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Hangouts on Android/iOS now does *voice calls*, GV integration trickling out again

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Alright I finally got the update and have been testing this out.

The fun thing about this is that if you have multiple phone numbers on multiple Google accounts (I have 3 numbers on two primary Google accounts), you can now easily make phone calls from those numbers through the Hangouts dialer. This is extremely handy, at least for me.
 
ponyo said:
Google can't kill Google Voice since so many people rely on it. Google Voice number is my business number and I've given that number out to everyone. Killing it now would piss off large group of people. I would be willing to pay small monthly/yearly fee to keep it as it's that important to me.
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you must be a super professional business
 
cronos said:
The fun thing about this is that if you have multiple phone numbers on multiple Google accounts (I have 3 numbers on two primary Google accounts), you can now easily make phone calls from those numbers through the Hangouts dialer. This is extremely handy, at least for me.
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Wait... does this mean you can finally get texts/voice mails from two GV accounts on one device!?
 
ponyo said:
Google can't kill Google Voice since so many people rely on it. Google Voice number is my business number and I've given that number out to everyone. Killing it now would piss off large group of people. I would be willing to pay small monthly/yearly fee to keep it as it's that important to me.
Click to expand...

Gooberlx2 said:
So would I. If that ever happens, however, they better start supporting MMS properly, across all carriers; and registering the numbers in such a way that all my two-factor auth services can properly send SMS. For example, Facebook and my bank can't/won't SMS to my GV number for whatever reason.
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I think they've been saying for a long time now (likely to get the point across to people to not depend on Voice) that they will be dropping it and integrating it's main features into Hangouts. They're consolidating their stuff and Hangouts is going to be the focus of it going forward.

I'll have to see if I can find it, but I'm almost completely sure that just earlier this year Google themselves posted somewhere on their official pages that the Google Voice team was being integrated into Hangouts and that Voice would eventually be dropped and Hangouts would become the sole focus. They said the integration with Hangouts would begin later this year. They've already killed off the SMS standalone I believe and Voice is next.

So they're not killing off the features (although no guarantee it will work as you've come to expect...), and you'll be able to move your number to Hangouts, but Voice will likely be dropped (when, who knows, I'd guess it'll take them a while unless they really try to push people to Hangouts).

I believe they also have some transfer options so you can keep your number but no longer be tied to Google.
 
s44 said:
Wait... does this mean you can finally get texts/voice mails from two GV accounts on one device!?
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I have not gotten the 'blue conversion box' (migrate google voice to hangouts) yet so I couldn't test this myself, but technically, yes!

Anyway, I dug around the settings and found the 'ring phone when incoming voice call' checkbox that is unchecked by default, so when this box is checked this means a huge YES to my question above! I am confirming that now you can both make outgoing calls and receive incoming calls on your GV number, 100% over data connection. This also allows you to receive and make calls using multiple GV numbers, by adding multiple Google accounts to your phone.

I really like the new interface, too. It's slick! :wub:

Some clarification:
I'm still not sure what the 'hangouts dialer' is and why it was rolled out this way. It's a stand alone app but it was just adding a dialer tab to the Hangouts app. After you installed it, you simply just fire up the Hangouts app and there's a dialer tab right there, you don't have to actually fire the dialer app to dial out.

Be aware that if you have 'ring hangouts for incoming GV call' box checked and also have your GV sets to forward calls to your actual (SIM card) number, then both your phone and Hangouts will ring when someone calls your GV number. This is the standard behavior similar to when you have an app like GrooVeIP or the like, so some people may choose to just turn off forwarding and always receive their calls over data than through the cellular network (or vice versa). I personally would like the option to automate so it would ring the phone through forwarding by default, but ring Hangouts if there's no/weak cellular signal (but there's WiFi).
 
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Tried manually downloading the apk for hangouts, but was having some issues so reverted, now waiting for the rollout to kick in for me.

One thing I noticed is that the Hangouts dialer did not do T9 search. If I started typing numbers it would search based on numbers, but I tried "mom" for instance and it wouldn't find her.
 
Red Storm said:
One thing I noticed is that the Hangouts dialer did not do T9 search. If I started typing numbers it would search based on numbers, but I tried "mom" for instance and it wouldn't find her.
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Good catch. The work around is to tap on the empty name/number field first, and then your keyboard will pop up and you can enter name or number as usual. It's only an extra tap, but they should have made it work with the default dialer tab. It's a pretty standard feature and expected of all dialers at this point.
 
iOS app updated - looks much better but I don't like the B&W theme. Also, noticed my calls to the Dominican Republic are now 9 cents a minute instead of 11. Can't complain there. 🙂
 
Totally agree with cronos. Google should really decouple G+ with their services for those who do not want it.
 
Wooo-hoo! Of course now Verizon will really want to try and kill my wife's unlimited data plan. She's on the old X number of minutes and Y number of texts.

We've been using GroupMe for messaging since I'm on a company phone and don't really have a data cap to worry about. So this voice thing is even better!
 
Alright....

The Good: Wifi / Data incoming & Outgoing calls.

The Bad: You can't set the Hangouts Dialer as the Default or as an option to callout when selecting a number in another place. (Yet?)

So looking up something on Google Maps and going to call the number..... You have to copy and paste it.... Lame. Hopefully this will get added. This was a feature in Talkatone and GrooveIP.

No easy way to turn off call forwarding to your Cell number. Not difficult but cumbersome.

It would be nice to have an option to automatically switch on forwarding to your phone number when on E data and disable phone forwarding when on 3G/4G/Wifi.... <-- Really need this!

The Ugly: Have to run 3 apps. LOL!

Hopefully the Hangouts Dialer will be added to the Dialer. I heard a rumor that will be a feature in the next version of Android?

Need Google Voice app installed so I can install the Toggle Widget to disable and enable phone number call forwarding.

Then Hangouts then Hangouts Dialer...... However I'm sure in time things will get more merged.

Still sounds like I will have to have 3 apps installed for quite some time but eh. At least things are finally improving....

Obihai just announced that Google has added Official Support. Which is awesome too.
 
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Gooberlx2 said:
So would I. If that ever happens, however, they better start supporting MMS properly, across all carriers; and registering the numbers in such a way that all my two-factor auth services can properly send SMS. For example, Facebook and my bank can't/won't SMS to my GV number for whatever reason.
Click to expand...

Facebook does now. 🙂

However I think some places like RedBox still aren't working yet....
 
Tmobile $30 100 min 5gb prepaid plan just became lot more attractive . Once my AT&T contract end I'll probably switch to that and just use Hangout for VOIP calls.
 
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