Inside Search
The official Google Search blog
Accelerated Mobile Pages in Search
October 7, 2015
People are consuming more content on their mobile phones than ever before. We read, listen, watch, play, and buy from our phones while we’re out, at home, on the bus, and with our friends. Google Search aims to show you the best answers for all of life’s contexts, and we want to
help you explore and discover great content on the web
. Today, Google Search is excited to share a preview of how
Accelerated Mobile Pages
are helping us create a fast and beautiful content browsing experience for mobile web.
Whether you want to find out the latest
[news]
or the next
[recipes]
to try in the kitchen, Search brings you fresh, high-quality content from around the web. Accelerated Mobile Pages are specially formatted web pages that enable Search to display this content extremely fast, while ensuring that publishers control the way their content looks and feels.
This
demo
of Accelerated Mobile Pages in Search utilizes content from a limited set of participating publishers and is accessible through the below links. We hope that it provides a glimpse of how fast the mobile web can become, and how Search is committed to making results fresher and browsing faster.
Explore and search within
g.co/ampdemo
in your mobile browser or follow the links below:
[fashion]
[mars]
[syria]
[nytimes]
Learn more about the Accelerated Mobile Pages Project at
ampproject.org
.
Posted by Daniel Rocha, Software Engineer
Translate text within apps thanks to the latest Android update
October 6, 2015
We face communication barriers every day. Switching back and forth between apps and screens to translate shouldn’t be another one. We’ve heard your feedback, and have worked with the Android team to make translating text, chats, and other app content a whole lot easier.
Beginning this week, you’ll be able to translate in 90 languages right from within some of your favorite apps like TripAdvisor, WhatsApp and LinkedIn.
Translating a TripAdvisor review from Portuguese
Composing a WhatsApp message in Russian
This update works on any device running the newest version of Android’s operating system (Android 6.0, Marshmallow). To get started, you first need to have
the Translate app
downloaded on your Android phone. From there, just go to an app, like TripAdvisor or LinkedIn, and highlight and select the text you want to translate. This feature is already enabled in apps that use Android
text selection
behavior. Developers who created custom text selection behavior can also
easily add
the new feature.
More than 500 million people translate over
100 billion words a day
on Google Translate. With updates like this one, plus features like
conversation mode
and
instant camera translation
, we’re making Translate available anywhere you need it. So when you’re chatting with a new colleague from halfway around the world, conversation mode is perfect. Wondering which subway sign says “exit” on your next global adventure? Instant camera translation has your back. And now, when you’re sending messages or checking out reviews on your phone, you can translate right from within the apps you’re using.
Posted by Barak Turovsky, Product Lead, Google Translate
Got a Nexus phone? Look out for Now on Tap
October 5, 2015
It’s Friday night and your friend just texted: “Hey, want to go see The Martian this weekend and then grab dinner at The Slanted Door?” Chances are you need to jump through a lot of hoops on your phone to get enough info so you can respond: you may want to find out what the movie’s about and who’s in it, what time it’s playing, where The Slanted Door is, if they serve any vegetarian dishes and whether you can get a reservation.
We built
Now on Tap
as a step toward taking the hassle out of these types of situations and get you help quickly. We first talked about this new feature at Google I/O, and now it’s here—rolling out over the next few days to Nexus phones and other devices running Marshmallow over time.
So—back to your Friday night plans. With Now on Tap, if you tap and hold down the home button of your Android phone, Google Now will show you quick info about the movie and restaurant and help you jump into the right apps to read reviews, see the menu, and reserve a table. Once you’re done, the back button will take you right back to your messaging app so you can respond to your friend.
Helping you with Friday night plans isn’t the only way Now on Tap can assist you right in the moment, anywhere on your phone. Here are a few other examples:
As you read about the 2016 US elections or Elon Musk’s plans for Mars, simply tap and hold down the home button on your phone: Now on Tap will show you quick facts, and with just a tap you can jump straight to social media or the latest news articles.
When a playlist or station in Google Play Music, Pandora or another music app surprises you with a new song, Now on Tap can give you more info about the artist or band.
Once your phone is updated to Android Marshmallow, just tap and hold down the home button to give Now on Tap a whirl. It’s available in English starting today and we’ll be adding more languages — and more ways for Now on Tap to help you — in the coming months. When a tap-and-hold doesn’t give you what you want, you can easily send feedback and help us improve this feature.
It’s early days but we’re excited about taking another step towards making your smartphone even smarter, by assisting you: getting you straight to the answer you need or the next step of what you’re doing.
Posted by Aparna Chennapragada, Director of Product Management and Behshad Behzadi, Principal Engineer
Celebrate Constitution Day with Google
September 17, 2015
Trying to remember how that famous phrase “We the People…” ends? Scratching your head over what’s included in the Tenth Amendment? Or maybe you need a refresher on how many amendments are even in the United States Constitution—or the Constitution of Japan, for that matter. Now (on Constitution Day, no less!) this information is more accessible than ever, thanks to our partnership with the
Constitute Project
.
The Constitute Project helps people access, compare and analyze the world’s constitutions. Now we’re adding more of this content to our search results, so you can find the full text for the United States Constitution—or constitutions from 12 other countries—right at the top of your search results page. To try it out, type (or say) “constitution” into Google Search or the Google App and a box will pop up with the Preamble for the United States Constitution and a drop-down menu where you can see all of the accompanying articles and amendments.
Besides the United States, you can find the constitutions for Afghanistan, Bhutan, Estonia, Finland, France, Iceland, Japan, Laos, Latvia, Micronesia, Norway and Ukraine. We’re starting with these constitutions and looking forward to adding more soon.
We're excited to play our part in showing the world the common ideals that tie different countries together, and the differences that make them each unique. In the end, We the People...of Google are always trying to do what we can in Order to form a more perfect Search.
Posted by Brett Perlmutter, Special Projects Lead, Google Ideas
Now Google can help with updated health information
September 3, 2015
In early August, New York City saw an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease, a very rare and sometimes deadly form of pneumonia. As more outbreaks came to light,
Google searches for Legionnaires' disease
spiked over 1,000%. People wanted to know what this disease is, why it’s spreading, and how to prevent it. So we quickly updated our health conditions feature (first
launched last February
) to provide information on Legionnaires' right up front, from a simple search.
Indeed, health conditions continue to be among the most important things people ask Google about, and one of our most popular features. So today we’re announcing broader updates—over the next few weeks, you’ll notice:
Hundreds more health conditions (soon over 900 total, more than double the number we started with) where you’ll get quick at-a-glance info on symptoms, treatments, prevalence, and more
Visual design improvements and some more specific triggering so it’s quicker and easier to get the info you need (for example, you can now search for “pink eye symptoms” and you’ll get straight to the symptoms tab)
A ‘Download PDF’ link so you can easily print this information for a doctor’s visit—this has been a top request from doctors
We’re making sure to include
neglected tropical diseases
, a set of infections that affect over 1.5 billion people including 500 million children in poorer regions. We think it's important for people to have facts on these diseases, such as Dengue Fever (already included), Chikungunya, and Leishmaniasis (to be added soon). Today the feature is still only in U.S. English, but we plan to expand it to more languages and regions.
As before, we’ve consulted and worked closely with a team of doctors to curate and validate this information. We’ve gotten lots of positive, helpful feedback from our users and medical professionals, and we’ll keep working to bring useful health information to your fingertips, whether in
the Google app
or on desktop.
Posted by Prem Ramaswami, Product Manager
Visual updates to Search and Now cards
September 1, 2015
Today, people use Google very differently from just a few years ago—we’re now as likely to touch and talk as we are to type. We also use Google on an endless number of devices, from mobile phones, TVs, and watches, to the dashboards in our cars, all in addition to desktop. We just
announced
a new visual language for Google that reflects this. You’ll start seeing our new logo, icon and animated dots soon across Google, including when you search on the mobile web and, of course, the Google app.
With mobile devices in mind, we’ve also made some changes to our search results page to help you more easily find what you need and dive into diverse content such as images, videos, news stories and more — by simply swiping and tapping.
On Android, we’ve also updated the “home page” of our Google app (which you can always get to by tapping the new, colorful G icon). On days when there’s a doodle, you’ll find it at the top of the page and Now cards will be organized by category so you can find what you need more predictably. As your day progresses, Now cards shift and change size so that the most important ones stand out.
If today’s news makes you curious about how our logo has changed over time, a search for
Google logo history
will give you a peek. And for those times when you’re
feeling curious
, we also have something fun!
Download high res images
Posted by Kai Conragan, Product Designer
Rest your thumbs: Ask Google to send your messages via WhatsApp, Viber and more
July 28, 2015
Between friends, family and work, we send dozens of messages a day. But there’s an easier way to do that than using your thumbs on tiny keyboards. Starting today, you can send messages using some of your favorite messaging apps on your Android by simply talking to Google, just like you can already do to send quick emails, Hangouts or text messages.
With the Google app on your Android, you can already say things like “Ok Google, send a text to Taylor: I’ll be in town for the weekend, want to meet up?”—the same way you can ask Google all your questions by voice on your phone. Now, you can do the same with some popular messaging apps.
Just say, “Ok Google, send a WhatsApp message to Joe”—after which you’ll get a prompt asking you to dictate your message. Or, you can do it all in one step: “Ok Google, send a Viber message to Josh: let’s do dinner tomorrow night.” In addition to WhatsApp and Viber, you can send voice messages via WeChat, Telegram and NextPlus (just make sure you have the latest version of both the messaging and the Google app). You’ll be able to do this in English initially (not only in the US though!) and we’ll be working to add more apps and languages in the future.
With all of us spending so much time in apps, we’ve been working to add new ways to surface the right content from your apps at the right time. Over the past few months, you may have seen
Now cards from many of your favorite apps
and new ways to also
get things done across your apps by just asking Google
something, like “Ok Google, Shazam this song” or “Show me apartments for rent near me on Zillow.” So type less and speak more—your thumbs will thank you.
Posted by Sunil Vemuri, Product Manager
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