July security patch is now rolling out for Google Pixel devices running Android 12.1.

Build number: SQ3A.220705.003.A1(B1)

The list of changes is very sparse, and includes only one item related to the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro in EMEA/APAC:

· Enabling additional VoLTE calling features on certain networks.

In addition, Pixel 3a/3a XL devices will see another update this month based on the May patch, and this time it will be the latest.

Curated Culture adds 3 new wallpapers by artist Aubii of Autumnalwood.

Grinnin, Vibin, Smilin — "Adventurin' is great, but it's just so, so fun when accompanied by your best (froggy) buddies."

You can find these uncompressed wallpapers in the comments.

It is Wednesday, my dudes!

Google News | En

Chromecast with Google TV is now available in India.

As promised a month ago, the two-year-old Chromecast with Google TV is now available in India, for now exclusively at Flipkart, but will soon arrive at other retailers as well.

Cost: ₹ 6399 (80 USD)

🔗 Flipkart | Google Blog

The Pixel's At a Glance widget is preparing to add three new features:

1. Cross-device timer to show timer info from Google Home devices;

2. Ridesharing service to show the status of your rides (At this stage it is supposed to support Uber and Lyft services)

3. Food delivery arrival status (So far it only supports Doordash and only in English)

For now, none of these features work, they are nothing more than findings discovered in the latest Android Intelligence Services update.

🔗 Mishaal Rahman

Google Play system update for July 2022: Google Wallet rebranding, new Nearby Share APIs, and more

Google has released a list of changes to the Google Play system updates for July. In it, the company indicated the rebranding of Google Wallet with a new Google Material design, which will become available through the Google Play Services update v22.22 . We will probably see the new app within a month.

Also, new APIs have been added for third-party developers to build seamless multi-device experiences in apps. Presumably it is about a new set of APIs announced at Google I/O 2022.

Source: Google Support

Google News | En

Android 13 Beta 4 is out!

This build has Release Candidate status.

Build number: TPB4.220624.005
Patch: July 2022

Top resolved issues:

• Fixed an issue where on some devices, paired Bluetooth devices could be observed to rapidly connect and disconnect from the device.

• Fixed an issue where the Google Camera app occasionally crashed on Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro devices.

• Fixed an issue where, when a user checks for system updates by navigating to Settings > System > System update, the system incorrectly reported Android 12 as the device's Android version, even when the device was already successfully updated to an Android 13 build.

• Fixed an issue on Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro devices where the Now Playing page sometimes got stuck on Downloading song database.

Android beta program

Download:

• Factory images

• OTA builds

Google News | En

Chrome OS Flex is now stable and available for more PCs and Macs.

Five months ago, Google introduced Chrome OS Flex, a lightweight version of its Chromebook operating system that can run on almost every PC. It's now stable and ready to use on a wider range of personal computers.

To date, the company has certified more than 400 devices to work with Chrome OS Flex, and in the future, devices from a decade ago are expected to be compatible. Certification means that audio input/output, built-in display, networking, USB, webcam and other major components will work seamlessly.

Existing CloudReady customers will be upgraded to the new experience.

🔗 Full Instructions | 9to5Google

Play Points can be redeemed for Google Store discounts for a limited time.

Google has begun introducing a new way to redeem your Play Points, offering a discount on purchases from the Google Store. 9to5Google has spotted this method on several of its devices, but it doesn't seem to be widespread yet. The offer, which, according to the terms, is currently only valid in the U.S., has four tiers - $10, $50, $100 and $200 - each of which can only be used once.

These offers do not stack, meaning you can’t redeem a $200 discount and a $100 discount to get $300 off the purchase of a Pixel phone. Also, don't use Play Points for one of these Google Store offers until you're ready to make your next hardware purchase, as the codes expire in 30 days.

Have any of you saved up 10,000 points to buy Pixel Buds Pro for free?

🔗 9to5Google

Android removes much of Fuchsia-related code in favor of developing the Starnix project.

It's no secret that Google has been investigating ways to run Android/Linux applications on the Fuchsia OS for quite some time.

This week, a large chunk of code called "device/google/fuchsia," which started work on back in 2019, was removed from the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). In it, the developers tried to "friend" the Fuchsia OS with Android Runtime.

But what's interesting is that the developer who made this change is mostly working on Fuchsia's "Starnix" project unveiled in early 2021. It aims to make it possible for Fuchsia to “natively” run apps and libraries that were built for Linux or Android. To do this, Starnix will translate low-level kernel instructions from what Linux expects, to what the Zircon kernel expects for Fuchsia.

🔗 9to5Google

Google News app now features a predictive back gesture.

If you remember, in Android 13 Google started working on the predictive back gesture.

In Android 13 Beta 3, Google added new "Predictive back animations" switch in the developer settings. For a while, the only Google's app this feature worked with was Google Keep Notes, but in one of its updates, Google disabled the feature.

Now, you can try the new gesture in the Google News app v.5.57 (after turning on the switch in the developer settings, of course).

A full release of this feature is planned for Android 14.

Google News | En

Chrome 105 allows you to test the new System Photo Picker from Android 13.

The current builds of Chrome Dev and Canary have a new "Android Media Picker" flag. When you turn it on, the browser will invoke the new System Photo Picker instead of the built-in Chrome tool.

Unfortunately, for now, this feature only works on Android 13, even though it was mentioned in the changelog for the May Google Play system update. Manually activating it with a special command also doesn't help, which suggests that the feature isn't yet available on earlier versions of Android.

Google has promised that the feature will appear on Android 11+ devices.

• Link to flag: chrome://flags/#android-media-picker

Google News | En

YouTube Music now supports the new Android 13 player notification design.

In Android 13, Google has updated the Media controls User experience, now for apps to have a new player notification design, they need to target the SDK33. At that time, only Podcasts, Files and Chrome were among the Google apps that supported the new layout. Now YouTube Music has joined them. The app version 15.16.51 now has target SDK 33 (Android 13).

APK in the comments 👇🏻

Google News | En

Devices with Android 11+ now support DNS-over-HTTP/3 (DoH).

Google announced today that devices running Android 11 and above can now use DNS-over-HTTP/3 (DoH) for "well-known DNS servers" that support it, starting with Google DNS and Cloudflare DNS. Support may also appear on "some devices with Android 10 which adopted Google Play system updates early".

Google managed to do this simply by updating the system DNSResolver module (via Google Play System Updates). You can check if DoH is enabled on your device by running this command in the ADB:

adb shell

cmd device_config get netd_native doh

It should return '1'.

🔗 Google Security Blog | Mishaal Rahman

Android 13 Beta 4 Software Survey is now open.

Google is collecting feedback from Pixel 4 - Pixel 6 Pro owners who have installed Android 13 Beta 4 (TPB4.220624.005) on their devices.

🔗 Survey Link