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The Chrome OS Beta Channel, the last step before a new build of the platform arrives to the masses, has been updated with its fourth Chrome 68 based build today.  Build 68.0.3440.59 (Platform version: 10718.50.0) is in the process of rolling out to the majority of devices registered in the channel and should be available today.  As always, you can check for the new update manually by typing chrome://help in the browser bar and then clicking the Check for update button.

This fourth update comes two full weeks after the previous update, a unusually long period of time during the beta cycles.  Most of the time in the Chrome OS Beta Channel, there is an update every 7-10 days.  The delay however could simply be because of the United States Independence holiday which was last week.

Google Clips, the autonomous AI-driven camera from the Mountain View company, has a new update rolling out for the Android app that supports it.  It brings a new timelapse feature to the camera as well as other improvements to things like recognizing facial expressions.  The new build is version 1.6.2026903322 for those keeping score at home.

The big new feature in the app is timelapse support.  Now you can setup your Google Clips camera in this mode and it will capture a continuous stream of everything that the camera sees.  It will then condense it into a fast-forwarded timelapse which you can then save to your Google Photos account.  While it goes somewhat against the grain of what Google intended Clips to be – a spontaneous event capturing camera with your family, kids and pets – this new timelapse feature should give you a quick and easy way to capture things like sunrises and sunsets.

Yesterday, Google announced that a Morse Code keyboard was coming to the Gboard app for iOS while improvements to the keyboard were made to the Android version.  The idea behind the keyboard came from Tania Finlayson, a developer who also has cerebral palsy.  The disease essentially left her with the ability to only answer yes or no questions which is why she worked with Google to develop the keyboard.  When Tania learned Morse in her youth, it greatly expanded her vocabulary and ability to communicate.  You can read more about her and her development efforts in the blog post from yesterday.

After the post was made by Google, I had a few friends and some of you readers email me asking a pretty simple question:  “How do I turn on the Morse Code keyboard in Gboard?”  It’s a fair question because it isn’t exactly intuitive and, to be honest, took me a few minutes on how to remember how to do this with any keyboard, let alone the Morse Code one.  In this How To, I’ll show you how to enable it so you have a reference for it.

Based on a new Chrome OS commit in the Chromium Gerrit, and further support from Chrome OS evangelist François Beaufort, Android App Shortcut support is coming to the platform and likely soon.  The commit points to right-click support for Android apps in the platform to allow for users to access the app shortcuts for apps that support the feature.

For those who may not know, Android app shortcuts allow you to get to a quick action within an app simply by long tapping it on your Android phone or tablet.  The feature became available in Android Nougat 7.1 but really didn’t start to gain traction until Oreo was released last year.