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Google Voice is the best thing to happen to phones since they went wireless. But Google itself, ever the overbearing parent, decided to break its little miracle for us savvy enough to own WebOS devices. Yet despite the tragic death of Gdial Pro, and the anguished cries of users on Precentral, there is still a way to use Google Voice (GV) with almost the convenience of an app.
The important thing to remember is that when somebody sends a text message to your GV number, you can simply reply to it like any other text message and it will come from your GV number. Of course when they call you, all you have to do is answer it. So this means that the only problem is initiating conversation. All Gdial Pro did was give you an on-device interface to initiate those conversations. You can accomplish the same thing with the GV web app.
Remember that epic battle between the tyrannical dictator of Apple and the rebel Google over the GV app on iPhone? Lord Jobs ultimately won that battle but Google created a web app instead that functions pretty much the same way the app would have. That web app works the same way on the Pre. All you have to do is load up the web browser, navigate to http://www.google.com/voice, then click the application menu in the top left, tap “Page” then “Add to Launcher.” Once you do that, it will pop up a box where you type in what you want to name it and tap the “Add to Launcher” button and voila, Google Voice app in your launcher. Use this to initiate conversations and you can use your GV number the same way you did before.
This is not as easy as typing a contact name in Universal Search and tapping the SMS button, but it functions precisely the same way as Gdial Pro did. Sure it doesn’t have all the features of Gdial Pro, nor the integration into other areas of WebOS, but it will get the job done and allow you to use your GV number as your primary number.
So no more crying kids, the candy may not be as sweet but the shop has not closed.
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