In a complete
contrast to Apple’s aloof-ish attitude towards the Android platform in
terms of apps, Google has been fairly attentive to the iOS platform,
developing apps and sending out updates regularly. If you are one of
those people who has an iPhone, you really don’t need to consider a
switch to an Android smartphone, just to be able to fully utilize the
Google ecosystem of apps and services. We tell you how to do the same,
on your iPhone or iPad. At the risk of some rather venomous clobbering,
it wouldn’t be inaccurate to say that the best “Android experience” is
actually on an iOS device. Now, while I go and don some pudenda
protection gear and hide behind a wall of riot police, you can read on
and Google-fy your iOS device. And hopefully, you will get results that
impress you.
While the default mail client in iOS 7 has seen some incremental
improvements of late, it still does not feel entirely well polished and
intuitive to use. Plus, with Google having sent Sync to the naughty boy
corner, message delivery on the Mail client has not been the most
consistent. You will need to download the Gmail app from the App Store
to get the best experience. Despite technically being a “third party
app”, Gmail app offers support for multiple sign-ins, threaded
conversations and integration into iOS’s notification system. If all
your contacts are synced to the Google account, the task of sending a
mail just becomes that much simpler, without having to sync all to your
phone’s contact list and make a mess of it. You will also be able to use
Gmail’s own archiving, labeling, starring, deleting and reporting spam
capabilities. Plus, Google has the good habit of constantly rolling out
new features and performance tweaks to the Gmail app every now and then,
to add to the usability.
If you are using Chrome on the desktop or laptop, or even your
smartphone, then this is pretty much a no-brainer. You can sync the open
tabs, sessions, bookmarks, history, passwords, and soon enough, apps
and extensions as well. In terms of performance, Chrome for iOS is
pretty much at par with Safari, for all it’s integration claims. Also,
the latest Chrome boasts of the data compression feature, which will
reduce data usage on your Wi-Fi or 3G connection and also improve page
load times.
Google worked out rather smartly that a lot of users on iOS devices,
particularly the iPad, work on documents on the device. And rather than
spending time developing a separate productivity suite, QuickOffice was
thrust into that role with the enticing price tag which read “free”.
Couple that with Google Drive as the source and storage of all
documents, presentations and spreadsheets, and the combination is rather
neat. Why we recommend this over Apple’s bunch of offerings is because
of a combination of factors. First, the three elements of the package
cost a lot of money - Pages, Numbers and Keynote all cost Rs 550 each.
While iCloud doesn’t technically cost any money from the outset, the 5GB
free storage sort of pales when compared to the 15GB free combined
storage that Google offers with your account - for Gmail, Drive and
Photos. With the 5GB iCloud storage also holding your iOS device
backups, things could fill up rather quickly. 10GB costs $20 per year,
while 20GB costs $40 per year. In terms of usability, Drive with the
proper interface to access files feels a lot more familiar than iCloud,
which depends on a relevant app to allow you access to files. The lack
of a folder structure where they can see all documents in one place is
something that perplexes most people.
This is pretty much a no brainer, unless you like getting lost. While
Apple has still not recovered from the self delivered low-blow that was
their Maps app, Google has made a rather jolly time of it. First, it
laughed at the misery of the iPhone toting masses who were walking or
driving around cluelessly. Then, the Google Maps app arrived for iOS not
soon after, and within a few hours reached the top of the most
downloaded apps from the App Store. Along the way, updates were
released, which means Google Maps, in its present avatar, offers
comprehensive, accurate maps in 200 countries, voice-guided GPS
navigation for driving, cycling and walking, public transport directions
and maps for over 800 cities and Live traffic and incident reports.
Switch right away, if you plan on using the iPhone as a navigation
device anytime soon.
Okay, this will not be as simple as long pressing the home button on the
iPhone, but the voice search feature within Google’s Search app for iOS
does the job. Again, for the Indian audience, accent understanding will
always be an issue when dealing with voice based assistants. The Google
Now integration brings you all the cards that gets you started with the
weather and traffic updates as you get ready for the day ahead.
Well, if your friends do not use iPhones or iPads, then FaceTime will
remain a grossly underutilized feature for you. But, Hangouts could be
the solution for you - one on one conversations, group chatting as well
as video calls. With the service available on multiple platforms, your
sessions will remain synced across devices. We would recommend using the
voice calls feature over Wi-Fi (or on 3G if you have a humongous data
limit), and cut down on the phone bills as well. And this is good for
family chats too!
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