Google sneak out an update that makes the Android keyboard much smarter
A good spot by Android Police. Apparently Google have just pushed out an update in the Google Play store that updates the default Android keyboard. What’s cool about this is that apparently, it will use Google’s intelligence to make better spelling suggestions.
Once installed, the new update won’t just correct spelling errors and make suggestions based on an internal dictionary, but instead it will pick what words you were most likely going for based upon analysing all of the data you’ve inputted into Google’s services. And when you think about it… that’s a hell of a lot of text. Search, Gmail, Google Drive… everything will be taken into consideration.
The idea is that this will make typing quicker – if Google knows intuitively what you’re going to say then that’s less faffing about trying to use the precision cursor on a small screen.
Whilst there will no doubt be privacy concerns raised, there is one company that will be especially worried: Swiftkey have offered a nearly identical product for a number of years now – their keyboard digs into your emails (and other social media) to get a handle on what you like to write about. Given the ubiquity of Google services, this latest update could possibly end up sinking them.
