Your Tech Story

Google

Whirlpool to Launch Wear OS App to Expand the Mobile Connectivity for its Appliances

News, Tech News / By
wearable
Image Source: wsj.com

The biggest home appliance manufacturer Whirlpool Corporation has announced that it is going launch a wear OS app, powered by Google, for its connected home appliances, in the coming event of CES 2019. The 107 years old company has been introducing unique and innovative technologies every once in a while, and now it is again pushing the bars with its new idea of controlling the home gadgets with the help of a wearable OS app.

The app will help the user to keep a track of and control the appliances like the microwave oven, speakers, washing machine, etc. The company has also mentioned that it has simplified voice commands to its Smart Laundry appliances for both Google Assistant and Alexa devices.

The General Manager, WLabs of Whirlpool Corporation, Doug Searles, said, “Innovations from labs are designed to deliver on people’s unanswered questions and pain points.” He further added, “Our engineers and designers push the boundaries of what the general public knows and recognizes as a Whirlpool product, and redefine what a home appliance can achieve. Whether delivering on a specific, singular need or making multiple steps in the cooking process easier, each of the WLabs innovations coming to the marketplace gives us a view of what the future of cooking will look like.”

The app will preferably work for the ovens, washers and the dryers. The user will be competent to see the current oven status and monitor it through commands given to the app, even during an active cycle. Same for the washers and the dryer, the user will be able to watch the status and handle them with various options in an active cycle.

Although it’s not the first time when Whirlpool is extending its functionality using a wearable, it has already launched the same with the Apple Watch in the early last year. But this time, Whirlpool has come with a Google OS app, that will now enable the android users to enjoy this innovative facility. The launch will take place in the CES 2019 event in the coming week, and the Whirlpool Wear OS app will go live soon in the first half of the year.

Google Plans to Start Charging the Chinese OEMs for PlayStore Apps

News, Tech News / By

The Chinese market for smartphones has gained a lot of popularity around the world, especially Android smartphones. The popularity of the Chinese apps was also on the peak last year. But for the smartphone manufacturers from the Chinese industry may have to face some heat this year, as now they may have to pay for the Android apps and services on their smartphones.

Chinese smartphones
Image Source: Pinterest

In a tweet from the official Android Twitter account (spotted by SlashLeaks), Google has stated that it may start charging the Chinese OEMs from third quarter for using Android apps.

The tweet wrote, ”We plan to charge Chinese manufacturers in the third quarter of 2019, which may include Huawei, ZTE, Xiaomi, and many other smartphone manufacturers.” Google has never charged the Android device manufacturers for its apps and services, but the tweet clearly shows that the biggest smartphone manufacturers like Huawei, ZTE and Xiaomi will be affected by this decision.

Last year in July, European Commission had fined Google with $5 billion, as it allegedly blamed the tech giant for “illegally tying” the Chrome and search apps to Android. Google provides a few pre-installed services and apps, like Google search and Google Chrome to the Android smartphone manufacturers for free, which was the major concern of the European Commission that Google forced those apps on to the smartphone users resulting in dominating their app market.

As a result, Google had produced a new licensing agreement for the smartphones that were shipped to Europe. According to the agreement, Google started charging the hardware firms, up to $40, for using its apps on their devices. The fee also depended on the size and type of the device as well as in which country it was going to operate.

Likewise, for the Chinese smartphone manufacturers as well, the company is planning to impose a fee on the usage of its apps and services. But still, the Android OS will remain free and open-source for them.

Meghan Markle to Tristan Thompson; List of Top 5 Google Searches 2018

Google, News, Tech News / By

google search

Yet again at the end of the year, Google has released its summary of what people searched the most in 2018, or we can say the list of the Most Searched 2018. Google started with a video on its most-searched list, which included the phrase, “In 2018 people searched for Good.” The video includes the searches like, “Good things in the world,” “Good news,” “How to be a good citizen/singer/dancer/listener,” etc.

But the year was not only about searching good things but also included sports, entertainment, history, self-care, etc. The top five searches of 2018 had the FIFA world cup on the top, followed by Avicii, Mac Miller, Stan Lee, and Black Panther, on the rest of the four positions respectively. Sadly the people on the second to the fourth position was searched due to their sudden death. People searched about who Avicii, Mac Miller, and Stan Lee, were, and what was the cause of their deaths.

Among news as well, the world cup topped the list, and at the second position, the Hurricane Florence of September 2018, 2006 and 1994 were the most searched. On the third place in the most searched news were the Mega Million lotteries and its results, which got the most searched in the month of October this year. The Royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle took the fourth place in the list followed by the election results on the fifth position.

The most searched people on Google in 2018 included Meghan Markle on the top for the obvious reasons, American singer Demi Lovato at the second position, Hollywood star Sylvester Stallone on third, the American actor and Internet personality Logan Paul on fourth position, followed by one of the Kardashian, Khloé Kardashian, on the fifth position.

Sylvester Stallone and Logan Paul again grabbed a position in the list of the most searched actors of 2018, and this time at the top and the second positions. Pete Davidson held the third position, Bill Cosby from the famous sitcom The Cosby Show and new Netflix sensation Noah Centineo held the fourth and the fifth positions, respectively. Surprisingly no female actor reached the top five most searched actors in 2018.

People also asked many beauty questions, and questions like “How to play Mega Millions,” “How to buy Bitcoin,” also about the “Keto pancakes,” “How to vote,” etc. The Google’s list of five most searched of 2018 in all the categories is as follow:

Searches:
World Cup
Avicii
Mac Miller
Stan Lee
Black Panther

News:
World Cup
Hurricane Florence
Mega Millions Result
Royal Wedding
Election Results

People:
Meghan Markle
Demi Lovato
Sylvester Stallone
Logan Paul
Khloé Kardashian

Athletes:
Tristan Thompson
Alexis Sánchez
Lindsey Vonn
Shaun White
Khabib Nurmagomedov

Musicians and Bands:
Demi Lovato
Cardi B
Daniel Küblböck
Travis Scott
Rick Ross

Actors:
Sylvester Stallone
Logan Paul
Pete Davidson
Bill Cosby
Noah Centineo

Loss:
Avicii
Mac Miller
Stan Lee
Anthony Bourdain
XXXTentacion

Movies:
Black Panther
Deadpool
Venom
Avengers: Infinity War
Bohemian Rhapsody

TV Shows:
Story of Yanxi Palace
Altered Carbon
Buppesannivas
Motu Patlu
Roseanne

Google Maps now Shows Nearby Lime Scooter & Lets You Book One for Your Last-mile Trip

News, Tech News / By

The tech giant Google has been continuously working towards improving its services for its consumers. Similarly, for its most widely used GPS app, Google map, Google has been adding new features to it to make navigation simpler for its users.

google map-lime
Image Source: pcmag.com

Google has already added Uber to its Google Map app, from where the users can book cabs for them. Now on Thursday, Google announced that it is going to partner with Lime and will show the location of nearby Lime battery-powered scooters, on Google Map. Google is planning to do so, in order to shorten the commute times for its users, as they will be able to rent those ride from the app.

Google, in its blog, said that after getting out of a taxi or a subway, the 15 minutes walk can be reduced to a smaller ride with the help of those scooters. Google will now display the nearby Lime scooters on the Google Map app, as another transport option, and after the users tap on it, they will be redirected to the Lime app. If there is no lime app on their smartphones, they will be redirected to the Apple Store or Play Store, so that they can download the app. And then, the users can book those scooters and bikes, from the app.

For now, the service will be available only in thirteen cities worldwide, i.e., Auckland (NZ), Austin, Baltimore, Brisbane (AU), Dallas, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, San Diego, Oakland, San Antonio, San Jose, Scottsdale, and Seattle. And, after the successful testing of the services, Google is planning to expand it into other cities as well.

The app not only will show the distance of the vehicle form users’ location but also will display the total journey time, battery consumption, the total cost for the journey and the number of other Lime vehicles nearby.

Lime, in the time of its 14 months operation, has fulfilled almost 1.5 million bike and scooter rides and has raised $467 million in funding to date, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, being one of the biggest investors in it. The partnership between the two companies is not only beneficial for them business-wise, but will be a great contribution in reducing the congestion and carbon emissions.

Google Shutting Down Allo; Now will Experiment with Rich Communication Services

News, Tech News / By

A few days ago, the news regarding the shutting down of Google Hangouts was circulating all over the internet, that later Google had denied completely. Now, again there is news that Google will soon shut down its two years old messaging app Allo.

allo
Image source: arstechnica.net

Allo is a Google Assistant empowered app, that was launched as a competitor for Apple’s iMessage, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and other chat applications. The device is built for both Android and iOS devices, enabled with end-to-end encryption. Google had launched Allo two years ago, as its another messaging app experiment, that too failed.

The vice president of Chrome, Comms, and Photos (at Google), Anil Sabharwal, said in a statement, “Google noted that Allo as a whole has not achieved the level of traction we’d hoped for.”

The app was facing some problems with its functionalities, so in April month this year, Google stopped investing over Allo and put a pause on its development and marketing work. The company now is entirely focusing on the Android Messages instead, and the Allo team has also been implanted to work on the same.

On the other hand, Verizon has come with its new messaging app RCS (Rich Communication Services), a combination of the best features of Facebook Messenger, iMessage, and WhatsApp, as one platform. Verizon has initially launched the app on the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL. The company is planning to replace the ages-old SMS (Short Message Service) by its new RCS app. Google has worked hard to get its own android chat, but it seems that now it is going to work with its competitor’s app, i.e. RCS.

And for Allo, it is already down for many users and will be discontinued by the March month next year.

Google Announced its Best of 2018 List; PUBG Selected the Best Game 2018

Google, News, Tech News / By

The year is about to end, and Google, following the ritual of selecting best of the year, has published a list of its best apps of 2018, in various categories, including “Most Entertaining” and “Hidden Gems”. There are millions of apps and other content available on the Play Store, and along with apps, the list of bests includes the best movies, TV shows, and books, etc.

Google on the basis of various factors selected the top five among every category and named the best of all. Google, also, first time also added a Fan Favorite category, a user poll, from where the users could support their favourite apps in various categories. On the basis of the voting, Google Pay won the User’s Choice App of 2018 and Google selected Drops as the Best App of 2018.

Google-Play-Best-Of-2018-Awards
Image Source: 9to5google.com

The best app also included other subcategories, and among those categories, Tik Tok became the Most Entertaining App 2018. Unfold won the Hidden Gems of 2018, and Home Workout – No Equipment was named the Best Self-Improvement App 2018. Otter Voice Notes became the Best Daily Helper 2018.

The other main category was the Best Game 2018, and it also had various sub-categories, i.e. Best Game, User’s Choice Game, Best Casual, Most Innovative, Most Competitive and Best Indie. PUBG Mobile won the Best Game 2018 from both User’s Choice and Google. The Best Casual 2018 won by Ludo King, Battlelands Royale named the Most Innovative 2018, Real Cricket 18 won the Most Competitive 2018, and Alto’s Odyssey named the Best Indie 2018.

Black Panther was selected as the Best Movie of 2018 on Play Store, and the top five list includes the following:

  • Black Panther
  • Avengers: Infinity War
  • Thor: Ragnarok
  • Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
  • Deadpool 2

Google’s top five TV shows of 2018 are:

  • The Walking Dead
  • Riverdale
  • The Big Bang Theory
  • The Flash
  • PAW Patrol

The top five eBooks of 2018 selected by Google:

  • Fire and Fury by Michael Wolff
  • The Outsider by Stephen King
  • Fear by Bob Woodward
  • 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson
  • Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis

In the category of best Audiobooks of 2018, the following win the race of top 5:

  • 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson
  • Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis
  • Fear by Bob Woodward
  • Becoming by Michelle Obama
  • The Outsider by Stephen King