This series is dedicated to specific e-mail providers on the internet. In this installment, the service provider concentrated on will be Google’s Gmail.

Gmail, launched in March 2004, has grown to be one of the most-used free e-mail services on the internet. While it doesn’t have a large of a userbase as Yahoo! Mail or Hotmail, it’s still a force to be reckoned with.

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Things to know about Gmail up front

When Google launched Gmail in 2004, they wanted to take a different approach to the way e-mail works, often dubbed the “Google way” of doing things. As such, this is what it means to do things that way:

Gmail never wants you to delete e-mail

In 2004 Gmail upped the ante of what was e-mail standard by offering a whopping 1GB of storage on introduction of the service. Bear in mind at the time this was unheard of. Gmail states, very plainly, that you should never delete mail – or simply put as a question “Why should you delete mail when you have this much storage?”

No folders, just labels

Gmail has no folders but rather something called “labels”, and although it would appear Gmail has folders when using it, it doesn’t and never has.

Threaded messaging

With traditional e-mail, each message is its own entity, so to speak. If you have an e-mail conversation with someone where several replies are traded back and forth, everything is kept separated per each e-mail.

Google changes this up a bit by having threaded messaging. This is very similar to the way internet forums work. E-Mails instead of being individualized messages are treated as “topics”. If said topic gets a reply (i.e. someone replies to your message), the reply goes into the topic’s thread and stays there.

Gmail is best used in the browser

While it’s true that Gmail offers ways in which to download mail via a traditional e-mail client easily (covered later in this series), the best way to use the Gmail service is in its intended environment, the web browser. Only in the browser can you get all the options and the full experience of that which is Gmail.

The basics of Gmail

Getting a new account

If you don’t have a new account, simply head on over to www.gmail.com and click the link that says Sign up for Gmail.

The look of Gmail

Gmail’s overall look purposely stays on the simple side with very little use of icons or graphics. All the major functions are located in the sidebar on the left. The settings are located at the top (simply labeled “Settings”).

Sending e-mails

To send an e-mail, click Compose Mail at the top left.

You will immediately notice that the larger portion of the screen gets a huge blue box with white fields. This is where you write your e-mail.

Things to note:

The carbon-copy and blind-carbon-copy fields are never there when you first compose an e-mail. If you want to add in cc:’s or bcc:’s you must click “Add Cc” or “Add Bcc” directly above the subject line.

If you attach files that are images, they will not be visible in the body of the e-mail itself. Gmail treats all file attachments the same, that being as attachments and nothing more. Images you attach will still send, but you can’t see them when composing.

Workaround: You can check your Sent Mail folder after sending your mail and see the images there. Looks like this:

Receiving e-mails

Gmail is set up in such a way that if you leave the browser open and logged into the service, it will auto-check for new mail dynamically. What this means to you is that even though there is no “Check Mail” button or icon, Gmail will keep checking mail anyway.

In addition, Gmail checks mail every time you login into it as well.

Reading mail and using the “Archive” feature

One of the more innovative features of Gmail is the archive function.

You’ll notice that when reading any e-mail from the inbox that above the subject and to the right of Back to Inbox is a button labeled Archive. What this will do is “move” the e-mail to the “All Mail” folder.

Important note: Technically Gmail is not “moving” anything. It’s simply labeling it as an archived e-mail that is only accessible by clicking the “All Mail” link on the left sidebar. Remember, there are no folders in Gmail – only labels.

Stay tuned for part 2 where we get into the nitty gritty details of Gmail!

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