Duplex, Android P and Assistant: Everything important from Google I/O

Microsoft Build 2018 started yesterday and is still ongoing, but now Google is competing for your future attention with its own annual Google I/O developers conference. Unlike the hardware-centric announcements of last October, I/O focuses mostly on software and how to to get the most out of those devices.

Before the conference started, Google announced it had rebranded its Google Research as Google AI. That should give you some idea of its overall direction. It also announced the official version of its embedded smart operating system, Android Things 1.0.

CEO Sundar Pichai kicked things off by discussing how AI helps everyone, especially improving health care diagnoses and predictions and accessibility.

Google Assistant

Google's competitor to Amazon Echo is now two years old; even younger if you start counting from when the first hardware product, Google Home, became available. This year, it gets a slew of new capabilities, a lot of them coming this summer:

And now Google Assistant gets native controls for ovens, coffee makers and a whole host of smart home products.

Android P

Google released the developer preview of Android P in March, but a lot can change in a few months. Today we saw the official update of Android P, along with some new features:

To help drive machine-learning use in applications, Google rolled out ML Kit. You can install the beta right now. And not just on Google's phones, but on the others, too.