Google’s Cloud Messaging service promises to cut down on developer data use, battery drain

At Google’s I/O conference today, Google unveiled Cloud Messaging, a developer service aimed at improving app performance and decreasing data consumption.

With the move, Google is phasing out the nearly-identical Android Cloud to Device Messaging framework. The new service will be free to developers.

Google says that Cloud Messaging will allow developers tell their apps that there’s new data to be fetched from a server, without fetching the actual data.

In one example, a messaging app can tell a user that she has new messages, which the user can retrieve manually. This cuts down on data transfers and battery drain while still leaving users’ app information up to date.

Cloud Messaging is one of a number of Google developer services Google announced today. Alongside Cloud Messaging, Google also unveiled Smart App Updates, a feature that allows updates to copy over only the new data in an app, instead of re-downloading the entire thing. This not only saves people’s time, but lets them cut down on data costs as well.

Expect lots of developers to implement both new services in future updates.