Hasta La Gadget!

Those with a hearty level of respect for beta builds have been enjoying these spoils for weeks now, but Google has today seen fit to push Chrome 29 and a refreshed Chrome for Android out to rest of us. Effective right now, Chrome 29 users on the desktop will see “improvements to omnibox suggestions based on the recency of websites visited, resulting in more timely and contextually relevant suggestions.” Interestingly, Google has also added a “Reset browser settings” option for those who end up going a bit overboard with extensions; thankfully, waving the aforesaid white flag won’t impact your themes, apps or bookmarks.

On the mobile front, Chrome on Android is being updated with improved scrolling and startup performance, as well as WebRTC support that will enable video conversation directly in the browser without a plugin. Yeah, we thought you’d dig that.

Filed under: Internet, Software, Mobile, Google

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Source: Google Chrome Blog, Google Play Store

Google acquired Waze just a few months ago, and since the acquisition, we haven’t heard a peep regarding the service from either Google or Waze. That is, until today as Google Maps users will finally be seeing the fruits of the acquisition for themselves.

Google has rolled out realtime incident reports to its Google Maps application on both iOS and Android which alerts users to accidents, construction zones, road closures and other inconveniences that would delay your trip if you were to come across them. The realtime incident reports of course is sourced from the Waze community and will be available to Google Maps users in the U.S., U.K. Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Germany, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Switzerland.

Google isn’t the only company that is benefitting from the acquisition of Waze as they also have upgraded their web-based map editor to include Google Street View as well as overhead satellite imagery in order to help build out their map as well as make it easier to correct map errors which are reported by their community. Hopefully the next update to Google Maps will include the ability to better interact with Waze from directly in the app as we’re sure many users would like to report what they see on the road instantly.

Google Maps iOS, Android Adds Waze Realtime Traffic Reports original content from Ubergizmo.

Google+ is adding a "translate" button on public posts and comments. The desktop-only (for now) addition will be rolling out gradually, and is controllable through language preferences. [Ed Chi via Engadget]

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I mean, we knew this was coming sooner or later. Still, it’s nice to see a major teamup come out of that Google / Waze marriage that happened back in June (who doesn’t love a summer wedding?). Google Maps mobile users in the US, UK and a slew of other countries are getting Waze-submitted real time accident, construction, road closure and other reports on Android and iOS. It’s a two-way street here, of course, meaning that Waze users on the aforementioned mobile operating systems will be getting Google Search, Street View and satellite images baked directly into their app. More information on the partnerships can be found in the source link below.

Filed under: Cellphones, GPS, Software, Mobile, Google

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Source: Google Lat Long

While other Google products have lain fallow, the company has been tinkering with Translate quite a bit lately. Now, the search giant is “gradually” rolling out functionality to translate desktop Google+ posts and comments into users’ native tongues. Below each foreign language post there should be a clickable “Translate” link that will convert the text inline; another click will undo the translation. The latter should be handy if that comment in French turns out to be an insult about your mother — not like that’s ever happened on the internet before.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Source: Ed Chi (Google+)