Continuing our discussion in a new place

Thanks to all of you for reading our updates over the years. To serve our global developer community equally and consistently, we’ve decided to centralize our updates on our Google Developers blog and Google+ page, and we won’t be posting here any longer. Please do join us on the blog and on Google+ to keep up on all the news and tips for developing with Google.

Posted by Emily Wood, Managing Editor, Google Blogs

New Look, New Purchase Flow in Google Play

By Purnima Kochikar, Director of Business Development, Games & Applications

Cross-posted from the Android Developers Blog

Today we announced that a new version of the Google Play Store app is rolling out worldwide to Android phones and tablets. This new app brings a redesigned UI that’s easier to use and showcases more great content for users. For developers, the new app offers more ways for your app to get noticed, as well as a new, simpler purchase flow.

The new UI is simple and easier to browse. Collections are front and center on the homepage, helping users discover great content through recommendations and curated lists. Items in collections are now presented as cards, with a larger area for your app’s graphics and a larger touch target for users. Overall, the homepage surfaces more apps than before and highlights them more effectively right on the page.

Most important for apps that sell in-app products, the new UI offers a dramatically simplified, dialog-based purchase flow lets users buy your products without leaving the context of your app. Your app remains active and visible behind the purchase dialogs. When the purchase is complete, users return directly to the place they left, without your app having to reconstruct its state. It’s especially powerful when combined with In-app Billing v3, providing a faster and more reliable purchase flow.

All of these changes build on the core features of Google Play. Our editorial team will continue to look for exemplary apps to showcase in Editors’ Choice and other collections, and our familiar top lists will continue to track the market performance of your app on an ongoing basis.

Watch for the new Play Store app (version 4.0.25) coming to your devices soon. The rollout has already started and we expect all devices running Android 2.2 or higher to have received the update over the next few weeks.

Introducing Google+ Sign-In: simple and secure, minus the social spam

By Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

Cross-posted from the Google+ Developers Blog

Today we’re adding a new feature to the Google+ platform: application sign-in. Whether you’re building an app for Android, iOS or the web, users can now sign in to your app with Google, and bring along their Google+ info for an upgraded experience. It’s simple, it’s secure, and it prohibits social spam. And we’re just getting started.



In this initial release, we've focused on four key principles to make things awesome for users:

1. Simplicity and security come first 
If you sign in to Gmail, YouTube or any other Google service, you can now use your existing credentials to sign in to apps outside of Google. Just review the Google+ permissions screen (outlining the data you're sharing with the app, and the people who can see your activity), and you're all set. Google+ Sign-In also comes with the protections and safeguards you’ve come to expect from your Google account (like 2-step verification), so you can always sign in with confidence.

Managing your signed-in apps is easy too: visit plus.google.com/apps at any time, or open the new Google Settings app on Android.

2. Desktop and mobile are better together 
Many developers offer web and mobile versions of their app, yet setting things up across a browser, phone and tablet is still a major hassle. Starting today, when you sign in to a website with Google, you can install its mobile app on your Android device with a single click.

3. Sharing is selective; spraying is just spam 
Sometimes you want to share something with the world (like a high score), but other times you want to keep things to yourself (like fitness goals). With Google+ Sign-In and circles you decide who to share with, if at all. In addition: Google+ doesn’t let apps spray “frictionless” updates all over the stream, so app activity will only appear when it’s relevant (like when you’re actually looking for it).

4. Sharing is for doing, not just viewing 
Pictures and videos are great for viewing, but sometimes you actually want to do stuff online. That's why, when you share from an app that uses Google+ Sign-In, your friends will see a new kind of "interactive" post in their Google+ stream. Clicking will take them inside the app, where they can buy, listen to, or review (for instance) exactly what you shared.

If you’re building an app for Android, iOS or the web, and you’d like to include Google+ Sign-In, simply dive into our developer docs and start checking stats once your integration is live. Android apps will require the latest version of Google Play Services, which is rolling out to all devices in the next day or so.

To see what other developers are doing with Google+ Sign-In, just visit any of the following sites, and look for the new "Sign in with Google" button (also rolling out gradually):

• Banjo 
• Beautylish 
• Fancy 
• Fitbit 
• Flixster 

• The Guardian 
• OpenTable 
• Shazam 
• TuneIn
• USA Today

Posted by Uttam Tripathi, Program Manager, Developer Relations

Calling student coders: Hardcode, the secure coding contest for App Engine

Protecting user security and privacy is a huge responsibility, and software security is a big part of it. Learning about new ways to “break” applications is important, but learning preventative skills to use when “building” software, like secure design and coding practices, is just as critical. To help promote secure development habits, Google is once again partnering with the organizers of SyScan to host Hardcode, a secure coding contest on the Google App Engine platform.

Participation will be open to teams of up to 5 full-time students (undergraduate or high school, additional restrictions may apply). Contestants will be asked to develop open source applications that meet a set of functional and security requirements. The contest will consist of two rounds: a qualifying round over the Internet, with broad participation from any team of students, and a final round, to be held during SyScan on April 23-25 in Singapore.

During the qualifying round, teams will be tasked with building an application and describing its security design. A panel of judges will assess all submitted applications and select the top five to compete in the final round.

At SyScan, the five finalist teams will be asked to develop a set of additional features and fix any security flaws identified in their qualifying submission. After two more days of hacking, a panel of judges will rank the projects and select a grand prize winning team that will receive $20,000 Singapore dollars. The 2nd-5th place finalist teams will receive $15,000, $10,000, $5,000, and $5,000 Singapore dollars, respectively.

Hardcode begins on Friday, January 18th. Full contest details will be be announced via our mailing list, so subscribe there for more information!

Android Code Lab @ Gurgaon on 3rd Aug 2012

Android Developer Relations team at Google would be conducting Android code lab in Gurgaon on 3rd August 2012. Session will be conducted by Anirudh Dewani from Android team.

Plan is to cover the following topics:

SDK Tools - memory and performance analysis

What's new in ADT

Please register here (no registration fee) by 1st Aug 2012. We will send the confirmation to the participants through e-mail.

See you at the Android Code Lab this week!

PS: Venue details would be shared with the confirmed participants through e-mail.

Cheers,

What goes behind organizing a community run DevFest event?

I am sure many GDG (Google Developer Group) organizers who are planning to host large community run DevFest events would be interested to know what goes behind organizing some of these events.

In order to help better answer this question, we invited GDG organizers who have hosted such events to our Google Developer India Live series.

Shrey Malhotra (GDG New Delhi) , Chintan Shah (GDG Bangalore) and Badrinath Kulkarni (GDG Bangalore) have been involved with DevFestX events in New Delhi and Bangalore respectively and share some valuable insight in their interaction with me.

You can check out the interview here.

DevFestX Bangalore!

GDG (Google Developer Group) Bangalore, would be hosting their first DevFestX - http://devfestx.com on 19th May 2012 at Hotel Royal Orchid in Bangalore.

This community organized event promises to be an excellent opportunity to learn about some of the recent developments in Google Developer Technologies. With four separate tracks on HTML5, Chrome, Android and Cloud, DevFestX would involve a good mix of speaker sessions and hands-on sessions.

Please refer to the DevFestX Agenda page for details on various sessions happening

Registrations for DevFestX Bangalore opened on 2nd May 2012 and all the tickets were sold out within few hours. However for folks who will not be able to make it to the event, we would be broadcasting the sessions live on "Hangouts on Air"!

Please follow G+ Page of GDG Bangalore for link of live sessions.



Venue: Hotel Royal Orchid Bangalore

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Date: 19th May 2012

G+: http://goo.gl/goHbh

GTUG and Start-up Weekend hosting the first event in Noida (April 12th 2012)

After successful bootcamp events in Mumbai and Bangalore, GTUG New Delhi and Noida and Start-up weekend will be hosting the next event in Noida. Slated for 12th April 2012 this event would give an excellent opportunity for budding entrepreneurs to understand how they can build successful businesses by leveraging some of the Google technologies. Since we have limited seats available for the event, encourage you to register at the earliest: http://event.ayojak.com/event/startup-weekend-delhi-edu

Event will have sessions on popular Google Technologies: Android and AppEngine. These sessions will be very useful for individuals with business ideas for apps. Registration is now open for the bootcamp at http://event.ayojak.com/event/startup-weekend-delhi-edu

See you there!

Date: 12th April 2012
Timing: 5pm
Venue: Times Internet Ltd, Times Center 1st Floor, Wing B, FC-6, Sector 16A (Film City) Near Shiv Murti Noida 201301, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India 

DevFestX New Delhi - See you there!

“Develop what the World is developing” -  This quote from New Delhi GTUG is very appropriate for Google’s developer technologies. Google technologies touch millions of lives every day and by being part of the developer ecosystem one gets an opportunity to innovate by leveraging some of these technologies.

Therefore, to encourage developer engagement around various Google technologies and to provide a platform to collaborate, New Delhi GTUG is organizing its first developer conference: DevFestX 2012.

The event is planned for two days and will be held at the Google office in Gurgaon on 11th and 12th February 2012. The theme of day 1 is “Everyday Google”, on which some of the Google APIs will be introduced to the participants. This day has been intentionally kept for the budding developers. The second day will have sessions focused toward experienced developers, highlighted by an Android code sprint. The list of speakers includes Googlers and industry experts.

In addition to all this, the conference will provide an opportunity to promote the GTUG brand in the Northern part of the country.

Finally, let’s not forget that there will be some finger-licking dishes for you to enjoy.

See you there!

Event Details and Registration Link: http://www.devfestx.com/gtug/delhi/2012/

Pune GTUG Event - 28th January 2012

Google Technology User Group, Pune organized their recent event at MKSSS Cummins college of Engineering for Women, Karve Nagar, Pune on Jan 28, 2012. The event was attended by 200+ 

participants, a healthy mix of professionals and students. Organizers publicized the event through press releases in Sakal, one of the most influential Marathi Newspaper dailies in Pune.

Event had all community speakers participating, Anupam Mangudkar (Google App Engine), Ravi Vyas (Why Android First) and Badrinath Kulkarni (Near Field Communication). Badri and Ravi used Google+ Hangouts to conduct their sessions.

Organizers would also like to send out their special thanks to 5 attendees who are visually challenged and have been working on Google technologies for last 1.5 years. Some of the participants travelled from as far as Kolhapur, Latur that are approximately 200-250 kms from Pune for this event.

Event concluded with high-tea and networking sessions.

We would like to congratulate Pune GTUG organizer Shishir Vaidya and look forward to more such events as part of Pune GTUG.

Come to our Bootcamp event in Mumbai - 4th February 2012

Startup Weekend and GTUG (Google Technology User Group) are teaming up to organize a technology bootcamp in Mumbai on 4th February 2012. This is part of the bootcamp events Startup Weekend and local GTUG chapters are hosting worldwide. Such events present an opportunity to learn more about some of the Google developer technologies (e.g. Android, Chrome, HTML5, Google Maps etc.) and also other technologies which budding entrepreneurs can leverage to build successful businesses.

The Mumbai bootcamp event will have two sessions. Aakrit Vaish (Director, Business Operations at Flurry Inc.) will be talking about "Business of Apps", while Ankit Daftery from BrailleType will talk in detail about what goes on behind the scenes when building an app, both technically and from a product design perspective.

Both these sessions will be very useful for individuals with business ideas for apps. Registration is now open for the bootcamp at http://mumbai.startupweekend.org/tickets/.

Speaker Profiles:

Aakrit Vaish: http://www.linkedin.com/in/aakrit
Ankit Daftery: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/ankit-daftery/12/510/424


Venue: Pinstorm Mumbai Office
Timing: 3pm-7pm (Please reach the venue by 2:30pm)

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