Google unveils “smart-reply” feature for Gmail
Today Google has unveiled a new feature for Inbox by Gmail which allows incoming emails to be replied automatically. Google will be using it machine learning and data mining techniques and offer a best guess email response in a feature being dubbed as "smart-reply".
It must be clarified that the smart reply is created on the fly by Google and this is not an auto-reply feature where static responses can be configured (e.g. a vacation auto-reply message for all incoming work emails). This auto-reply feature is already provided by most email clients and services.
Smart-reply feature analyses the incoming email and suggests upto 3 reply messages to respond with. Google says that for emails that require small and quick responses, this feature will "save precious time spent typing." For any emails that requires a longer and more detail response, this feature will provide an important head start with the email response. Machine learning will be used to generate these responses in natural language. For those who are more interested in getting into the technical details of what magic work happens behind the scene, they can visit the Google Research Blog.
Google promises that these suggested responses will get better as people choose these suggested responses to respond to their incoming emails. Smart-reply is safe for work according to Google.
Smart Reply will be released later this week on Android Play Store and Apple's App store.
Google's Inbox application can be accessed here.