August 2023 Summaries

Innovative app and game creators from around the world are highlighted for their unique contributions to the digital landscape. In Sweden, Ingrid, Totta, and Erika developed Ridely, a platform designed to democratize equestrian training access, partnering with the US Equestrian Federation and enhancing the user experience with features like expert programs and social feeds. In Indonesia, Johanes, inspired by his storytelling passion, shifted from aspiring author to game developer, creating the successful anime-inspired RPG Epic Conquest with graphic artist Meiky, leading to sequels. In South Korea, industry veteran Young-Gon founded Nexelon, launching the soothing fishing game Fishing Life and planning an eco-sci-fi game exploring resource restoration on alien planets. Meanwhile, Lithuanian trio Victoria, Michail, and Sergej turned their childhood game-making dream into reality with Nordcurrent, releasing Cooking Fever, a game challenging players to prepare dishes from global cuisines, and expanding with new features and themed culinary events. These creators showcase the diverse and impactful stories within the #WeArePlay community.

Google has updated its Calendar API to allow developers to programmatically read and write the working locations of Google Workspace users, enhancing the hybrid working experience. This functionality, available to eligible Workspace editions, enables seamless synchronization between Google Calendar and third-party tools like Robin and Comeen, eliminating the need for users to manually input their working locations across multiple platforms. The API also facilitates the display of working locations in various tools, aiding in coordination and planning among teams. Additionally, it enables the analysis of working location patterns, helping organizations optimize resource management, such as predicting peak office days or planning meal preparations in on-campus facilities. This development aims to streamline hybrid work setups by integrating working location data into relevant systems.

Google's Identity team has announced a beta program for developers to test integration with Chrome's new Federated Credential Management (FedCM) API, offering a privacy-preserving alternative to third-party cookies for federated identity providers. This initiative is in response to Chrome's plan to phase out third-party cookies by 2024 as part of the Privacy Sandbox initiative. FedCM aims to enhance user privacy by preventing identity providers from tracking user activity without consent, while also improving the sign-in experience with a browser-native UI. Google Identity Services (GIS) developers using One Tap and Auto Sign-In will gradually transition to FedCM, with most changes occurring seamlessly via updates to the GIS JavaScript library. While some websites may need minor adjustments, developers are encouraged to review the migration guide and participate in the beta program to prepare for the transition. The gradual migration to FedCM will begin in November 2023, with full adoption expected by mid-2024, aligned with Chrome's default blocking of third-party cookies.

Daniel Shirvani, Alex Cussell, Angela Busheska, and Sapphira Ching are notable figures who have made significant strides in their respective fields, each with a unique approach influenced by their involvement with Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC). Shirvani, a pharmacology graduate from the University of British Columbia, developed an electronic medical record software to address inefficiencies he encountered while volunteering at a heart clinic, drawing attention from prominent institutions across North America. Cussell, inspired by her leadership role at the University of Central Florida, founded the Jisell app, a universal e-wallet for gift cards, after studying technology ventures at Carnegie Mellon University. Busheska, an electrical engineering and computer science student at Lafayette College, founded EnRoute, a nonprofit and mobile app aimed at reducing carbon footprints, inspired by personal loss due to air pollution. Ching, a Wharton School senior, has focused on integrating Environmental, Social, and Government standards into technology and business, founding the Penn Innovation Network and participating in ESG-focused internships. These individuals exemplify the impact of GDSC in fostering innovation and leadership among students.

In May, MediaPipe Solutions introduced tools for no-code and low-code machine learning tasks on Android, web, and Python, and has now expanded to include an iOS SDK and an updated Python SDK for Raspberry Pi. These tools support audio classification, face landmark detection, and various natural language processing tasks. For Raspberry Pi, users can set up object detection by installing MediaPipe, OpenCV, and NumPy, and downloading a pre-trained model like EfficientDet-Lite0. For iOS, developers can use MediaPipe to perform text classification by creating a TextClassifier object and passing strings to receive classification results. Detailed examples and documentation for both platforms are available on GitHub and developers.google.com/mediapipe, with additional resources provided through I/O 2023 sessions.

Women founders continue to be underrepresented in venture capital investments, receiving less than 3% of all funding. To address this disparity, the Google for Startups Accelerator: Women Founders program was launched in 2020, offering mentorship, technical support, and community resources to women entrepreneurs in North America. Since its inception, the program has supported 36 women-led startups, which have collectively raised $73.46 million. Now in its fourth year, the equity-free, 10-week virtual accelerator program has announced its 2023 cohort of 11 women-led startups, each innovating in various sectors, from AI-driven talent solutions and consignment shop software to ADHD coaching platforms and data-driven career development. The program aims to empower these startups by providing access to Google's extensive resources and technology, helping them advance their growth and development in the tech industry.

Developer Journey is a monthly series that focuses on the experiences of developers from around the world, highlighting the challenges they face, the opportunities they seize, and the successes they achieve. This installment features insights from Google Developer Experts Eslam Medhat Fathy, Carmen Ansio, and Stéphanie Walter, who share their experiences using various Google tools. Eslam Medhat emphasizes the ease and scalability of using Firebase for app development, Carmen Ansio highlights Chrome DevTools for its debugging capabilities, and Stéphanie Walter values Lighthouse for its performance insights. Each expert discusses their favorite tools, projects they've built, and their plans with Google Bard, which they use for tasks ranging from dynamic design prototypes to language assistance. They also offer advice to aspiring developers, emphasizing the importance of continuous learning, project passion, and the balance between work and personal life to avoid burnout.

Google has introduced new tools to advance the adoption of Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE), a technology that allows computation on encrypted data without accessing sensitive information. These tools aim to facilitate the use of FHE in applications such as private machine learning, text analysis, and video processing by releasing new hardware, a software crypto library, and an open-source compiler toolchain. Among the developments are a TensorFlow-to-FHE compiler for converting trained machine learning models into FHE versions, and Jaxite, a cryptography software library that runs FHE on hardware accelerators like GPUs and TPUs. Additionally, Google announced Homomorphic Encryption Intermediate Representation (HEIR), an open-source compiler toolchain for ensuring interoperability of FHE programs. These initiatives are part of Google's ongoing efforts to enhance privacy technologies and make them accessible to researchers and developers worldwide, aligning with their commitment to Protected Computing to ensure data privacy and safety.

India's startup ecosystem is booming, thanks to a large pool of talented engineers and entrepreneurs, along with increasing support from investors and policymakers. Google Developer Groups (GDGs) in 50 key Indian cities play a crucial role in this growth by offering a platform for early-stage startups to connect, learn, and grow through local meetups, hackathons, and bootcamps. GDGs are collaborating with Google to launch Startup Success Days, a series of events across 15 Indian cities, to further enhance the interaction between developer communities, startup founders, VCs, and Googlers. These events, which are free and open to startups from any industry, focus on technical topics related to Google technologies, such as Generative AI and Google Cloud, and provide mentorship and networking opportunities. The initiative begins in August 2023, with the first event scheduled in Bangalore, aiming to strengthen the startup ecosystem by facilitating discussions on the latest technological trends and offering valuable feedback from industry experts.

Project IDX is an innovative, browser-based development platform from Google, designed to streamline the process of creating, managing, and deploying full-stack web and multiplatform applications. Built on Google Cloud and powered by Codey, an AI model based on PaLM 2, Project IDX aims to simplify the complex workflow of app development across mobile, web, and desktop platforms. It offers features such as importing existing projects from GitHub, creating new projects with templates for popular frameworks, and providing built-in web previews and emulators for Android and iOS. The platform also integrates AI tools for smart code completion and contextual code actions, enhancing productivity and code quality. Additionally, Project IDX facilitates easy deployment through Firebase Hosting, supporting dynamic backends for frameworks like Next.js. Google invites the developer community to provide feedback and contribute to the ongoing development and refinement of Project IDX, with plans to add new capabilities and improve collaboration features.

MakerSuite, a platform designed to empower individuals to create AI applications using Google's large generative models, has expanded its availability to 179 countries, accessible to anyone with a Google Workspace account. This expansion allows more developers to utilize MakerSuite's latest language model, PaLM 2, to build innovative AI solutions. The platform introduces features such as text prompt optimization through "Prompt Suggestion," a dark mode setting, and seamless data import/export with Google Sheets and CSV files for enhanced collaboration. Additionally, MakerSuite's integration with the PaLM API enables users to easily transition from prompt creation to coding without requiring machine learning expertise, allowing them to incorporate AI capabilities directly into their projects. Users are encouraged to explore MakerSuite's resources, including a quick-start guide and prompt gallery, to inspire their AI development endeavors.

This month, #WeArePlay highlights inspiring stories of app founders improving lives through innovative solutions. Nikhil and Ayushi from India launched Alippo, an upskilling app for women inspired by the lack of educational platforms during the Covid-19 lockdown, aimed at helping women gain skills and manage their businesses. In Taiwan, Ed, Ken, and Erin developed Health2Sync, a diabetes management app inspired by family experiences, featuring AI-based food recognition for better diet tracking. In Brazil, Lorenzo and César created WeCancer after personal losses to cancer, providing home-based cancer care support to reduce unnecessary hospital visits. Lastly, Laura, Erich, and John from the US launched Curable, an app for chronic pain relief using science-backed methods such as cognitive behavioral therapy and meditation, driven by their shared experiences with chronic pain.

Google Lab Sessions collaborated with GRAMMY® Award-winning rapper Lupe Fiasco to explore how AI can enhance human creativity through an experiment called TextFX. The initiative involved examining Lupe's creative process, particularly his unique linguistic techniques such as creating phrases that sound identical to given words but have different meanings. Leveraging large language models (LLMs), the project aimed to integrate these techniques into AI-generated text, using few-shot learning to refine the outputs. TextFX, built using Google's PaLM API, consists of various creative prompts that explore possibilities like similes, alliteration, and unexpected scene construction. The project underscores the potential of AI in augmenting creative writing and invites users to experiment with these tools through Google's MakerSuite platform. By open-sourcing the code and offering public access, Google encourages further exploration of AI as a collaborator in various creative domains.

In 2023, Google Play is renewing its Indie Games Fund for Latin American developers, committing $2 million in non-dilutive cash awards and providing hands-on support to small games studios in the region. The fund targets indie developers with previously launched games across any platform, offering between $150,000 and $200,000 to each selected studio to enhance their games and business growth. The application deadline is September 1, 2023, at 12:00 pm BRT, with priority given to submissions by August 16, 2023. The initiative aims to empower developers and promote their success, and further information about eligibility and application processes is available on Google Play's website and social media channels.