Monthly Archives: May 2022

Android Auto is getting another refresh, this time with a focus on the evolving nature of vehicle touchscreens.

Google says the new split-screen display will be standard for all Android Auto users, allowing them to access key features like navigation, media player, and messages all from one screen. Previously, the split-screen display was only available to owners of certain vehicles. Now, it will be the default user experience for all Android Auto customers.

We used to have a different screen mode that was available in a very limited amount of cars, said Rod Lopez, lead product manager at Android Auto. Now this is available no matter what type of display you have, what size, what form factor, and its a really, really exciting update.

Android Auto will also adapt to any type of touchscreen, no matter what size. Automakers are starting to get creative with the size of their infotainment display, installing everything from large portrait-style screens to long vertical ones shaped like surfboards. Google says that Android Auto will now conform seamlessly to all of those varieties.

Weve seen some really interesting innovation from the industry, going to these very large portrait displays going into these extremely wide landscape displays, Lopez said. And you know, the coolness is Android Auto will now support all of them, and will be able to adapt, giving you all of these features at your fingertips as a user.

Lopez acknowledged that screens in cars are getting bigger, especially in luxury vehicles like the Mercedes-Benz EQS, with its 56-inch wide Hyperscreen (which is actually three separate screens embedded in one pane of glass), or the Cadillac Lyriqs 33-inch LED infotainment display. He said that Google has been partnering with automakers to better adapt Android Auto to this trend.

That was part of the new motivation behind this redesign, was being able to adapt our product better to these vehicles that are coming out with these massive portrait displays and massive widescreen displays, Lopez said. And so our approach has been working really closely with these OEMs [original equipment manufacturers] to make sure that things make sense and they work.

As the screens get bigger, the likelihood that drivers will get more distracted by their displays also grows. A recent study found that drivers selecting music with Apple CarPlay or Android Auto had slower reaction times than those who were high from smoking pot. Google has been trying to work its way through this problem for several years now, but they have yet to arrive at a definitive solution.

Lopez said that safety is top of mind for the Android Auto product team, which motivates them to work closely with OEMs to ensure that the experience is fully integrated into the cars design to minimize distraction.

In addition to adapting to different sized screens, Google is also rolling out several other updates. Users will soon be able to respond to text messages with standardized replies that they can send with just one tap.

There are also more entertainment options. Android Automotive, which is Googles embedded Android Auto system, will now support Tubi TV and Epix Now streaming services. And Android phone owners can cast their own content directly onto their cars screen.

See original here:

Google updates Android Auto to better fit all the different sized touchscreens in cars today - The Verge

At Googles I/O developer conference, the company rolled out a series of updates for Android app developers who publish to Google Play. Among these were two high-profile changes to its Google Play app marketplace, custom store listings and in-app events, which follow updates Apple made to its own App Store just last year.

Google had been offering A/B testing for product page enhancements since 2015 a feature that allows developers to see which text and graphics would best convert users.

Apple later adopted a similar feature when, at last years Worldwide Developer Conference, it introduced Product Page Optimization designed to help developers to try out different app screenshots, videos and even app icons to try to appeal to different types of users. Developers could segment a certain percentage of App Store traffic to these cohorts to see which product pages performed better before deciding which page should be their default.

Apple last year also announced a related feature called Custom Product Pages that lets developers create different product pages to highlight different app features, each with its own unique URL to be used in external marketing channels.

Today, Google is following suit and essentially launching the same thing with Custom Store Listings.

Instead of simply testing different product pages, Android app developers will be able to make up to 50 custom store listings for their apps. Each page will have its own analytics and deep links available. Notably, this is more listings than Apples solution offers, which is currently set at 35 per app. Google explains developers can use this feature to display different listings to users based on where theyre coming from. For example, a developer with a recipe-finding app could target ad campaigns to U.S. users based on U.S. holidays, by showcasing recipes for Thanksgiving or Fourth of July. But it could target users from other markets at different times with recipes related to their own cultural traditions.

Apple last year also introduced an App Store feature, in-app events, to allow developers to promote real-time happenings going on inside their apps like special events or even just seasonal deals.

Google Play is now rolling out its own take on this feature, as well.

With the launch of what its calling LiveOps, developers will be able to submit content for featuring on the Play Store, including major updates for their app or game, in-app events and limited-time offers.

Google says LiveOps can drive 5% more 28-day active users to apps and deliver 4% higher revenue for those using the feature compared with those who dont. The feature is in an invite-only beta testing phase for the time being.

While these changes were the highlights among those designed to help developers target, acquire and reengage their users, Google also announced a few other notable Google Play updates.

The company said the Play Store would be updated to help people find the best tablet-optimized apps with new large-screen focused editorial content and a separate review and rating system for large-screen applications. Google Play will also later this year be updated to look better on tablets and foldable devices.

Image Credits: Google

For developers, Google also launched the Google Play SDK Index, which lists over 100 popular SDKs and which app permissions they use, so developers can determine if they adhere to Google Play policies and help fill out their apps privacy labels.

The company said it will soon launch a new Play Console page dedicated to deep links to put all the information and tools for deep links in one place. It also improved its Store Listing Experiments feature (aka A/B testing) to allow developers to see their results more quickly, with more transparency and control so they can better understand how long each experiment may need to run.

And beyond this, it rolled out features focus on improving app quality, including a new Developer Reporting API for accessing Android vitals metrics and issues data outside the Play Console; support for viewing vitals data at the country level; and Google said its making it possible to view vitals alongside Firebase Crashlytics. Itupdated the Play Console by adding revenue and revenue growth metrics to Reach and devices and overhauling its device catalog to include install data and filters by new device attributes like shared libraries. It said its now easier to test apps on different form factors including Android Auto and soon, Wear OS.

Play App Signing was updated to use Google Cloud Key Management and the ability for any app to perform an app signing key rotation in the event of an incident or as a security best practice from the Play Console.

And finally, Googles In-app Updates API will now let users know if theres an update available within 15 minutes instead of up to 24 hours.

See the article here:

Google Play adopts App Store-like features including in-app events and custom product pages - TechCrunch

During yesterday's Google I/O keynote, there was a moment that stood out to me that may have been lost on a lot of folks. While giving examples of new apps featured on Wear OS 3, Google took the time to call out KakaoTalk. I wont lie. I stood up, pointed my finger at my computer monitor, and screeched some version of AHA! I was right!

If you already know what KakaoTalk is, you likely are Korean, Korean-American, have a ton of Korean friends, love K-pop and K-dramas, or have lived / are living in Korea. You can see where Im going here. KakaoTalk is the number one messaging app in Korea. The easiest way I can describe it is that KakaoTalk is Koreas version of WeChat or WhatsApp. According to Statista, more than 47 million South Koreans were active monthly users on the app in Q4 2021. The current population of South Korea is roughly 51 million.

In my family, only the iPhone users actually text each other. The rest of the time, its KakaoTalk. Thats where the family group chat is. Its how I call and text my aunt. If I call my aunt the normal way, she is much less likely to pick up than if I call her over KakaoTalk. When my parents were alive, it was the main app we used to communicate, send pictures, and share videos. I sometimes hear the KakaoTalk ringtone in my dreams.

While Tizen, Samsungs proprietary wearable OS, had its strengths, it didnt have a good selection of third-party apps. What third-party apps it did have were infrequently updated. Meanwhile, Apple and less technologically impressive Wear OS watches had a much more robust app ecosystem. Fixing this weakness was the main reason Samsung made the switch to Wear OS.

I doubt Samsung would ever admit it, but my theory is that Kakaos refusal to make a Tizen app drove home the point that Samsung would have to abandon the platform if it wanted to grow its smartwatch business. Samsung is the most powerful company in the country. It accounts for roughly 20 percent of South Koreas GDP and it could not get KakaoTalk, the countrys most popular messaging and social media app, to develop a dedicated Tizen app. Reportedly, the reason KakaoTalk gave boiled down to Tizens market reach not being worth the effort. To rub salt in the wound, KakaoTalk had already created Android, iOS, and watchOS versions of its app. Samsung was, in essence, getting dissed on its home turf.

KakaoTalk actually developed its Wear OS app back in October, but its another thing for it to be singled out at I/O. This actually isnt the first time KakaoTalk has been featured in Wear OS promotional materials. The app was also thrown up on the screen at Google I/O last year when Google announced it was collaborating with Samsung on Wear OS 3. I have to imagine this was Google helping Samsung out in appealing to the Korean market, where 72 percent of the population uses Android and 67 percent uses Samsung phones. (Google did also use japchae during the keynote to demo multisearch near me, and you cannot underestimate Korean national pride at stuff like that.)

This is Samsung signaling to the Asian market that its got the apps they want now. Apps that have been on the Apple Watch for a long, long time. For instance, LINE, another Korean-made chat app that is hugely popular in Japan, was also included as one of the featured Wear OS 3 apps. And while Google may not decide to bring the Pixel Watch to the Asian market, these additions do help Samsung smartwatches appear more appealing in arguably its most important market Asia.

So this feels like one of those times where Google trotting out KakaoTalk as a selling point wasnt meant for American or European markets at all. And judging by how I reacted, Id say it was pretty effective.

See the original post here:

Here's why Google highlighting KakaoTalk on Wear OS 3 matters - The Verge

Among the multiple artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) initiatives announced by Google last week at its annual I/O developer conference, there were a number of projects to train the internet companys AI platforms. One such development was the introduction of a 10-shade Monk Skin Tone (MST) Scale something that could have a broader sociological significance as technology platforms witness deeper intersections with society at large. In Googles words, the MST Scale will support inclusive product and research across the industry.

What is the Monk Skin Tone Scale?

Developed in partnership with Dr Ellis Monk, associate professor of sociology at Harvard University, the Monk Skin Tone (MST) Scale is a tool that will be primarily incorporated by Google into computer vision, which is a type of AI that allows computers to see and understand images. It has been found that computer vision systems often do not function as efficiently for people of darker skin as they do for those with fairer complexion. Using the MST Scale, Google and the tech industry are aiming to build more representative datasets so that such AI models can be trained to identify a wider range of skin tones in images.

How will it work?

According to Google, the scale will make it easier for people of all backgrounds to find more relevant and helpful search results. For instance, users who search for makeup or beauty tutorials in Google Images will see an option to refine search results further by skin tone. Going ahead, Google will utilise the MST Scale to better detect and categorise images to give a larger range of results.

Newsletter | Click to get the days best explainers in your inbox

The tech giant plans to further expand the use of this schema the structure of the database created based on different skin tones so that creators and online businesses may label their content or products based on other attributes, such as hair colour and hair texture. Google has openly released the scale so that anyone can use it for research and product development.

Why the MST Scale?

According to Dr Courtney Heldreth, a social psychologist and user experience (UX) researcher at Googles Responsible AI Human-Centered Technology UX department, persistent inequities exist globally due to prejudice or discrimination against individuals with darker skin tones, also known as colourism. And AI not accurately seeing skin tone, which could further lead to existing inequities, is a type of colourism.

To bridge this gap, a Google research team including Heldreth and Xango Eye, a product manager working on Responsible AI, focused on bringing more skin tone equity to AI development. The team last year partnered with Monk, whose research has centred on how factors like skin tone, race and ethnicity affect inequality.

The foundation for the MST scale was laid upon the existing Fitzpatrick scale, developed by American dermatologist Thomas B Fitzpatrick in 1975, which classified human skin type into seven broad colours. The Google team and Monk arrived at a scale composed of 10 shades a range pegged to be not too limiting but also not too complex and surveyed thousands of adults in the US who felt more represented with the new methodology.

Are there similar developments elsewhere?

Several large corporations stepped up their efforts towards colour-based inclusiveness in light of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, which had happened in aftermath of police brutality and the killing of 46-year old African American George Floyd. In 2020, Johnson & Johnson-owned Band-Aid launched a new range of adhesive bandages in different shades of black and brown to make its products more inclusive for people of colour. In India, after backlash and strong public feedback over discrimination against people with darker skin tones, the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) in 2014 released guidelines for the advertising of skin lightening and fairness products. More recently, in 2020, Hindustan Unilever-owned cosmetic brand Fair & Lovely was renamed Glow & Lovely, after criticism for promoting colourism in its advertisements and marketing campaigns.

See the article here:

Explained: Googles new skin tone scale for refined search results and more - The Indian Express

In conjunction with itsGoogle I/Oconference,Google published a pinball gameTuesday that's geared to show off one of the company's favorite programming tools.

The pinball game is made with Flutter, a framework meant to help developers write software that'll work on Google's Android, Apple's iOS and the web. You can try it by loading the website in a browser.

Very Good Ventureswrote the app over the last 10 weeks, Chief Executive David DeRemersaid Wednesday. Curious developers can check out Google's Flutter talk from Google I/O.

At Google I/O, Google announced several new products, including its lower end Pixel 6A smartphone, new Pixel Buds Pro earbudsandupdates to its Android 13 beta. And it teased some upcoming offerings, including its Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro phones and Pixel Watch, coming this fall, and its Pixel tablet due in 2023.

On Android, the pinball app will ask if you want to install it as an app on your home screen. That illustrates Google's effort to blur the boundaries between web apps and native smartphone apps that run natively on iOS or Android.

Flutter plays a role in that effort. It's easy to craft an app that runs on either of the two smartphone families, the web, Windows and MacOS, DeRemer said. "It's truly one thing that can do almost anything," he said of Flutter.

The pinball game also uses a game engine called Flame designed to speed up game development, Google developers said in a blog post Tuesday.

Cross-platform programming can be tough because of interface differences, but the pinball game makes some accommodations. On a desktop browser, you use right and left arrows to operate the flippers. On phones, you tap the left and right sides of the screen.

But factors like different screen sizes can mean hiccups. In one test with Chrome on a Google Pixel 6 Pro, a phone with a relatively narrow screen, the rocket icon used to launch the ball is mostly off the edge of the screen.

Continue reading here:

Google I/O Pinball Game Shows How Apps Can Span Phones and the Web - CNET

After almost a year of waiting, we finally know when Google Assistant will arrive on Samsungs Galaxy Watch 4 lineup. Kind of. In a blog, Samsung executive vice president Patrick Chomet announced the long-awaited feature will arrive this summer. As for when this summer, its anybodys guess.

Chomet writes that Google Assistant on Wear OS 3 will enable faster and more natural voice interactions as well as the ability to look up quick answers while on the go. He also noted that it would be possible to control Spotify with Google Assistant on the watch.

A big reason why Samsung opted to work with Google to create a unified Wear OS 3 platform was the Google Play Store. Samsungs smartwatches had historically been a way for it to push its ecosystem of products and services, including its voice assistant Bixby. The promise of Wear OS 3 was that Android users would get a greater say in which apps and assistants they could use. So if you were someone who hated Bixby with the burning fire of a thousand suns, you could instead download Google Assistant.

The only hitch is that Google and Samsung were never very clear about when Google Assistant would arrive. In updates, both companies tended to use vague allusions that can be summarized as, Its coming. Later. For example, in February, Samsung released some new health features for the Galaxy Watch 4 and merely noted that Google Assistant would arrive in the coming months. Just two weeks ago, Verizon accidentally released an update log that seemed to imply Google Assistant had arrived but that wasnt actually the case.

The timing of this announcement makes a lot of sense. Not only has Google just officially announced the Pixel Watch due later this year but it also noted that other Google services would arrive on the Wear OS platform. That includes Google Home and Google Wallet.

Todays announcement, while vague, at least narrows that time frame. That said, your interpretation of what counts as summer may not be the same as what Google and Samsung have in mind. Many people tend to think of June, July, and August as the summer months. However, if you were to go by equinoxes and solstices, summer 2022 is defined as June 21st to September 22nd. Also, given that the Pixel Watch is slated for this fall, it wouldnt be surprising if we see Google Assistant arrive toward summers end. So, you can expect Google Assistant relatively soon though how soon is still up in the air.

Read the original:

Samsung says Google Assistant will arrive on Galaxy Watch 4 this summer - The Verge

Google has updated the title it uses for real time analytics in Universal Analytics 3 to read in the last 5 minutes. Previously this section was titled right now but with Google Analytics 4 rolling out, Google wanted to make the title more specific to what both are actually displaying.

In the last 5 minutes. Googles title for the real time metrics was updated to say in the last 5 minutes to more accurately describe what UA3s real time metrics actually displayed. Here is a screenshot of the new title:

Previously, it looked more like this saying right now which is not really right now but in the last 5 minutes.

Why the change. We believe Google made this change in order to help communicate why UA3 real time metrics are different from GA4 real time metrics. UA3 real time metrics are based off the last five minutes whereas GA4 real time metrics are based off the last thirty minutes.

Why we care. When you see this change, dont worry, you are not alone we are all seeing this title change. But rest assured, the metrics in real time Universal Analytics 3 have not changed. Google is just making it crystal clear that UA3 is measuring the past 5 minutes and GA4 is measuring the past 30 minutes.

Keep in mind, both UA3 and GA4 also measure traffic differently so even if they both looked at the past 5 minutes, it would show different numbers.

Follow this link:

Google Universal Analytics real time metrics now titled "in the last 5 minutes" - Search Engine Land