Google wants to boost productivity in G Suite apps with machine learning-powered features. In Google Drive, this is through a new “Priority” homepage that surfaces your most relevant documents, and customizable “Workspaces.” After beta and enterprise launches this past year, it will be available for all G Suite editions in the coming days.
On the web, “Priority” appears first in the navigation drawer over “My Files” or shared drives, but has to be manually set by users to become the default homepage. At the top of this new section is a scrollable carousel that shows items that were recently commented on, edited, or have share requests.
Each item is represented as a card that provides a preview and notes what is expected of you. Inline buttons allow you to quickly take action to see the full thread or open sharing preferences. Compared to the traditional user-organized folder and document view, Google wants its smarts and organization to save time on browsing and searching.
“Workspaces” are next, with Drive automatically grouping together files that you often open in tandem. ML is leveraged to intelligently list related documents, like files for weekly meetings and active projects. Google will suggest Workspaces, with users able to manually add files by right-clicking to access “Add to Workspace.” You can also easily create your own groupings.
Priority becomes the first tab on Android and iOS, with carousels for that feed and Workspaces at the top. Back in March, the ML-powered feature exited beta for G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise customers. Google announced Priority and Workspaces at Cloud Next 2018 last July.
It’s now rolling out to the other three G Suite editions — Education, Enterprise for Education, and Nonprofits — that were initially excluded in March. The full rollout for web started yesterday and should be complete by the end of this week. It will be on by default for all accounts.