Google is bolstering its user experience with a series of updates across its platforms. Among the highlights are enhancements to video playback and search capabilities on iOS devices, alongside the introduction of the Gemini AI fine-tuning feature.
These updates underscore Google’s commitment to innovation and meeting user needs effectively.
Google Drive Brings Improvements to Video Playback, and Search Experience on iOS
Google Drive is getting a couple of updates that will improve the usability of the cloud-based storage platform.
The Google is adding a new transcode to improve the playback speed and rebuffering of videos played within Drive.
It is also improving the search functionality on iOS and adding query filters to help users quickly get to the desire file.
Also, Google is increasing the timeout time for BigQuery and Looker within Connect Sheets.
These features were roll out last week.
These new features were announce in a Google Workspace blog post.
On video playback improvements, Google said :
“We're enabling the generation and playback of Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) video transcodes for all new videos uploaded to Google Drive. DASH transcodes provide adaptive bitrate playback, which allows users to receive higher or lower resolution playback based on aspects like their local network quality.”
Users will see two changes from this.
- First, the video join time, which is the time a video takes to start after clicking the play button.
- Second, users will also notice reduced instances of rebuffering as the video plays.
Currently, the changes will only be visible on new videos that are upload to Google Drive, but, the company said that the transcode will be apply to existing videos by the end of the year.
Search within Drive is also getting an upgrade, but it will only be available to iOS users for now.
You will now be able to access query filters while searching.
These will show up right below the search bar and users can choose between File Type, Owners, and Last Modified to narrow the search results.
While typing a search query, users will also see relevant filters emerging, to help easily select them.
Google is also adding an option to refine the search results post query to get to the desire file.
Google said the feature will soon arrive for Android as well.
All these features will be available for the corporate clients of Google Workspace, individual Google Workspace subscribers, as well as personal account holders.
The Google has already ship the features and it should appear for all users globally in the next few days.
Google Adds a New Gemini AI Feature That Will Let Users Fine-Tune Its Responses
Google has introduce a new feature for Gemini, its artificial intelligence (AI)-power chatbot.
This new feature provides users with granular control over the generate response to a prompt and allows them to make changes to a particular portion of the text.
You can regenerate the select portion, edit its length or get it entirely removed.
This feature is currently only available for the web app version and has not extend to the app.
Google recently announce multiple new AI features for Android devices.
Announcing the new feature in a post, Google said :
“We're launching a more precise way for you to tune Gemini's responses. Starting in English in the Gemini web app, just select the portion of text you want to change, give Gemini some instruction, and get an output that's closer to what you are looking for.”
This feature is being add to offer more control to users’ creative process by letting them make changes to a small part of the response instead of regenerating it entirely.
When a response for a prompt has generate, users can select and highlight any part of the text.
Highlighting it now will show a pencil icon in a circle.
The Gemini logo also appears next to the pencil.
Hovering the arrow over the icon brings the description “Modify selected text.
Clicking on this icon shows four options, Regenerate, Shorter, Longer, and Remove.
This options work as the name suggests.
Regenerate will change the portion of the text and it will be generate again.
Shorter and Longer increases or decreases the length of the topic, and Remove deletes it entirely.
You can also add a prompt for that particular portion to modify it as well.
Those who have spent time on AI chatbots know that oftentimes, it generates a great response which is ruine by one sentence.
So far, the solution to it was to regenerate the entire content or make modifications to the prompt, and repeat it ad infinitum till the desired result appears.
Making granular changes via this feature can potentially save a lot of time for users.
