Email has taken over our lives, and most of us hate it. But a new generation of email apps are changing how we interact with the inbox, and on Monday Facebook might even join the party. The inbox of the future is going to look a lot more like Facebook than the one you’re using today—but it’s also going to do a lot more. Thanks to these apps, you’ll learn to love your email again.
Here are four ways your inbox is changing, with some of the services that are making it better: → Read More
Yesterday, we posted about horrible latency issues many Gmail users have been experiencing over the past couple of weeks. When I reached out to Google about the issue a few days ago, they told me that they weren’t aware of anything wrong, but would look into it. Well, those of us who noticed it aren’t crazy. Sure enough, there was an issue, and Google says they have now fixed it.
Google reached out to us today with the following statement: → Read More
Something is rotten in the state of Gmail. At least for some of us.
I thought it was maybe just me when I tweeted a couple days ago about awful Gmail performance recently. But it’s not just me. Dozens of people responded to me about that tweet. I tweeted about it again earlier today and dozens of other people responded. Some quick Twitter searches reveals many others noticing the same thing: sometime in the past couple of weeks, something has happened that has made Gmail almost unbearably slow.
It seems to be particularly bad when I first start up Gmail in the morning. Then it often gets better. Then it gets worse again. A number of people I’ve spoken with have noticed the exact same thing — including at least three of my colleagues here at TechCrunch. Opening an email can take upwards of 30 seconds to a minute. Sending one is even worse. And don’t dare try to do an email search when Gmail is acting up. → Read More
I have fond memories of the old days of dial-up AOL (and no, not just because they’ve acquired us now). I remember thinking how stalkerishly awesome it was that I could see if another AOL user had read the email I had sent them, if they hadn’t replied yet. Then the Internet had to come along and ruin everything. But wait, a nifty startup just popped onto my radar which brings that functionality to Gmail.
EmailOracle is going to seem like a nightmare to some people at first glance. But it’s actually really cool — and smart. The service, which is a browser plug-in, augments Gmail to make it easy to track any message you send, get analytics on it, and send yourself reminders about the email if you don’t hear back in a set number of days. → Read More
For the longest time, all I’ve wanted is a solid native Mac client for Gmail that supports starring of messages. Sure, there have been some out there, but they’ve all been lacking. Today, I may have finally found a good one.
Sparrow is a super-simple Mac client for Gmail. If you’ve used Tweetie for Mac (which is now owned by Twitter, but development is more or less frozen), you’ll feel right at home here. On the right hand toolbar you’ll find a big icon for you account (again, just like Tweetie), your inbox, your starred items, your replies, your drafts, and your trash. Along the top of the window, you’ll see an option to compose, reply to, archive, or delete. Naturally, there is also a search bar as well. → Read More
Threaded emails in Gmail is a controversial subject. Some say that the automation of drawing emails together within Gmail saves them the time of figuring out which emails are connected. Others find the feature complicated. What it comes down to is either you love the way Gmail clusters conversations together, or you hate it. Today, Gmail is giving people the option to turn on threaded conversations or mute the feature completely.
Within setting, you’ll be able to toggle off conversation view to see email as individual messages in chronological order. Some actions commonly associated with unthreaded email can be accomplished with searches in Gmail. → Read More
Curious what Google’s Gmail Priority Inbox means for those of us who use an IMAP or POP client like Mac Mail or the Mail function on an iPhone? Well as of yet the feature is not fully enabled on either IMAP or POP-compatible third party or mobile clients, leaving a large percentage of people who hate viewing email their email on a standard web browser out in the cold.
If you try to use the service in Mac Mail right now the emails determined by the Priority Inbox algorithm to be “Important” are sent to an “Important” folder under Gmail. In order to reach them in Mail for the iPhone you have to search for the “Important” folder under your Gmail account. → Read More
It’s hard to remember a product I’ve become so dependent on quicker than Gmail’s new Priority Inbox. I’m so addicted, that the few times I’ve accidentally clicked on the old “regular” Inbox view in the past week have really annoyed me. So much so that I actually moved that view into my “more” drop down (you can drag any sidebar item in there). And now I have good news: you can all share in this addiction.
While it began rolling out to users on Monday, Google is now saying that Priority Inbox should be available to all users (including Google Apps users) today. Look for the “New! Priority Inbox” message in red in the top right corner of your Gmail account to activate it. There’s a slight learning curve with it, so you’ll still probably want to watch Google’s official video. But once you get started, it’s unlikely that you’ll go back. → Read More
Editor’s note: Guest author Adam Rifkin is a Silicon Valley veteran who organizes a networking group for entrepreneurial engineers called 106 Miles. In this post he argues that Gmail is perhaps not the best vessel for Google’s social ambitions.
Last week was marred for me by a temporary but super-painful Gmail failure, and the software’s behavior points to why a “more social” Gmail would be a PERMANENT FAILURE. It pains me to write this because I actually believe the Gmail team has been the best web application team long-term in the entire company, and they come way closer than anyone else inside Google to understanding how normal people work and think.
So it’s telling that even within the Gmail team, there is a basic, fundamental, deep-seeded inability to put things together in a contextually graceful way that makes sense to actual (non-Googler) users—in other words, to deliver a great user experience. Let me explain with a personal experience. → Read More
Hopefully you’re reading this as you’re waking up with access to Gmail Priority Inbox. Jason already posted his review/overview last night, so I figured I’d just talk a bit about how I’ve been using it for the past several days since Google turned it on for me to test out on my account. My opinion of it is in-line with Jason’s — once you fine-tune it, it’s game-changingly awesome. There is simply no way I could ever go back to using Gmail without it enabled. So how have I tuned it?
First of all, before you get started, I highly recommend that you watch the overview video Google made for the feature. It’s two minutes long, and makes the basics easy to understand. For most people, the basics are probably good enough. But for people who get a lot of email, you’re going to want to go a bit deeper.
My favorite aspect of Priority Inbox is the settings that allows you to create four different sections of your inbox. Yes, you could previously do this with the Multiple Inboxes feature, but these new settings make things much easier to understand and implement. The three default sections here are: “Important & unread,” “Starred,” and “Everything else” — but there’s an option to add a fourth, which you should. You should create a new label that you can quickly tag emails with. For example, I chose “A1″ since “A” shows up first in the Labels drop down menu. Set this section (which is actually the second section) to show emails with that label. → Read More
In May 2009, I wrote a post speculating about something called “Magic Inbox.” What was so special about it? It was a reference found in the code of Gmail by the blog Google Operating System, and appeared to point to a new Gmail feature that would sort your email with the help of your social connections. Many of us wondered if such a feature would be launching soon. But that never happened. Well, until tonight, that is. Magic Inbox is the new Gmail Priority Inbox.
Gmail Product Director Keith Coleman made that revelation during our meeting with him last week to discuss the new Priority Inbox. Magic Inbox had been in testing at Google for a long, long time leading up to this launch. “We went through so many versions of this,” Coleman said. In fact, Coleman noted that the idea to prioritze email based on who you contact that most was an original idea for Gmail itself, but no one could nail the combination of user interface and features. Obviously now, they think they have. → Read More
Email overload has finally met its match. Tomorrow, Gmail is rolling out a new feature called Priority Inbox that is going to be a Godsend for those of you who dread opening your email. In short, Google has built a system that figures out which of your messages are important, and presents them at the top of the screen so you don’t miss them. The rest of your messages are still there, but you don’t have to dig through dozens of newsletters and confirmations to find the diamonds in rough.
The beauty of the system lies in its simplicity — it’s nearly as easy as Gmail’s one click spam filter. There’s almost no setup: once it’s activated on your account, you’ll see a prompt asking you if you want to enable Priority Inbox. You can choose from a few options (the order of your various inboxes and if there are any contacts you’d like to always mark ‘Important’) but don’t have to setup any rules or ‘teach’ Gmail what you want it to mark important. It just works, at least most of the time. → Read More
Google doesn’t have a native app for Gmail on the iPhone. I know, it sucks. Thankfully, their mobile Safari-optimized version is pretty damn good. But it’s not perfect. And they’re working to make it better.
This morning, I loaded up the mobile version of the site on my iPhone as was greeted by a shiny new version. The entire look and feel has been mildly revamped: everything is a slightly darker blue hue, and the buttons are now more rounded. But more significantly, buttons have been shifted around — and one key one has been removed altogether. → Read More
I’d wager that you’d be hard-pressed to find an iPhone user that doesn’t use Gmail on the device. And yet, it’s an awkward relationship. Why? Because Gmail run through the iPhone’s native mail client is a crippled experience. Set aside for a second that you cannot star anything (well, aside from moving an email to the “Starred” folder, which is ridiculous), more importantly, there is no push support. This means you cannot get your email in realtime. Instead, you have to ping Gmail’s servers (either in set intervals or manually). Both Yahoo Mail and MobileMe mail have full push support. It’s ridiculous. Google finally made a move to fix that today. Well, sort of.
With the latest version of their Google Mobile App, you can set up your iPhone to receive Push Notifications each time you get a new Gmail message or when you have a Google Calendar alert. No, Push Notifications on the iPhone aren’t technically the same as full push support for mail, but it will do. Essentially, you’ll now be getting a notification when a new message comes in and this will alert you to open your Mail app and retrieve it. It’s two more steps than regular push would require, but whatever. → Read More
While Google is testing search results that update as you type on its own, startup CloudMagic is bringing that functionality to Gmail and Google Apps – and other cloud-based services in the near future – by means of a Firefox and Chrome browser extension.
Installing the extension results in an extra search box in your Gmail interface that allows you to rapidly search for anything in your inbox, with results updating as you type and the ability to preview messages from a thread in a tab or open entire conversations with a single click. → Read More
I would estimate I spend roughly 20 percent of any given day in Gmail. So naturally, I want a way to spend more time looking at the Gmail logo. Luckily Paul Truong, a “creative technologist” (I want that job) at Google spent his own 20 percent time coming up with a way.
Truong has made a new HTML5-based game called Galactic Inbox. When you start it up, a little Gmail logo envelope guy pops out of a “20% Projects Lab” and starts flying. Essentially, he’s a spaceship and can shoot objects coming his way. It’s simple, but fun. → Read More
Gmail is a great product; easily one of my favorites on the web. But it has an Achilles heel — well, actually it’s more like a bum leg: Contacts. Despite a solid contact area being a vital part of pretty much every email and productivity service, Gmail’s is awful. Or, it was awful. Today it’s getting a lot better.
Starting today, Google is rolling out its latest version of Gmail to users around the world. As you can see, it has been slightly redesigned to more prominently display both Contacts and Tasks. While you click on the link to go to the new Contacts area, you’ll notice that Gmail’s left sidebar transforms to show you labels for your various contacts. And the contacts themselves in the main view are now one big stream of names and email addresses — it looks a lot more like Gmail. → Read More
While I occasionally rag on Google Apps for downtime, the fact of the matter is that some of them are getting pretty amazing. The crown jewel is still, of course, Gmail. It’s so good that I haven’t regularly used a desktop email client in years. But despite that fact, there have still been a few things I’ve always missed, such as simple drag-and-drop to insert images into messages. Tonight, that changes.
As Google has just announced on its Gmail blog, the ability to drag images into messages has been added to Gmail. There is no Labs feature to enable, it just works — well, provided you’re using Chrome. (You see the benefit of developing your own browser?) You can simply click on any image on your computer, drag it into your browser window, drop it into the body area of your Gmail email, and it’s instantly inserted in the message. → Read More
Since October 19, 2005, Gmail has been known as “Google Mail” in the UK. The means that everyone who signed up since that point was forced to use the cumbersome @googlemail.com address rather than a @gmail.com one. But soon, Gmail is going on a UK comeback tour. And the better news: all those with @googlemail.com addresses can “upgrade” to a gmail.com one.
So why the change? Well, initially Google had to stop using Gmail in the UK because of a legal dispute. As they explain here, it was a trademark issue. Rather than offer no service to UK users, Google made the call to go with Google Mail while it fought for the Gmail name. “We are still working with the courts and trademark office to protect our ability to use the Gmail name, but in the meantime, we want you to have an email address you can rely on,” they wrote at the time. → Read More
If you live in Gmail all day, you’re almost certainly going to want to activate a new feature that just want live in labs: Gmail Sneak Peek. The feature, as the name suggests, allows you to get a preview of the message you’ve currently got selected, without actually opening it (it reminds me a bit of the preview pane you get in Mac OS X when you hit the spacebar).
After activating Sneak Peak in Labs, either right click on a message or use the handy keyboard shortcut ‘h’, and the preview pane will pop up. You probably won’t be able to see the entire message you’re looking at, but it’s definitely enough to figure out if the message is important or if it should promptly be sent to your archive. You can use the ‘j’ and ‘k’ shortcuts to scroll through your list of messages, looking at a preview of each. My only gripe (and it’s a fairly significant one) is what Sneak Peek does when you actually act on a message. → Read More
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