Google I\O 2015 Keynote

It’s 4:45AM in the morning. I am still in night shift mode in my long weekend. I had ordered July month Digit and got it yesterday. It has the 2 hour key note of Google I\O 2015 in its DVD, one of the major reasons I ordered the July issue.

I have massive respect from Google since long time. If you read my ‘Technology’ label posts here, you could easily infer the same. I have read The Google Story, and got really impressed by their ideology and values. I\O 2015 keynote started by a note from the VP of Sales, who unsurprisingly is an NRI, key takeaways were there are currently 4000 different Android mobile models in the world, 8 out of 10 mobile phones shipped last year were Android, and another very impressive thing which we take for granted is Google is same for everyone. A student in rural India and a professor in MIT USA can both search google search engine and get the same results. Another highlight was there are 1 billion plus users each of 6 top Google products currently, really impressive all this!

Second note was on the Android M Developer Preview. M is the next major Android version (after the current L implying lollypop). There are not going to be major UI changes this time around, they have rather focused on removing maximum bugs and making it as clean as possible. There are 6 main areas of focus in M. First is App Permissions. Now permissions won’t’ be asked while installing, but after install when you try to access a feature like voice, permissions would be asked one time. You can also revoke or grant any permissions for the app from app settings. This is really nice feature from security point which was missing from Android. One of the experts in my hackathon prep session had highlighted this last year.

Second was Web Experience. They have introduced a feature called the ‘Chrome Custom Tab’. What it does is when you click on any links inside you app, it opens the link in chrome maintaining the theme of the link’s original app. The loading is very fast as the app is able to pass the information to Chrome ahead of time. The dev version of this is currently available; commercial release is Q3 this year.

Third was ‘App links’. It mainly involves linking multiple apps. This is essentially a security feature of sort, when you click on a link in one app, the android platform will verify from the server the authenticity of the link and open the link in the respective app providing security and convenience. 

Fourth feature is ‘Android Pay’. Using Android pay you can make payments using your mobiles at stores. A good step in convergence I believe. No more need to carry wallets!  Android pay is simple, secure and has choices for users. To make payment all you need to do is just unlock you phone and expose to NFC reader, simple indeed! When you add your credit card to Android pay and new account number is created, and your credit card number is not shared with the store, thus secure.  You can register for this via Google, via banks or via you carrier, so secure in that regards. Android pay will work in 700 stores to start with in US. Android pay will also be integrated for in-app purchases.

Fifth new feature is fingerprint support. Devices have been providing this since 2011 but with their own application. With M, this will be standardized across all devices, as it will be integrated in the OS. Fingerprint supports will be useful for 3 main purposes: Device Unlock, Play Store purchases and Open Authentication APIs. The last one is mainly for developers, where they can easily integrate the feature in their apps. 

Last but not the least was Power and charging. There is a new smart feature for managing power called ‘Doze’. What it will do is if there is no activity for long period of times, like say when we are sleeping, the device would go in a deeper sleep state. This will enable longer battery life, however all features like alarms and incoming messages over the net would still be active. Compared to L, M devices were tested to last 2 times longer in standby mode. For charging they have developed a new USB Type C standard. Charging would be 3 to 5 times faster, the chargers would be flippable, so you could insert it in your device socket either ways. Small, but very insightful and important change.

There are loads of other new useful features like easy word selection, floating keyboard toolbar, direct share,  Flex storage, App standby, etc.. Official release of M is in Q3 2015. And guess who would get it first? Hell yeah.. the Nexus users!!!

Next note was by David Singelton, Director of Android wear on Android wear, obvio maan! Currently there are 1500 watch faces. As of May 2015, the latest watch LG Watch Urbane also comes with new features like Wifi. Features like GPS and offline music are already there. Seems eventually this will replace mobile phone in few years’ time for basic computing, entertainment and communication.  The latest release of Android wear will have always-on feature. No need to shake wrist or push button to check time. This feature is extended to apps to integrate on home screen. Examples include a grocery list or a map will stay on the screen till you want.

Next feature is wrist gestures. This one I like especially. Flip your wrist to go through notifications. Their moto is wearable app should be glanceable, actionable and effortless. Awesome indeed. He also showed the hordes of features available in wearable devices now, those include microphone, haptic motor, accelerometer, compass, gyroscope, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, barometer, heart rate monitor, and GPS. Whao!! Dint imagine all this in a watch!! You can virtually do anything with the watch now, if you can dream it, you can build it is the message for the developers. All the code would run independently inside the watch, another big add on. Currently there are already over 4000 apps specifically for Android wear.

Next was announcement of ‘Brillo’, the operating system for IoT. Next ‘WEAVE’ a communication channel using which devices could talk to each other. Brillo would be available from Q3 2015, and WEAVE from Q4 2015. Another great feature in M is ‘Now on Tap’. This is google now going epic in NLP and smart use of 30 level neural network of Google! Just tap on the Home button anywhere, and see Google Now unlock the magic!

Next was introduction of brand new product ‘Google Photos’ by Anil, another Indian, we were in majority, hell yeah!! Lot of kool new features of sharing, searching and editing in there! Awesome indeed. Great feature is backup and store unlimited fotos and videos for free. Up to 16 Mpx for fotos and 1080p HD for videos!!Google Photos is already available.

After this there were announcements specifically for developers community on new products, and new features in existing products for developers. It was a wonderful event, I felt really inspired. The major takeaway was domination of Android in world market, and use of Android in Brillo stack, something of a major takeaway for me indeed!!