Web-based email is the future and it is now. We live in a world now where access to email from wherever you are is pretty important. Putting your email in the cloud (the Internet) is the best way to do that.
I am a big fan of Gmail. Rich bailed on Gmail because he thought they lost one of his emails. He is now using Hotmail. But, Gmail continues to rule the roost and I think it is a great email client and service.
But, Gmail is not without some annoyances. Some of those annoyances are big and would need to be solved by Gmail themselves (such as the addition of a to-do list). Others are small but can be “fixed” using Greasemonkey.
For those unaware, GreaseMonkey is a Firefox extension that allows you to run scripts in the browser and customize the way webpages look and work. Duncan Riley recently posted some quick GreaseMonkey scripts, for example, that will add tabs to your FriendFeed page and allow you to access other sites like Google Reader, Facebook, etc. These tabs are not part of FriendFeed otherwise. I am using Duncan’s scripts and they work well.
To improve Gmail, one of the big GreaseMonkey scripts to check out is Better Gmail 2. This script does a bunch at once. Once installed, you can access it’s options in the Firefox Tools menu. The script can do things like the following:
- Gmail skins
- Put the number of unread messages first in the tab title
- Hide the number of spam messages
- Hide the invite box
- Put icons next to messages with attachments to indicate the type of attachment
- Macros
- Intercept mailto: links and open with Gmail
- Show CC and BCC fields
- Allowing HTML signatures
- Folders4Gmail (allow you to organize labels into a hierarchical structure)
- Others
The above screenshot is using the “Redesigned” skin that comes with Better Gmail. As any Gmail user will clearly see, this is nothing like the original Gmail interface.
Now, this GreaseMonkey script is a “kitchen sink” approach, giving you a lot of various functionality all in one package. But, there are some others out there you might want to check out:
- Multiple Account Login: Replaces the “Sign Out” link at the top of Email with a dropdown which will allow you to easily switch between multiple Gmail accounts
- Label Hider. Allows you to selectively hide certain labels from the web interface
- FB Gmail. Get Facebook notifications in your Gmail.
- Fixed Navigation. Will make the left sidebar fixed as you scroll.
So, your first step is to install GreaseMonkey and give some stuff a try. If you don’t like anything, just remove it. These are all just add-ons and can easily be removed.
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That’s great… but what about those who don’t use FF? Everyone has browser preferences and basically all these great features are of benefit to FF users only, not IE, Opera etc.
If Gmail did this kind of thing on their own without the need for plugins solely through the use of a particular browser so only certain people could use them, I would possibly switch back over to it (or at least try it out)
Kind of sucks when it’s all bells and whistles for a select segment of users though.
When I was using Gmail I also used Greasemonkey, but got knocked 3 times for it. First, FF is a memory-hungry browser. Second, Gmail is a top-heavy interface (load Gmail in the browser and watch the memory usage climb up, and up, and up…) Third, Greasemonkey adds scripts to an already top-heavy browser using a top-heavy webmail interface.
Gmail is good. Greasemonkey is good and puts in all the features Gmail forgot. But it’s annoying to have to restart your browser several times a day just to clear the memory leak – no matter what OS you’re using.
This is why I use a mail client.
There are a few ways to include a to-do list with GMail.
-Remember The Milk FF extension: http://www.rememberthemilk.com/services/gmail/ – more about RTM at the bottom.
-There’s a to-do script for Google Calendar: http://gimite.ddo.jp/archive/user_js/googlecalendartodolist.user.js – You’ll need GreaseMonkey as well. GMail and GCal are so integrated that this is a fairly light weight option but not quite as flexible as RTM.
I personally like the RTM to-do list extension for GMail – I can update RTM anytime, anywhere separate from GMail or from within GMail. IT also connects to-do lists with your Google Calendar and connects tasks with mail.