As Alex reported over the weekend, Google Babel is all but confirmed, although there is no release date of yet. Since then though, we have seen quite a bit of news about the new app in the form of bug reports and screenshots of Google Groups conversation between developers. What this tells us may be a bit of a letdown to some folks, as it looks as if Google Voice support will not be implemented into Google Babel at launch time. What the app is said to unify thus far are Google+ Messenger, Google Talk, and Google Hangouts. On to more good news.
The app is also reported to have an iOS counterpart, and right now is running on Chrome as well as Android. The screenshots of proof have been verified by Android-Police, so just have yourself a little looksy and see what you think.
Droid-Life reports from undisclosed sources, that although Google Voice may not be implemented into Google Babel at launch, and is somewhat on the “back-burner” for now, the service will be added into the unified messaging application at a later date. Once the application is completed the source says that the unified system of messaging will work most like Apple’s iMessaging, being that it will sync messages across devices and allow for all Google Babel users to communicate directly through Babel. Although the application may not be as solid as we might all have dreamed of at launch, what is there now already will be a significant improvement on the current fragmentation in this area of Google services. We may still have to deal with getting our pseudo text messages via both our Google Voice app of choice and the new Google Babel, although they will hopefully have baked in a fix for that at release to make my our life easier.
As of right now we still have not procured a solid release date for Babel, but it is looking like Google i/O might just be the time and place that we can bring you all of the firm and at least half-baked features and details of Google’s newest messaging baby. We will be there to bring you the news, and if it happens before hand, we’ll be there too. How many of you are looking forward to being able to ditch all of the fragmentation and different messaging icons in your app drawer for one great big bundle of Babel? Tell us all about it in the comments.
Source TechCrunch