The Android | What is Android | Androids | Android Market | App for Android | Android Apps | Android Application | Download Android | Tablet Android | Tablet PC | Phone Android | Android 2.2 | Android 2.3 | Android Free | Games for Android | Android Samsung | Galaxy Android | Android Google | Games Android | アンドロイド | Android | Android 2 | Android PC | Google Android | Android Galaxy | Phones with Android | Which Android Phone | What is an Android Tablet | What is an Android Phone
Google is always looking to make it easier for you to search and explore the web on your phone. We recently launched Near me now, which lets you explore what's around you from the Google home page, and a category browse feature on Local Search with categorized business listings. Today, we're happy to announce Popular Images which lets you browse and find interesting images.
This feature is accessible from Google Image Search on Android-powered devices and iPhones in the US. To try it out, go to www.google.com on your phone browser and click on "Images". Under the search box, you will see a few of the top images along with a link to "Browse Popular Images".
Clicking the link opens up a categorized list of image searches and corresponding images.
We have organized popular images across a few categories like Movies, Sports, Cars & Bikes, Music, and Cartoons. You can click on individual categories to see related images corresponding to what's popular on Google Image Search. The queries are automatically categorized with an algorithm that will continue to improve over time. One special category is Trends, which shows image queries from Google Trends that have especially high recent activity.
Give it a try and have fun exploring images.
Posted by Jignashu Parikh and Varun Sharma, Google Mobile Engineering
Sometimes when you're searching for a local business on your mobile device, you're not looking for their website, but rather to connect by phone. After searching for a restaurant, you might want to call and make a reservation. Or, after searching for a video store, you might want to find out if they have the video you want. Calling the business is now easier thanks to a feature that allows advertisers to add a clickable local phone number to their mobile ads. If you're using an iPhone, Android, or other smartphone, you just click the number to call the business. What's more, the ads and phone numbers you see are based on your location. So, if a store or restaurant has multiple locations, you'll be calling the nearest one, and not making reservations in some other city. You can use My Location to make sure you get search results that are tailored to your location.
Of course, if you're going to be in another city next week and you want to call ahead to make your reservation, include the city in your search query to get the most relevant results.
If you're an advertiser and would like to learn more about how to add a clickable phone number to your ads that appear on mobile devices, check out this post on the Inside AdWords blog for more details.
Posted by Surojit Chatterjee, Product Manager, Mobile Ads Team
There will be technical presentations throughout the day and a developer lounge where you can talk to Android team members and meet others in the growing Android developer community.
Whether you’re already developing Android apps, you're an experienced mobile developer, or you’re considering making your first foray into writing mobile applications, the Android Developer Lab will provide access to the resources you need to create innovative and compelling apps for the Android platform.
Space is limited in the technical sessions, so if you're attending MWC and want to come by the Android Developer Lab, make sure to sign up now.
Also, we're offering a limited number of complimentary passes that provide access to the Android Developer Lab, the rest of App Planet, and the general exhibition areas for MWC. Sign up to be considered to receive a pass.
A few weeks ago, Alex Nicolaou, Engineering Manager, wrote about the benefits of the fast and feature-rich iterative web app. Delivering Google services via mobile browsers has worked well for the Gmail team, so we decided to follow the same approach with Google Voice.
Today, we're excited to introduce the Google Voice web app for the iPhone and Palm WebOS devices. This HTML5 application provides you with a fast and versatile mobile experience for Google Voice because it uses the latest advancements in web technologies. For example, AppCache lets you interact with web apps without a network connection and local databases allow you to store data locally on the device, so you don't lose data even when you close the browser.
One of the great benefits of web applications is that you don't need to download and install an app on your phone. Instead, simply point your mobile browser to m.google.com/voice and sign in to your Google Voice account.
Then you can make calls from your phone that show your Google Voice number as the caller ID. You can also listen to voicemail and read voicemail transcripts, send and receive text messages for free, and take advantage of the low international call rates offered by Google Voice.
For quick access to the most important features like "Dialer", "Compose SMS", "Inbox" or "Contacts," you can add shortcuts to your iPhone home screen or Palm Launcher -- so cheap calls and messaging will be just a single click away. And because the Google Voice web app uses advanced features of modern HTML5 browsers, it offers native app-like performance and speed.
For more information visit m.google.com/voice or take a look at the Google Mobile Help Center. Please note, the web app is compatible with all versions of Palm WebOS and iPhone OS 3.0 and higher.
A Google Voice account is required to use the app, and Google Voice is currently only available in the United States. To learn more about Google Voice or request an invite, visit www.google.com/voice or read the Google Voice blog.
Posted by Marcus Foster, Product Manager and David Singleton, Engineering Manager
Late last year, we held a series of developer labs to give you a chance to ask questions and play with some new hardware. One of the most common questions we received was, "When are you going to visit my city?" It's a good question, and we're pleased to answer it today.
The Android team is embarking on a world tour, which will include cities in Europe, North America, and Asia.
At each stop, we'll be delivering an update on the state of the Android platform—including a look at the latest Android hardware. It's a great opportunity to meet like-minded Android app developers, play with the latest Android devices, test your apps, and ask Android team members any questions you might have. You can find out more on the Android Developer Lab site.
Here's the line-up of Android Developer Lab locations for February and March 2010:
North America
Austin, Texas – Feb 4
Seattle, Washington – Feb 8
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada – Feb 8
Washington, D.C. – Feb 9
Mountain View, California – Feb 10
Cambridge, Massachusetts – Feb 11
New York, New York – Feb 12
Europe
London, UK – Feb 2
Paris, France – Feb 8
Berlin, Germany – Feb 10
Zurich, Switzerland – Feb 12
Madrid, Spain – Feb 13
Asia
Singapore – Feb 28
Taipei, Taiwan – March 3
Hong Kong – March 5
If you'd like to attend, you'll need to request a spot by February 1st. Space is limited, so please wait for an email to confirm that you have a spot in the lab.
While we're on the road, we're also going to stop by and speak at the following local Android user groups:
2009 has been a great year for Android Market. With the support of developers like you, Android Market now has more than 20,000 applications. Of these applications, games have proven to be particularly popular with Android users. Seven of the ten most popular paid applications on Android Market are games, so there's a significant opportunity for game developers as the number of Android devices continues to grow at a rapid pace.
To better support this trend, we are increasing our support of Android game development. As a first step, we will be presenting a number of Android sessions at the Game Developers Conference on March 9th and 10th in San Francisco. The sessions will be technical and will include everything you need to know about Android game development in Java or C++. Engineers from the Android team will also be available to answer your questions. Whether you are new to the platform or already have games in development, we would love to meet you face-to-face, answer your questions, and see what you're working on. Be sure to keep checking the GDC site because we'll be adding more sessions.
But that's not all. Google and GDC will also be providing complimentary Android phones to attendees who register for All Access or Tutorials and Summits passes by the Early Bird deadline of February 4, 2010. Qualified attendees will receive either a Nexus One or a Verizon Droid by Motorola, so they can quickly apply what they learn from the various Android sessions. You can find more details about the Android phone offer on the GDC site.
Our goal is to make it as easy as possible to develop awesome games for Android, and this is a first step. Hope to see you at GDC!
You may recall that we announced IRC Office Hours for Android app developers back in December. We just want to provide a quick update that upcoming office hours will be held on Thursdays from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. PST, instead of twice weekly. These will be held in the #android-dev channel on irc.freenode.net as before.
Please post your questions on Stack Overflow with "from-irc" tag in addition to "android" tag one day before office hours. We will follow up on those specific questions during office hours, and will also post answers after.
Typing a query into the search box on a phone can often be slow and difficult. For this reason, relevant search suggestions that match your intended query can meaningfully reduce the time and effort it takes to submit a search. Today in the US, we are happy to announce an improvement to Google.com search suggestions offered on Android powered devices and iPhone. Now, Google will offer suggestions based on the phone's current or last location, making the suggestions more relevant.
For example, when users in the Boston metro area begin typing "Muse", suggestions such as "museum of science boston" and "museum of fine arts boston" are provided because people near Boston frequently look for these very popular museums. On the other hand, users in San Francisco who begin their query with "Muse" will see suggestions for museums in the San Francisco area. By using the device's current or most recent location, Google is able to offer even better, more useful suggestions than ever before. To try this yourself, go to google.com on your phone's browser and start typing a query to see the new location-optimized suggestions. Make sure you have turned on "Save recent locations" and "Allow use of device location" under the Settings link on the google.com home page.
Update @ 4:50 PM: Note that you may have to refresh google.com in your phone browser to see the new optimized suggestions.
Posted by Natalia Marmasse and Scott Huffman, Google Mobile Engineering Team
If you have a BlackBerry and use the built-in Messages and Contacts apps, you can now search the email and contacts on your device using the new version of Google Mobile App.
Just type (or speak) your query - perhaps the name of the person who sent you the mail or a phrase from the text - and Google Mobile App will search through the emails and contacts on your device and return the results. You can quickly reply to an email or forward it on.
You can also quickly call, SMS, or email contacts by typing the first few letters of your contact's first or last name, and then pressing the corresponding button. Google Mobile App will suggest contacts as you type and you can scroll down to select one. Google Mobile App will promote the people you contact frequently to the top of the suggestions list.
To switch between on-device results (email and contacts) and web results (from Google), click on the link underneath the search box.
If you'd rather Google Mobile App not search your email and contacts, you can turn off Phone Search in the options screen. Google Mobile App does not send information about your contacts or content from your emails to Google. This data is only accessed on your device.
Searching email requires BlackBerry OS version 4.5 or higher. Searching contacts is available on BlackBerry OS 4.2 and higher.
The new version of Google Mobile App also includes other improvements, such as the ability to use your BlackBerry's Wi-Fi connection to access the Internet.
To download Google Mobile App to your BlackBerry, visit m.google.com. Learn more in our help center.
Today, we are releasing the SDK component for Android 2.1, so that developers can take advantage of the new features introduced in Android 2.1. Please read the Android 2.1 release notes for more details. You can download the Android 2.1 component through the SDK Manager.
In addition to the new SDK, a new USB driver that supports Nexus One is also available today through the SDK Manager. The USB driver page contains more information.
Last month, Vic Gundotra, VP of Engineering, demonstrated at the Computer History Museum the ability to search by using your location as the query. Starting today, you can try this yourself by going to Google.com in your iPhone or Android browser and clicking on "Near me now" once your location has been provided by your phone.
"Near me now" was designed to address two user problems. First, we wanted to make it fast and easy to find out more about a place in your immediate vicinity, whether you're standing right in front of a business or if it's just a short walk away. For example, you may want to know what other customers think about a restaurant before you go inside (see quick video below) or what they have been raving about on the menu before you order. By selecting the "Explore right here" option, you can find out more about a place "right here" with just a few clicks.
Second, we wanted to make searching for popular categories of nearby places really simple. Imagine that you emerge from the subway station and you want to grab a coffee, but you don't see a coffee shop around you. You can simply search for all nearby coffee shops by using "Near me now". To search other categories of places not shown, "Browse more categories" provides access to our local search product with more category choices.
"Near me now" is currently available in the US for iPhone (OS 3.x) or Android-powered devices with version 2.0.1 or later. You must first enable location in order for "Near me now" to appear, and "Explore right here" works only if the phone provides location accuracy within approximately a city block.
Posted by John Eric Hoffman and Jussi Myllymaki, Google Mobile Engineering
We're very excited about today's launch of Nexus One, the newest Android-powered phone running the latest Android 2.1 software. Nexus One comes with all your favorite Google Mobile apps pre-installed: find the classics like Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube and Google Talk, with additional goodies like Maps Navigation and Google Voice. With its 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon™ chipset, these apps are speedier than ever before.
Additionally, Nexus One has a few cool new features like a voice-enabled keyboard for any text field; this way, you can speak to your phone and it does the text messaging, email writing, or search querying for you. Try adding the new YouTube widget to one of the five customizable home screen panels to quickly access the videos you want with just a few clicks. Explore your Picasa Web Albums with the 3D interface of the new Cooliris Gallery application. With Nexus One's 3.7" AMOLED display, your videos, apps, and photos are larger, clearer, and sharper.
Clicking the link opens up a categorized list of image searches and corresponding images.
We have organized popular images across a few categories like Movies, Sports, Cars & Bikes, Music, and Cartoons. You can click on individual categories to see related images corresponding to what's popular on Google Image Search. The queries are automatically categorized with an algorithm that will continue to improve over time. One special category is Trends, which shows image queries from Google Trends that have especially high recent activity.
Give it a try and have fun exploring images.
