Hasta La Gadget!

If the 850 hand-drawn emoji included in Hangouts aren’t enough for you, we’ve got some good news — there’s a small collection of Easter Eggs that add even more whimsy to your discussions. The commands are mostly initiated with an IRC-like “/” followed by certain words. For example “/ponies” sends a colorful little filly prancing across your window. There’s also “/ponystream” which overruns your chat with young horses. Of course, you can also punch in the Konami code (if you don’t know what that is by now, there’s no hope for you) which will change your background to pleasant drawing of a mountain and a tree. Sadly, that one is only visible to the person doing the typing. So far we’re having mixed results with the web interface for Hangouts and the commands don’t work on the mobile version. But in the Chrome app, everything is golden.

Filed under: Internet, Google

Comments

Via: Droid Life

Source: Moritz Tolxdorff (Google+)

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours — all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

Comments

If you have a smartphone connected to AT&T, you just got a bit more incentive to hop over to WiFi whenever possible. The new Google+ Hangouts app group video chat feature appears to be disabled whenever you attempt to connect via the cellular network. We tested the feature using a Verizon handset as well — we were able to stream video just fine. It’s not entirely clear whether AT&T has specifically blocked access to the service, but regardless of the reason, we’re all too familiar with the carrier’s desire to keep video chat off the airwaves. We can only hope that we’ll be able to use Hangouts to its full potential soon, just as we can with Apple’s FaceTime.

Update: AT&T has reached out with a statement. From what we can tell, Hangouts won’t fall under the first category outlined below, as it replaces a pre-loaded app (Google Talk).

All AT&T Mobility customers can use any video chat app over cellular that is not pre-loaded on their device, but which they download from the Internet. For video chat apps that come pre-loaded on devices, we offer all OS and device makers the ability for those apps to work over cellular for our customers who are on Mobile Share, Tiered and soon Unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices. It’s up to each OS and device makers to enable their systems to allow pre-loaded video chat apps to work over cellular for our customers on those plans.

Filed under: Cameras, Wireless, Software, Google

Comments

Via: SlashGear

The new Google Hangouts app combines typed conversations, images, and video conferencing into a single, seamless experience. This is the way chat is supposed to be.

Google hasn’t even officially launched Babel, but word on the street has it that the aforesaid term was being used internally to reference a new, unified chat platform. Now, TechRadar is reporting that Babel will simply become a part of Google Hangouts — almost certainly as a means to continue the art of subtly shoving Google+ onto every user it can. Moreover, the newly expanded Hangouts could launch as early as next week during Google I/O, and we’ll be there to bring you the goods if indeed it does.

Filed under: Internet, Google

Comments

Via: SlashGear

Source: TechRadar