A big thanks to reader @ianmurchison for this tip.
It seems as though the integration of gizmo5 into Google Voice is steadily progressing, taking one more step last week. The gizmo5.com domain was transferred to google on 18 January 2010, and now gizmo5.com redirects to google.com/gizmo5.
Gizmo5 was a VOIP company which provided both software and a service which allowed users to make VOIP calls. Similar to the popular skype-in/skype-out service offered by Skype, gizmo5 allowed users to register a phone number to attach to their gizmo5 software or device for the purposes of receiving calls, and allowed users to use the service to make cheap calls out to regular phone numbers.
Back in November of 2009, google acquired gizmo5, adding the missing piece to google’s telecommunications services.
It looks as though google’s intentions are to incorporate gizmo5’s VOIP capabilities with google voice’s services to provide a full VOIP service on its Android devices. This means one could have a fully functioning phone through google on only a data plan – no voice plan would be required. Furthermore, due to google voice’s cheap long distance rates, one could conceivably get unlimited talk and text in North America on just a data plan.
Probably tired of waiting around for Apple to decide whether it will ever approve a Google Voice app for the iPhone, Google decided to do a bit of an end-around on the app store by releasing a very nice html5 web app which will work on the iPhone and the Palm Pre/Pixi.
Looks like a dialer
The app is now live and is available at http://m.google.com/voice. Google previously had a web-based interface for google voice which worked, but was not quite as intuitive. This html5 version brings almost all of the functionality of a native app on the iPhone.
And there’s nothing Apple can really do about it.
The buttons in the web app all respond as one would expect in a native app. Dialing is quick and intuitive with little to no delay.
Navigation between screens is simple when using the nav bar at the top and allows you to switch between your voicemail/sms inbox, the dialer, the sms writing page, google contacts, and settings.
To qualify the italic “almost” above, it should be mentioned that the difference lies in how you manage and access your contacts.
On the iPhone, the phone dialer has direct access to your phone’s contact list. The web app does not have such access, but it does have access to your google contacts. Getting a seamless integration of your iPhone’s contacts with google voice requires the extra step of syncing your iPhone contact list with google. As can be seen from the screenshots, I have not yet done this.
Bravo to google for giving us a usable google voice interface on the iPhone.
“Good news everyone! Several years ago I tried to log on to AOL, and it just went through! Wheee! We’re online!”
―Farnsworth
Okay not really, but it must feel this way to Sean Kovacs, the developer of the iPhone app GV Mobile, a pretty slick Google Voice interface for the iPhone. If you happened to be one of the lucky few who got to use GV Mobile when it was on sale (me!), you’ll also be one of the unlucky few who experienced the removal of the app by Apple. I had to restore my iPod and lost GV Mobile completely, unable to re-download it from Apple and with it my ability to send free SMS messages easily.
Well, Sean has re-written GV Mobile and has gotten it approved by Apple. This is all very recent, with GV Mobile still not appearing in the app store for me.
- January 15th – GV Mobile sent to Apple
- January 16th – GV Mobile released on Cydia
- January 19th – GV Mobile approved on the app store
Details on price/upgrades/features and usability will follow once I get my hands on the app, so stay tuned for that. In the future, Sean intends to include push notifications, which would be a nice addition.
As noted in the comments of the How-to: Google Voice in Canada post, and further explored in the Google Voice Charging For Calls To Canada post, calls to Canada through google voice seem to now cost $0.02 per minute instead of being free.
Astute reader @ianmurchison noticed something interesting:
It has been known for a while now that google has acquired Gizmo5, a VOIP company which has the ability to place and terminate calls to standard phone numbers. The acquisition gave google the piece it needed to start offering full VOIP service. With the switch to a $0.02 per minute charge for google voice calls to Canada – the same that Gizmo5 charged – we could be looking at the incorporation of Gizmo5’s VOIP abilities into google voice.
It shouldn’t be long now until google starts offering full VOIP service.
For some time now, google voice has allowed free calls to Canada in addition to free calling within the US. It seems however that this is not working correctly, at least for calls originating in Canada.
Read the rest of this entry »
Sean Kovacs, the developer of the previously-on-the-app-store GV Mobile, has been hard at work lately on a new project.
After developing GV Mobile, an app for the iPhone which allows near seamless integration and access to google voice, Sean became one of the growing number of developers to become intimately familiar with Apple’s less than developer-friendly approval process for apps. Despite being approved for the app store, and appearing there for some time, Apple pulled the app and suspended sales. Why exactly is still a matter of discussion, but one thing appears certain – GV Mobile won’t re-appear on the app store.
More details after the break.
Read the rest of this entry »
