning January 24th you’ll be able to create and join events on Google+ web as you have in the past. Please note that Events will not be available for G Suite at this time.

Note that the post said on the web.  It does not look like you’ll be able to add events from the app – at least not yet.

Last month I wrote about a referral program that Project Fi had going on last month.  Basically the way it worked is that if you used a referral link from a Project Fi customer (like mine for example), you would get a $20 kick back on your bill have you have been active for 30 days.  In return, I get the same kick back after you have been active for 30 days.  It was a win-win and it was a great for you to try Fi with a little bit less risk.

And while I’m at it, thank you Alan, Rodger and Stef for using my referral link last month!  😀

Now the referral program has been extended indefinitely.  If you want to try out Fi, you can use a referral link from any current Fi customer and sign up.  After you have been with the service for 30 days, you too will get a referral link so you can share the love too.