[Editor"s Note: What immediately follows is a rundown of the latest developments and features Google has added to Apps for Work (G Suite) since this review was first written.]
December 2017
- Auto-provisioning was enabled for 8 more third-party apps for G Suite Business/Enterprise customers, including: AWS, Evernote, GoToMeeting, Sugar, Zendesk and Office 365.
- Google made life easier for admins by giving G Suite’s apps settings page, which lists core apps, a much more streamlined look and feel.
- If the Device Policy app detects that an Android device has violated a company security policy, it will now disable all non-critical apps (i.e. those not needed for the device to function).
- And for iOS devices, Google Mobile Management now allows admins to stop employees from syncing corporate data on jailbroken iOS hardware.
- Google tuned up the menus in Docs and Slides, renaming certain tools and menu options to make them easier to find, and for better consistency across these two apps.
- G Suite has new templates in four fresh categories in Google Docs, Sheets and Slides, including templates for HR, project management, freelancer engagement and sales.
- Google Sites was improved with the ability to create and easily manage site-wide page footers in a single place.
- The Jamboard app for mobile devices was enhanced to enable users to create and edit objects in jams on their smartphones.
- Google Docs and Slides now has a bigger font catalogue which supports 62 languages, and that includes non-Latin scripts like Cyrillic, with more on the way.
- Google Docs, Sheets and Slides now allows users to (optionally) copy across comments and suggestions when they are duplicating a document, spreadsheet or presentation.
- Google released a new kit for Hangouts Meet which contains all the hardware you need to hold high-quality video meetings using Google’s videoconferencing software.
- Add-ons for Gmail were launched, which let users access certain features of popular apps right from within their inbox, including the likes of Asana, QuickBooks and Trello.
- Google Calendar on the web benefited from a redesign to make it look more like the mobile app, and some new features including the ability to manage multiple calendars side-by-side.
- Google made it easier to compare and contrast different G Suite editions, and the firm also made it simpler for users to switch their subscription between these different editions.
- A new version of the Google Contacts app emerged on Android, which introduced action buttons under a contact’s photo to start a chat or make a call, among other new features.
- Hangouts Meet now allows G Suite Enterprise customers to use a dial-in phone number to join a meeting (audio-only) when out and about, if they don’t have an internet connection.
- Drive File Stream is now available to all G Suite customers, a desktop app which allows for easy and convenient access to all your Google Drive files on demand.
- Google improved the Jamboard app to make it easier to use on your mobile device, and to allow users to present a jam to a meeting directly from their phone.
- Google Sheets users have gained the ability to customize their headers and footers, and to choose from a range of predefined options (such as page numbers, dates and so forth).
- Google Slides got some nifty tweaks including a new range of add-ons, plus integration with Google Keep, allowing you to drag notes directly from the latter into the former.
- Gmail’s Email Log Search feature in the Admin console now allows admins to track the delivery of emails sent by users in their domain, and see the current status of those messages.
- Google’s Jamboard finally went on sale in the UK (after being available in the US and Canada) with an asking price of £3,999.
- Google made its Contacts app available to a wider range of devices – basically to all hardware running Android 5.0 or better (including Samsung, LG and Motorola devices).
- Google’s collaborative whiteboard, Jamboard, is now on sale in Canada for CA$6,949 (as opposed to just the US). With any luck it will come to the UK soon, as well.
- Google boosted the collaborative powers of Docs, Slides and Sheets with the introduction of a new system that clarifies which version of a document collaborators are working on.
- Following the introduction of anti-phishing security measures in the Gmail app for Android, those same capabilities that warn of suspicious links have arrived in the iOS app.
- Google has made data loss prevention (DLP) functionality available for content stored in Team Drives (this feature came to Google Drive back at the start of this year).
- Google has tweaked the default apps which appear in its app launcher, so it will highlight more useful apps off the bat, such as Gmail, Google Drive and Docs.
- Google Drive has been tweaked so employees can share files stored in Google’s cloud with folks who don’t have a Google account, providing admin permissions allow this.
- Google’s Jamboard (collaborative digital whiteboard) now allows for duplicating objects, offers easier object selection, and boasts a new keyboard that supports ‘glide typing’.
- G Suite benefited from the introduction of a new recruiting app: Hire lets employers keep tabs on potential candidates and allows for scheduling interviews and the like.
- Hangouts Meet now offers a live chat function, so meeting participants can send messages or links in real-time, with a chat history available for the duration of the meeting.
- Google announced the imminent launch of a Backup and Sync app which automatically backs up files and photos from a PC onto Google Drive. The enterprise version will follow later in 2017.
- G Suite admins benefited from the introduction of automatic provisioning for six new apps: Asana, Dialpad, Freshdesk, Lucidchart, RingCentral, and Smartsheet.
- Google has extended the ability of G Suite admins to restrict certain users from creating Team Drives, and this functionality will be available indefinitely (instead of expiring in 2018).
- Gmail admins received the ability to notify internal mail senders with an informative warning when a message gets quarantined due to an issue with compliance policies.
- Google Vault was graced with a number of new features to make retrieving data a more accurate process, including detailed metadata for files exported from Google Drive.
- Google’s Jamboard, the massive collaborative digital whiteboard, went on sale in the US on May 23. You need a G Suite plan to use the 55-inch board which costs $5,000 (£4,100).
- The Quick Access feature, which attempts to intelligently highlight the files you might need before you’ve even searched for them, arrived for Google Drive on the web.
- Smart Reply – Google’s nifty system which automatically suggests quick responses to emails, in order to save you the effort – is coming to Gmail for Android and iOS.
- Google added pre-integrated single sign-on support for 9 more third-party apps, including Asana, Dialpad, Evernote Business, Expensify, Keeper, Pagerduty and Trello.
- Gmail on Android received a boost in security with the introduction of anti-phishing checks to warn users when they click on a suspicious link in a message.
- New settings were introduced in the admin console to allow for better management of users’ offline access to Google Docs, Sheets and Slides files.
- Google Sites was improved with the introduction of the ability to add a logo to your site, which the app will intelligently scan for colours, and offer to use them across your theme.
- For those firms that use Google+, which became part of G Suite last autumn, admins now have access to improved enterprise-focused reporting on adoption and engagement.
- Google Cloud Search is now available as an iOS app (it was already on Android). The app offers a machine intelligence-powered, unified search experience across G Suite.
- Google began the rollout of a refreshed Google Accounts login page, which has a new look and feel that’s designed to be consistent across phones, tablets and PCs.
- Gmail on the desktop has been improved so that when you receive a message with a video attachment, you’ll be able to preview the clip from right inside your inbox.
- As part of an effort to better integrate G Suite with Salesforce, Google made it possible to export a Salesforce Opportunity List View directly to Sheets in order to bulk edit data.
- Google announced that Jamboard, its giant digital whiteboard – billed as the ‘ultimate freeform collaboration experience’ for G Suite users – will be out in May costing $5,000.
- Google launched a fresh app, Meet by Google Hangouts, a videoconferencing solution for businesses that allows for video calls with up to 30 group members.
- G Suite saw the addition of the Google Keep app, an Evernote-style note-taking effort which you can now access from a sidebar panel in Google Docs.
- Google clarified that Hangouts users won’t be able to make video/audio calls in Firefox 52 due to plugins being disabled for security reasons, but it’s actively working on a solution.
- Google Drive users can now view password-protected Microsoft Office documents in Drive, in read-only form – and this works for Gmail attachments, too.
- Sheets (and its mobile apps) now supports the ability to rotate text within a cell, plus Google introduced new border styles and improved accounting number formatting.
- Google also changed Sheets on the web so users can link to specific cell ranges, so for example it’s now possible to create a linked table of contents for your spreadsheet.
- Want to insert videos directly from Google Drive into Google Slides presentations? You can now do exactly that, with a number of options to pick from such as autoplay.
- Google Cloud Search was brought to G Suite, offering bolstered search functionality across the productivity suite, and machine intelligence-powered recommendations.
- Google added enterprise-grade controls and visibility to G Suite, including improved data control with Data Loss Prevention measures, and more scope for analytics.
- It became easier to create documents and the like from templates, as the latter can now be accessed directly from Google Drive (rather than having to go into the G suite apps).
- The mobile apps for both Google Docs and Sheets got a number of new features, including the ability to insert headers/footers, plus improved manipulation of images.
- On the security front, Google made the decision to block JavaScript (JS) file attachments in Gmail (alongside the already barred EXE, BAT and MSC attachments).
- Google made it easier to create group chats for teams in Hangouts, allowing for the easy creation and naming of ‘placeholder’ group chats which can be swiftly shared.
- Basic Mobile Management was introduced to G Suite, which lets admins implement basic security on iOS devices with no need for the user to install an MDM profile.
- Google Sheets received some tuning, including a new setting to keep a limit on iterative calculations, and some interface improvements were made with the Android app.
- Gmail has been improved to make ‘bounce’ messages – the notifications users receive when an email fails to be delivered – more easily understandable and informative.
- Google bolstered the Explore feature (introduced in September) by making it dead easy to insert citations as footnotes in Docs, Sheets and Slides.
- Finally, this past month, we discovered that G Suite is only half as popular as Microsoft’s Office 365, at least according to one survey of European enterprises.
- The mobile apps for Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides had a ‘trash view’ introduced whereby you can now see and restore previously deleted files.
- Google opened up applications for the Early Adopter Program for the Team Drives feature in Google Drive, a new and more robust way of sharing files between teams.
- Slides was tweaked to enable users to be able to save in the OpenDocument Presentation (ODP) file format for compatibility with the likes of LibreOffice and OpenOffice.
- G Suite has introduced custom templates for Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms, so you can set up your own specifically tailored templates for colleagues to use as needed.
- The overhauled Google Sites has been rolled out to all G Suite users, boasting a refreshed design, six new themes, and the ability to track performance with Google Analytics.
- Google pushed out a new Gmail app for iOS with major changes including an improved design, better search functionality, and an ‘undo send’ option to retract email mistakes.
- It was announced that the Google Drive desktop app won’t be supported by Google for Windows XP, Vista or Server 2003 as of the start of next year, January 1, 2017.
- The voice features of Docs got a serious boost, with the introduction of new commands to format text, and do things such as inserting links and comments.
- Google teamed up with Slack so users of the team-focused messaging solution can directly import files from Google Drive, or create new documents from within Slack.
- Google also announced that those using aged versions of the Google Drive desktop app should note that support for versions 1.27 or older will be discontinued in February 2017.
- Google Docs now lets you include page numbers in the table of contents you can create for a document.
- Google introduced integrated search functionality for Gmail, Calendar, Groups, and Drive on the web, meaning that search results will be pulled from across all of these.
- Google has renamed Apps for Work as G Suite, which the company says better reflects the software"s mission in terms of putting the emphasis on real-time collaboration.
- Docs, Sheets and Slides witnessed the introduction of a new Explore feature consisting of intelligent assistants that help you craft better documents.
- A new Quick Access capability was brought to Google Drive. It uses machine learning to automatically surface files it thinks you"ll need next based on your usage patterns.
- Google rolled out a new offer for users of its productivity suite, with a free 60-day trial of Chrome device management which is good for up to 10 devices.
- Google Drive made searching easier with the introduction of natural language processing, meaning that you can phrase your search in everyday conversational terms.
- Google announced a partnership with Box whereby the latter will be integrated with Google Docs, allowing users to edit documents directly from Box"s cloud storage.
- A new Google Hangouts Chrome extension was pushed out allowing for multiple chat windows to be incorporated into one, and making more chat content readily visible.
- Google introduced a "Cast…" function in the main menu of Chrome, and this can be used to share the contents of a browser tab – or the whole desktop – into a Hangout session.
- Forms received a new feature which allows the insertion of images into surveys, so you can now do things like have a multiple choice question with pictures for answers.
- The Android apps for Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides were improved to make it easier to create tables and better looking charts.
- A couple of security tweaks were applied to Gmail, the most important of which is that the webmail service will now issue a warning about a link if it leads to a known malware site.
- Inbox got integration with Trello and GitHub, so Trello users will receive a summary of what"s new with projects, and GitHub denizens will get a summary of code changes.
- Google Drive"s preview feature was improved to make viewing previews of stored files a slicker experience, with a cleaner UI and better zoom functionality.
- Google introduced a new scheme to help train employees on its productivity suite, with the system designed to act like a "virtual coach" to help users learn when IT staff aren"t around.
- Google tweaked the Admin app for Android to let delegated admins (and not just super admins) use the software to access functions while out and about.
- Google gave the Admin console some attention in terms of two-step verification, allowing admins to view the real-time status of where each user is in the 2SV enrolment process.
- Apps for Work is apparently being muscled out by Microsoft"s Office 365, at least if sentiment from Redmond"s Worldwide Partner Conference is on the money.
- Google launched the new Quizzes feature in the Forms app, designed to allow teachers to easily create and mark assessments for students.
- Google Springboard was announced, a search tool (currently being tested) that can be used to quickly find things across Google Apps, plus it makes proactive recommendations.
- Google Sites got revamped with a new preview version boasting a simple drag-and-drop design which is more intuitive, and support for real-time collaboration was introduced.
- A "new and notable" section was introduced to the Google Apps Marketplace, in order to highlight the best third-party apps available to businesses.
- The Android and iOS apps for Google Docs and Sheets gained the ability to edit content in Print layout view, and to edit existing conditional formatting rules in Sheets.
- Google tweaked Docs, Sheets and Slides so notifications of comments made not only arrive via email, but you can also get a notification on your Android device or web browser.
- Google announced its new Spaces messaging app designed for small groups – but there"s no news as yet on when (or indeed whether) it will come to Apps for Work.
- At Google I/O new APIs were introduced for Sheets, giving developers a "new level of access" to some of the most popular features in the app.
- New APIs were also brought to Slides allowing developers to easily push data from other third-party apps into Slides for maximum convenience.
- Google revealed that Android apps will be available for Chromebooks, and this opens up more productivity possibilities including using the Android version of Microsoft Word.
- Google integrated its BigQuery service with Google Drive, allowing users to query files directly from Drive, and save query results from the BigQuery UI directly to Google Sheets.
- Google Slides benefited from a new Q&A feature that lets audience members submit questions to the speaker directly from their mobile devices during a presentation.
- The Synergyse service was fully integrated with Google Apps, a virtual assistant that helps train users in the various apps and was previously a Chrome extension.
- Google Drive and Evernote were integrated, allowing Evernote users to seamlessly access any file on Drive.
- Google Apps for Work received two new certifications: ISO 27017 for cloud security and ISO 27018 for privacy.
- A new "Find a Time" feature arrived in Google Calendar for Android, allowing mobile users to find convenient times for meetings when they"re on the go.
- Google"s scheme of providing Apps for free to medium-sized firms who want to migrate over but are locked into an Enterprise Agreement was extended until the end of 2016.
- Reminders pitched up in the web version of Google Calendar, and said reminders will sync across browsers and mobile devices.
- The Google Admin app received bolstered mobile device management capabilities, allowing for admins to handle security breaches even when they"re out and about.
- Research into the most-used business apps on the web ranked Google Apps for Work in fourth place – behind Office 365, Salesforce.com and Box.
- Google launched its #maketime website, which aims to help you prioritise how you spend time during work hours, and highlight how Google Apps for Work can save you time.
- Google expanded support for its Identity Platform to cover logins for far more third-party apps in the Google Apps Marketplace, including Office 365 and Facebook at Work.
- A whole bunch of new templates were added to Google Docs, Sheets and Slides.
- Gmail"s existing Data Loss Prevention features got a boost with the addition of OCR for scanning attachments and additional predefined content detectors.
- Google also gave Gmail the ability to flag email accounts that it deems "insecure".
- Google Docs was enhanced with voice typing, allowing users to dictate to their word processor, and also access editing and formatting commands.
- Google Forms gained support for add-ons and the ability to edit Apps Scripts, plus work and education-related templates were introduced to the home screen.
- The Gmail for Android app received support for rich text formatting, and an option for one-tap instant RSVPs was introduced.
- Instant comments were introduced to Google Docs, allowing users to click a simple icon to add an immediate comment to a document.
- The ability to add comments arrived in the Sheets and Slides apps for both Android and iOS.
- Google further bolstered the Sheets Android app with the ability to open and edit CSV and TSV files, along with additional files supported for import and export.
- Google Calendar for Android and iOS apps was graced with smart suggestions that pop up suggested event titles, places and people.
- Search became more powerful across Google"s productivity suite, so when users search from Docs, Sheets, and Slides home screens, they get results from across all three apps.
- Google rejigged device management in the Admin console, categorising the various settings to make everything easier to find.
Now move on to Page 2 for our full review and detailed look at what Google Apps for Work offers, including an evaluation of features, pricing, and ease-of-use.
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