Articles tagged with: google

Or rather, "Google launches boyz to men of Florissant". At least, that’s how the speech-recognition facility of the updated Google Mobile App translated our headline when we just uttered it into our iPhone.

Yep, four days later than expected, Google’s new voice-search tool has made its way onto the App Store. So why was it late? Well, plenty of others have been speculating over the weekend, with most pointing the finger at Apple and its mysterious application-approval process. Our favourite take on the affair was posted by Mike Arrington over at TechCrunch.

But forget the whys and wherefores of its delay – speaky search is here. Is it any good? Our received-pronunciation appraisal is after the cut.

It may have been on sale since the end of October, but a “limited supply of review units” (always an interesting concept when applied to a mass-market consumer product that’s launched worldwide) has meant that we’ve had to wait a few weeks to get a T-Mobile G1 for review. Still, it’s here now, so in the time-honoured tradition, here’s a first-impressions video prior to our full review.

Google will soon update its iPhone tool, Google Mobile App, to include the ability to perform searches using speech recognition.

In other words, iPhone users will no longer need to tap at the handset’s on-screen keyboard in order to execute Google searches: just launch Google Mobile App, speak into the microphone and a recording of your voice will be sent to Google’s servers and translated into a search query. Well, that’s the theory, at least.

The New York Times was first to report on the advance today. However, the Google Mobile Blog team in fact posted a video about the update to Mobile App on YouTube a couple of days ago. More, including that video, after the cut.

Though expressly against T-Mobile’s terms and conditions, some clever chap over at the TmoNews forums has put together a step-by-step guide to tethering the G1 to a computer so that it can be used as a 3G modem.

Now, in an ideal world, we’d run our own step-by-step guide to this process but, as we still haven’t been loaned a G1 review sample, we can’t – sorry. However, TmoNews poster bdogg64’s instructions seem pretty clear, if a tad convoluted (though he can hardly be blamed for detailing the process). More after the cut.

Advert-delivery outfit Medialets has undertaken some early analysis of the Google Android Market and concluded that entertainment apps and utilities are leading the way.

It has tracked the movement of all 167 applications available up to and including 29th October and found that of those, just 41 accounted for somewhere between 73 and 83% of all downloads. Two applications – Pac-Man and The Weather Channel – generated the most downloads. More rather vague statistics after the cut.

Click the Labs icon in Gmail (/Google Mail) today and you’ll find a bunch of new experimental features. The one most people seem to be talking about is the addition of SMS (text messaging) to Google Chat but be warned, for the time being this is for US-based GChatters only.

However, there are three other recent additions to Labs that to our mind are just as noteworthy.

It’s now possible, for instance, to add a Google Calendar gadget to the Gmail sidebar, as well as a Google Docs box. But we think the most interesting newcomer is the 'Add any gadget' option. More details after the cut.

Today's the day to get your paws on the T-Mobile G1. In fact you may already be reading this on your shiny new touchscreen Android handset because doors opened at 7am at T-Mobile stores in eager anticipation of hoards of Google Phone seekers.

It goes on sale on T-Mob's standard contracts from £30 or for free on £40+ tariffs with free web'n'walk worth £7.50 thrown in. More after the jump.

With Android barely wet behind the ears, Google is already mapping out its illustrious future. Private schooling, university, marriage and a bright career perhaps? Not a bit of it instead Google has little Android down for some extra language packs (starting with German), support for "multiple APNs" and, er SIM application toolkit support for all those slightly pointless "features" that networks like to pack in to their SIM menus.

This is one of those headline-says-it-all stories: Google Earth is available right now for the Apple iPhone.

If you’ve heard enough, then head right on over to the iTunes App Store to download it.

Not convinced? You’re not alone: not everyone here at Mobile Computer 'gets' Google Earth

Fortunately, he’s a lone soul and for the rest of the team, this is a product launch to get really excited about. Really, really excited. Why? Well, read on after the cut.

Short and sweet version: Google has released the next major bump of Gmail for mobile – version 2.0, in other words. If you want to know more, read on.

Along with the vague promise of "overall performance improvement", Gmail for mobile 2.0 offers some quantifiable not to mention welcome improvements.

For starters, users can now manage multiple accounts with the mobile version of Gmail, so it’s possible to switch between a Gmail and Google Apps account from the same screen. As well, multiple email drafts can be saved and there’s a bunch of shortcut keys. More after the cut.