Updated Pushbullet improves notifications, supports Tasker events

File- and notification-pushing Android app Pushbullet fired its big guns again as the app’s updated version now provides richer desktop notifications and Tasker event plugin support.

According to the Pushbullet blog, the full images of notifications on your Android device are now displayed on your desktop. This means that, with just one look, you can instantly know who sent an email or a text message.  A preview of the message is also shown in the notification.

The post also mentions that Pushbullet can now display the album art of a song currently playing on your Android device.

Improved power efficiency

Pushbullet forwards notifications from your Android device to your desktop through the app’s Notification Mirroring Service, which, according to the same blog post, has been optimized for performance and power consumption. The improvements will reportedly make the service run faster and use less memory, resulting in a more efficient battery use.

Tasker Events support

Pushbullet also now supports Tasker event plugins, a new feature as of Tasker version 4.3. Pushbullet already supported sending Pushbullet notifications through Tasker. The latest version of Pushbullet, however, added support for triggers. This means that you can push a notification from your desktop to phone, for example, and have Tasker react to that. This feature practically opens up many different possibilities for automating your Android device using both Tasker and Pushbullet.

And, while not many people will be as eager to play around with a Pushbullet+Tasker toy, most people will find Pushbullet’s core functions still useful for “pushing” notes, files, images, URLs, addresses, and others to your desktop from your phone — or vice versa — plus the convenience of not having to pick up your Android device just to know why it’s beeping or ringing.

Do you use Pushbullet? Or do you prefer other file-sharing Android apps or remote desktop apps? What do you use Pushbullet for? Have you tried using Tasker with Pushbullet — and for what purpose? Let us know in the comments.

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AutoCast brings the power of Tasker to Chromecast: multi-tasking, voice control and more

Ever since Google released its official SDK for the Chromecast we’ve seen a major increase in the number of apps that support the media streamer, and in turn the Chromecast’s functionality has greatly improved.

Think your Chromecast is already more than impressive? AutoCast takes your casting experience to a whole new level and puts just about every other app to shame! AutoCast is by the same developer as the impressive Tasker plugin, AutoPebble and largely works the same way.

With AutoCast, you can can not only cast video, audio and images from sources such as Dropbox, VIMEO and other locations, but you can also receive notifications from your smartphone directly over to your Chromecast’s screen. There’s even the ability to cast multiple different types of content at once — such as showing off a slideshow while playing music.

Equally impressive, AutoCast allows you to control the entire experience using your own voice, giving you the ability to fastforward and rewind content, do Youtube searches and so much more.

Out of the box, Chromecast might not offer nearly as much functionality as Roku, Apple TV and the new Fire TV, but efforts like AutoCast illustrate just how flexible the Chromecast can be. It’s hard not to be impressed when you consider that the Chromecast is less than half the price of its biggest competitors.

To check out AutoCast for yourself, you’ll want to give the fry app a try. Keep in mind, the free version only works with select content and is designed to give you a better idea of what to expect before buying the premium version. Thankfully, the paid app is very affordable, and can be unlocked for just $1.37.

What do you think of AutoCast, impressed? Anyone try it out yet, if so, what do you think so far?

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