Tag: Android

The SwiftKey team at Microsoft has rolled out another new update to the SwiftKey for Android app.  The update, version 7.0.3.19 for those keeping score at home, brings support for five new languages, Alsatian, Fongbe, Norman, Urdu (English), and Warlpiri, as well as several bug fixes to the keyboard alternative for Android phones.

With the addition of Alsatian, Fongbe, Norman, Urdu (English), and Warlpiri, SwiftKey for Android now supports well over 200 languages natively, making it one of the most language diverse apps in the Google Play Store.

After three beta builds over the past few weeks, the Chrome team has released the Chrome 66 update to Chrome for Android.  The new app is build 66.0.3359.106 and it will be landing on devices over the course of the next few weeks.  There are several changes in this update including most noticeably, a new modern UI look to the browser.

This new look rolled out via a flag change in one of the first betas of Chrome 66 and it is still a flag that you can enable.  That flag is chrome://flags/#enable-chrome-modern-design.  It gives everything a more rounded and polished look over the current, default UI.  Also, like the desktop updates and Chrome for iOS, you can now export your passwords in the mobile browser to save as a .CSV file.  Keep in mind though that the file is not encrypted so if anyone gets hold of it, they have your passwords.  Protect it!

The Android Distribution Report for April has been released and it reflects a sizable gain for Android Oreo.  The latest version of Android, either the 8.0 or 8.1 builds, jumped 3.5% over the February report’s figures for the version.  It now is on 4.6% of all devices that went to the Google Play Store for the 7 day period ending April 16, 2018.  It is the biggest single jump for Oreo in the reports so far.

The gains have been helped largely lay the number of manufactures who have released the Oreo update for their devices.  Samsung, Sony, HTC, Nokia and OnePlus have all been updating devices in the two months since the last report.

OnePlus has released OxygenOS 5.1 for the OnePlus 5 and 5T today, bringing Android Oreo 8.1 to the two phones as well as other improvements to the device.  On the OnePlus 5T, it also brings the new full screen gesture support which is similar to the gestures found on Apple’s iPhone X.  The gestures have generated a bit of controversy as they appear to almost directly mimic Apple’s gestures on their flagship phone – but the implementation in testing has been lackluster with multiple user issues.

Along with Oreo 8.1, OxygenOS 5.1 brings the April Android Security Update patches to the phone as well as a new optimizing gaming mode which pauses the adaptive brightness of the screen and has power saving features.

The Microsoft OneDrive app for Android has been updated with an important and handy new feature that allows you to recover deleted files on the cloud storage service.  Version 5.7 of the OneDrive app is now rolling out in the Play Store which is where this new feature appears.

To this point, you have been able to delete files in OneDrive with no problem from your Android phone.  But, if you accidentally deleted a file and need to recover it, you couldn’t.  You had to go to the OneDrive site and go to the Trash folder to recover it.  Now you can do it all from your phone, making it quicker to recover that accidentally deleted file.

A third, and very likely the last for this train, update has come to the Chrome for Android Beta app in the Play Store.  The update brings a new build of Chrome 66 to the app, build 66.0.3359.106.  As readers likely know by now, the Chrome for Android Beta app is a separate download from the stable Chrome app and can be installed at the same time so you can see and try out the new look and features.

The update will likely be the last as the stable version of Chrome is slated to be updated tomorrow, April 17th.  It is also possible that this .106 build will be the build that makes it to the stable build assuming that there aren’t any major bugs found in this late stage.