It’s been a little while since we made a release of Google Play services, because we’ve been busy integrating Firebase. While Firebase will contain the SDKs you’ve come to know and love for building mobile applications that run cross platform, we’ll also continue to ship Google Play services updates with new SDKs regularly. Firebase was built using Google Play services 9.0, so let’s dig a little deeper into some of the new and cool APIs that are available in this release.
Ads
If you build apps that monetize with ads, we’ve added a lot of updates since 8.4. There's a new Initialization method that publishers can use to kick off the SDK at app start. There's also a new native ads format: Native Ads Express. With Native Ads Express, publishers can define CSS templates for their ad units that define fonts, colors, positioning, and other style information. AdMob combines these with advertiser assets like headlines and calls to action to make a finished ad, which is displayed in a NativeExpressAdView. Moving the work of customizing presentation off the device means there's less mobile code required, plus it's possible to update templates without redeploying the app.
Nearby
We’re continuing to update BLE beacon scanning in Nearby Messages. Any app with ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION will be able to scan for beacons via Nearby without any additional permissions. We recommend developers check to see if the app has the location permission prior to calling GoogleApiClient.connect(). Get started here.
For peer-to-peer Nearby Messages, there’s now an option to show the opt-in dialog upon connection to the GoogleApiClient which significantly reduces boilerplate for obtaining the Nearby permission.
Player Stats API
We’re also continuing to update the Play Games Client SDK with improvements to the Player Stat API and the public launch of the video recording API. The Player Stats API now has Predictive Analytics to help you identify which groups of players are likely to spend or churn, and we are adding new predictions for how much a player is likely to spend within 28 days and the probability that a player is a high spender. This allows you to tailor experiences for these players to try to increase their spend or engagement. Learn more about the Player Stats API.
Video recording API
You will be able to easily add video recording to your app and let users share their videos with their friends and on YouTube in a few simple steps. In the coming months, we are also adding live streaming functionality to allow your fans to broadcast their gameplay experiences in real time on YouTube.
That’s it for this release of Google Play services 9.0 -- we’re continuing to ship new APIs all the time so watch this blog for future announcements.
Developers have built amazing Android apps. They use your mobile device to the fullest, including the camera, GPS, and sensors to connect to the real world. They’re beautiful and immersive, with Material Design and smooth animations running at 60 frames per second. They use access to identity and payments to create seamless experiences.
But developers tell us they wish they could bring users into their apps more quickly and easily. With the web, you can click on a link and land on a web page — it takes one click and just a few seconds. It should be easier for users to access a wider range of apps, and for developers to reach more people.
So, we asked ourselves: How do we make it possible for people to access a wider range of apps, seamlessly? How do we help developers reach more people? And how do we do that while giving developers access to the range of capabilities and experiences that Android apps provide?
Today we’re sharing a preview of a new project that we think will change how people experience Android apps. We call it Android Instant Apps, and it evolves Android apps to be able to run instantly, without requiring installation. With Instant Apps, a tap on a URL can open right in an Android app, even if the user doesn’t have that app installed.
As a developer, you won’t need to build a new, separate app. It’s the same Android APIs, the same project, the same source code. You’ll simply update your existing Android app to take advantage of Instant Apps functionality. In fact, it can take less than a day to get up and running for some developers, though the effort involved will vary depending on how your app is structured. You modularize your app, and Google Play downloads only the parts that are needed, on the fly. And when you do upgrade, your app will be available to more than a billion users on Android devices going back to Jelly Bean.
This is a big change, so it's going to take some time. We’ve been working with a small set of partners to help refine the experience, including developers like BuzzFeed, B&H Photo, Medium, Hotel Tonight, Zumper and Disney. We’ll be gradually expanding access for developers and bringing Instant Apps to users later this year.
B&H Photo
(via Google Search)
BuzzFeedVideo
(via a shared link)
Park and Pay (example)
(via NFC)
If you’re interested in learning more about Android Instant Apps, please check out the Android developers website, where you can sign up for updates as they become available. We can’t wait to see what you build when your app is just a tap away.
Posted by Lily Sheringham, Developer Marketing at Google Play
Google Play games services includes Player Analytics, a free reporting tool available in the Google Play Developer Console, to help you understand how players are progressing, spending, and churning. Now, you can see what Player Analytics looks like with an exemplary implementation of Play games services: try out the new sample game in the Google Play Developer Console, which we produced with help from Auxbrain, developer of Zombie Highway 2. The sample game uses randomized and anonymized data from a real game and will also let you try the new features we’re announcing today. Note: You need a Google Play Developer account in order to access the sample game.
Use predictive analytics to engage players before they might churn
To help you better understand your players’ behavior, we’ve extended the Player Stats API in Player Analytics with predictive functionality. The churn prediction method will return data on the probability that the player will churn, i.e., stop playing the game, so you can create content in response to this to entice them to stay in your game. Additionally, the spend prediction method will return the probability that the player will spend, and you could, for example, provide discounted in-app purchases or show ads based on these insights.
Create charts in the new funnels report to quickly visualize sequences of events
The funnels report enables you to create a funnel chart from any sequence events, such as achievements, spend, and custom events. For example, you could log custom events for each step in a tutorial flow (e.g., tutorial step 1, step 2, step 3), and then use the funnel report to visualize the exit points in your tutorial.
Measure and compare the effect of changes and cumulative values by new users with cohort’s report
The cohorts report allows you to take any event such as sessions, cumulative spend, and custom events, and compare the cumulative event values by new user cohorts - providing valuable insight into the impact of your decisions on your gaming model. For example, you can view users that started the day before you made a change and the day after. This allows you to measure and compare the effect of changes made, so if you doubled the price of all your items in your in-game store, you can see if the cumulative sessions started after the change was lower or higher than the users that started before the change.
Updated C++, iOS SDKs and Unity plug-in to support Player Stats API
We have updated the C++ and iOS SDKs, and the Unity plug-in, all of which now support the Player Stats API, which includes the basic player stats as well as spend and churn predictions.
We’re delighted to announce the availability of Google Play services 8.4. There’s a lot of new information to share with you about what’s available to you in this release.
Custom Email App Invites
App Invites is a technology that enables your users to share apps with people they know. In Google Play services 8.4 we’ve updated this to make it easier for them to share via email. Before this you could create a custom email that contained user defined text and an image, but now we’re allowing you to add content from the app directly into the message. It allows you to fully define the email body using HTML, and set the email subject line. So, for example, if you have a favorite cooking app that you want to share with your friends, your invite to use the app can include a favorite recipe from the app. They get the immediate benefit of being able to access the desired content, giving them a more informed choice about whether or not they decide to install the app to get richer and more content. Check out the App Invites sample on GitHub here.
Predicting User spend and churn in games
The Play Games Analytics developer experience is designed to enable game developers to better understand, manage, and optimize game experiences throughout the player lifecycle. With this in mind, we’ve extended the Player Stats API to help you better understand your players behavior, and based on this, entice them to stay in your game.
The churn prediction method will return data on the probability that the player will churn, i.e., stop playing the game. You can create content in response to this to entice them to stay in your game.
Additionally, the spend prediction method will return the probability that the player will spend something in the game. It’s up to you how to handle this data, but -- for example -- if there’s a low probability that the player will spend something, you could provide discounted in-app purchases or show ads.
Fused Location Provider Updates
The Fused Location Provider (FLP) in Google Play services provides location to your apps using a number of sensors, including GPS, WiFi and Cell Towers.
When desiring to save battery power, and using coarse updates, the FLP doesn’t use Global Positioning Services (GPS), and instead uses WiFi and Cell tower signals. In Google Play services 8.4, we have greatly improved how the FLP detects location from cell towers. Prior to this, we would get the location information relative to only the primary cell tower. Now, the FLP takes the primary tower and other towers nearby to provide a more accurate location. We’ve also improved location detection from WiFi access points, particularly in areas where GPS is not available -- such as indoors.
Maps API Improvements
Have you ever wished you could easily handle a tap on a suburb without having to add another layer on the map to intercept the taps? We’ve added an onClickListener for polygons, so you can easily add transparent polygons and intercept the taps directly. We’ve also added on click listeners to polylines and ground overlays.
Here’s how you can use a listener to detect a click on a polygon:
Info windows now also offer an OnInfoWindowCloseListener and an OnInfoWindowLongClickListener. The on close listener is particularly useful if you wish to zoom back out on the map after the user has looked at the detail associated with a particular marker.
For more details, and an example that uses these, see the ApiDemos sample on GitHub and check out the historical changes to this sample, so you can see how the new APIs work. Also see the Release Notes.
Support for Aztec bar codes
In Google Play services 7.8, we launched Vision APIs that supported face and barcode detection. One bar code format we didn’t support was Aztec bar codes, so with Google Play services 8.4 we’ve now added support for these.
Applications using BarcodeDetector in its default configuration (no barcode format restrictions) will automatically start decoding AZTEC codes.
Background Beacon Scanning
With Google Play services 8.4, the Nearby Messages API now supports background scanning for Eddystone, the open beacon format from Google. With this update, your app can be woken up when a BLE beacon is sighted. Back in July, Google Play Services 7.8 introduced the Nearby Messages API with a simple publish-subscribe interface. In the case of beacons, developers publish content by adding attachments to beacon records using Proximity Beacon API. These attachments are served back to your app when Nearby sights a beacon of interest.
New methods that we’ve added include a subscribe method for background beacon subscriptions where BLE scans are triggered at screen-on events; an associated unsubscribe event; and the ability to handle intents that you get when the Nearby API calls back during a background subscription.
We also have a new HistoryApi.updateData() method. This method allows you to update data in one API call without having to delete and insert with two calls.
Place Picker Autocomplete Widget
Today we are announcing the mobile autocomplete widget, the latest addition to our existing set of programmatic autocomplete features on Android and iOS, as well as the addition of Autocomplete to our place picker widget. Autocomplete functionality assists users by automatically completing the name and address of a place as they type. Widgets make it even easier for developers to add autocomplete functionality to their application with just a small amount of code. Learn more about this at this blog post.
With Google Play services 8.3, we’ve been hard at work to provide a greatly improved sign-in experience for developers that want to build apps that sign their users in with Google. To help you better understand some of these changes, this is the first in a series of blog posts about what’s available to you as a developer. In this post, we’ll discuss the changes to the user experience, and how you can use them in your app, as well as updates to the API to make coding Sign-In with Google more straightforward. On Android Marshmallow, this new Sign-In API has removed any requirement for device permissions, so there is no need to request runtime access to the accounts on the device, as was the case with the old API.
User Experience Improvements
We’ve gotten lots of feedback from developers about the user experience of using Google’s social sign-in button. Many of you noted that it took too many steps and was confusing for users. Typically, the experience is that the user touches a sign in button, and they are asked to choose an account. If that account doesn’t have a Google+ profile, they need to create one, and after that they have to give permissions based on the type of information that the app is asking for. Finally, they get to sign in to the app.
With the new API, the default set of permissions that the app requests has been reduced to basic profile information and optionally email address as demonstrated here. This introduces opportunities for much streamlined user experience: the first improvement here is in the presentation of the button itself. We had received feedback that the Google+ branding on the Sign-In button made it feel like the user would need to share Google+ data, which most apps don’t use. As such, the SignInButton has been rebranded with the reduced scopes -- it now reads ‘Sign In with Google’, and follows the standard Google branding for use with basic profile information.
After this, the user flow is also more straightforward. Instead of subsequent screens where a Google account is picked based on the email addresses registered on the device, followed by a potential ‘Create Google+ Profile’ dialog, followed by a permissions consent dialog, like this:
The user experience has changed to a single step, where the user chooses their account and gives consent. If they don’t have a Google+ profile, they don’t need to create one, eliminating that step. Additional consent dialogs come later, and are best requested in context so that the user understand why you might ask for access to their calendar or contact, and they are only prompted at the time that this data is needed.
We hope that a streamlined, one-tap, non-social sign-in option with additional OAuth permissions requested in context will help improve your sign-in rates and make it a breeze to sign-in with Google.
Posted by, Lily Sheringham, Developer Marketing at Google Play
Editor’s note: As part of our series featuring tips from developers, we spoke to some popular game developers to find out how they use Player Analytics and Google Play game services to find success on Google Play. - Ed.
Google Play games services, available in the Developer Console, allows you to add features such as achievements and leaderboards to your games. Google Play games services provides Player Analytics, a free games-specific analytics tool, in the Developer Console Game services tab. You can use the reports to understand how players are progressing, spending, and churning backed by a data-driven approach.
Bombsquad grows revenue by 140% per user with Player Analytics
Independent developer Eric Froemling, initially created the game Bombsquad as a hobby, but now relies on it as his livelihood. Last year, he switched the business model of the game from paid to free-to-play. By using Player Analytics, he was able to improve player retention and monetization in the game, achieving a 140% increase in the average revenue per daily active user (ARPDAU).
Watch the video below to learn how Eric uses Player Analytics and the Developer Console to improve gamers’ experience, while increasing retention and monetization.
Tips from Auxbrain for success with Google Play games services
Kevin Pazirandeh, founder and CEO of games developer Auxbrain, creator of Zombie Highway, provides insight into how they use Google Play games services, and comments:
“While there are a few exceptions, I have not run into a better measure of engagement, and perhaps more importantly, a measure for change in engagement, than the retention table. For the uninitiated, a daily retention table gives you the % of players who return on the nth day after their first play. Comparing retention rates of two similar games can give you an immediate signal if you are doing something right or wrong.”
Kevin shares his top tips on how to best use the analytics tools in Google Play games services:
You get Player Analytics for free - If you’ve implemented Google Play game services in your games, check out Player Analytics under Game services in the Developer Console, you’ll find you are getting analytics data already.
Never assume change is for the better - Players may not view changes in your game as the improvement you had hoped they were. So when you make a change, have a strategy for measuring the result. Where you cannot find a way to measure the change’s impact with Player Analytics, consider not making it and prioritize those changes you can measure.
Use achievements and events to track player progress - If you add achievements or events you can use the Player progression report or Event viewer to track player progress. You’ll quickly find out where players are struggling or churning, and can look for ways to help move players on.
Use sign-in to get more data - The more data about player behavior you collect, the more meaningful the reports in Player Analytics become. The best way to increase the data collected is to get more players signed-in. Auto sign-in players, and provide a Play game services start point on the first screen (after any tutorial flow) for those that don’t sign-in first time.
Track your player engagement with Retention tables - The Retention table report lets you see where players are turning away, over time. Compare retention before and after changes to understand their impact, or between similar games to see if different designs decisions are turning players away earlier or later.
We’re delighted to announce the availability of Google Play services 8.3. There’s a lot of new information to share with you about what’s available to you in this release.
A big part of this release is focused on user identity. We’ve revamped the Sign In with Google APIs to make implementation simpler and provide users a streamlined experience. First off, the new Google Sign-In no longer requires the device accounts permissions, a big win when you start to develop for Marshmallow. The API also supports the latest Google branding. When using Google Play services 8.3, you’ll find a SignInButton that looks like this with the default scopes:
Previously, users would have to touch a sign in button, and then follow several steps (i.e. selecting account, giving permission to access profile information, and possibly needing to create a Google+ account). With Google Play services 8.3, only one tap is needed for basic profile access.
You can check out the documentation for the new API here.
And to make signing in easier across devices, whether you use Google Sign-In or still have password-based authentication, the Smart Lock APIs received some important updates. We’ve added a new API method to show a dialog that helps your user select a previously-used email address to pre-fill sign in or up forms easily: check out getHintPicker (sample code). This doesn’t require any device permissions and provides an alternative to a picker you may have previously populated from accounts on the device, which would now require a runtime permission with Marshmallow.
You can use this hint information to populate an entire sign-up form with name, email address, and profile picture with one tap, or even direct the user into a sign-in or sign-up flow intelligently based on their email address. Better yet, if the entry the user picked matches an account on the device, Google can provide a verified email address in the hint, which you can use to skip email verification and authenticate the user if your system can support ID tokens, similar to Google Sign-In.
For determining location, Google Play services provides a Fused Location Provider (FLP) which abstracts the underlying location sensors, such as GPS, WiFi, and the cell radio signal, into a single easy-to-use API. We’ve made some improvements to the FLP when it comes to batching. Prior to version 8.3, the batch location APIs would allow the FLP to save power by consolidating network traffic, but when an app removed a batching location request, the batch would be cleared. You may not want this behavior, so we’ve added an API that can return any batched locations immediately. Check the flushLocations and removeLocationUpdates method calls on the FusedLocationProviderApi for more details.
App Invites is a technology that enables your users to share your app with people they know. If you build using App Invites, Google Play services 8.3 has an update that will make coding much simpler. Now, you can use the AppInvite.AppInviteApi.getInvitation() method. This will set up a ResultCallback that you can use to launch your deep link activity, drastically simplifying your code.
The Play game services Player Stats API also gets an update. The latest version now includes a new signal for the probability that a player is about to churn. Developers can use this signal to offer special promotions to improve retention. For example, a developer could provide a discount on a power-up for players that are at risk of churning.
Finally, if you are developing for wearables, you’ll know that battery life and optimization of power usage are critical in having a great user experience. With Google Play services 8.3, we’ve updated the DataApi to allow for urgency in how data items are synced. Now, a priority can be added to the data item to determine when it should be synced. For example, if you are building an app that requires immediate syncing, such as a remote control app, it can still be done immediately by calling setUrgent(), but for something such as updating your contacts, you could tolerate some delay. Non-urgent DataItems may be delayed for up to 30 minutes, but you can expect that in most cases they will be delivered within a few minutes. Low priority is now the default, so setUrgent() is needed to obtain the previous timing.
Filter support has been added to listeners in the Android Wear API, allowing listeners to only receive a subset of changes on both phones and watches. Listeners registered in the Android manifest should be filtered to only receive events that require launching the process, with the remaining events being delivered to live listeners added via methods such as addListener(). This reduces the need for listeners to filter out uninteresting events, making applications and the system more efficient.
That’s it for this release of Google Play services. To learn more, visit the Google Developers site.
With the release of Google Play services 7.8 we’re excited to announce that we’ve added new Mobile Vision APIs which provides the Barcode Scanner API to read and decode a myriad of different barcode types quickly, easily and locally.
Barcode detection
Classes for detecting and parsing bar codes are available in the com.google.android.gms.vision.barcode namespace. The BarcodeDetector class is the main workhorse -- processing Frame objects to return a SparseArray<Barcode> types.
The Barcode type represents a single recognized barcode and its value. In the case of 1D barcode such as UPC codes, this will simply be the number that is encoded in the barcode. This is available in the rawValue property, with the detected encoding type set in the format field.
For 2D barcodes that contain structured data, such as QR codes, the valueFormat field is set to the detected value type, and the corresponding data field is set. So, for example, if the URL type is detected, the constant URL will be loaded into the valueFormat, and the URL property will contain the desired value. Beyond URLs, there are lots of different data types that the QR code can support -- check them out in the documentation here.
When using the API, you can read barcodes in any orientation. They don’t always need to be straight on, and oriented upwards!
Importantly, all barcode parsing is done locally, making it really fast, and in some cases, such as PDF-417, all the information you need might be contained within the barcode itself, so you don’t need any further lookups.
You can learn more about using the API by checking out the sample on GitHub. This uses the Mobile Vision APIs along with a Camera preview to detect both faces and barcodes in the same image.
Supported Bar Code Types
The API supports both 1D and 2D bar codes, in a number of sub formats.
For 1D Bar Codes, these are:
EAN-13
EAN-8
UPC-A
UPC-E
Code-39
Code-93
Code-128
ITF
Codabar
For 2D Bar Codes, these are:
QR Code
Data Matrix
PDF 417
Learn More
It’s easy to build applications that use bar code detection using the Barcode Scanner API, and we’ve provided lots of great resources that will allow you to do so. Check them out here:
