Google’s Siri competitor, Google Now, could be moving from Android-only devices onto Windows and Mac desktops, according to reports from CNET.
CNET is reporting, “Chrome team programmers accepted the addition of “skeleton for Google Now for Chrome” to the Google browser yesterday, an early step in a larger project to show Google Now notifications in Chrome.”
Google Now was released mid-summer this year and so far has only been something that the owners of the latest 4.0+ Android devices could get to use. Google Now is the company’s answer to Apple’s Siri; the service performs certain tasks, such as providing directions or opening applications, based on voice commands.
Apart from voice operation Google Now’s box of tricks include providing automatic weather, sports, and flight information based on users’ locations and previous searches. Its main selling point it that it can work out a user’s typical daily commute and provide driving and transit information in real-time.
Described as a killer feature for Android devices the service has been compared favourably to Siri but due to the relative low number of Android Jelly Bean users it hasn’t become a mainstream Google product yet.
The likely reasons for releasing a version of Google Now for Chrome would be to encourage more users to remain with Android when upgrading their smartphones and to keep users in the big G’s ecosystem.
It’s a smart move from Google, which would allow it to capitalize on its large number of Chrome users to boost its growing number of Android 4+ users (depending on which report you read Chrome is vying for second place with Firefox in the browser wars or has already overtaken Mozilla’s flagship product).
So how likely is this? Well, Google Chrome developer rumours have a habit of being right – the last one we reported was the possible release of Chrome for Android, so it’s quite appropriate that an Android service is now (possibly) coming to Chrome.
That said, it’s early days, so don’t expect this to be appearing the Chrome Web Store any time soon.
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Google and Apple will wage another battle on this front. But small businesses need to make sure that their information is visible on both Siri and Google Now, which means making sure the business has a Google Places page and is on Apple Maps (which can be accomplished through Yelp). In this way, no matter what happens between these two companies and their products, the business will be found on both.