Filed under: E-mail

New in Google Labs for GMail - Green Robot!

by Paul O'Brien Nov 24th 2009

There are some great little tweaks available in Google Labs for GMail, one of which is pictured above - 'Green Robot!'!

Like many of the labs additions (accessed by clicking the little green conical flask at the top of the GMail page), the beauty of Green Robot is in it's simplicity. It changes the appearance of your Google Talk contact list to illustrate which of your contacts are using Google Talk from their Android mobile device - handy!

If you haven't checked out the contents of the laboratory yet it's well worth a visit - I have a total of 12 labs features enabled on my account at this time which really smooth my GMail experience.

My labs features at the time of writing are Offline Mail, Message Translation, Sender Time Zone, Mark as Read Button, Inbox Preview - to let you view your inbox contents as the main site loads, Multiple Inboxes - to allow me to view a specific subset of my messages in a seperate 'pane', Undo Send, Green Robot (of course), Search Autocomplete, Inserting Images, Google Docs Gadget and the ability to Add Any Gadget by URL.

Which labs features are you using?

Tags: gmail, google mail, GoogleMail, labs

Filed under: Internet, E-mail, Microsoft

Look out! Outlook wants to become your new social media and collaboration hub

by Sebastian Anthony Nov 18th 2009

It's been a long time coming, and perhaps a little too late, but you can now track your friends' and colleagues' social networking activity in Outlook 2010. Dubbed the 'Outlook Social Connector' (OSC), the functionality is available right now to all Office 2010 Beta testers.

The list of much-needed features that OSC brings to Outlook is long and juicy. 'Activity Feeds' is the new social media technology, collating the activities of your contacts into your Outlook screen. LinkedIn support is included in the current beta version, but there's no mention of anything like Twitter or Facebook support yet.

There's also neat functionality to show you all of the attachments sent between you and another contact, a communication history that shows you your recent emails with that contact, Next year, there will be added connectivity with Windows Live Messenger! There are numerous mentions of 'extensibility' and an easy-to-use developer kit, however, so I'm sure lots of other add-ons will emerge in due course.

For enterprise users there's even a SharePoint 2010 interface! Actually, does anyone really use Outlook outside the enterprise environment? Do social media 'gurus' use Outlook?

There's a little introductory video after the break, from the Outlook Team Blog!

Tags: collaboration, connectivity, outlook

Filed under: Design, E-mail, Google

Declutter your Gmail setup with Minimalist Gmail

by Jay Hathaway Nov 1st 2009

Minimalist Gmail is a Firefox plugin that gives you control over whether to hide or show each part of the Gmail interface. You can take out individual buttons and menus and, yes, even ads. There are Greasemonkey scripts that do similar things, but not every Firefox user has delved into userscripting, so this simple add-on makes a nice alternative.

One of the nicest things about Minimalist Gmail is the way it handles chat. You can hide the chatbox, but as long as you're signed into chat, you'll still see new messages if they come in. If you're using other Gmail skins, Minimalist Gmail might be compatible with those, too. It works with my favorite clean Gmail look, Helvetimail.

[via Lifehacker]

Tags: add-on, extension, firefox, gmail, minimalist gmail, MinimalistGmail

Filed under: News, E-mail, Mozilla, Open Source

Mozilla scores enterprise email win: 130,000 French government PCs switch to Thunderbird

by Lee Mathews Oct 29th 2009

A French website [Google Translate link] is reporting that 130,000 Tax Authority computer systems are soon to make a major switch to open source software. Email and calendar duties are being handed over to Thunderbird and the Lightning plugin. The move also includes a transition to OBM's open source groupware/collaboration/messaging platform.

When the General Directorate of Public Finance was formed, two tax agencies were combined. Their users were split, with 80,000 using Lotus Notes and 50,000 running Microsoft Outlook. In the end, the new agency's decision had a lot to do with a desire not to re-license Lotus Notes and Outlook and to simplify operations by supporting a single client.

Thunderbird had already made inroads with the French Department of Defense as well as the Misitry of Culture. The new migration brings the total number of installs to more than 200,000.

Always nice to see Mozilla adoption in the enterprise!

[via OSOR.eu]

Tags: email, mozilla, open source, opensource, oss, thunderbird

Filed under: Utilities, Macintosh, E-mail, Productivity

FlagIt! helps tame your Apple Mail inbox

by Jay Hathaway Oct 24th 2009

When it comes to organizing your email inbox, Apple's Mail.app isn't the most sophisticated offering out there. FlagIt! is a mail add-on that lets you quickly mark your messages as urgent, pending or to-do. It adds its own set of flag icons to the seldom-used "flag" column in Mail, and sets the titles of your messages to the corresponding colors.

Once you've installed FlagIt!, you can start flagging by right-clicking (or control-clicking) on messages in your inbox and scrolling down to "Mark." In addition to flagging messages, you can set up custom flags and mark messages as completed right from this menu. All the default Mark menu items are still there, too, so you can mark as read or unread like you normally would. One word of caution to Snow Leopard users: to make FlagIt! work, you'll have to put Mail.app into 32-bit mode. You can do that by selecting Mail in the Finder and doing a Get Info.

Tags: apple mail, AppleMail, email, flagit, mail, mail.app

Filed under: E-mail, Productivity, Web services, Mozilla, Beta

Mozilla Raindrop: don't call it another Google Wave

by Jay Hathaway Oct 23rd 2009

The lead designer for Mozilla Messaging describes Mozilla's new communication tool, Raindrop, this way: "Raindrop is not another email client. We started from scratch with fresh ideas about what a communication application should be ... " Sound familiar? That's the same promise we heard from Google Wave a few months ago. Raindrop is similar to Wave in some ways, but it takes a completely different approach to dealing with integrating different kinds of communication into one service.

Raindrop's main goal is to separate personal conversations from bulk email that's less relevant to you. To that it, it pulls out all of the notifications you get from various web services, as well as messages from newsgroups, and sorts them into separate places. It also brings in Twitter, and separates out replies and direct messages. Other social networks will eventually be integrated, and the UI is still in the draft stages, but Raindrop looks pretty promising for a version 0.1 product. It's not as hard to get your head around (or "revolutionary," depending on who you ask) as Wave, but its focus on the problem of bulk vs. personal communication might make it more useful to the average Internet joe.

[via Slashdot]

Tags: mozilla, mozilla labs, mozilla messaging, MozillaLabs, MozillaMessaging, raindrop

Filed under: E-mail, Productivity, Web services, Google

Gmail Labs introduces Google Docs previews

by Jay Hathaway Oct 16th 2009

Gmail Labs keeps getting better at integrating other Google products into Gmail The latest addition to Labs is Google Docs Previews, which recognizes Google Docs links in your email, and lets you view Docs inline, right from Gmail. To turn it on, go to Settings in Gmail, and then hit the Labs tab. Enable "Google Docs previews in mail."

If you're a hardcore Google Docs user, being able to preview documents from Gmail is a fantastic boon to your workflow. You can keep responding to mail without having to click through to Docs or open another tab. The only thing that would make it better would be a Quick Edit option, in case you need to make a couple of changes on the fly. Google Docs Preview is the latest in a line of other "preview" Labs for Gmail, including YouTube, Flickr, Yelp, and Picasa.

Tags: gmail, gmail labs, GmailLabs, google, google docs, GoogleDocs, preview

Filed under: Utilities, E-mail

b2 GMail Notifier brings insipid Incredimail style alerts to your webmail

by Lee Mathews Oct 14th 2009

So you've switched to GMail but pine for the days of yore when that snooty butler hand delivered your new Incredimail messages to you? Well, you're in luck!

Among the dozens of options available for GMail inbox alerts is b2 Notifier. Think of it as a combination of one part something Download Squad readers love (GMail) and two parts things they hate with a passion (Adobe Air and Incredimail).

And unlike Incredimail, since this baby is built on Air that means it will run on all three major OSes. Isn't that awesome news?! Yeah, I didn't think so either. I've built up an aversion to apps like this over the years.

It never fails that a system which can barely run the diagnostic and cleanup apps I throw at it will have Incredimail (or some other cheesey animated alerter - RIP, Bonzi Buddy) installed. And it also never fails that they'll start popping up with great frequency the moment I need to dig in.

But hey, to each his/her own. If you love sappy happy animated shenanigans, b2 Notifier should be right up your alley. And, in truth, if this app would actually convince some of my customers to switch from Incredimail to GMail, I'd be all for it.

Tags: alert, gmail, gmail-notifier, notifier

Filed under: E-mail, Google, Beta, Web

Gmail's "Got the wrong Bob?" helps avoid misfired emails

by Brad Linder Oct 13th 2009

Gmail's auto-complete address feature is kind of awesome. I can't remember the last time I actually looked up a contact's email address before sending a message in Gmail. Instead I just start typing their name and Gmail usually locates the address within a few characters.

But there's a downside. Sometimes you'll have more than one contact with the same first name. If you've ever sent a message to the wrong Dave, Jen, or Bob, there's a new Gmail labs feature that can help... sometimes.

The feature is called "Got the wrong Bob?" and it works much like the "Don't forget Bob" feature that was already available in Gmail labs. When the Don't forget feature is enabled, Gmail will pay attention as you start to type a list of email addresses. If that list looks similar to lists of recipients for previous email addresses, it will automatically suggest additional people you may want to include.

Instead of suggesting recipients, Got the wrong Bob will notice if you normally send emails to Paul Simon, Neil Young, and Art Garfunkel and if you accidentally address a new message to Art Vandelay instead of Garfunkel Gmail will ask if you meant to send the message to the other Art.

Of course, there's no way for Gmail to know if you've got the wrong Bob when you're sending a message to a single recipient. But that's why you should really pay more attention to what you're doing in the first place.

Tags: email, gmail, gmail-labs, got-the-wrong-bob

Filed under: Utilities, Windows, E-mail

Scott's GMail Alert is a kick-ass GMail, Google Calendar, and RSS notifier

by Lee Mathews Oct 13th 2009

Plenty of apps will give you a simple tap on the shoulder when new mail arrives arrives in your GMail inbox. There's GMail Assistant, GMail Notifier, GMail Notifier Plus, and of course Google offers their own app.

Today's entrant into the battle for GMail notification supremacy -- Scott's Gmail Alert -- has a lot going for it. Way more than just the fact that it doesn't use the word notifier in its name.

SGA can check up to five different GMail accounts including those in your Google Apps domains. Set custom color for your accounts and create as many as ten special alerts to make sure emails from VIPs stand out. Font settings can also be customized, and Aero Glass is supported on Windows 7 and Vista.

Tags: alert, alerter, atom, gmail, google-calendar, notifier, rss, scoots-gmail-alert

Filed under: Security, E-mail

Gmail, Hotmail, AOL and Yahoo! users fall victim to phishing scheme

by Jay Hathaway Oct 6th 2009

Over 30,000 email addresses have been compromised, with their login info posted online, in the past few days. The BBC has apparently seen the list, and it includes Hotmail, AOL, Yahoo and Gmail users. None of those companies are to blame, though, because the owners of the email addresses got caught in a phishing scam. In case you're not already in the habit of making sure you're not giving your login info to fake websites that are made to look real ones, this is a good reminder to start.

Gmail is dealing with its share of the stolen accounts by forcing password resets, and a spokesperson at Google said there was no breach in Gmail security. This comes right on the heels of a possibly-related Hotmail-only phishing attack that hit 10,000 accounts earlier this week. To be safe, make sure you use a different password for each service you sign up for (the BBC says 40% of Internet users have the same password for everything), and if you click on a link in your email, make sure you're on a legitimate website before you sign in.

[via Mashable]

Tags: aol, email, gmail, hotmail, passwords, phishing, scam, yahoo

Filed under: Photo, E-mail, Web services, Google, Yahoo!

Yahoo! shuts down Xoopit for Gmail users

by Jay Hathaway Oct 4th 2009

Xoopit is a service that turns Gmail into a powerful media browser, letting you quickly view your attachments. Since Yahoo! acquired it, though, it's been available to Yahoo! Mail users, and now Yahoo! is looking to make it exclusive. Xoopit will become the My Photos feature of Yahoo! Mail, and it's being pulled out of Gmail completely. Even the Firefox add-on and Facebook app for Gmail are being discontinued.

How does Yahoo! explain removing Xoopit from its biggest group of users? "We will not be able to keep investing in our Xoopit for Gmail product, and don't want you to end up with a lousy experience." That's going to leave a lot of Xoopit Gmail users disgruntled. Here's how this move affects you if you're one of them: your Xoopit data disappears on November 13th, but your attachments remain untouch (albeit unindexed) in your account. I don't know about other Xoopit users, but losing the service certainly doesn't make me want to sign up for an email address with the company that took it away. Bad form, Yahoo!

Tags: attachments, gmail, google, media, xoopit, yahoo

Filed under: Utilities, Windows, E-mail

Gmail Notifier: you know Google already does this, right?

by Jay Hathaway Sep 30th 2009

Gmail Notifier makes sense. Using webmail has its advantages, but it also means either keeping a webpage open or checking back periodically to see if you have new mail. So, it's good to have an app that's lighter than a full email client, but lets you know when you have unread messages. The problem is that Google already makes a Gmail Notifier, and it's better.

Google's version of Notifier is not only better-looking than the gmailnotifier.com version, it's also available for both Windows and Mac, and supports Google Calendar alerts. Why would you want to use the off-brand version of Notifier? The only reason I could find is that it supports multiple Gmail accounts, and lets you delete messages without going to your inbox. I'll still take Google's version, thank you very much.

Tags: email, gmail, gmail notifier, GmailNotifier

Filed under: E-mail, Productivity, Web services

Use webpages and Gmail messages as tasks with Todoist Anywhere

by Jay Hathaway Sep 29th 2009

Todoist has been around for a while. In fact, Download Squad first wrote about this web-based to-do app back in 2007. It's come a long way since then, though, and the latest feature addition, Todoist Anywhere, lets you turn webpages and Gmail messages into to-do items. With one click, you can view your Todoist tasks and take advantage of Gmail integration.

Access Todoist at any time using a convenient bookmarklet - you can even sign up for a new account from there - and then you're good to go. Todoist anywhere supports multiple lists and recurring dates, and there's even a convenient mini-calendar included. In terms of Gmail-specific features, Todoist lets you click on a message in your inbox and add it as a task that links back to the original email.

[via Lifehacker]

Tags: anywhere, gmail, organization, productivity, to-do, todoist

Filed under: Business, Developer, Internet, Blogging, E-mail, Web services, web 2.0, Web, Lists

Tell DLS: What are your Top 10 Web Apps?

by Nik Fletcher Sep 28th 2009

We're continuing our Tell DLS column by leaving the desktop and heading to the web. There's tonnes and tonnes of webapps out there -- however here's just 10 that I use day-in, day-out. If you're got any other favourites, be sure to leave them in the comments!

Tags: basecamp, facebook, flickr, instapaper, lists, tumblr, upcoming, web-applications, web-apps

The World's Hardest Game 2.0 - Time Waster

So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do. Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game. The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...

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