A bunch of new fun stuff is coming down the pipeline, Google-fans! Your favorite search giant has just pushed several updates to some of its headlining properties, including Play Music, Play Magazines, and Google Goggles. We've got the full rundown for you.
Play Music
For starters, Google Music has added expandable notifications to its repertoire. It doesn't look like you'll see much more info if you expand it, but Play Music continues to be one of the best examples of how to make notifications robust and useful. Also, good news for Google TV owners: if you purchased a newer GTV box (like the Vizio Co-Star), Play Music will now be supported. Here's the full changelog:
What's in this version:
v4.3.609
* Bug fixes and support for Google TV devices.
* Expandable notifications in Jellybean.
Play Magazines
Over in Play Magazine land, the updates are mostly under the hood. The app will now be better at estimating just how much space you have available, which is handy since more often than not you'll want to download magazines locally, as flipping through issues while they download from the cloud can be a laggy experience. Aside from that, bug fixes and performance improvements abound. Here, have another changelog:
What's in this version:
v1.0.1
* Home screen / library performance improvements.
* Better recognition of available space.
* Bug fixes targeted at Nexus 7 and Jellybean users.
* App crash fixes.
Google Goggles
Finally, Google Goggles has gotten a small but substantial update. Now, searching with the camera doesn't require history to be enabled. Nice for those of you who would like to try out this fancy feature without feeling like you're being forced into mining data for Google. The Goggles now also feature better object tracking in continuous mode, and QR code scanning has become more robust. It will even check embedded URLs against a malware blacklist. How nice! And for my last trick, a changelog!
What's in this version:
- Search-from-camera no longer requires search history to be enabled.
- Faster, more robust object tracking in “continuous” mode
- When scanning a QR code that has a URL encoded:
- The thumbnail of a page is shown
- URL is checked against a malicious URL blacklist
- More complete barcode coverage
- Support for non-autofocus cameras
- When Goggles fails to find an exact match - search for products that look similar.