Skip to main content

Allo and Duo: Google's New Messaging Apps

Hangouts was supposed to be Google's unified messaging solution, but things didn't go as planned: Hangouts was buggy, lacked features and many people hated it. After releasing a separate app for SMS (Messenger), Google will soon launch 2 other apps: Allo for group chat and Duo for video calling.

Both Allo and Duo use your phone number, much like WhatsApp, so you can chat or talk with anyone from your phonebook. Allo includes a special version of the Smart Reply feature from Google Inbox and it suggests replies for both text messages and photos. Smart Reply learns over time and adapts to your style, suggesting replies you are likely to send.


There's also a Google Assistant you can add to a conversation to answer quick questions, show search results and even perform actions like reserving a table at a restaurant. "The Google assistant in Allo understands your world, so you can ask for things like your agenda for the day, details of your flight and hotel, or photos from your last trip. And since it understands natural language patterns, you can just chat like yourself and it'll understand what you're saying," informs Google.

Allo lets you share photos, add text to photos, add emojis and stickers. There's also a Whisper Shout feature that lets you resize the text before sending it.


Allo has an incognito mode for private conversations. The incognito mode features end-to-end encryption and discreet notifications. Much like in Chrome, you'll need to manually start an incognito conversation and some features aren't available in incognito mode.

Duo is a simplified one-to-one video calling app that uses your phone number, works well on slow Internet connections (it uses WebRTC) and has a Knock Knock feature that shows a live preview of the caller before you answer. Hopefully, users will be able to block those who abuse this feature.


"Duo calls are in crisp HD video (up to 720p) and audio. We've optimized Duo to work well even on spotty networks, so if bandwidth is limited it gracefully adjusts quality so you're still able to connect. We also seamlessly transition calls between cellular and Wi-Fi, so you don't need to worry about what network you're on. Finally, we built Duo with privacy and security in mind and all calls on Duo are end-to-end encrypted," explains Google.


Allo and Duo will launch this summer and will be available for Android and iOS. For now, Hangouts will continue to exist, since Allo and Duo lack many of the features from Hangouts.

Google doesn't have a good track record when it comes to messaging services, so it's hard to tell whether the new apps will be successful. It looks like Allo and Duo will be simple, fast and more focused.

{ via Google Blog }
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Austerity-A Fancy Word for Destitute.

The reason for this post is not for the folks who have been caught in the first wave of personal economic hard reality, but the next wave. Regardless of the optimism espoused by grinning leaders and sycophant press, we are entering the final stage of global economic collapse. It began in 2008 and was forestalled for five years with fudge putty, but the weight of global indebtedness cannot be propped any longer and the final crunch is imminent. Austerity measures herald the final throes.  Indications of coming austerity.   Austerity measures are the final last ditch effort, futile or not! Back in the day many of us old-timers went through periods of "hard-times". In retrospect I realize there is no comparison to yesteryear hard times and today's version. Back then, expectations were never very high for the working class, there were no sophisticated systems or conveniences anyway. In fact the difference between being "set" or not was about having treats or not. Si...
Post a Comment
Read more

Terrifying Arctic methane levels

A peak methane level of 3026 ppb was recorded by the MetOp-B satellite at 469 mb on December 11, 2021 am. This follows a peak methane level of  3644 ppb  recorded by the MetOp-B satellite at 367 mb on November 21, 2021, pm. A peak methane level of 2716 ppb was recorded by the MetOp-B satellite at 586 mb on December 11, 2021, pm, as above image shows. This image is possibly even more terrifying than the image at the top, as above image shows that at 586 mb, i.e. much closer to sea level, almost all methane shows up over sea, rather than over land, supporting the possibility of large methane eruptions from the seafloor, especially in the Arctic.  Also, the image was recorded later than the image at the top with the 3026 ppb peak, indicating that even more methane may be on the way. This appears to be confirmed by the Copernicus forecast for December 12, 2021, 03 UTC, as illustrated by the image below, which shows methane at 500 hPa (equivalent to 500 mb). Furthermore, ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Women and children overboard

It's the  Catch-22  of clinical trials: to protect pregnant women and children from the risks of untested drugs....we don't test drugs adequately for them. In the last few decades , we've been more concerned about the harms of research than of inadequately tested treatments for everyone, in fact. But for "vulnerable populations,"  like pregnant women and children, the default was to exclude them. And just in case any women might be, or might become, pregnant, it was often easier just to exclude us all from trials. It got so bad, that by the late 1990s, the FDA realized regulations and more for pregnant women - and women generally - had to change. The NIH (National Institutes of Health) took action too. And so few drugs had enough safety and efficacy information for children that, even in official circles, children were being called "therapeutic orphans."  Action began on that, too. There is still a long way to go. But this month there was a sign that ...
Post a Comment
Read more