Google IO 2017

Google IO is an annual Google developer conference that announces new Google Products and provide technical advice & support for development. I was sponsored by University of Washington to attend this year's Google IO, which was held at Mountainview, California. University of Washington article here

The two strongest emphasis of this year's conference were machine-learning and virtual reality. Google announced new products such as Google Lens, newer Google Assistant, Android O, and Android Auto, which were very exciting news for fortifying and expanding Google product’s ecosystem. There were many design-related sessions in this year’s IO including Progressive Web Application(Web design), Google Home(voice UI), Google Assistant (multi-modal conversational UI), Android Things (IoT), Android Auto (Car UX), Daydream/Tango (VR/AR). 

I attended all VR-related sessions, and found VR sessions “VR, AR, and paths to immersive computing” and “Designing screen interfaces for VR” to be most insightful and interesting. Another session I found helpful was Google Assistant team’s session: “Defining Multimodal Interactions: One Size Does Not Fit All.” This session showed the design choices and constraints that the team explored to create a uniform and appropriate interaction for voice-controlled AI in multiple screens and screen-less interface. 

The overall experience of the conference was fun and exciting. I felt that Google put much effort into making the IO event place to be uniform in design. 

This Kotlin 101 session definitely reminded me that this was a 'developer' conference.

This year's giveaway was a Google Home

I will compare this with my Echo.