Showing posts with label Google Hangouts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Google Hangouts. Show all posts

Hangouts Integration in Google Search

Donal Trung 2:14 PM Add Comment
Some of the phone numbers from Google's Knowledge Graph cards are now linked and open Google Hangouts. When you search for a local business, Google usually displays the phone number next to the address. Click the phone number and you can call directly from your browser using Google Hangouts, which opens in a pop-up window and informs you about the fees. Calls made to the U.S. and Canada are free.


For searches like [john radcliffe hospital phone number], Google shows a separate card that includes the phone number.



It's interesting to notice that not all phone numbers are clickable. Phone numbers from local search results or from ads don't have links. Another exception: customer service numbers.


{ via Search Engine Roundtable }
Access Hangout video calls from Microsoft Outlook®

Access Hangout video calls from Microsoft Outlook®

Donal Trung 1:57 PM Add Comment
If you’re using Microsoft Outlook® with Google Apps you can now add, manage and join Hangout video calls with just a click. Just download the Hangout plugin for Microsoft Outlook® and you will be ready to go.

Release Track:
Rapid release and Scheduled release.

Editions included:
Google Apps for Business and Education

For more information:



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New Google Calendar events will now have a Hangout video call link

New Google Calendar events will now have a Hangout video call link

Donal Trung 2:32 PM Add Comment
Later this week customers on the Scheduled release track will have all new meetings respect the admin setting to control whether Hangout links are automatically added to Calendar events. This new setting was added to the Admin Console earlier this year.

Release Track:
Scheduled release

Editions included:
Google Apps for Business and Education

For more information:


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Improvements to Hangouts chat in Gmail

Improvements to Hangouts chat in Gmail

Donal Trung 8:46 PM Add Comment


Google Hangouts chat users will start seeing an updated UI in their conversation list in Hangouts in Gmail. Status markers are shown as green bubbles and the displayed contacts are in order of most recent chats. Other features include recent conversation snippets and a new contact search button.


Editions included:
Google Apps for Business and Education


For more information:


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The Curious Case of Google Hangouts History

Donal Trung 4:06 PM Add Comment
Do you remember the post about the updated Gmail chat logs? The new interface is only displayed for Google Hangouts conversations, while the old interface is still used for Google Talk/Chat conversations.

The updated interface no longer treats chat logs like regular Gmail messages, so many features like reply, forward, label, "move to inbox" are gone. You can no longer disable chat history from Gmail's settings, but you can click "delete Hangout history" to "permanently delete all messages" in a Hangout.

Google Hangouts logs are loaded dynamically, as you can see in this screenshot. This suggests that the logs aren't really stored like standard Gmail messages.


I clicked the "print" icon next to one of my Hangouts and I was surprised to notice that the print preview page only included a few messages, not the entire conversation.

In fact, Google Hangouts logs are only displayed in the regular desktop Gmail interface. They're nowhere to be found in the "basic HTML" interface or in the mobile Gmail sites/apps, not even when you use the search feature.

Here are the search results for label:chat in the desktop interface. There are two kinds of results: conversations from Gmail Chat and Hangouts and they have different icons.


The basic HTML results only include Gmail Chat conversations:


Here's the mobile Gmail:


I disabled the conversation view in Gmail's settings to see how this affects Hangouts logs. Each reply was displayed in its own separate message, so a Hangout generated tens of message. Google Hangouts logs are unusable if you disable conservation view.



A very basic feature that worked well ever since Google Talk was launched is now broken: buggy, more limited and less useful.

{ Thanks, Katty. }