If you use a Braille display, you can now enable Braille support in Google Docs, Slides and Drawings to read and enter text. This option is currently available for Google Chrome and Internet Explorer.
We know that often times you’d like an easier way to return to your most relevant and recently edited documents, spreadsheets, and presentations, no matter what device you’re using. So we created new home screens to help you do that with direct access points for Docs, Sheets & Slides. To access these home screens, use the following urls: http://google.com/docshttp://google.com/sheetshttp://google.com/slidesRelease track: Rapid release (Note: this launch will be rolling out gradually over the coming weeks), with Scheduled release coming soon For more information: https://plus.google.com/+GoogleDrive/posts/PPEQLd8huvn
With the integration of Quickoffice into the Google Docs, Sheets and Slides apps, the Quickoffice app will be unpublished from Google Play and the App Store in the coming weeks. Existing users with the app can continue to use it, but no features will be added and new users will not be able to install the app.
Now in Google Docs, any user with "can comment" access to a document will be able to make suggested edits to the document. The suggested edits will appear in the document along with a comment explaining the edit. Those with "can edit" permission will be able to accept or reject those suggested edits. Those with "can view" access will not be able to see suggested edits (until they are accepted). Viewers will also no longer be able to see regular comments, which is a change from today.
Owners of a document, spreadsheet or presentation will now be able to move it to the trash from within its own File menu, rather than needing to do so from the Drive home page. Editors and viewers will see the ‘Move to trash’ option in the File menu, but it will be inactive and greyed out.
Now you can crop, mask, rotate, and add borders to images without leaving your Google Doc or Slide. Just select an image and edit from the toolbar, Format menu, or context menu.
Release Track:
Rapid release, with scheduled release coming later in May
Editions included:
Google Apps for Business, Education and Government
Starting today, you can download new, standalone mobile apps for Docs and Sheets—with Slides coming soon. When you open the new apps, you’ll see your most recently edited files, which means less time searching and scrolling. The apps also come with offline support built in, so you can easily view, edit and create files without an Internet connection. You can get the apps on Google Play [Docs] [Sheets] and in the App Store [Docs] [Sheets]. If you don’t have time now, over the next few days you’ll be prompted to download the apps when you go to edit or create a document or spreadsheet in your Drive app. You will still be able to use the Drive app to view and organize all of your documents, spreadsheets, presentations, photos and more. Release Track: Scheduled release Editions included: Google Apps for Business, Education and Government For more information: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2014/04/new-mobile-apps-for-docs-sheets-and.html
Google Docs and the new version of Google Sheets now support add-ons. Just click the new Add-ons menu, select "Get add-ons" and install some of them. They're not browser extensions, they're just ways to add new features to Google Docs and Sheets. Some of them are developed by Google, while others are developed by third-parties.
"Once you install an add-on it will become available across all of your documents or spreadsheets and you can start using it right away," informs Google. You can always find them in the Add-ons menu.
There are add-ons that translate the selected text, find synonyms, create a table of contents, insert maps, create charts from spreadsheets, generate bibliography, check your writing for consistency, add mail merge to Google Docs, print address labels, remove duplicates, import Google Analytics data and more.
Here's the Translate add-on in action. Select some text, go to the Add-ons menu, click Translate and Start. You can select the destination language in the sidebar that shows up. For some reason, only a few destination languages are supported.
There's a new version of Google Sheets. "It's faster, supports larger spreadsheets, has a number of new features, and works offline," informs Google.
Just in case you're wondering how to enable it, you should go to Google Drive's settings page, enable "Try the new Google Sheets" in the Editing tab and click "Save". You'll get the new version of the application only for the files you create from now on. The existing files will still open in the old Google Sheets.
There are some missing features in the new Google Sheets (protected sheets, spell check, publishing) and this shows that this is an early release.
So what's new? You can create and edit spreadsheets offline in Chrome, just like in Docs and Slides. The new Sheets is designed with performance in mind and handles huge spreadsheets: it supports 2 million cells of data and all of the other limitations have been removed. You're no longer limited to 256 columns per sheet. Other improvements: spreadsheets load faster and scrolling is smoother.
There are some new formula editing tools. "In the new Google Sheets, we've made it easier to build complex formulas in your spreadsheets. For example, you'll now see syntax highlighting, which shows you the argument in your function that you are working on, and you'll get more details on how to fix errors in your formula by hovering over them." Google also added 24 new functions, including SUMIFS, COUNTIFS, and AVERAGEIF.
Another new feature is called filter views and it lets you create, save and share filters, so you can get different views of your data without disrupting how others are viewing your spreadsheet.
"In the new Google Sheets, you can apply conditional formatting using a custom formula. This allows you to apply formatting to a cell or range of cells based on the contents of other cells."
Now it's easier to check the spelling of a Google Docs document or a Google Slides presentation. Just click the Tools menu, select Spelling and review each spelling suggestion. You can click "change", "change all", "ignore" or "add to dictionary". After performing an action, Google locates the next spelling mistake, so you don't have to manually find it.
Until now, you had to right-click each spelling mistake and select one of the options. Google Docs flags the mistakes with red underlines, so you can still fix them manually.
"The updated spell check lets you check the spelling of your entire document or presentation at once, instead of having to resolve misspellings individually," explains Google.
I've always wanted a tool that lets you highlight a text and quickly link to the top search results for that text. Now this feature is available in Google Docs and Google Slides: select some text, right-click and select "Link". Then you can pick one of top Google search results, one of your other documents or the headings/bookmarks that match the text selection.
Type something in the "link" box and Google will show results for the new text:
You can also use the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+K) or use the link button from the toolbar.
The following features are now available to domains following the Scheduled Release track:
-Docs: Research pane which allows you to look up information and search from inside your document. -Gmail: Quick access to contact details: When searching for an email address, the results will now show you contact details in addition to that person's profile photo and the emails sent from and to them. From here, you can start a chat, call their phone and more. Plus, if your contacts have a Google+ profile, this information will stay up to date automatically. -Gmail: More circle integration and circle search: Users on Google Plus will also now see profile photos of people in their selected circle and circles are now supported in search and filters. -Contacts: Contacts delegation allows users to delegate full access to the contacts in their “My Contacts” group without granting access to their mail or anything else in their accounts.
The following features are intended for release to these domains on June 5th: -Gmail: Graduation of the "Nav bar drag and drop" lab, which allows the user to reorder gadgets inside the gadget pane.
Release track: Scheduled*
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
*Scheduled Release track: Domains with ‘Scheduled Release’ option enabled in the administrator control panel. Learn more.
You can now search the web for information directly from Google Docs using the new research pane. From the research pane, you can look up maps, quotes, images and add them directly to your document.
Release track: Rapid
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
Languages included: All languages supported by Google Docs
How to access what's new: Access the research pane from the 'Tools' menu by right clicking on a selected word that you want to learn more about, or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+R on Windows or Cmd+Alt+R on Mac.
Users can visit drive.google.com where they can opt-in to Drive.
As part of opting in, they will be shown an interstitial which includes this video.
If an opted in user visits docs.google.com, the user will be redirected to drive.google.com.
The “Documents” navigation item will change to “Drive.”
The rollout will start on 5/14 and take 1-2 weeks. Once Drive is fully rolled out to a domain, new users in the domain will be Drive users. Even once a user has opted into Drive, they can revert to the Docs look via a setting in the Drive user-interface (although they will remain on drive.google.com).
Domains can disable both the Drive for Mac/Windows and use of the SDK via the Drive / Docs settings page settings in the Google Apps control panel. Note this is not a forced migration, simply an opportunity for schedule track users to try the product.
Release track: Scheduled*
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
*Scheduled Release track: Domains with ‘Scheduled Release’ option enabled in the administrator control panel. Learn more.
Starting Wednesday, May 16th, we will begin the process of migrating legacy Google documents (those created before July 2010) to the new document editor. The new editor has the following features:
- Real time collaboration: See updates from other collaborators as they edit the document. - Higher-quality imports: More consistent imports from your desktop into Google Docs. - Ruler: Google documents have a ruler for setting margins, indentations, and tab stops. - Chat with other collaborators: As you make your edits, you can chat with other document editors about the changes, from within the document.
Release track: Rapid & Scheduled
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
Google Drive is a brand new file synchronization product that allows users to centrally store all of their files in Google Docs. Files can be accessed via a web browser, the Google Drive client, and the Google Drive mobile app.
Google Drive access will be rolling out to all domains over the next 4-8 weeks.
There are numerous changes in Google Docs, some of which are noted below. Please see the "For more information" section at the end which contains additional details.
What’s completely new - Sync files between all of your devices with Google Drive for your Mac/PC - Download the Drive mobile app for your iPhone or iPad - View and search Google Drive on the web in a visual way with grid view - Add a file to a folder by clicking the folder icon within a file or Google document, spreadsheet, or presentation - Work with more file types by installing Google Drive apps from the Chrome Web Store
What's changed - Collections are now called folders - More things have been added to the Settings menu, including upload settings - The left navigation has new views: "My Drive", "Shared with me", and "Activity" - The Home view is gone. Instead, use My Drive to organize all of your files, folders and Google Docs.
Release track: - Rapid domains
Google Drive will become available to your users on an opt-in basis via invite at drive.google.com/start. Because we’re releasing Google Drive gradually, some users may not be able to get started immediately, but they can request to be notified when Google Drive is ready for them to opt in.
In the coming months, Google Drive will become the default and will replace the documents list as the way for users to access their files and documents. At this time, all users will have access to the desktop sync clients and mobile applications.
- Scheduled domains
Google Drive will become available to your users on an opt-in basis shortly. We’ll announce when this is available on whatsnew.googleapps.com. Following the opt-in period, Google Drive will become the default and will replace the documents list as the way for users to access their files and documents. At this time, all users will have access to the desktop sync clients and mobile applications.
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
Languages included: All supported languages
How to access what's new:
- Google Docs has been renamed to "Drive and Docs" in the Google Apps control panel. There are new settings in this service.
The following features are now available to domains following the Scheduled Release track: - Google Spreadsheets- Left-to-right support for the menu and formula bar
The following features are intended for release to these domains on Apr 17: - Gmail: New look released to all users. Opt-out link will be removed starting April 17th and continue throughout the week
Release track: Scheduled*
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
*Scheduled Release track: Domains with ‘Scheduled Release’ option enabled in the administrator control panel. Learn more.
The following features are intended for release to these domains on Mar 27: - Gmail: New look released to all users. Opt-out link will be removed starting March 27th and continue throughout the week - Gmail: The Gmail loading bar has received a visual refresh, inline with the New Look - Gmail: Users who prefer text buttons rather than icons will be able to change this in "Settings" - Gmail: Star and label messages before you send them
Release track: Scheduled
Editions included: Google Apps, Google Apps for Business, Government and Education
*Scheduled Release track: Domains with ‘Scheduled Release’ option enabled in the administrator control panel. Learn more.
