Google Just Announced New AI Tools for Workspace
During the big presentation of Cloud Next 2024, Google presented quite a few new projects in the field of artificial intelligence on its horizon . Most of these enhancements are reserved for Google Workspace, which means you won’t get them in your personal Google account (unless you pay for Workspace yourself). However, if your company or business uses Google Workspace, you’ll soon have several new AI-powered tools to help you get your work done.
One of the big new features here is the ability to use your voice to trigger Google’s Help Me Write feature. Previously, you had to right-click in an open text field to use Help Me Write, which, as the name suggests, involves you starting to write with the help of generative AI when the words just don’t come to you. You can now ask Gemini in your voice what you want it to write—another step toward making Google’s AI more like a smart assistant.
Another new feature is exclusive to Gmail: the next time you write a draft of an email, you might see a “Polished Draft” option, which will use Gemini to rewrite the existing draft into something more, well, presentable. I think that in the near future all our correspondence will sound exactly the same.
Google Sheets users will soon see the ability to trigger an alert when cells change, keeping everyone in the file updated. Google is also putting a lot of emphasis on its new templates, which the company says will ensure you’ll “never have to build a spreadsheet from scratch again.”
Google Docs, on the other hand, introduced tabs for the first time. This is a great addition for those who frequently switch between multiple documents related to the same topic: instead of creating different documents, you can simply open new tabs in the same file, which should reduce the time you spend for viewing. for information.
You’ll also find Gemini on Google Chat, where it can help summarize your messages and answer questions about chat. In an upcoming update, Google Chat will automatically translate messages into the language of your choice, and chats will support up to 500,000 participants. Speaking of translation, Google Meet automatically translates conversations into 69 languages. You will see these transcripts on the screen as Gemini transcribes the speaker during the conversation. Google is currently testing Google Meet’s ability to take notes for you in preview. These features will be included as an optional add-on for $10 per user per month.
However, perhaps the highlight of the announcement was Google Vids. While it sounds like an artificial intelligence program for creating videos, it’s actually a little more complicated. You tell Vids what you want from the video, and the AI will create a storyboard for you to work with. He’ll then put together a rough draft using stock footage, images, music and sound effects that you can edit as you see fit. You can even add a voiceover using your own voice or one of Google’s voices. Google’s goal here is to “help anyone become a great storyteller at work.” Personally, I’m just glad Google isn’t creating full-blown AI videos for a simple work meeting. I think leave it to OpenAI .