Google Goggles 1.4 for Android includes search history, note-taking capabilities and better business card recognition as the computer vision app gets more user-friendly.
Google May 9
added better search history and business card recognition, as well as results
sharing to Google Goggles, lending some personal touches to the visual-search
application.
Google Goggles
allows users to snap pictures of objects with the cameras from their Android
smartphone or Apple iPhone.
The application
is limited in the scope of its coverage, recognizing which landmarks and two-dimensional
objects, such as book and CD covers, paintings and Sudoku puzzles.
Google also
taught Goggles to recognize and translate menus and signs, and accelerate the
speed of the application. Facial recognition via Goggles is also possible, but
Google is
working
out the privacy issues for this feature.
In keeping
with Google's effort to socialize its company's myriad Web services, Goggles
1.4 for Android devices now lets users
search
their past Goggles results, add notes on those results and share them with
friends. Notes will appear in a user's search history so they can view what
they wrote later.
This feature, which
users can test by tapping the pencil in the corner when viewing a search
result, will prove extremely useful when Google improves its product
recognition for Goggles.
For example, a
consumer will be able to browse clothing in a retail store, snap a picture of
an item they're interested in but not committed to buying, and write a note
about what they liked and didn't like for later reference to help in their
purchase decision.
The user can
then check their search history for words in their note to help find out more
about the product.
Goggles now boasts better business card recognition, which
lets users snap a picture of a person's business card to have Google retrieve
results about the card owner.
Now, instead
of recognizing a business card content purely as text, the application
recognizes the information as a contact to call immediately or add to a user's
Android phone's contact list.
Finally,
Goggles 1.4, available now for Android 1.6 and later handsets, lets users
suggest a better result when Goggles cannot find an image match.
To access this
feature, users will tap the "Can you suggest a better result?" prompt
on the results page and then select the relevant part of the image and submit a
tag.
These tags
will be used to improve recognition in object categories where Goggles already
provides some results.
One day, Goggles
will
likely
be used as an augmented-reality vector in some instances, though Google has
yet to work out how that will work, Shailesh Nalawadi, Goggles product manager,
told eWEEK.
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