Summary of Google Workspace 2023 improvements (Part 3)

In this final post on the 2023 improvements to Google Workspace in 2023, let’s look at the AI and coding side of things.

Duet AI

Google weren’t content with just bringing out Bard to compete in the AI ‘arms race’ last year, they also brought out Duet AI. This uses AI right across Google Cloud. It looks amazing and is full of potential, the only thing is that it’s behind a paywall. Below are some examples of its use.

Create original images from text within Google Slides

You can write a description of a picture in Slides and Duet AI will create a picture of it. Saves you hunting for a picture that matches that description.

Write emails, documents using Duet AI in Google Docs and Gmail

Write a few notes, and Duet AI can write an email or document for you. It can also expand on it or shorten it. In Docs you can also change the tone of a text, summarize it, or simplify it in bullet points.

Enhance your writing in Google Docs with Proofread

Get Duet AI to proofread your texts, which goes beyond a simple spellchecker.

Turn ideas into action using Google Sheets

Type in your idea with a few details and Duet AI will things like a plan, schedule, budget with some sample text which can then be edited.

Other examples:

-Create a deck of slides based on a prompt, where Duet searches your Drive for files which refer to the prompt, and comes back with a deck based on what it finds.

-Provide live meetings summaries for those in a Meet, including catch up summaries for those arriving late to meetings, and can tell you what’s been said so far. It also includes video snippets, and automatic translations.

You can see the Keynote here on YouTube, and the Duet/Workspace part is between 1h 12m and 1h 20m. They also showed Duet’s capabilities in Google Cloud with code generation, refactoring code and converting old code to modern code.

AppSheet

Licences

It’s never been easier to make apps without coding knowledge, and AppSheet is available freely to most Workspace accounts. It has been added free-of-charge to these editions — Business: Starter, Standard, Plus, Enterprise: Starter, Standard, Frontline: Started, Standard, Non-Profits, and Education Standard. More info here.

Visual editing

They made editing your app easier by doing some of those edits in the visual preview of your app.

Apps Script

Revision history

You can now save the history of your scripts, allowing you to go back to different versions of them. More info here.

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More improvements in part 1 and part 2. Let’s see what 2024 has in store for us!