New Google Android Phone from Verizon and Motorola
Google and Verizon team up to bring you the 'Droid' you've been looking for.
This week, Verizon and Motorola unveiled the latest phone to make use of Google's Android operating system. Dubbed "Droid," the new phone includes both a touch screen and a hardware QWERTY keyboard. Like T-Mobile's entry into the smartphone world making use of Android, the Droid's screen slides out to uncover the keyboard.
The Droid will be the first Android-based smartphone to make use of the latest version of Google's operating system for mobile devices, Android 2.0. The updated open-source operating system features enhancements to performance and a host of new features. Some new features include:
Voice activated search allows users to speak a query and the Google-powered search engine will deliver either web results or results from the phone's memory. Results pulled from the phones memory may include photos, music, or contacts.
Turn-by-turn navigation for Google Maps, with which Android 2.0 has integrated its voice activated search feature. This feature allows a user to do a voice activated search for a destination such as "coffee shop." The phone will locate nearby coffee shops and show them as pins on a Google Map. The user then 'clicks' the desired location and the phone will deliver turn-by-turn, spoken directions.
Android 2.0 allows users to add multiple accounts to a device for email and contact synchronization. This now also includes Exchange accounts, which promises to be a significant selling point for corporate and business users.
The Droid will come with a number of popular Apps pre-installed, and users will have access to thousands more through Google's Android Market.
Other features of the phone not specifically tied to the Android operating system include:
A built in five megapixel camera.
Wi-Fi capability.
Bluetooth for headsets and other Bluetooth enabled devices.
GPS
A lithium ion battery boasting 6.4 hours of continuous talk time, and up to 11 days of standby time.
What this means to you Fans of the iPhone are not terribly likely to ditch their favorite mobile device in favor of the Droid. However, it does present the best alternative to date in the market created by Apple's dominate mobile device. While the Droid does not currently offer the ease of use of the iPhone for adding music and media, other features (like Exchange integration) will likely appeal to other users.
Just for fun
Motorola had to license the word "Droid" from Lucasfilm in order to use it on the phone. This is reasonable as Lucas coined the term "Droid" in his original Star Wars films.
Below is the teaser video created by Verizon to announce the Droid.
Google Apps Updates: More features in administrator Chat settings!
Administrators now have more control over how their users use Chat and can:
- Enable/disable their user's ability to chat outside the domain.
- Enable a setting to automatically accept chat invitations between users in their domain.
Editions included:
Premier and Education Editions
Languages included:
US English
How to access what's new:
Go to Chat settings in the control panel, and enable/disable the checkbox 'Users can chat with other users outside this domain'. This will also affect the ability to chat within the Google Network.
To set automatic acceptance of invitations to chat, enable/disable the checkbox 'Automatically accept chat invitations between users in this domain'. Please note that your users will be able to override this setting and it's a default setting only.
Google Docs editors are now more consistent across each product. The links, title area, menus, menu terminology, and toolbar are now nearly uniform across documents, spreadsheets and presentations.
Editions included:
Standard, Premier, Education, Team and Partner Editions
Languages included:
All languages supported by Google Docs
Google has added some new features to the Docs list:
- New export features which allow you to select multiple documents, convert them into your chosen format and download them as a zip file.
- Indicators to show if a document has been viewed already or not.
- A 'New!' indicator that shows you when a new document has been shared with you.
Editions included:
Standard, Premier, Education, Team and Partner Editions
Languages included:
All languages supported by Google Docs
How to access what's new: -Select one or more files and then click on "Export" from the "More Actions" menu. Next, pick the format (e.g. PDF, Microsoft Word, etc) you want for your exported files. Finally, click "Continue" and it will create a zip file to download that has all your content. You can "export" up to 500 MB of content in a single zip file. It can sometimes take a few minutes to download so you also have an "email when ready" option to notify you when the zip file is ready.
- "Unviewed" files are in bold, while "viewed" files are not. You can toggle this setting by selecting the item and clicking on "mark as (Un)Viewed" in the "More Actions" menu.
- When an item is first shared to you, it will be bold ("Unviewed") and marked as "New!". Once you view this item, it's listed normally. If the item is updated by someone else, then it will be marked as "Unviewed" again.
Councilman Tony Cardenas, who made the motion in Council to go Google, told the Los Angeles Times "The City of Los Angeles, the second largest city in the nation, made a world-class decision today to support a state-of-the art e-mail system."
Los Angeles will be the first major city and the largest in the US to move to Google's platform.
Google is about to join the online music sales fray joining iTunes, Amazon, etc. with yet another method to allow consumers to find and buy the songs they want.
According to Tech Crunch Google will partner with hosted music services Lala and iLike to integrate a music search and purchase feature into Google Search. From what is currently known users will be able to both stream and play music online as well as purchase MP3s for download.
Lala and iLike have an announcement event planned for this Wednesday the 28th and it is widely speculated Google will be part of the roll-out at Capitol Records legendary HQ in Hollywood along with members of the groups Linkin Park and Dead By Sunrise.
Some enhancements to Google Calendar have been released:
- Snooze alerts: Ability to be reminded again after a pop-up notification.
- Hide calendar from the list: Ability to hide unwanted calendars from your list of calendars.
- Your primary calendar timezone is now synced to your display timezone.
Editions included:
Standard, Premier, Education, Team and Partner Editions
Languages included:
All languages supported by Google Calendar
How to access what's new:
- When alerted to an event via a pop-up notification and dismissing it, the calendar interface will show you an option to remind you again shortly. Click on that link if you want to be reminded of the event again.
- If you want to hide a particular calendar from your list of calendars, click on the drop down arrow to the right of the calendar name, then select 'Hide this calendar from the list'.
- You can adjust your display timezone in 'calendar settings' then in the 'general' section.
For the translate function, the fields should contain a combination of the text you want to translate, the two letter language code of the text and the language code you want the text to be translated into.
For the detection function, simply enter the text in the field and it will output the two letter language code of the text.
One of the first 10 Google Apps for Enterprise partners worldwide and initial contributor to the Google Apps Open Source provisioning tool kit, SADA Systems, Inc. has developed an proven track record in successful implementations of Google Apps solutions for the higher education market. SADA works closely with its clients to create custom, leading edge solutions that strategically meet their business and institutional objectives.
