New Version Of Google Calendar Is Rolling Out Soon With Material Makeover, Events From Gmail, And More

You can cross another one off your listâ€”Google Calendar is getting its material design update today for Lollipop devices, according to Google. It’s not just the design, though. The new version of Calendar is adding some awesome features and new layouts too. It’s a big, big deal. This usually where I tell you we have an APK for you, but we don’t (it’s out “in the coming weeks”). We do, however, have all the details for you to salivate over.

Here’s the full rundown of changes from the new Calendar app.

Events from Gmail: Any time you book something online, you get an email, from reservations for a flight, hotel, or restaurant to those concert or big game tickets you managed to nab. However, you then have to then copy and paste the details into a new event in your Calendar. The new version of Calendar does all this work for you by automatically adding events to your calendar from Gmail. If for some reason you donâ€™t want Events from Gmail, you can always turn this off.

Assists: We introduced the concept of Assists in the new Inbox, and now Calendar is getting them as well. They make adding events both quicker and easier. When you start typing in details for an event, Calendar will assist you by providing relevant suggestions for event names, places and people. And over time, Calendar will learn to adapt to your preference, so if you frequently go to yoga in the park with Jane, it will suggest this when you start typing â€œY-o-gâ€¦â€.

Schedule View: With the new Calendar, we aimed to create something that is both beautiful and useful. The new app will include photos and maps of the places youâ€™re going, cityscapes of travel destinations, and illustrations of everyday events like dinner, drinks and that yoga in the park. These images not only make Calendar enjoyable to look at, but also create a glanceable view that doesn’t require you to decipher tiny text to figure out what’s going on.

The event integration with Gmail seems like a logical step. Google Now can already pull out those context clues, so you might as well get entries in your full calendar app too. If it’s not as smart as advertised, you can turn it off. Similarly, Calendar will be smart enough to suggest places, people, and events as you’re typing. This, again, feels like some Google Now/Inbox juice being pumped into Calendar.

Schedule view is basically a better version of the agenda on phones. You’ll get images, photos, and maps that match your events right there in the timeline. Additionally, the tablet layout includes a full month view calendar next to the agenda-style list.

So when can you have it? Android 5.0 devices will get it today, but the Google Play build for 4.1 and higher will roll out in the coming weeks. That could mean almost anything with Google, but we’ll have a mirror up as soon as we get the APK.

[Gmail Blog, Calendar Demo]

Source : Android Police – Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets Â» Apps/Games