Ready to meet the holiday rush with GFiber at Charlotte’s The Market at 7th Street

Tucked in between a picturesque skyline and modern architecture sits a Market brimming with ingenuity, ambition and dream making.

Billed as North Carolina’s first food hall, The Market at 7th Street opened in Charlotte in 2011. Since its inception, the nonprofit Market has hosted more than 40 small businesses, acting as a non-profit incubator, helping local entrepreneurs and minority businesses realize their vision in an inclusive and supportive environment. To help small business owners reach their full potential, GFiber supplied the building with internet. 

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“Our business relies on it. If we’re going to accept business via card, we need to be hooked up to a reliable internet system and Google Fiber does not fail us at all. I wouldn’t change it for anything,” says Janelle Doyle, owner of It’s Poppin Kettle Corn, a Market staple.


Doyle started her business in The Market in 2017. Since then, her kettle corn business went from a handful of flavors to a finger-licking 60, including customer favorites like cheesy caramel, fried chicken and cookies and cream. She says the role GFiber plays in her day-to-day life is even more pivotal during the holiday season when people’s appetites increase.

“The fact that GFiber is so reliable, it really does help us maintain a good customer relationship,” she says. “It’s essential to my livelihood. It’s one less thing I have to worry about. It’s quick, it’s fast and I haven’t had any problems with it at all. It’s reliable and dependable. GFiber checks all the boxes.”


About 20 feet away you’ll find Josh Villapando. The first-generation Filipino American has an eye for elegance and a taste tailored for it. His comprehensive and curated wine selection (along with vintage toys dating back to the 1940s) has operated at The Market since 2012.

“I remember seeing it advertised to greater Charlotte, and I could not wait. Sure enough, Google Fiber set up across the street. It was night and day, not just for us to run faster, but more efficiently and more reliably,” he says.


Similar to Doyle, the holiday season is big business for Villapando. He makes more than 50% of his revenue during this time, so the importance of fast and reliable internet is paramount.

“I don’t know how we could live without it. It’s essential,” he says. “I consult and give advice to other small business owners. I tell them, ‘You need a strong accountant, a very strong lawyer, a paper shredder and you definitely need super-fast and reliable internet service.’”

Posted by Jess George, Head of Government & Community Affairs Manager, East Region



Google Workspace Updates Weekly Recap – November 29, 2024

2 New updates

Unless otherwise indicated, the features below are available to all Google Workspace customers, and are fully launched or in the process of rolling out. Rollouts should take no more than 15 business days to complete if launching to both Rapid and Scheduled Release at the same time. If not, each stage of rollout should take no more than 15 business days to complete.


Drag and drop contacts in the addressee fields when composing an email on your Android device 
When writing an email in the Gmail app on your Android device, you can now drag and drop contacts in the addressee fields. This makes it easier for you to move an email address between the "to," "cc," and “bcc” fields. | Rollout to Rapid Release domains and Scheduled Release domains is complete. | Available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts.
Drag and drop contacts in the addressee fields when composing an email on your Android device

Expanding row limits in Connected Sheets for Looker 
Earlier this year, we increased the maximum number of rows of results returned from BigQuery to 100,000 for pivot tables. This week, we’re expanding this to Connected Sheets for Looker by increasing the maximum number of rows of results returned from Looker to 100,000 for pivot tables. With this update, users can analyze even more results in Sheets from the petabytes of data in Looker. | Rolling out to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains now. | Available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about Connected Sheets for Looker.


Previous announcements

The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.


The Gemini mobile app is now available for Google Workspace users
The Gemini mobile app for Android and iOS devices is now available for Google Workspace users accessing Gemini as a core service. | Learn more about the Gemini mobile app.

Introducing huddles: instant-on, audio-first meetings in Google Chat
In continuing our effort to make Google Chat your home for team collaboration, we’re excited to introduce a fast and flexible way to connect: huddles. Powered by Google Meet, huddles let you start an audio-first meeting, making real-time collaboration easier than ever. Once the huddle has started, you can resize or drag the window, add video, or share your screen for a fuller meeting experience while multitasking in Chat. | Learn more about huddles in Chat.



Introducing huddles: instant-on, audio-first meetings in Google Chat

What’s changing

In continuing our effort to make Google Chat your home for team collaboration, we’re excited to introduce a fast and flexible way to connect: huddles. 

Powered by Google Meet, huddles let you start an audio-first meeting, making real-time collaboration easier than ever. Once the huddle has started, you can resize or drag the window, add video, or share your screen for a fuller meeting experience while multitasking in Chat. 

Huddles provide a seamless collaboration experience across Chat and Meet, and can be useful in a variety of scenarios, such as two colleagues syncing quickly to discuss a project they’ve been messaging about in their Chat stream. 
starting a huddle in google chat

Who’s impacted 

End users 


Why you’d use it 

Huddles help to reduce meeting fatigue for hybrid workers, and eliminates the need for lengthy discussions over email or in Chat. Instead of jumping out of the conversation and into a meeting, huddles integrates directly and smoothly into the Chat experience. The format of huddles also supports multi-tasking while in Chat as you can easily resize or share your screen. 


Additional details

The Meet video button that’s currently in the compose bar of Chat is moving to the Chat header, giving you multiple options such as the ability to call, start a huddle, or share a Meet link through a single entry point. 


Getting started 

  • Admins: If Meet is turned OFF for users in your domain, they will not be able to create Huddles, but they can join Huddles. Visit the Help Center to learn more about turning on Meet meetings and calls for your organization. 
  • End users:
    • Huddles are available in direct messages, group messages and spaces. 
    • To start a huddle in Chat, click the Video icon in the top right corner of your chat message > select Start a huddle. 
      • Huddles start audio only as default but you can turn video on at any moment. 
    • When you’re requested to join a huddle, you will see a chat chip in your message thread that says [user] has started a huddle, click “Join” to enter the huddle. You will also see the huddles toggle in the Chat header for that conversation. 
    • Visit the Help Center to learn more about huddles in Google Chat. 

Rollout pace 

  • Rapid Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 27, 2024, with expected completion by December 20, 2025 
  • Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on January 6, 2025 

Availability 


Available for Google Workspace: 
  • Business Starter, Standard, and Plus 
  • Enterprise Starter, Standard, and Plus 
  • Frontline Starter and Standard 
  • Essentials, Enterprise Essentials, and Enterprise Essentials Plus 
  • Nonprofits 

Resources 

Improved support for service accounts in the Google Ads API

Google Ads has rolled out a new feature that allows Google Ads account administrators to grant access to a service account. Once the access has been granted, you can use the service account credentials to make API calls to that Google Ads account and other accounts in that hierarchy, if applicable. Refer to the service account guide to learn more about this option.

This new approach simplifies the Google Ads API authentication process in two important ways:

  1. If your application works entirely offline without any user interaction, then you no longer need to generate a refresh token. This means you can also avoid other steps such as configuring an OAuth consent screen and performing OAuth App verification.
  2. The new service account flow doesn’t require you to be a Google Workspace user or configure the service account for domain-wide impersonation.

We hope this simplifies your experience when working with the Google Ads API.

How to get help

If you have any questions or need help, check out the Google Ads API support page for options.

 - , Google Ads API Team

The Gemini mobile app is now available for Google Workspace users

What’s changing

Beginning today, the Gemini mobile app for Android and iOS devices is now available for Google Workspace users accessing Gemini as a core service. With the Gemini mobile app, users will be able to do research or find quick answers while on the go. They can also leverage the camera of the phone to take pictures of handwritten notes and export them into Google Docs or Gmail, or create presentation-ready visualizations of a chart that was drawn on a whiteboard; All of this comes with the enterprise data protections Google Workspace customers are accustomed to. 

As part of this roll out, we’re also extending access to the Gemini mobile app for all Education users, both as a core service with a qualifying edition and as an additional service.


Access the Gemini mobile app on Android and iOS



Additional details

  • Refer to this article in our Help Center, Gemini mobile app availability, for a list of supported languages, countries, and age requirements for the Gemini mobile app.
  • Currently, some Gemini app features available on the web aren’t available to Google Workspace users in the mobile app. This includes Workspace extensions, file upload, and Gems. Refer to this article in our Help Center for more details: Use Gemini Apps with a work or school Google Account.
  • Currently, the Gemini app on Android does not support Work Profile.
  • The Google mobile app on iOS, which includes Gemini, will not support authenticating with your Google Workspace account. iOS users hoping to authenticate with their Google Workspace account must install the Gemini mobile app.
  • There is no impact to Google Workspace users accessing the Gemini app as an additional service. These users will continue to be able to access the Gemini mobile app.

Getting started

Rollout pace


Availability

Available for Google Workspace:
  • Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus
  • Enterprise Starter, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus
  • Frontline Starter, Frontline Standard
  • Essentials, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Essentials Plus
  • Google Workspace for Nonprofits edition
  • Education Fundamentals, Education Standard, Education Plus 

Also available for Google Workspace customers with these add-ons:
  • Gemini Business
  • Gemini Enterprise
  • Gemini Education
  • Gemini Education Premium

Resources