Google+ Developers Blog

Moving to the Google Developers Blog

2016-02-25T12:39:00.000-08:00

For the latest news about developing for Google+, please read the Google Developers blog. We’ll post all new announcements about the Google+ API, buttons, and developer tools to the Google Developers blog instead of this one. As always, you can find documentation for the Google+ platform and getting started guides at https://developers.google.com/+/. Thanks and happy coding.

Posted by Katherine Miller, Developer Relations Program Manager

Google+ iOS SDK: sharebox improvements

2013-12-16T10:18:00.000-08:00

UPDATE (1/9/14): These updates were launched on Android as part of Google Play Services 4.1 (learn more).

Today we’re updating the Google+ sharebox in two ways, making it even easier for users to share with the right people from your app:

1) Better auto-complete. Now when users start adding recipients, auto-complete will suggest Gmail contacts, device contacts, and people on Google+. And of course: users can also just type in an email address.

Auto-complete now suggests Gmail contacts, device contacts, or anyone with a Google+ profile.

2) Suggested recipients. Users often share with certain people more than others (like family, for example), so the new “Suggestions” experience highlights these frequent and/or recent contacts at the top of the sharebox. Adding a recipient is as easy as tapping their photo.

Suggested recipients now appear at the top of the Google+ sharebox

Check out our developer documentation to learn more. If you’ve already added the Google+ sharebox to your iOS app, just upgrade to the latest iOS SDK to use today’s features.

Posted by Mohamed Zoweil, Software Engineer, Google+

Interactive post best practice: Lasting engagement

2013-12-16T08:10:00.000-08:00

This is the second in a 2-part series that chronicles best practices for interactive posts. Read part 1 ”Interactive post best practice: Involve friends.”

In today’s installment of interactive post best practices, we’ll review how +Mashable makes it easy to further the conversation around their content and create lasting engagement. Let's take a look at how they’ve done this:

Interactive post shared with a “View” call-to-action button

Ayush has shared an article on Mashable with me. When I click the “View” button in the interactive post, I’m taken to the article page on Mashable. Mashable encourages meaningful on-site interaction by displaying who shared the article with me, and inviting me to discuss the article with that person. Having context and a targeted action button entices users to respond back and keep the conversation going.

When I’m taken to Mashable, they include sharing context and encourage me to respond back.

When I click the “Discuss with Ayush Agarwal” button, the Google+ sharebox includes a pre-filled message to Ayush ("Thanks for sharing, +Ayush Agarwal"), and it adds him as a recipient in the “To” line. I can then extend the conversation by adding additional text and sharing with more people from my circles or with specific email addresses.

Mashable pre-fills Ayush as a recipient in the “To” line and pre-fills some text in the sharebox.

Mashable’s unique way at providing social attribution for those who share content furthers the conversation in an authentic and meaningful way. By working interactive posts into your user flow in a relevant way and by making it easier to share, you can keep users engaged in your content longer.

To get started and for more info on interactive posts, visit https://developers.google.com/+/features/interactive-posts.

Posted by Amy Walgenbach, Product Marketing Manager, Google+

Google+ Sign-In improvements

2013-12-11T11:28:00.002-08:00

Today we’re launching three updates to Google+ Sign-In, making it easier and more effective to include Google authentication in your app:

1. Support for all Google account types
Google+ Sign-In now supports all Google account types, including Google Apps users, and users without a Google+ profile.

2. Easy migration from other auth methods
If you’re using OpenID v2 or OAuth 2.0 Login for authentication and want to upgrade to Google+ Sign-In, we’ve made it easy to do so; it’s entirely your choice. Google+ Sign-In can grow your audience in multiple ways — including over-the-air installs, interactive posts, and cross-device sign-on — and now it’s fully compatible with the OpenID Connect standard. For more details, see our sign-in migration guide.

3. Incremental auth
Incremental auth is a new way to ask users for the right permission scopes at the right time, versus all permissions at once.

For example:

If your app allows users to save music playlists to Google Drive, you can ask for basic profile info at startup, and only ask for Google Drive permissions when they’re ready to save their first mix.
Likewise: you can ask for Google Calendar permissions only when users RSVP to an event, and so on.

Now that incremental auth is available for Google+ Sign-In, we recommend asking for the minimum set of permissions up front, then asking for further permissions only when they’re required. This approach not only helps users understand how their information will be used in your app, it can also reduce friction and increase app engagement.

8Tracks only asks for the necessary permissions to get users started in their app.

Once in the app, 8Tracks prompts users to connect their YouTube account to get mix recommendations.

When users click ‘Connect Your YouTube account’, 8Tracks asks users for the additional YouTube permission.

If you have any questions, join our Developing with Google+ community, or tag your Stack Overflow posts with ‘google-plus’.

Posted by Yaniv Yaakubovich, Product Manager, Google+

Interactive post best practice: Involve friends

2013-12-09T13:54:00.000-08:00

This is the first in a 2-part series that chronicles best practices for interactive posts. Come back next Monday to read the 2nd installment.

As part of our launch of Google+ Sign-In we introduced interactive posts: Google+ posts with custom calls-to-action button like buy, listen to, review, or just view. We’ve since found that interactive posts have a click-through rate that’s 3x higher than a standard share! In this two-part blog series we’ll cover a few best practices for incorporating interactive posts into your app. In today’s installment, we’ll review how +Fancy has integrated interactive posts into their app resulting in highly targeted, action-oriented shares. Let’s take a look at how they’ve done this:

When I create a group gift on Fancy, there’s a prompt to ask friends for contributions. Prominent placement of the button on the page encourages users not to miss it. When I send the post to friends they’ll see the “Contribute” button in the post, taking them back to Fancy to add funds. Fancy has also integrated Google Wallet so users can pay with just one click.

When friends click “Contribute”, they’re deep linked into Fancy to pay

Fancy designed their site to help users involve friends in meaningful ways. The action they want users to take is included as descriptive text on the share button, and it’s relevant to what users are doing on the site. This produces a clear and compelling case for involving friends. By giving users meaningful context why they should involve friends in your app and prominently displaying the call-to-action, you can create highly targeted, action-oriented shares.

To get started and for more info on interactive posts, visit https://developers.google.com/+/features/interactive-posts.

Posted by Amy Walgenbach, Product Marketing Manager, Google+

Google+ JavaScript SDK Enhancements

2013-11-25T10:13:00.000-08:00

Today we’re announcing a few updates to the Google+ JavaScript SDK APIs. These changes are backward compatible with current integrations, and are designed to make future integrations easier.

gapi.auth.signIn() triggers user sign-in and authorization in JavaScript, making it easier to integrate Google+ Sign-In with existing account creation flows.

gapi.auth.signOut() signs the current user out of your app.

A new status field indicates whether users are signed in to Google and/or your website, and a new method field describes how the sign-in occurred.

You can now specify sign-in parameters once in <meta> tags, versus passing them multiple times to multiple page elements. These page-level configuration parameters simplify your integration of Google+ Sign-In and interactive posts.

The sign-in callback is now dynamic when using page-level configuration. This makes it possible, for example, to sync your site’s user experience across multiple tabs.

We hope these changes make it easier to integrate your website with Google+ Sign-In, and we welcome your feedback in the Developing with Google+ community.

Posted by John Hjelmstad, Tech Lead, Google+

Google+ iOS SDK 1.4.0: in-app share box and ID token support

2013-10-03T10:00:00.000-07:00

Today we are announcing version 1.4.0 of the Google+ iOS SDK. The new version includes two of the most highly requested features from the developer community:

In-app share box. Now your users can share with their Google+ circles, directly from your iOS app! In addition, the native in-app share box supports image and video attachments. If you've already implemented browser-based sharing, you can switch to the native in-app share box with a single line change:

Just update this:

     [[GPPShare sharedInstance] shareDialog]

to this:

     [[GPPShare sharedInstance] nativeShareDialog]

The native iOS in-app share box
2. ID token support. ID tokens allow you to securely verify the identity of users of your iOS clients to your application servers.

Companies like Huffington Post are already taking advantage of these new features. To download or to learn more about the Google+ iOS SDK, visit our Google+ Developers site.

Posted by Ranjith Jayaram, Product Manager, Google+ iOS Platform

Google+: author attribution & embedded posts

2013-09-09T11:14:00.000-07:00

When you create and share content online, you want people to know you're the author— no matter how far that content may travel. Not only do you get the credit, you can also grow your audience over time. Today we're introducing two Google+ platform features that help authors do both — on Google, and across the web.

Author attribution

Starting today we’re integrating Google+ Sign-In with Google’s Authorship program. So if you connect your WordPress.com account with Google, for instance, the articles you publish will now be associated with your Google+ profile automatically.

With this association in place, we can look for ways to surface your info when it's most relevant. For example, today users may see your name, picture and/or a link to your Google+ profile when your content appears in Search, News and other Google products.

We’re piloting this integration with two major platforms today: WordPress and Typepad. We’re also working with a variety of other sites — including About.com, WikiHow, and Examiner — so we can learn and expand the pilot to all kinds of sites and apps using Google+ Sign-In.

Embedded posts

In addition to sites like WordPress and Typepad, many of you (in fact, millions of you) are posting content on Google+. We want to make it easy to expand your audience across the web, so today we’re introducing embedded posts.

With embedded posts, site owners can now add your public Google+ posts to their web pages — as a primary source, for example, or to highlight your point of view. Text, photo and media posts are all supported, and the embeds are fully interactive, so visitors can +1, comment and follow you inline.

If you’re a site owner and you’d like to embed a post, simply find a public post on Google+, and select ‘Embed post’ from the drop-down menu. Copy the code, add it to your web page, and you’re all set! We've also worked with the following sites, so you can see embeds in action: Business Insider, Elle, Eurosport, Financial Times, LA Times, National Geographic, NDTV.com, Rolling Stone, Sports Illustrated, People StyleWatch, TechCrunch, Thrillist, TV Guide, US Weekly, and The Verge.

To learn more about today’s announcements, feel free to check out our Help Center and developer documentation.

Posted by Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

Google+ Sign-In: trends and case studies

2013-08-26T09:58:00.001-07:00

Back in February we added a new feature to the Google+ platform: application sign-in. Since then we've launched numerous improvements (like cross-device single sign-on, app activities in Google Search, and over-the-air Android install metrics), and we've seen more and more apps offer great experiences with Google+ Sign-In.

Developers continue to see positive results, so we've highlighted some overall trends and illustrative numbers below.

Google+ Sign-In boosts Android downloads
Developers have found that enabling over-the-air installs on their websites effectively drives Android downloads, leading to a more unified experience across desktop and mobile. On average, 40% of Android users accept the offer to install a website's mobile app, yet some apps like fitness tracker Fitbit has seen a 60% acceptance rate.

Users prefer Google+ Sign-In
Google+ Sign-In lets users sign in to apps with their existing Google credentials, including the sign-in protections they expect (like 2-step verification). Cloud platform provider JoliCloud has discovered that Google+ Sign-In is their most popular option on the web, with 48% of users choosing Google. Movie app Flixster has found that Google+ Sign-In is their most popular third-party option on the web (35%), and their most popular option on Android (45%). Google+Sign-In is also the most popular option on Android for music app Songza, with 40% of users signing in with Google.

Google+ Sign-In increases new user registrations
Adding the option to sign in with Google has advanced the rate of new user growth for many apps. Mobile shopping app Snapette has seen a 16% acceleration in registered users, and pixiv, one of Japan's most popular social networks, has seen a 21% increase in new user registrations. Integrating with Google has also led to a 25% reduction in bounce rate from pixiv’s new user registration page.

To learn more about Google+ Sign-In, check out our Google+ Developers site and view our Case Studies page.

Posted by Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

Integrating Google+ with Existing Social Features

2013-08-15T09:24:00.000-07:00

If you are familiar with social web development, it’s easy to integrate the features of the Google+ platform, including Google+ Sign-In, into your web application. In fact, we’ve written a handy guide - initially focusing on existing Facebook integrations - to help you create a meaningful integration that will work with your existing social and business logic. The guide walks you through:

Basic Setup: create a project in the Google APIs console, include the Google+ JavaScript Client Library, and configure the ‘Sign in with Google’ button.
Identity Logic: structure your application to allow for users with multiple social identities, and create readable, maintainable code that allows you to work with users that have signed in with different social identity providers.
Feature Translation: add Google+ platform features that match your app’s other social features to create a seamless user experience across social identities.
Going Beyond: discover the unique capabilities of the Google+ platform, such as cross-platform single sign on and over-the-air installs.

If you’d like to learn more, check out our Adding Google+ to your Facebook Integration guide and watch the related Google+ Developers Live episode.

Posted by +Sam Stern, Google+ Developer Relations

Connect your organization to Google+ using the Google+ Domains API

2013-08-14T09:38:00.000-07:00

Google+ makes it easy for Google Apps customers to connect and share within their organization and encourage collaboration between teams. Today we’re launching an update to the Google+ Android app that includes a number of new features for Google Apps customers, and a new developer offering, the Google+ Domains API.

The Google+ Domains API allows Google Apps customers to integrate Google+ into their existing tools and processes, and allows enterprise software vendors to access Google+ from their products. Applications using the Google+ Domains API can act on behalf of Google Apps users to share posts within the same domain, comment on posts shared within the domain, and manage circles. In addition, the Google+ Domains API enables Google Apps domain administrators to pre-populate the circles of new employees, or review sharing activity.

For example, Ocado is building a tool that uses the Google+ Domains API to regularly sync team membership stored in Active Directory with the circles of their employees. This will ensure that every employee always has an up to date circle containing the other members of their team. Cloudlock is using the Google+ Domains API to add support for Google+ to its suite of data loss prevention, governance, and compliance applications.

Any developer can begin developing with the Google+ Domains API today. However only members of a Google Apps domain can use Google+ Domains API applications. To get started check out the documentation. If you have any questions, you can consult the google-plus tag on Stack Overflow, or join the “Developing with Google+” community.

Posted by Thor Mitchell, Product Manager, Google+ API

Cross posted to the Google Apps Developer blog

New Google+ Plugins For Your Website, With An Improved Look and Feel

2013-06-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

UPDATE (11/14/13): All page and profile badges have been updated to the new visual style.

UPDATE (11/7/13): All +1 and Share buttons have been updated to the new visual style.

Today we're launching a bunch of new plugins that help visitors to connect with you on Google+, directly from your website. These include:

A new Follow button
The Google+ Follow button is a standalone plugin that — as you might expect — lets visitors follow you from your site. It’s nice and compact, so it integrates easily with your existing social buttons.

The Follow button is simple to add to your website. In fact, if you've already installed the +1 button, no new JavaScript is required. Just configure the plugin, add the markup to your page, and you’re all set.

You can already see the new Follow button on the following websites: Celebuzz, Cooking Light, Fitness Magazine, and Huffington Post.

A new badge for Communities
Community managers have been asking for a way to attract members across the web, so today we're introducing badges for Google+ Communities. These badges are highly configurable, making it easy to match your site design.

Community badge examples using Dark and Light color themes

When visitors click the 'Preview' button they'll see your community page in a new browser tab. From there they can view recent posts (subject to your community's privacy settings), as well as join. Returning to your site is as simple as closing the new tab.

Updated badges for Pages and Profiles
Like the new Communities badge, the updated Page and Profile badges are highly customizable, including portrait and landscape modes, light and dark themes, and turning on/off items like the cover photo and tagline.

Profile badge examples using Light color theme

Page badges examples using Dark color theme

Existing badges will stick around for up to 90 days, giving you time to configure the new version for your website. After 90 days, we'll automatically upgrade any Google+ badges to the new design.

Finally, today's plugin updates include a new visual style that's more consistent with the recent improvements to Google+. This includes the +1 and Share buttons, which will be updated automatically over the next few weeks.

We'd love to hear your feedback on today's new features, so follow the conversation on Google+ and let us know what you think!

Posted by Raj Iyengar, Product Manager, Google+

Cross-Device Single Sign-On

2013-05-15T13:46:00.000-07:00

We recognize that users aren’t just using one device to interact with your app. They switch between laptops, tablets, and mobile devices daily. We’re focused on making desktop and mobile work better together so users have a seamless experience between platforms and devices. And today, we are launching another step in this direction -- cross-device single sign-on (SSO).

Cross-device SSO lets you stay connected to users and more easily keep them engaged across devices, removing the friction of consent and authentication. Now, when a user signs in with Google on one device, they grant consent once and can continue their experience seamlessly between web and Android devices. For example, if a user signs in with Google on the web and adds items to their cart but doesn’t get around to completing the purchase, if they switch to your app on their Android device, Google+ Sign-In will automatically authenticate the user, so they can be taken directly to the same state and resume their purchase.

We are rolling out this feature on the web and via the new release of Google Play services v3.1 on Android over the coming days. It will be automatically enabled if you integrate Google+ Sign-In.

Get started and learn more at https://developers.google.com/+/features/sign-in.

Google+ platform at I/O:
With Google I/O underway today, we have a lot in store for developers. In addition to over 15 exciting sessions and code labs, we have a packed sandbox with over 50 partners showing off integrations with Google+ Sign-In, mobile recommendations, and Hangout apps.

Posted by Francis Ma, Product Manager, Google+

Google+: Content Recommendations for your Mobile Website

2013-05-13T06:34:00.002-07:00

When you help someone find a great article on your site, you’re not only making them happier, you’re inspiring deeper engagement and loyalty. That's why today, we're bringing together elements of Google+ and Google Search to suggest the right content from your mobile website, at just the right time.

For example: Forbes visitors can now more easily discover other Forbes articles based on Search Authorship signals and other articles with lots of Google+ activity (including +1's and shares). In all cases, recommended content is based on the specific page the visitor is viewing, to boost the relevance of recommendations. And they only appear when people tap for more, so as not to interrupt their browsing experience. Here's how it works:

Recommendations can appear regardless whether your visitors are signed in to Google. But when they are, they'll see content that was +1'd or shared by the people in their circles:

We're also making it easy to add and configure these content recommendations. Just add a single line of javascript to your mobile website, and from there you can make changes in the "For your site" section of your Google+ page dashboard -- no web editor required.

To give today's features a try, feel free to visit any article page on Forbes on your favorite iOS or Android device. More details are also available in our developer docs: developers.google.com/+/features/recommendations.

Of course: we've got lots more planned for Google+ content recommendations, and Google+ Sign-In more generally, so we’re looking forward to having over 50 companies who have integrated Google+ Sign In share their stories (examples below) this week from Google I/O.

"Google+ Sign-In is the most popular social sign-in method on our Android application, measuring 41% of overall social sign-in users”

- Tom Grinstead, Product Manager, Guardian News

"We're thrilled with the initial results of our Google+ Sign-In integration. Our analytics show tremendous sign-in conversion from Google, besting other popular social networks across web, Android and even iOS. Because of this success, we're considering removing other sign-in sources to give more prominence to this new growth channel."

- Haisoo Shin, Director of Engineering, Fancy

Google+ partners at Google I/O include:

Air New Zealand, AllTheCooks, Banjo, Branchout, Business Insider, Colopla, Community Factory, Contacts+, Dealflicks, Deezer, Editora Globo, eHow, Fandango, Flixster, Forbes, Funny or Die, Glamour, Go SMS Pro, HRS.com, Huffington Post, ibotta, Jolicloud , Kabam, KickSend, KLM, Magisto, Mashable, mon.ki, n24, NDTV, NPR, Owners.com, Pixiv, Polygon, RebelMouse, Restalo.es, SB Nation, SkillPages, Slacker, Softonic, Songza, SoundCloud, Speakingtree, Synacor, Tamindir, Terra, The Fancy, The Guardian, The Verge, Trovit, TuneIn, Vasily, Verbling, and Voxy.

See them all here.

Posted by Mario Anima, Product Manager, Google+

Google+ Sign-In: Bringing App Activities to Google Search

2013-04-30T08:05:00.000-07:00

When users search for your app, they often want to go deeper and see what in-app content fellow users find interesting. Today we're making this possible by bringing app activity to Google search results.

Aggregate app activity for SoundCloud in Google Search.

Soon, if you search for a site or app on Google.com (and that app has integrated with Google+ Sign-In app activities), you'll see popular and aggregate user activity to the right of search results. Searching for Fandango, for example, will show the top movies among Google users. And when you click on a movie, you’ll go directly to its page on Fandango.

The current Google Search results page for Fandango (left) and the Google Search page results with app activities (right).

We're rolling out this feature in desktop Search over the next few weeks, starting with a limited number of music and movie apps — including Deezer, Fandango, Flixster, Slacker Radio, Songza, SoundCloud and TuneIn — but we'll be adding more apps over time.

We've got lots more improvements planned, so stay tuned for more updates.

Posted by Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

More Ways to Add Google+ Sign-In to your Apps and Sites

2013-04-02T09:30:00.000-07:00

With Google+ Sign-In, users can sign in to your Android, iOS and web apps using their existing Google credentials, and bring along their Google+ info for an upgraded experience. We already provide APKs and APIs that you can build directly into your apps. And today we're adding even more integration options.

Hundreds of thousands of developers already use the user management and social infrastructure platforms Janrain and Gigya to manage their sign-in systems. Today we're happy to announce that both companies are including Google+ Sign-In as part of their product suites! This means that their customers will be able to:

Add trusted authentication to their apps and sites
Allow web users to automatically download their Android app
Customize their app experience using Google+ profile info
Enable users to share interactive posts with friends
Write app activities that only appear when they're relevant

To get started, simply visit Janrain's and Gigya's getting started guides. You can also stop by some of their customer’s sites, who are already starting to launch their Google+ Sign-In integrations, including:

Janrain: NPR, Universal Music Group sites (which includes over 100 music artist and industry sites like ladygaga.com, justinbiebermusic.com, imaginedragonsmusic.com, eminem.com, and interscope.com), and HSN.

Gigya: American Idol (a Fox Broadcasting Company) and Food Network UK

Posted by Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

Global Google+ Sign-In Bootcamps

2013-03-06T10:58:00.002-08:00

Since our launch of Google+ Sign-In with trusted authentication, over-the-air installs, app customization, interactive posts, and app activities on February 26th, we have received huge interest from the developer community about integrating the new features. The interest was so significant, in fact, that we thought a better way to enable as many developers as possible would be a series of Google+ Sign-In bootcamps.

These bootcamps are a unique opportunity for you, your engineers, and your product managers to work side-by-side with Google engineers over the course of five days, while building the next generation of web and mobile applications with Google+ Sign-In. Google engineers will provide design advice and best practices, help with any implementation issues, and give suggestions on how to get the greatest number of signed-in users. It’s also a great opportunity to connect with other talented developers from a wide range of apps, companies, and technologies. This being Google, of course food and snacks will be provided! A specific agenda will follow for each location.

Bootcamp Cities & Dates:

Mountain View, CA - March 11th - March 15th
London, U.K - March 11th - March 15th
New York, NY - March 18th - 22nd
Berlin, Germany - March 18th - March 22nd
Bangalore, India - April 1st - April 5th
Sao Paolo, Brazil - April 1st - April 5th
Sydney, Australia - April 8th - April 12th
Seoul, Korea - April 8th - April 12th

If you’d like to attend a bootcamp, please apply here. There is limited space, but we prefer two engineers from your company (or anyone that is critical to the integration) to attend each day. If you are accepted, you will receive a confirmation email with additional details after registration closes. Hope to see you there!

Posted by Kinnari Jhaveri, Google+ Product Partnerships

Introducing Google+ Sign-In: simple and secure, minus the social spam

2013-02-26T08:01:00.000-08:00

Today we’re adding a new feature to the Google+ platform: application sign-in. Whether you’re building an app for Android, iOS or the web, users can now sign in to your app with Google, and bring along their Google+ info for an upgraded experience. It’s simple, it’s secure, and it prohibits social spam. And we’re just getting started.

In this initial release, we've focused on four key principles to make things awesome for users:

1. Simplicity and security come first
If you sign in to Gmail, YouTube or any other Google service, you can now use your existing credentials to sign in to apps outside of Google. Just review the Google+ permissions screen (outlining the data you're sharing with the app, and the people who can see your activity), and you're all set. Google+ Sign-In also comes with the protections and safeguards you’ve come to expect from your Google account (like 2-step verification), so you can always sign in with confidence.

Managing your signed-in apps is easy too: visit plus.google.com/apps at any time, or open the new Google Settings app on Android.

2. Desktop and mobile are better together
Many developers offer web and mobile versions of their app, yet setting things up across a browser, phone and tablet is still a major hassle. Starting today, when you sign in to a website with Google, you can install its mobile app on your Android device with a single click.

3. Sharing is selective; spraying is just spam
Sometimes you want to share something with the world (like a high score), but other times you want to keep things to yourself (like fitness goals). With Google+ Sign-In and circles you decide who to share with, if at all. In addition: Google+ doesn’t let apps spray “frictionless” updates all over the stream, so app activity will only appear when it’s relevant (like when you’re actually looking for it).

4. Sharing is for doing, not just viewing
Pictures and videos are great for viewing, but sometimes you actually want to do stuff online. That's why, when you share from an app that uses Google+ Sign-In, your friends will see a new kind of "interactive" post in their Google+ stream. Clicking will take them inside the app, where they can buy, listen to, or review (for instance) exactly what you shared.

If you’re building an app for Android, iOS or the web, and you’d like to include Google+ Sign-In, simply dive into our developer docs and start checking stats once your integration is live. Android apps will require the latest version of Google Play Services, which is rolling out to all devices in the next day or so.

To see what other developers are doing with Google+ Sign-In, just visit any of the following sites, and look for the new "Sign in with Google" button (also rolling out gradually):

Posted by Seth Sternberg, Director of Product Management, Google+

Deep Linking From Mobile Apps

2012-11-15T12:24:00.002-08:00

Hello Android and iOS mobile developers. Now when a user shares a favorite song or news story from your app to Google+, their stream post can include a deep link to that piece of content. Clicking the link either:

Opens your app, and goes directly to the news story (for instance), or
Redirects to Google Play or the App Store to encourage download

Using the Google+ mobile SDKs, you can integrate the Share dialog and embed a deep-link ID with your post. The deep-link ID may be a URI or an identifier that your app can use across its supported platforms, to identify the correct context to launch in your app.

Here are some examples of deep link sharing on Android from Pulse News:

You can also download Pulse News from Google Play to see deep links in action.

Check out our developer docs to learn more about today's launch of deep links on Android and iOS and follow the conversation on Google+.

Posted by Francis Ma, Product Manager, Google+.

Case Study: Scoot & Doodle Sparks Creativity With Their Google+ Hangout App

2012-10-08T09:55:00.000-07:00

San Francisco-based startup Scoot & Doodle brings people face-to-face in a shared online play space in real time. Scoot & Doodle chose to launch their first product as a Google+ Hangout app, and since launching built a user base of 100,000+, achieved strong engagement with returning users averaging 28 minutes per session, and increased their Google+ followers to nearly 900,000.

Scoot & Doodle chose to launch their first product as a Google+ Hangout app because the platform offered advantages to gain traction in the crowded, competitive online social space. Those advantages included:

Access to 400 million highly engaged Google+ users already connected through Circles, Gmail, YouTube, and Calendar
Easy, streamlined discovery of Scoot & Doodle on Google+, through viral channels such as Notifications
Quality, strength, and reach of face-to-face on hangouts, which let Scoot & Doodle users connect, create, and collaborate with up to nine people, simultaneously, worldwide
Relatively simple development in the Hangouts API, they went from concept to launch in just three months

Scoot & Doodle has seen extremely high engagement with its product in Hangouts. The average visitor spends 22 minutes per session, and returning users spend 28 minutes per session. They’ve also found their users are engaging in ways they hadn’t expected, like anime artists collaborating daily with each other and with Japanese writers to create and design characters for online games. Also, students from junior high school to college use the app to illustrate, collaborate, discuss, and solve problems for their class work; for fun breaks, they doodle and play Pictionary-like games together.

U.S. and Japanese artists use Scoot & Doodle to collaborate on anime projects like this one.

“We’re seeing users engage with the product in creative, diverse ways. As a result, Scoot & Doodle has captured far more user communities than we initially envisioned,” says Patty Chang, company cofounder and product lead. “Scoot & Doodle on Google+ Hangouts has pushed the bounds of how we look at our product and where we’re going with it.”

Scoot & Doodle has identified new uses for its product from its followers, and connects with them regularly in hangouts and via Google+. The company also conducts focus groups using Hangouts. Its latest features—talk bubbles, stamps, and scrapbook—arose from discussions between users and customer reps on Google+.

We think Scoot & Doodle is a good example of a company who has built a strong audience on Google+ through its use of Circles, content rich posts, interactive Hangouts, and creative promotions. These promotions have focused primarily on community building and engagement, with good results from encouraging users to create with the app, then share and engage with others in their Circles.

Follow Scoot & Doodle on Google+ and download the full case study here. To learn more about Google+ Hangout apps, visit: developers.google.com/+/hangouts.

Posted by Amy Walgenbach, Product Marketing Manager, Google+

Google+ Roundup From I/O

2012-07-10T14:31:00.000-07:00

With so much going on this year at Google I/O -- including an epic skydiving product demo --we wanted to make sure you caught all the action from the Google+ team.

This year's event was our biggest and most amazing yet, and we shared it all with more than 5,500 developer attendees in person, and millions more in 172 countries around the world via I/O Live and I/O Extended.

Here are a few of the highlights from Google+:

Launched Google+ Events, and Google+ tablet apps for Android and iOS.
Extended the Google+ platform to mobile, with mobile web optimized social plugins and Google+ SDKs for iOS and Android (coming soon).
Introduced new featured hangout apps, and showed off sandbox partners Google Art Project, MiniClip 8-ball Pool, Symphonical, and a preview of Dominion!
Brought the Google+ history API into early developer preview, allowing sites and apps to privately save moments to their users’ Google+ history where users can, if they want, share those moments with others.
Added +1 recommendations to help site owners show more relevant content to their users.

You can watch all nine Google+ session videos from I/O to learn more about the announcements, check out the beginnings of the Google+ developer showcase to get inspired, and attend this week’s Google+ platform office hours to have your questions answered.

Posted by Ken Norton, Group Product Manager, Google+

Extending the Google+ Platform To Mobile

2012-06-28T11:43:00.000-07:00

Since unveiling Google+ to the world a year ago, the number of mobile users on Google+ has grown rapidly. In fact, there are now more people that use Google+ from a mobile device than from a desktop computer. We have always believed in the importance of mobile for our users, and today, we are announcing an offering for mobile developers -- the Google+ platform for mobile, in early developer preview.

This platform includes mobile web optimized social plugins and Google+ SDK for iOS and Android (coming soon). With these new SDKs, you can integrate Google+ identity, sharing, and history into your mobile apps to create more engaging social experiences and connect with more users.

Check out the mobile platform documentation to learn more about integrating Google+ into your app!

We are just getting started and would love to hear your ideas and suggestions. Share your thoughts and follow the conversation on Google+.

Posted by Francis Ma, Product Manager, Google+

Apps are a Plus in Hangouts

2012-06-27T13:06:00.000-07:00

We’ve seen Google+ Hangouts being used in the most creative and innovative ways, connecting fans, facilitating debates, and making a difference in people’s lives.

Three months ago, we launched the Google+ Hangouts API, with the belief that developers can build even more memorable experiences and activities inside the face-to-face-to-face setting of hangouts. The response so far has been exciting.

In the 90 days since we launched apps in hangouts, we’ve seen:

over 200 apps built for hangouts
the average duration of a hangout increase by 2.5 times when participants use an app
1 in every 3 hangouts use an app.

Today, we are introducing a new set of featured apps built by developers around the world that provide fun and entertaining activities for our users.

Google Art Project: Explore collections from around the world with thousands of artworks photographed in extremely high resolution. You can play an art guide and take your friends on a tour of different museums.
New YouTube App: Create, control, save and even share playlists of videos with friends—all inside a hangout. It’s like your own VIP table at the world’s coolest YouTube party.
New Effects App: One of the most popular hangout apps gets more fun with a brand new UI and with the introduction of new effects.
Symphonical: Conduct your business meetings and manage projects in real-time using the Symphonical app for hangouts.
MiniClip 8-ball Pool: Challenge friends to a game of pool with real-time stats tracking.
A Story Before Bed: Family hangouts just got better with this app. Pick a storybook from the shelf and read it to your loved ones.
Panoramio Game: Compete with friends to be the most precise wanderer by finding out where a photo was taken while traveling around the world with Google Maps through stunning Panoramio photos. If you are the best, you get to choose your next destination.
Cheer On: Root for your favorite sports team by customizing your video appearance in a hangout. With so many sporting events coming up this summer, this is one app you must have next time you are in a hangout.

We are still in the early days of this real-time platform and can’t wait to see what you come up with next. Learn more about how you can get started building hangouts into your app.

Posted by Amit Fulay, Product Manager, Google+

Launching Google +1 Recommendations Across the Web

2012-06-26T11:37:00.000-07:00

UPDATE (7/9/12): After a few productive weeks in platform preview, we're rolling out +1 recommendations to all users today. Thanks for your feedback at Google I/O, in the discussion forums, and on our Google+ page. We're always eager to hear from you -- so keep it coming.

Working on +1, we often hear people say they want to see more of what their friends recommend. Likewise, when we talk to site owners, they ask us to help them show more relevant content to their users. Today, we are rolling out a new feature of the +1 button in platform preview: when users hover over a +1 button, they will see recommendations for other great content on your site.

For example, when I go the the Chrome Web Store and look at +1 recommendations on the Gmail app, I see related apps and recommendations from friends.

To keep these recommendations more relevant and on-topic, they will always refer to pages on the same domain or subdomain as the +1 button.

If you’ve already added the +1 button to your site, there’s nothing more you need to do. Recommendations will work across all +1 buttons for all users, whether or not they’re signed into Google+. This update will go live to all of your users in the next few weeks.

If you want to see recommendations today, sign up for the developer preview group and tell us what you think. The +1 team and I would love to hear from you! As always, we are iterating quickly and are hungry for your feedback.

Join the conversation on Google+.

Posted by Julie Farago, Engineering Manager

Sharing Rich Content From Your Android Apps, to Google+ and Beyond

2012-05-22T12:04:00.000-07:00

Many developers have been using Android's share intent to help their users share content with others, directly from their apps. With the recently-launched ShareCompat library, you can now help your users share rich content with their friends (like images and videos) more easily, and the items they share include attribution to your app. All you need to do is add a few lines of code!

I'll walk through a few examples that use Google+ as the application handler, but of course, these share intent improvements can work for any service. Popular apps like Foodspotting, Pulse News, and Shazam are already using ShareCompat to help users share rich content with their Google+ circles. You can check out this photo album to see how they are all taking advantage of the new library.

Creating the Share Intent

If you'd like users to be able to share text from your app, start by building the following intent:

Intent shareIntent = ShareCompat.IntentBuilder.from(ShareActivity.this)
   .setText("This site has lots of great information about Android!
      http://www.android.com")
   .setType("text/plain")
   .getIntent()
   .setPackage("com.google.android.apps.plus");

startActivity(shareIntent);

Here, I passed text and a URL to the setText method, and I used the setType method to identify the content as "text/plain." The intent builder can then pass this information to the application that's doing the sharing. Additionally, I used the setPackage method to specify the application that I want to handle it. In this case, the Google+ application is specified.

The Google+ share box with pre-populated text and link snippet.

Sharing Pictures and Video

Modifying an intent to share pictures or video takes just two modifications:

Intent shareIntent = ShareCompat.IntentBuilder.from(ShareActivity.this)
   .setText("Hello from Google+ Developer Relations!")
   .setStream(MEDIA_URI)
   .setType(MEDIA_TYPE)
   .getIntent()
   .setPackage("com.google.android.apps.plus");

Here, I changed the type to an appropriate content type for the media being shared (“image/png” for images, “video/mp4” for videos, etc...). Additionally, I told the intent builder that I’m sending the media store URI of the picture that I want to share.

A Rich, Personalized Post

Once users shares text, links, images, or video using share intents, the post on Google+ will include attribution to your application, like shown below.

A Google+ post with text and an image shared from the Google+ Share Intent Demo app.

As you can see in the screenshot, I combined sharing an image with sharing text. You can mix and match setting text with sharing pictures, videos, or links.

If you'd like to add similar functionality to your Android app, just check out the ShareCompat documentation. Happy sharing!

Follow the conversation on Google+.

Posted by Julia Ferraioli, Developer Advocate, Google+