Google has revealed a number of interesting changes at its Google I/O conference. Here are our favourites so far.
Google Play Gaming Services
Google is introducing its Google Play Gaming Services to Android which will provide gamers with persistent cloud save functionality, achievements and leaderboards, multiplayer matchmaking and social activity via Google +.
Google Play Music All Access
Google Play Music All Access expands on Google’s existing music catalogue on Google Play. Essentially a subscription based streaming service, All Access lets you stream from curated genre collections and will automatically create and preserve playlists of new tracks based on what you already listen to.
Samsung Galaxy S4 with stock Android on Google Play
A bit of a shock announcement, Google revealed it will be stocking a version of the Samsung Galaxy S4 on Google Play which will run stock Android. It’ll be a 16GB model and will arrive in June - every update to Android Jelly Bean will come direct from Google.
Google Hangout App
Google has announced a dedicated Hangout app based on the Hangout functionality found on Google+.
Android will get a new icon and the interface has been altered so that it now groups interactions in terms of conversations as opposed to by contacts. These conversations are automatically saved and can be revisited, even if users change devices, although there is the option to delete and toggle the feature on and off.
Video chat within Hangouts has also been subjected to a revamp so that tapping on one icon invites all those participating to a video hangout regardless of the device being used.
Google Photos
Google’s photo services tied into Android and Chrome are being updated. The most impressive feature is that Google can automatically curate a photo album from hundreds of snaps uploaded to your photo cloud storage. It picks the best photos based on recognising friends and family members, whether people are smiling, aesthetic quality, landmark locations and general image quality (it’ll disqualify duplicates, blurry and under/overexposed images).
Google is also introducing Auto-enhance and Auto-Awesome. Auto-enhance will automatically improve colour, contrast, human skin and various other photo elements, it can salvage a blurry or poorly exposed photo into something usable by itself. Google will present you with its modifications and you can opt in or out of them at any time.
Auto-awesome is a collection of automatic enhancement features including Motion (a GIF maker), Mix (Collage), HDR mode, Smille and Pano.
by pbriden via Featured Articles
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