Google hopes to help you out with your travel plans with new app updates

Google is making it easier for you to work out your last-minute travel plans this holiday season with an update coming to its suite of travel-related apps and services. First up is Google Flights. It makes use of its machine learning capabilities to let you know when is the best time to book a flight. When you select where you want to go, you can opt to have the apt let you know things like “price won’t drop further” or “prices are less than normal.” Now, if you want to search hotels, you can get similar information. Google will let you know if a room costs higher or if the surrounding area is busy because of a local event. You can even get the option to receive email alerts for when price fluctuates. Lastly, the Google Trips app, now has a new Discounts section. This’ll show you deals on everything from tickets, attractions, tours, and activities in the areas you plan to visit. The flight and hotel price tracking is rolling out worldwide, while the Discounts tab is coming to Trips app in English, French, Italian, Portuguese, German, and Spanish.

Source: Android Authority

Quick holiday tips from Waze

‘Tis the season for gift shopping and giving, all kinds of festivities, and traffic, tons of it. Waze has a couple of tips to help you avoid the extra stress the season brings. According to the traffic and navigation app, the busiest time and day for Canadian roads across the country last year was December 22 between three and five in the afternoon. For those in smaller metros like Collingwood, Ontario and Canmore, Alberta, they see a significant rise in traffic this time of the year with double the number of Waze users on the road.

Now, if you want to get yourself in the spirit of the season, Waze and Spotify has some interesting nuggets to share about this. The most requested song unsurprisingly is Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You. But the three other extremely popular tracks are It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas by Michael Bublé, What Child Is This by Lindsey Stirling, and Noel – Live by Chris Tomlin.

Holiday tech gifts for everyone on your list

Are you ready for Christmas? It's officially crunch time now with almost a week left of holiday shopping. It's probably too late to get in any online shopping without paying a premium in shipping, so I guess I'll see you at the mall? But you're still stuck on what to get? Don't panic. It's last minute but if you're like me, some of the best ideas come to mind when I'm under stress. So, here are some last minute tech gift ideas for everyone on your list! 

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BlackBerry ends support for Priv

Keeping in line with the company’s two-year support policy, BlackBerry is ending its support for the Priv. This means the monthly security updates will stop rolling in, except for “critical” vulnerabilities that might need work. The Canadian company also said they will soon be unveiling a trade-up program for existing BlackBerry Priv users and those with BB10 and BBOS devices. The program will include discounts and incentives to purchase a new Keyone or Motion.

According to BlackBerry, support for BB10 and BBOS devices will continue on for at least two years. However, some “ancillary services” will be shut down soon including BlackBerry World app store (December 31, 2019), BlackBerry Travel site (February 2018), and Playbook video calling services (March 2018).

Source: GSMArena