How to: Top 10 Tips for Android from Google Canada

Flexibility, customization and variety are what make the Android OS stand out and while there's a lot one can do with their Android device, there's a lot of functionality that's buried deep within the system that might be easy to miss. Google Canada has shared the top 10 Android tips for users wanting to get the most out of their devices. Hit jump for the full rundown. 

1.     Add a custom keyboard for Gesture Typing: Add a custom keyboard to your Android device from Google Play to do things like Gesture Typing, which lets you Glide through letters to compose messages: just lift to finish a word, no spacebar required. Google Keyboard let’s you do this, and is available on Google Play, as are many other custom keyboards.

2.     Photo Sphere -- capture immersive 360-degree views: Up, down and all around you, it’s like no camera you’ve ever seen. With Android 4.2, snap pictures in every direction that come together into incredible, immersive photo spheres that put you right inside the scene. View your photo spheres right on your phone, share them on Google+ with your friends and family, or even add them to Google Maps for the world to see.

3.     Face Unlock: Unlock your device with your smile -- Face unlock uses facial recognition and your front-facing camera to unlock your device. To set it up, go to settings > security > screen lock and choose face unlock. You can set a backup pin/pattern for when lighting conditions aren’t adequate enough to recognize your face (you can also improve accuracy by capturing your face in different lighting conditions and settings).

4.     Android Beam: Android Beam is an innovative, convenient feature for sharing across two NFC-enabled devices. It lets people instantly exchange favorite apps, contacts, music, videos, photos — almost anything. Many apps have Android Beam integration, expanding the number of things you can share between Android devices (for instance, favorite places on foursquare or tagged songs on Shazam). It’s incredibly simple and convenient to use — there’s no menu to open, application to launch, or pairing needed. Just touch one Android-powered phone to another, then tap to send.

5.     Customize your home screen with a launcher: One launcher is the Google Now Launcher, which gives you quick access to Google Now, while keeping your apps right where you want them. Just tap home and then swipe right to access Google Now cards that show you just the right information, at just the right time. And anytime you see the search box at the top of your screen, you can say “Ok Google” (if you’re in the US, UK, or Canada), or you can tap the microphone button to trigger voice input. There are many launchers available on Google Play, just search “launcher.”

6.     Place a widget: Go to your widgets section (on most Nexus devices, open your apps folder, and swipe all the way to the right to widgets) and choose a widget. Notice that as you place it on the homescreen, other app icons that are in the way will automatically move to make room. You can also expand or shrink a widget by holding down on it and then dragging the bounds.

○      Power Control Widget: as an example, the power control widget lets you maximize your battery usage on your phone, including managing display brightness, connectivity, syncing, and more. From the widgets section, scroll to find the Power Control widget. 

7.     Set Data Controls: Android lets you set controls and manage network data usage. In the Settings app, tap “Data usage” to reveal colorful charts that show the total data usage on each network type (mobile or Wi-Fi), as well as amount of data used by each running application. You can optionally set warning levels or hard limits on data usage or disable mobile data altogether; you can also manage the background data used by individual applications as needed by tapping on an app below the chart.

 8.     Gesture shortcuts:

○      Pinch to expand notifications: You can preview multiple emails, see full-bleed photos people have shared with you on Google+, and return missed calls directly from the Notifications shade. The notification at the top of the list will automatically expand, or you can pinch a notification further down the list to expand or shrink it, in addition to being able to swipe it away to dismiss it.

○      Two finger swipe down to quick settings: One finger swipe down from the top will bring down your notifications shade, but drag two fingers down from the top to get quick access to your Quick Settings (so you can jump into your settings and make adjustments quickly)

9.     Just speak! On a small keyboard, it’s so much easier to just speak than to type — and it’ll take you further than you’d think. Just tap the mic or say “OK Google” and your Android will do your bidding.

○      Send texts or emails — just say 

■      “OK Google, send a text to Jason, I’ll be 10 minutes late” (text will be right there so you can send with one quick tap — if you have more than one contact with the same name, you’ll be asked to clarify)

■      Or try “OK Google, send an email to Susan: do you guys want to go to the beach with us for a picnic on Saturday?” (Note that for both of these, you’ll need to be in the app.)

■      For more about Voice Actions and commands, visit the Android Help Center.

○      Find your stuff (pix, flights, packages) without digging

■      "Show me my pictures of sunsets" or (Works if they’re in your Google+ / Picasa Web Albums.)

■      “What gate is my flight leaving from?” or "Where's my package?" (These work if you’ve gotten confirmations in Gmail.)

○      Roadtrip research? Calorie check? Set a reminder?

■      Do a bit of quick and dirty research before a road trip, say to Seattle?

“Show me pictures of the Space Needle.”

“How tall is it?”

“Who was the architect?”

“when is it open?” (Google understands this is a whole conversation.)

●      Thinking of taking the kids to Coney island and want to make sure they won’t have a meltdown when you find out they’re too little to ride the Cyclone? Often you can get answers to those obscure questions as well:

“How tall do you have to be to ride the Cyclone?”

“How many calories are in pizza?” Then follow up: “What about lasagna?” (Google will understand you're looking for calories in both cases)

○      Get translation help quickly

“How do you say in Spanish ‘do you need me to call an ambulance for you?” — you’ll see the translation and get it spoken out to you 

10.  Google Now — so you don’t even have to ask

○      Just the right information when you need it

■      Your everyday things: traffic updates before you leave for work in the morning, the weather, your mom’s birthday

■      When traveling: when to leave for the airport, your boarding pass just before a flight, hotel or Airbnb reservations, currency conversion, photo spots nearby

■      The fun stuff: notification that your favorite artist’s new album is out, events nearby, movie showtimes, etc.

○      Full set of cards here.

Other great tips:

Google Play:

●      Set your Google Play to auto-update apps: Set apps to automatically update by default, so you don’t need to individually update them manually. You can also set to update over WiFi only [open Play Store > Settings > Settings > Auto-update apps by default]

●      Pin content for offline use: Watch movies, read books and listen to music when you're offline easily - just "pin" the content to the device. Literally just push the pin in the icon of the content and it will download to the device.

●      Season Pass for a TV Show: Buy a season pass for a TV show -- when a new episode is added, it will automatically get added to your library.

Google Maps for Android:

●      Save your favorite places: Don’t worry about typing the same addresses over and over again. If you’ve got a restaurant you want to visit next time you’re downtown, search for the restaurant, tap on the card at the bottom of the screen, and hit the star icon to save the location. You’ll even see your saved places on your desktop when you’re signed-in to Google across both devices.

●      Share your location: Help your friends find your exact location. When you’re on your mobile device, tap and hold a point on the map, and a pin will drop. From there, tap the address card at the bottom, select “Share,” and then send your location by text, email, or social media to anyone you choose. Your friends can then click on the address link and navigate to the exact place they need to go using Google Maps.

●      See ratings and review you trust: Want to find a great date night restaurant? Search for a category like “pizza in San Francisco” to see results right on the map, including ratings from Zagat and reviews from friends. And if you want to see all your options alongside the map, just click the list icon to the right of the search box.

●      Find popular tourist destinations: Visiting a city for the first time? Type an asterisk (*) into the search bar to see popular locations in the area of the map your screen is focused on.

●      Let Google Maps be your travel assistant: Avoid digging through your email to find your reservation information. When you’re signed-in to Google, your upcoming flight reservations from your Gmail will pop up right on the map. Now you can get directions alongside details like your flight number and reservation time.

Chrome for Android:

●      Incognito mode: Love Incognito mode? You can also use Incognito mode on Chrome for Mobile to browse on your phone or tablet when you don’t want to leave your history behind. Here are a few tips to get you started: Open a new Incognito tab - Touch Menu > New Incognito tab. You can learn more about Incognito tabs on Chrome for Mobile here: http://goo.gl/RudQD

●      Accessing open tabs from other devices: If you’re signed into Chrome, you know that you can access all of your open tabs across other devices where you’re signed into Chrome. To access all of your open tabs from a mobile device, just hit *Other Devices* from Menu or the New Tab Page - but what if you’re offline? With the Chrome to Mobile extension you can also send an offline version of a particular web page to Chrome on your phone or tablet, so that you can pick up right where you left off, even if you aren’t connected to the internet. You can find the Chrome to Mobile extension here: http://goo.gl/kFTmZ