Gears is a powerful browser plug-in that aims to make web applications feel like their desktop counterparts. Early this month, Google announced it was bringing Gears to mobile and today we see their first release for Android. Mobile Gmail and Calendar have been updated to include Gears support for both iPhone and Android.
The 2nd time I saw Gears pop up.
How is this going to affect Android users? First off, you now have access to new features that are not available in the native Gmail application. The most notable being a new “floaty bar” that allows you to perform mass actions on email. This was a feature I asked for in my 7 Complaints About Android Gmail article and I’m glad to see they included it. I’m not actually taking credit for that, but Google does read your email listen to their customers. (this is why all you lurkers should start leaving comments and joining the discussion. c’mon, there are 6k readers who have visisted 10+ times)
I can already hear people complaining, “Why is this on iPhone? Where is the update for the app?”. Even though mobile is the future of Google, they have only begun porting some of their applications to the Android platform. Now that every Googler has an Android phone, we should expect an increasing number of Android upgrades. Everything you see in this new mobile version will work its way into an Android app. I can’t wait for the day, when I have Analytics, Reader, Adsense, and more all installed to my phone and not running in the browser.
So it is nice to see Google release these apps for mobile browsers, we really can’t wait for the new Android apps. I know they are doing this to target all cell phone users. We only make up 5% of the smartphones, so they got to serve the larger customer first. One day soon, we will be at the head of the table.
The following is a quick video demonstration from Google.
Here is the video earlier this month when Gears came to mobile.
Visit the official Google Mobile Blog for more information and be sure to leave your feedback on their new release.
Anything new from Google is always welcome.
Related Posts
About The Author
Follow on Twitter Subscribe
Taylor Wimberly
Taylor is the founder of Android and Me. He loves playing with all kinds of gadgets, but most importantly cell phones. His other hobbies include cooking (BBQ hero!), politics, football, and watching every MMA event possible.
10 Comments
When I go to gmail on the browser, i see a link that says update now, but the link does NOTHING whatsoever, would love to try it, but cant/
Is anyone else missing the floating bar when they view gmail in their android browser? Am I missing something?
I don’t see any reason for this not to supersede the built in gmail app. Not so sure about the calendar app though. Lets hope we get some more mobile gears apps soon.
You are probably right. I think the goal is to make it so we can’t tell the difference and just run everything in the browser.
I use Google Apps to run my email on my own domain, when I checked my email yesterday I noticed this and was pretty impressed.
You have to press the update button a few times untill you get the install progress bar.
I can’t wait for these functionalities to come over to our native apps, because I am not visiting the browser for my email and calendar!
No matter how many times I clicked on Update, nothing ever happened.
I got the Gear to work on my G1 but I don’t see a “floating bar” anywhere…
Yes I have the same problem with my G1. It won’t let me update but I still like the new Gmail interface. Can’t wait for them to fix the link though. Loving Google!
got to just love gmail.