Google Now has arrived in Chrome Canary, the experimental version of Google’s desktop browser. While it’s been possible to enable the feature since April last year, this is the first time that it’s been possible to actually receive cards in the Notification Center.
As reported by the Google Operating System blog, users can access Google’s personal assistant by enabling the correct flag (chrome://flags/#enable-google-now) and then relaunching the browser. A notification card then
appears to signal that Google Now has been successfully integrated with the Notification Center in the Mac menu bar or Windows system tray.
A support page shows that Google Now on the desktop will support weather, sport scores, current traffic for commuting and event reminder cards. Many Google Now card types are missing – public alerts, nearby photo spots, activity summaries and stocks, to name but a few – but we expect Google will make these available in future Chrome Canary browser updates. Google says:
“Google Now on Chrome shows a subset of the Now cards you see on your mobile device, which uses your device’s location.
You can edit your location settings (Location Reporting and Location History) on your Android or iOS device at any time.”
Ever since the Notification Center was first spotted in Chromium – almost a year ago by Chromium evangelist François Beaufort – we’ve been expecting the arrival of Google Now on the desktop versions of Google Chrome.
The 💜 of EU tech
The latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!
We expect it’ll be some time before the service is released in the official Chrome browser, or communicated officially to any of its users, but this is a huge milestone in the evolution of Google Now.
Get the TNW newsletter
Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.