Category: Google+

Screen Layout Improvements


Screen Layout Improvements
From the start, our new Google+ Web experience was built as a Responsive Web Design (RWD), meaning it adapts to the amount of screen space available within a Web browser by re-sizing images, changing layouts, and more. Recently we had the pleasure of working with Ethan Marcotte (https://ethanmarcotte.com), the originator of RWD, on a number of substantial improvements to how we adapt to different screen sizes on the Google+ Web experience. Starting today, we:

* Display more posts on smaller screens
* Switch to a 3 column display sooner
* Use new header designs on Communities, Collections and Profiles
* Resize posts more effectively
* And more…

To experience these all changes, simply try out the Google+ Web experience on different phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, or just different Web browser window sizes.

And as always, please send us your ideas/issues using our Send Feedback menu item as that’s the best way to ensure we’ll see them. Thanks~

Over a Year of New Web Features


Over a Year of New Web Features
With today’s announcement (https://blog.google/products/google-plus/making-googleplus-work-better-for-you/) of our upcoming transition to the new Google+ Web experience, I thought it would be useful to share all the feature additions, fixes, and updates we’ve made thanks to your feedback over the past fourteen months:

Home Stream
* Ability to reply to comments in the stream
* +1 comments with one click
* Turn animated comments (as seen on all streams) on/off
* Extra fast Web page loading with AMP
* New presentation for original comments on re-shared posts
* Real-time indicator of when there’s new posts
* Auto-play of animated GIFs (with setting to turn on/off)
* 3 column stream view for very wide screens
* Quick action to view full post pages
* Hover over user images for more info about people
* “What You Missed” posts in your Home stream
* Full timestamp on post pages
* View poll results from the post menu
* No limits on circle streams in menu
* Volume control for Recommended & Trending posts
* Recommended & Trending ranking improvements
* Recommended Community & Collections improvements
* Ability to scroll Community & Collections recommendations

Posts
* Drag & drop images to make new posts & comments
* Ability to create polls
* Ability to crop photos in polls
* Upload multiple images at once to a post
* Ability to re-order multiple images using drag & drop
* Warning to ensure you don’t lose new posts
* View map for images with location
* Multiple improvements to +mentions

Communities
* New “Hold Posts for Review” setting
* Search for members in a Community
* Search for posts within a Community
* New simpler invite to Community feature
* Visible about information for Communities
* Links to categories on Community pages
* New Community content controls
* Community owner & moderator badges on comments
* Possible for owners to delete communities
* Possible for owners & moderators to leave communities
* View most recently visited Communities
* Create new posts inside Communities

Collections
* Easily move any of your posts into a Collection
* Improved Collection sharing
* Ability to create a Collection when making a post
* When following a Collection, see related Collections
* Related Collections on post pages
* Follower counts visible on your Collections

Notifications
* Ability to get Google+ notifications in Chrome browser
* Mark all notifications as read
* Mark individual notifications as read
* Updated notifications in the header
* New full-screen notifications page
* Filter notifications by All, Unread, & Other Updates
* Thumbnails & icons to help scan notifications
* The new Google+ Activity Log
* Pinned posts on Collections, Communities, and Profiles

Profiles
* Easier access to profile information
* Full “About” information on profiles
* Edit your introduction in About Me
* See large profile images in a gallery view
* New Following screen design
* View ‘Posts from Circle’ from the Following screen

Search
* Personalized search autocomplete suggestions
* Improved people search results
* Improved Community search results
* More topical results for Collections & Communities
* Search history

Spam & Abuse
* Additional details when reporting abuse on posts
* Approve or reject comments we (G+) flag as spam
* Remove suspended users from Community member lists
* Community “Strict” content control setting
* Community “Hold Posts for Review” setting
* Review & reinstate comments we flag as spam

Some of you might rightly recognize that items on this list were present in Google+ Classic but were added to the new Web preview over the past fourteen months. Why? We completely re-wrote the Google+ Web app from scratch. Rather than rebuild every nook and cranny that developed over the five year history of Google+, we started with a clean slate of the features people used the most (based on our data & research). We then released this preview version to collect feedback and find out what people missed the most of what we left out.

Not every feature/setting has returned but we have been continuously listening and making updates (as seen above). And we’ll continue doing so. To make your voice heard, please send us your ideas/issues using the Send Feedback menu item. Thanks~

Hiding Low-Quality Comments


Hiding Low-Quality Comments
Today we announced a new feature for Google+ Android, iOS, and Web: hiding low-quality comments on posts so its easier to have good conversations on G+. By default, this helps you focus on comments that matter most. But if you’d like to see all the comments on a post, you can simply tap on “View more comments.”

As always, please send us your ideas/issues using our Send Feedback menu item as that’s the best way to ensure we’ll see them. Thanks~

Fast and easy video posting


Fast and easy video posting

I’m excited to announce a new feature to make it easier than ever to add high quality video content to your posts with a couple taps. The new youtube icon you’ll find in your posting options leads to a page where you can simply tap on videos to preview them and add them to your post. For easy navigation, we’ve included your recently liked (on youtube) and the most popular videos pre-loaded and you can always search for that specific video you wanted to share.

Happy sharing!

Improved Recommendations


Improved Recommendations
Today we’re rolling out the ability to scroll through Community and Collections recommendations in your home stream on the new Google+ Web experience. We’ve also made improvements to which Communities we’re recommending on all platforms (iOS, Android, and Web) to surface things more relevant to your interests.

Please send us your ideas/issues using our Send Feedback menu item as that’s the best way to ensure we’ll see them. Thanks~

iOS “N” (6.3.0) Release Announcement


iOS “N” (6.3.0) Release Announcement

I’m excited to announce our 12th and final Google+ iOS app release of the year. We’ve focused on two experiences that we’ve gotten a lot of feedback about improving for mobile: community moderation and photos & video posting.

– We’ve made a number of optimizations to how we handle media posts to reduce the likelihood of posts failing in poor networks. This should especially help photo, video and multi-photo posts.
– Easy-to-access community moderation
– Easy-to-access community preferences

There’s plenty more in our pipeline, but please pass on your feedback so we can continue to make the right improvements for our users 🙂