One of the Android features that Google is going to promote the most in the coming months is NearbyShare either Share with Nearby. Google’s AirDrop is going one step further to improve communication between nearby devices.
At the moment NearbyShare is used by applications to share filessuch as photos, videos, links, documents or files, but soon apps will be able to detect nearby devices to create new experiences.
What’s new in Nearby Share
Google wants apps to be able to interact between nearby devices to perform certain actions, either between different people’s devices or between our own devices through ultra-wideband, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi technologies.
Google is going to release a new API so that Nearby Share also supports the bidirectional communication between devices, which means that two devices in addition to communicating with each other will be able to share a common task.
Some new experiences that we can find with the launch of this new improved version of Nearby Share are the following:
- Complete the rental or purchase of a movie on our television using the mobile to enter the payment method.
- Start reading an article on the phone and finish reading it on the tablet from where we were.
- Share a location on the map as a passenger directly with your friend’s car.
- Share our Sunday bike route with the people who accompany us.
- Make a group food order without having to pass the mobile.
As we see, Nearby Share will be a new way to link apps between nearby devices to perform certain actions. Google’s service will no longer be limited to just transferring files.
During this second quarter, developers will have a preview of the new Nearby Share APIs available so that they can start creating new experiences in their applications. It will be compatible from Android 8.0 (Oreo), so most Android devices will enjoy this improvement. Google intends to go beyond Android and Android TV and bring the new experience to Chrome OS, iOS, Windows and other platforms as well.
The company hopes to release these new features to everyone later this year through an update to Google Play Services, but the plan is to add this support in AOSP next year starting with Android U.
Via | 9to5Google
