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Google+ iOS app to get full-res uploads, background sync

The Internet giant's 'A Morning with Google+' event is underway and the company's just made it official: the Google+ app for the iPhone and iPad will soon be updated with the ability to upload full resolution images to Google+ Photos, previously Picasa Web Albums and now part of Google's social thing.

Another new feature being mentioned is support for Background Refresh in iOS 7 which will allow the application to automatically synchronize your photos in the background, even when it's not running.

Currently, background photo sync only works if you have the app open...

Google+ for iOS kills in-app Messenger, adds Google Apps and Drive integration

After giving Google+ for Android its fair share of love earlier in the week, the Internet giant Google today pushed a new version of its universal iPhone and iPad app.

In accordance with the announcement back on Tuesday, the new build gets rid of the built-in Messenger feature as the focus turns to the new Hangouts app which was created to consolidate Google's many chat services under a single umbrella.

Google+ version 4.5 also features Google Apps domain support and lets you view, edit and share photos stored in your Google Drive...

iPhoto beware: native Google+ Photos app heading to Mac

Despite its pedestrian and overly geeky interface, I still find myself using Google's Picasa Mac app to geotag my photos, find duplicates and organize image files in folders prior to importing the images into iPhoto. Picasa may not win any beauty contest, but it sure is lightning fast and gets the job done.

Now, once Google retired Picasa Web Albums and doubled-down on Google+ Photos, I could tell the desktop Picasa software was heading to the technology graveyard. But some good will come out of this: according to a Google-focused blog, the Internet giant may be replacing Picasa soon with an upcoming desktop Google+ Photos app for Mac, Windows and Linux...

Google+ notifications will soon sync across devices

One of the annoyances about notifications in today's multi-platform world is the alert conundrum. We've all been there: an alert comes in, you act on it on one device and yet it doesn't clear on the other. And with apps constantly producing all sorts of notifications, managing these things across our gadgets is tricky, to put it mildly.

Matter of fact, you'd be right to argue that notifications tend to get a little out of hand, up to the point where they turn your daily computing into a nightmare.

Apple feels your pain: that's why it gave iOS 7 a new Notification Sync feature where reading a notification on your iPad automatically marks it as read on your iPhone, and vice versa, courtesy of iCloud. Google isn't standing still either: today, the search monster started rolling Google+ notification sync across the web, Android and iOS...

Google+ iOS client updated with Auto Enhance and dozen new features

The search monster at the Google I/O event earlier this month refreshed its social thing, Google+, with as much as 41 additional features and classy new design. Having updated the Android client last week with support for the new Google+ features, the Internet giant gave its iOS counterpart some love, bringing out such new capabilities as related hashtags, Auto Enhance for photos, the ability to edit comments and copy the post's URL and much more...

Google now gives you 15GB of shared Gmail, Google+ Photos and Drive storage

Hands up who lives in the Google cloud. If you keep your images on Google+ Photos (formerly Picasa Web Albums), manage documents in Google Drive or file messages with large attachments in Gmail, you are tapping the power of Google's cloud storage. But up until today, each of these relied on their private cloud locker in the sky, which was inconvenient.

This morning, Google has tweaked the offering to include fifteen gigabytes of unified, free storage shared across Gmail, Drive and Google+ Photos. Previously, Google gave you ten gigabytes for Gmail and an additional five gigabytes of combined storage limited to Drive and Google+ Photos.

The change strengthens the Drive brand while simplifying things for consumers, akin to Apple's iCloud that comes with five free gigabytes of shared cloud storage...

SoundCloud now has Google+ Sign-In and sharing

Nearly a year ago, the Internet giant rolled out Google+ Sign-In as a way to counter Facebook Connect, a feature web site owners predominantly tap to simplify the sign in and account creation process for their users.

The Google+ SDK for iOS was released shortly after, giving Apple's registered iOS developers a set of tools and social plugins to write programs that are deeply integrated with the Google+ thing.

Although apps that support Google+ Sign-In are few and far between, at least relative to Facebook Connect-enabled mobile software, more and more developers are integrating Google+ features into their warez. The latest example: SoundCloud, an online audio distribution platform that today updated its iOS app with support for Google+ Sign-In and sharing...

Google+ updated with photo filters, new profile design and more

Google has rolled out a significant update for its iOS Google+ client today. The app, which is now in version 4.3, received a number of improvements, including new photo editing features and redesigned profiles.

The new photo editing features are probably the most welcomed addition, and come courtesy of Google's recently acquired Snapseed application. You can now add filters to, crop and rotate, your photos on the fly...

Former Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki accepts an advisory role at Google-owned Motorola

Guy Kawasaki, now a Silicon Valley venture capitalist and book author, was instrumental in marketing the Macintosh in 1984. A well-known blogger, Kawasaki just tweeted he has gone Android by accepting an advisory role at Google-owned Motorola which is said to be working on a mysterious iPhone contender tentatively code-named X Phone.

Kawasaki's new advisory role with Motorola will see him focus on product design, user interface, marketing and social media. One of the first orders of business was to create a Google+ community about mobile devices, he confirmed...

Google+ iOS apps land in 48 new countries and territories

Google's social network may have gotten off to a rocky start, but through perseverance and a string of handsome mobile app updates, it's managed to turn the service into a hit. As of last month, it had more than 500 million users, with 235 million being active.

And that number could see a small bump this weekend, as the search giant just announced that it has launched its two iOS Google+ apps in 48 new countries and territories this week, including Barbados and the Ukraine. We've got the full list after the fold...

Google+ holiday treats: better photo experience, conversation cards, more fluid UI

With over a hundred million active users, Google+ is, as Eric Schmidt put it, "a viable competitor to Facebook" and its nearly one billion users. This morning, the search firm is issuing new iOS and Android builds that enable a bunch of holiday treats. On the iOS side, you can now swipe through photo albums inline or tap once to see the photos full screen. New conversation cards are also available for highlighting specific content, from longer snippets to bigger photos to comments that slide in beneath each post...

Google+ app now opens links in Chrome if you have it

Google updated its Google+ iOS client yesterday with just a handful of changes. There were some bug fixes, performance enhancements, and the age limit for creating hangouts was lowered to 13.

But perhaps the most interesting change in the client is the new Safari workaround. For those of you who have it installed on your device, Google+ can now open web links in Google's Chrome browser...