How Google Can Improve Google Now To Actually Give Us The Right Information

I have been using Google’s relatively new service called Google Now on my Android devices and absolutely love it. It learns about you as a user as you continue to use your phone and makes suggestions for you accordingly. However, for me one of the best features that it offers is the integration with your Google Calendar. Not only does it pop up upcoming events from your calendar in its own list of cards and on its widget but it will give you “Time to leave” notifications. Depending on what you have told it previously is your “Default Transportation Mode” it will alert you when to leave for upcoming calendar entries based on your current GPS location, the distance to the next entry, and the traffic along the way. It will pop up a “Time To Leave” notification on your phone without any alarm set or anything giving you a few minutes lead time to actually get out of wherever you are. It also gives you the option of instantly opening up directions to your next appointment with one simple click of an on-screen button.

Fantastic, right? Yes, yes it is. The only thing is that as a person who drives but often takes public transit I would like the ability to specify for my entries what mode of transportation I will be taking. For example, if I am going to play a round of golf then I know far in advance that I will be driving there. However, if I am going downtown on a busy night when it makes more sense to take transit than it does to drive (or if I plan on having a few drinks) I would like to be able to note that in my Google Calendar and have it reflected in when Google Now tells me to leave and what route it advises I take (if I ask it for directions).

I understand there might be a problem with this in terms of shared calendar entries but I figure there must be a way to work around that. You can already make changes to an event you have been invited to via Google Calendar and the changes will not be reflected on others’ entries so this should be doable. After all, if you look at the Google Now landing page their motto is “The information at just the right time.” In my opinion they can be doing more to ensure that the information actually is the right information.

Time to leave notification screenshot via forums.digitalspy.co.uk