Today, September 27, 2017, I was surprised to discover that on my iPhone, and on other phones with Android OS, it became possible to update . The update of Mobile VK has to be taken for granted, a sharp transition to a new type.
Quick navigation:
A new type of VK mobile application.
At first glance, it’s very interesting, something new! But after a few seconds, when I couldn’t find the “Messages” tab in the menu, I was confused and remembered all these crappy services from mail ru. Of course, VK is no longer Pavel Durov. A wave of indignation swept through my head with slogans like: “Bring back Durov!”...
What's new and good?
But there really is good, no matter what anyone says. After all, everything new is always perceived with hostility.
New menu (More convenient with a larger screen)
All the most important functions moved to the bottom panel, the remaining menu items are now in the lower right corner. With this interface it has really become more convenient and you can get to messages, for example, in 1 click.
Now owners of smartphones with big screen, it will be much more convenient to use the application. Previously, the menu button was at the top and in order to use it you needed a second hand or incredible tricks with one.
Now this very menu is at the bottom and can be easily clicked with your thumb.
Answers "Bell"
Now all the most important things, friends, likes and reposts, are all collected in one point. There are also notification settings there, now you can do fine tuning notifications, for yourself. Leave only what is truly important to you.
Improved search
The new version uses a single input field for search, here you can find a person, group, recordings, videos and music. Search has become more interactive, with an algorithm at the forefront that displays information based on user preferences.
To turn off safe search, you still need to switch in the browser (See).
Less significant changes in the new VC.
As soon as I put the first one, I noticed that it turned red, it immediately reminded me of Instagram. Previously, when pressed, it acquired a darker, blue color. What I immediately liked were the very carefully executed elements under the news, likes, messages, and views. Now they look more harmonious and stylish.
By the way, VKontakte music now has a listening limit, how to get around this innovation (See).
How do you like the innovations?
Now it’s too early to give a definite answer, it takes time and this time may force us to get used to the new design and functionality. Welcome pictures telling about new features are made in a disgusting style, where the simple design is used to it. Now just add a beige background and it will be ala Odnoklassniki...
Surely in the near future there will be a lot of debate, better or worse, but we will have to grab a new update, redesign 2017.
As for the changes, at first glance you can see that the messages function has been moved from the main menu to a separate lower tray icon, WhatsApp recalled. Of course, if we take all the changes, then VK has become more like Facebook and a little like Instagram.
They got a new design where there is no longer a side menu, new section with a recommendation feed, and in the future the company is going to launch a platform for creating longreads within the social network. I spent a day with the new application and talked with company representatives about how everything would work now.
In the web version of the social network, the news feed already had a “Recommendations” section, but its content was not synchronized with the search tab in the application where it works new algorithm. In addition, the content in the tab is visually grouped: photos and videos are tiled, posts with long texts take up more space and stand out.
For about half of the posts, you can immediately tell how they got into the recommendations - mainly because they were liked or commented on by friends. The other half ends up in an unknown way: the algorithm showed me in the top recommendations an unfunny (although seemingly humorous) video of an unknown girl with 43 views and one like, not even from a friend.
The feed also contains many short text entries, and sometimes there are publications of celebrities with verified profiles (for me these were Ruslan Sokolovsky and Ilya Varlamov). Overall, the recommendations leave the impression of a more convenient tool for consuming content than a news feed or video section. Due to the removal of unnecessary interface elements in this case, the content came forward and became more neat. By clicking on the card, you can go to the post itself - the entire familiar interface and a button for quick subscription will be available there.
VKontakte calls its algorithm “Prometheus” (in ancient Greek myths it brought fire to people): when a user’s post is included in recommendations, he receives a flame-shaped tag on his page. This way you can understand where the flow of new comments and likes came from.
But it’s not just Prometheus that works in the recommendations feed, looking for something new and supporting little-known bloggers. There are two more types of selected content: the first - personal recommendations, built on the user’s social graph, and the second - trends common to VKontakte.
Representatives of VKontakte said that Prometheus can search for users similar to others. If a social network knows that the artist Duran is popular among users, it will use data collected about their interests to search for bloggers similar to him.
At the same time, the company promises that it will fight plagiarists who do not produce their own content, but earn popularity by stealing it from others. The algorithm will search for the original and try to show exactly it, and we are talking about all media - text, pictures and videos, explains Sergei Paranko, who is developing the social network’s media platform: “If someone took someone else’s content and began to climb on it, then we will always check - and whether this content was uploaded by someone earlier.”
Cosmetics
At the beginning of September, the leading designer of VKontakte, Pavel Knyazev, announced an imminent redesign of mobile applications. In the current form of the application, only half of what was promised has been implemented: the likes have become red (they look much juicier and are more pleasant to press), the buttons have become rounder, many icons have been redrawn and, most importantly, the application no longer has a side menu - there are only five buttons at the bottom.
Visually, this is unusual: the side menu sections are now located under the fifth button, and music and video have been hidden there: when listening to music, you will have to return to this tab to switch tracks. The design of the audio player is still the same, and in the video section there are still no recommendations that appeared on the desktop back in 2015 - now all recommendations are only in the search tab.
The news feed is very reminiscent of a combination of Facebook and Instagram: on the one hand, there is a variety of “heavy” content, the output of which is controlled by an algorithm. On the other hand, stories and quick access to create them by swiping to the right. But now VKontakte has not one, but two algorithmic feeds in adjacent tabs: news and recommendations.
It sounds difficult, especially since it is fully synchronized with the desktop mobile version does not imply - neither in the methods of work, nor in the visual design. Managing Director of VKontakte Andrey Rogozov explains: the web has long faded into the background, mobile platforms are ahead, and user patterns on them are very different.
Platform for longreads
So far, VKontakte has only the old capabilities for creating posts - writing text posts, taking photos, videos and stories with masks. But by the end of 2017, the social network promises to launch a platform for creating longreads that will be “displayed correctly on all devices.”
Paranko explained that the platform for longreads is essentially an editor for long posts with various attachments, which will allow you to publish complex formats within the social network. Previously, VKontakte publics used wiki markup for this, but it will most likely become a thing of the past - it will not be disabled, but it will not be developed. According to the description, the platform will resemble what already exists on Medium, Facebook and Telegram.
Medium has a catalog of interesting articles, Facebook has a tool for richer text layout, and Telegram has a primitive editor for publishing any large materials with support for fast loading via Instant View. VKontakte says it will support the AMP initiative (this standard is used by Google and Twitter) for faster loading of its materials, including those embedded on external sites.
According to the company’s idea, for the user, reading external materials and those published through the platform should be no different - and the “smart” feed will rank such posts higher than regular links, since the content will load faster for the user. According to VKontakte statistics, within a year of the “smart” feed’s operation, 85% of users switched to it.
How correct the display will be on all devices is still a question. A few years ago, as part of a similar initiative for media, large cards appeared on VKontakte for links to media materials and other external sites - however, the social network application for iPad still does not know how to display them correctly.
Built-in messenger
Back in August 2014, representatives of VKontakte, during a special event, announced plans to release a separate messenger for messaging. These plans were repeated many times by media sources until the end of 2016, until the question “When will VKontakte release a messenger” finally became a meme.
Informally, representatives of the social network have long recognized that the need for a separate messenger has disappeared. Now this is enshrined in the company’s official press releases: it began to separately count the audience of the “built-in VKontakte messenger” - according to the latest data, this is 82 million people per month. 97 million people use the social network every day.
Reading time: 3 minutes.
It’s very easy to update VK on your Android phone. In this case, the procedure is mandatory, because outdated versions may function poorly over time.
You need to update the program on your phone in order to take advantage of all the new functions, because developers are constantly adjusting the site, creating something new and improved for more convenient use.
New version
The new version of the program, which everyone can download to their phone absolutely free, boasts a rewritten code, in addition, the design is completely updated. You can note that the section headings are now blue.
And this is not all the “new things” of the site. At the top of the “news” section, you can use the “Search” and “Recommendations” tabs. You can use the “comments” tab in the “Responses” section. Previously, all this could only be done by swiping the screen on the right side.
User profiles have also expanded; they display all the same information as on the web version. The changes also affected the music listening mode; the audio player now contains song lyrics and album covers.
Update
It is extremely easy to download updates on Android. How to update VK on an Android phone:
- To do this you need to go to standard application all android smartphones – Google Play. This store of programs and applications is the most convenient place to download updates.
- On the top left you need to click on the menu and select the “My Applications” tab.
- Next, you will see which applications are installed on the phone, and at the very top those that require updating will be indicated.
- We look for the VK application among them and click “update”.
- The application will display a notification that it will have access to identification data; you need to click the “accept” button.
- After this, the update will begin downloading.
- The program is updated automatically at this stage.
If you use regular Internet traffic, the application may notify you that the downloaded file size is too large. This is necessary so that the user knows that there may be a delay or overpayment for traffic. It is best to update VK while Wi-Fi is connected, this will save money cash on traffic.
It is possible that there is little space left on your phone. In this case, the application will also display a notification that the update could not be downloaded.
Then you will need to clear space on your phone in order for the update to install. You can delete games, music or photos. Are deleted extra files With internal memory phone, because all applications are installed only here, and not on the SD card.
But even if there is not enough space, try to free it up, because updates are responsible for correct operation applications. The purpose of new versions is not only to come up with innovations, but also to correct errors in old versions. After the application has installed the update, the program can be used again.
Hi all. Did you know that on April 1, 2016, VKontakte released an updated version? Wasn't it an April Fool's joke? Let's figure it out together...
So. Back in April of this year, on the official VKontakte blog, a post was published that VK was introducing a new design. Everything is in the same style, blue and white. But the design itself looks different...
At first, the update was not available to everyone, and was tested for some time so that users could evaluate the innovations, and specialists from the contact, in the meantime, collect necessary information from analytics of what the user does and how to understand how convenient it is new template and site functionality.
After a while, a number of accounts had the opportunity to switch to new version, submitting an application through a special link, which, as stated, appears to the left of the main menu, under the My settings link:
join testing
use the new version of the site as default
The same thing happened on the official VKontakte blog, a special button was available:
It seems simple! Yes, there is only one BUT...
Updating VK to a new version was not available to everyone, but to a limited number of users. That is social network, has opened in advance or periodically opens such an opportunity so that people can join the testing. And in total, this opportunity was available for 1 million accounts. And those who managed to submit an application were able to test it. The rest are promised that it will happen later and for everyone!
That is, it turns out that VK has not yet been completely updated, and BETA TESTING is underway.
Therefore, stay tuned for the final release.
Or maybe you managed to update? Write below in the comments, so why not!
What do people write? (latest changes...)
Meanwhile, there is so much talk around this process that everyone is in a hurry to announce how they updated VK on their computer.
So, some write that the link is available. But others don't succeed. And those who were able to submit an application, again, waited more than 2 weeks for the final decision. In response, an official response comes from the VK support service, and the updated version becomes available.
In general, everything is not so simple yet. Although you may get it quickly, most will have to wait for the final release.
As you can see, some are able to update VK, while others are not! They say it’s true that it’s different for everyone...
What updates await VKontakte?
Let's move on to the social blog. networks, and read the following:
Work on the new design has been carried out over the past year and a half. We carefully studied, thought through and re-created every element. Today we take the next step and move to new level development of the site to make it more modern.
The main principle of the new VKontakte design is that it looks similar and recognizable on all devices. The website is easy for the user to find required section V mobile application, and vice versa.
We increased the screen width and fonts, got rid of unnecessary details and made the site easier to understand. There is additional space for new useful functions. We also updated left menu: shortened the names of items, added icons and moved the most popular sections to the top - News and Messages.
News
The display of each element has been redesigned. Entries in the feed have become more visible. News lists are now in a separate block on the right along with search and comments. It has become easier to turn on the smart news feed - switching to the “Interesting first” mode is located immediately below this block.
Messages
The messages section has been rewritten from scratch. In the updated interface, we placed a list of recent conversations and the current open chat on one screen. Switching between conversations and responding to new messages has become easier. Unread messages are marked with a blue dot, which disappears after reading, and the online status is marked with a green dot.
Notifications
Likes, friend requests, mentions, friends' birthdays, and other events are collected in a new notification section. On the pages of people and communities, you can now subscribe to notifications about new posts so as not to miss important news. When a new event appears, a red indicator will appear next to the “bell” icon in the site header.
Photos
Photos in albums and when viewing all photos have become larger and are displayed in a beautiful magazine layout. The photo viewer is oriented horizontally to better utilize the space of widescreen screens. Comments appear to the right of the photo, so you no longer have to scroll down to view photos and see comments on them at the same time.
Other sections
The changes affected every interface of the site, without exception. The sections telling about VKontakte have also been updated: “About the company”, “Products” and “Work on VKontakte”. We have also resumed own blog. Here the VKontakte team will share news about products and innovations.
Today we are launching a new design in test mode for a limited audience. Gradually it will become available to everyone.
The social network VKontakte announced the release of completely updated mobile and iOS devices. Literally everything has changed in them - both new functions for users and a redesigned user interface. Updated earlier this month.
New for presenters mobile platforms They lost the side navigation menu, which opens by clicking on the hamburger menu. From now on, the so-called tabbar is used - a single panel at the bottom of the screen, which combines the key functionality of the social network. Thus, users can now switch between news, messages, notifications and search with literally one touch.
In addition, the largest VKontakte update for Android and iOS also introduces completely new recommendations and search sections. They include recordings, videos, live broadcasts, stories, communities and personal pages, which may be of interest to the user. These will mainly be aspiring musicians, photographers and writers. The recommendations work is based on the new “Prometheus” algorithm - with the help of it the social network plans to promote high-quality content.
