Android TV’s discovery-focused UI is now rolling out to more TVs in more regions

Google released a major UI update for the Android TV interface in February this year. The new interface resembled the Google TV UI and laid emphasis on helping users discover new content on the platform. However, it featured fewer tabs on the home screen. Google rolled out another update for this new discovery-focused UI in July this year, which introduced three new features including a watchlist. The UI is now rolling out to more TVs in more regions, and it comes with a minor home screen UI change.

The Android TV UI update recently started showing up for some users in India, Brazil, and Europe. The UI is reportedly rolling out to OnePlus TVs (via @hardik3333333), a few Xiaomi Mi Box models (via u/ErickJail), and even some TCL TVs. It includes all the content discovery-focused changes that Google introduced in February this year, along with a minor home screen UI update that adds a ‘Favorite apps’ carousel.

(Screenshot: u/venky61)

In addition to the home screen UI changes, the latest update also highlights all of Android TV’s discovery features on the home screen. Clicking on the ‘New features available now’ dialog gives you an overview of the UI and navigation changes, personalized recommendations, and home screen customizations.

User reports on Reddit suggest that the new UI changes are rolling out with the latest Android TV Home app update. There doesn’t seem to be any regional limitation to the rollout, as users from India, Brazil, Europe, and a few other locations have received the update. In case you haven’t received the new UI so far, you can try sideloading the latest Android TV Home app release on your TV.

Do you like the new Android TV UI changes or would you rather have Google release the Google TV update to your TV? Let us know in the comments section below.

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Signal’s new monetization feature makes it easier to make donations

Signal, the privacy-focused instant messaging app that shot to popularity after WhatsApp’s controversial privacy policy change, is adding a new monetization feature into its app. Unlike its rival instant messaging services, Signal runs entirely on donations and this new feature will make it easier for users to make monetary contributions and support and sustain the donation model.

As the company notes in a new blog post, “Signal has no data to sell, no advertisers to sell it to, and no shareholders to benefit from such a sale….. as the sole beneficiaries of Signal, it is up to the people using Signal to sustain it.”

Users can become a Signal Sustainer by contributing a small amount on a monthly basis or making on-off contributions (via The Verge). There are three sustainer levels users can choose from: $5, $10, and $20. Signal notes that your subscription will only renew if you access the app over the course of the month. If you uninstall the app or stop using it for some reason, Signal will automatically cancel your subscription after the next cycle to “eliminate the “dark pattern” of subscriptions you’ve forgotten about.”

Users can make donations using Apple Pay and Google Pay, with the company planning to add more payment methods in the future. When you make a donation, it unlocks a badge that you can display on your profile  Signal also emphasizes that the entire payment process is designed to be privacy persevering, adding that it doesn’t associate your payment information with your Signal account.

 

“Leveraging the anonymous credential scheme that we introduced for Signal private groups, clients make payments and then associate a badge to their profile such that the server can authenticate the client is in the set of people who made a payment, but doesn’t know specifically which payment it corresponds to,” the company wrote in a blog post.

The donation feature is rolling out with the latest Signal update on Android and iOS.

Signal Private Messenger (Free, Google Play) →

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[Update: Wider rollout] Google is finally letting users initiate Android TV app installs from their phones

Update (12/03/2021 @ 03:44 ET): The new device drop-down menu on the Install button is now available widely. Scroll to the bottom for more information. The article as published on November 15, 2021, is preserved below.

At I/O 2021 in May, Google announced a new feature to make finding and installing apps on Wear OS devices much easier. The feature added a drop-down menu to the Install button on the Google Play Store, giving users the option to install an app on their Wear OS smartwatch right from their phone. The company is now rolling out a similar solution for Android TV devices, making it easy for users to install apps on the TV from their phone.

Currently, if you want to install an app on your Android TV, you have to open up the Play Store on the TV itself to install the app. While you can install an app on your Android TV from the web version of the Play Store, you can’t do so from your phone. But according to Reddit user r/avigi, Google is finally rolling out this feature to some users.

(Screenshot: u/avigi)

As you can see in the attached screenshot, the Install button in the latest version of the Google Play Store has a drop-down menu. Tapping on it shows a list of available devices, including the Android TV connected to your account. You can tap on the checkbox next to your Android TV and tap on the Install button to get the app on your Android TV.

The new feature isn’t widely available at the moment, and it seems to be rolling out via a server-side update. It doesn’t appear on any of our devices running the latest Google Play Store update. However, comments on the Reddit post linked above reveal that it is available for some users. While Google hasn’t released an official statement on the rollout, we expect the feature to show up for more users in the coming days. We’ll make sure to let you know as soon as we learn more.

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Update: The new drop-down menu is now available for more users

Recent reports suggest that the new drop-down device menu on the Google Play Store ‘Install’ button is now available widely. It’s available on all my phones on the Play Store listings for apps that are compatible with my Android TV.

If you haven’t received the feature yet, you can try manually updating the Google Play Store on your device. You might have to wait a few more days if the feature still doesn’t show up after installing the latest Play Store update.

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OnePlus Games receives a minor visual refresh, preps a “Smart resolution” feature

The OnePlus Games app, previously OnePlus Game Space, is a one-stop shop for all your gaming needs. It comes pre-installed on most OnePlus phones and lets you access your game library, check out your game stats, enable optimizations and enhancements, and more from one centralized space. The app last received a major redesign last year, which brought a new icon, a dark blue theme, and other UI tweaks. Now the app is getting a new update which brings a minor visual refresh and also reveals some of the upcoming features that will make your gaming experience even better.

An APK teardown can often predict features that may arrive in a future update of an application, but it is possible that any of the features we mention here may not make it in a future release. This is because these features are currently unimplemented in the live build and may be pulled at any time by the developers in a future build.

OnePlus Games version 3.0.0 has started rolling out and while it’s not a huge update, it does bring along a minor visual refresh. Essentially, the update changes the background color from dark blue to metallic black. Another small change we notice is that gaming stats have been consolidated into the three-dot menu. Previously, there was a dedicated button for accessing game stats which appeared right beside the three-dot menu.

Screenshots credit: XDA Member Some_Random_Username

Within the new APK, we have also spotted evidence for an upcoming feature called “Smart resolution.” Strings we have discovered indicate that this new gaming enhancement would automatically adjust the screen resolution based on your phone’s temperature and battery level. From what we can gather, it looks like the Smart resolution feature will be able to detect if your device is under too much stress and getting hot or if the battery is too low and will automatically scale down the screen resolution and graphics quality. However, it looks like it will only work with select games.

<string name="smart_resolution_confirm_ok">Exit game</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_confirm_title">To enable Smart resolution, the game needs to be restarted. Exit the game now?</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_confirm_title2">To disable Smart resolution, the game needs to be restarted. Exit the game now?</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_hint">Only some games are supported</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_message_oupo">Automatically adjust the screen resolution based on your phone temperature and battery level.</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_message_yijia">Automatically adjust the screen resolution based on your phone temperature and battery level.</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_title_oupo">Auto resolution</string>
<string name="smart_resolution_title_yijia">Auto resolution</string>

The Smart resolution feature is still under development and isn’t accessible to users. We don’t know when it will go live. It’s also unclear if will be made available to all the latest OnePlus smartphones or select models only.

OnePlus Games version 3.0.0 hasn’t started rolling out widely. However, you can sideload the latest APK from APKMirror.

OnePlus Games (Free, Google Play) →

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Thanks to XDA Member Some_Random_Username  for the tip!

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The long-rumored Pixel Watch might finally arrive next year

Google has been developing its own Wear OS software platform since 2014, but in all that time, the company has never sold a Google-branded smartwatch with the software. There have been rumors of a smartwatch with the Pixel brand (or simply Google’s name) for years, and according to a new report from Business Insider, it might happen for real next year.

According to Business Insider (via The Verge), Google is working on a smartwatch that it plans to release next year, under the codename Rohan. It will supposedly run the latest version of Wear OS, paired with a circular design, “no physical bezel,” and health and fitness tracking. Business Insider was not able to determine if Google will produce the watch in multiple sizes, like Samsung does with its Galaxy Watch series.

Unfortunately, not only does the watch reportedly require daily charging (like some other Wear OS smartwatches), but it also supposedly uses proprietary watch bands. Apple also uses proprietary bands on its watches, but Fossil, Samsung, Mobvoi, and other companies use standard bands on their Wear OS smartwatches — giving those watches thousands of affordable options for replacement bands.

The LG Watch Sport (left) and Watch Style (right), which reportedly came from Google’s first attempt at a Pixel Watch.

There have been many rumors about a possible Pixel Watch over the years. Evan Blass (@evleaks on Twitter) reported in 2018 that a Pixel-branded watch was going to arrive alongside the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL, and WinFuture said the watch would come in three variants with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Wear 3100. Google confirmed later in August 2018 that it wouldn’t release a Pixel Watch that year, and Business Insider claimed in 2019 that the watches were ultimately cancelled and re-worked into the LG Watch Sport and Watch Style.

More recently, Front Page Tech published a video about the Pixel Watch, which mentions the same ‘Rohan’ codename as this latest report. However, it’s not clear if the render images shown in the video match Google’s current hardware design.

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The FTC is suing NVIDIA in order to block its acquisition of Arm

NVIDIA has run into hurdle after hurdle in its acquisition of Arm, and it seems things are going to get a whole lot worse. The Federal Trade Commission in the U.S. is now suing NVIDIA in an attempt to prevent the deal, saying that it would “stifle competing next-generation technologies.” This adds the FTC to the long list of concerned parties, including the European Commission and the U.K. Competitions and Market Authority.

“The FTC is suing to block the largest semiconductor chip merger in history to prevent a chip conglomerate from stifling the innovation pipeline for next-generation technologies,” said FTC Bureau of Competition Director Holly Vedova in a statement (via The Verge). “Tomorrow’s technologies depend on preserving today’s competitive, cutting-edge chip markets. This proposed deal would distort Arm’s incentives in chip markets and allow the combined firm to unfairly undermine Nvidia’s rivals. The FTC’s lawsuit should send a strong signal that we will act aggressively to protect our critical infrastructure markets from illegal vertical mergers that have far-reaching and damaging effects on future innovations.”

Arm’s technology is powering an ever-growing number of devices, from smartphones to the MacBook Pro 16 (2021), so it’s not too surprising that government agencies want to verify the deal won’t harm the global technology industry.

The FTC points out that not only does NVIDIA make use of Arm technologies in some of its products, but that it would then benefit from the knowledge of some of Arm’s agreements with NVIDIA’s competitors. This would result in a “critical loss of trust in Arm” and its ecosystem. Qualcomm, Microsoft, and Google have all voiced concerns about the deal.

Furthermore, it would give NVIDIA both the incentive and the ability to restrict those competitors from accessing Arm’s technology, stifling market competition and potentially damaging consumers in the process. The complaint names both NVIDIA and Arm’s owner, SoftBank. The trial is scheduled to begin in August 2022.

Given the length of the investigation, it might get a bit tight for NVIDIA to complete the acquisition of Arm. The company said in September last year that the acquisition was scheduled to be completed within 18 months. However, Jensen Huang, NVIDIA CEO, admitted in August that it may take a little bit longer than expected. Arm’s current owner, SoftBank, agreed with NVIDIA that the acquisition should be completed by the end of 2022.

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OnePlus 6 and 6T now receiving November security patches

OnePlus might be slow to update many of its phones to newer versions of Android, but the company still does a (mostly) decent job of keeping the security patches coming. The OnePlus 6 and 6T are three years old at this point, but security updates are still trickling out for both phones, and now the November 2021 patches have arrived.

OxygenOS 11.1.2.2 is now rolling out to the OnePlus 6 and 6T. The changelog only mentions “improved system stability” and the November 2021 security patch level, with seemingly no other changes. This is the first update for both phones since September, when OxygenOS 11.1.1.1 brought the September 2021 patches and various bug fixes.

Credit: cooldeepak

This could end up being the last official update for both the OnePlus 6 and 6T, considering they were only promised two years of Android updates and three years of security patches. Both phones are still plenty powerful for 2021 though, and OnePlus makes it easy to unlock the bootloader and install custom ROMs, so head on over to the forums for each device (linked below) if you’re interested in keeping your OnePlus 6 or 6T up to date.

OnePlus 6 Forums ||| OnePlus 6T Forums

OnePlus is still pushing OxygenOS 11.1.2.2 to the OP6/6T in a staged rollout, but if you don’t want to wait, we have all the links you need (thanks to XDA member some_random_username). As usual with OnePlus phones, you just have to download the correct package from the links below and move it to the root directory of the phone’s internal storage. Then head over to Settings > System > System Update > Local Update and select the downloaded file to begin the installation.

OxygenOS 11.1.2.2 for OnePlus 6T

• Full system package (Global)
• Incremental update from OxygenOS 11.1.1.1

OxygenOS 11.1.2.2 for OnePlus 6

• Full system package (Global)
• Incremental update from OxygenOS 11.1.1.1

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