Cloud Covered: What was new in March on Google Cloud
Spring brings new growth and possibilities, and with COVID-19 vaccinations underway, this spring feels even more hopeful than usual. In the spirit of spring, the most popular Google Cloud blog posts from last month focused on the new: features, resources, innovations and awards. Here’s our recap.
Our popular cheat sheet helps you learn Google Cloud technologies in four words or less.
Back by popular demand, our developer’s cheat sheet summarizes Google Cloud products, each in four words or less, for a quick, handy reference. You can print the cheat sheet and post it by your desk, or make it your desktop wallpaper. If you see a product that piques your interest, learn more about it on our GitHub page. Or check out a couple of other resources mentioned in the same blog: GCP Sketchnotes describe each Google Cloud product in a format that combines art and technology. The video series Cloud Bytes summarizes individual Google Cloud products in less than two minutes.
Google Workspace showed off new features.
A mantra that captures the last year of work might be “flexibility in the face of change.” Last month we announced new features in Google Workspace that will help in all the ways work gets done in an ever-changing world. Many features will contribute to what we call collaboration equity, or the ability to contribute equally, regardless of location, role, experience level, language or device preference. We also launched a new offering, Google Workspace Frontline, to open up safe and secure communication and collaboration channels between frontline workers and corporate teams. Finally, we shared that Google Assistant can now be used with Google Workspace for tasks like joining a meeting or sending a message.
Users can now include carbon emissions in their app’s location choice.
We recently set a new sustainability goal: running our business on carbon-free energy 24/7, everywhere, by 2030. Decarbonizing our data center electricity supply is the critical next step in realizing that carbon-free future and providing Google Cloud customers with the cleanest cloud in the industry. Last month, we were excited to share news about our new Carbon Free Energy Percentage (CFE%), which will help our customers select Google Cloud regions based on the carbon-free energy supplying them. This way, our customers can incorporate carbon emissions into decisions on where to locate their services across our infrastructure.
Undersea cables connect the world.
Speaking of infrastructure, Google works hard to build technologies that connect people, geographies and businesses. Last month, we announced our new investment in Echo, a subsea cable that will run from California to Singapore, with a stopover in Guam, with plans to also land in Indonesia. Additional landings are possible in the future. Echo will be the first-ever cable to connect the U.S. to Singapore with direct fiber pairs over an express route. It will help users connect even faster to applications running in Google Cloud regions in the area, home to some of the world’s most vibrant financial and technology centers.
Google Cloud rode the Forrester Wave of recognition.
Google was named a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Cloud Data Warehouse, Q1 2021 report. Using feedback from our customers as one of their inputs, Forrester measured and scored BigQuery, our cloud data warehouse for analyzing lots of data quickly, and gave it a 5 out of 5 across 19 different criteria. Forrester said, “Customers like Google’s frequency of data warehouse releases, business value, future proof architecture, high-end scale, geospatial capabilities, strong AI/ML capabilities, good security capabilities, and broad analytical use cases.”
That’s a wrap for March! Stay tuned to the Google Cloud blog for all things cloud.
