Currently viewing the tag: "GMail"
This is actually a pretty cool, simple, painless and quick way to get a handle on your inbox! I gave it a try and liked what I saw. I try to get as close to a zero-inbox as possible – I do know many people that have almost given up on that dream though. Mailstrom can help – even you to
Clear Out Thousands of Messages from Your Inbox in About an Hour
Details from Lifehacker:
Inbox zero is a holy grail that seems unattainable for most, but a wonderful webapp called Mailstrom makes that dream a reality in hardly any time. Through clever sorting methods, it’ll show you your mailboxes in a different light and make it easy to clear out the crap in no time.
While I’m fairly good at looking at messages, I’m not good at clearing most of them out of my inbox and responding to the important ones. Wanting to improve my skills, I decided to give a few tools a try assuming that I wouldn’t get there on the first try. Mailstrom worked so well, however, that I’m now seven messages away from inbox zero after an hour of clearing out and responding to a pile of nearly 1,000 messages.
How does this work? Mailstrom provides unconventional views of your mailbox so you can take a quick look at what’s there and decide what’s important and what’s not. You can find shopping notifications, sort by time, sort by sender, find emails that take up a lot of space, and much more. As straightforward and simple as this may sound, it really makes a difference when clearing things out. I was able to find unimportant senders and random notifications with a few clicks. When I cleared out one view, I tried another, and then another, until my mailbox was virtually empty. If you’re looking to get yours under control, give Mailstrom a try. It’s free to try indefinitely, works with pretty much any kind of email account, and you can use it as much or as little as you need.
And these details from Mailstrom:
Welcome! We created Mailstrom with one goal: to put you back in charge of your email. Mailstrom works with your favorite email tools to help you pay attention to what’s important — and get rid of the noise.
Get started now. Here are some tips to help you take control of your email workflow.
Use Mailstrom Every Morning
The best time to use Mailstrom is first thing in the morning. You’ll find big, delectable chunks of email waiting for you.
- Facebook and Twitter updates? Use the Social tab and give them a quick scan. Then delete them.
- Promotions from Groupon or Amazon? Use the Shopping tab and give them a quick scan, then delete.
- The Sender and Subject tabs let you quickly act on batches of related email. Already resolved a question? Archive those messages.
- Find big messages using the Size tab. No need to have them taking up space (potentially on multiple devices) and slowing down searches.
- Find and archive old messages using the Time tab. Don’t need messages from last year, or last month? Get them out of the way!
- On too many mailing lists? Use the Lists tab to quickly remove mail from mailing lists — and automatically unsubscribe. This alone can quickly reduce the amount of mail you receive.
- Manage multiple accounts and act across all of your accounts simultaneously. Go to Mail Accounts > Add Accounts and add multiple Gmail or IMAP accounts. Mailstrom gives you a unified view!
Archive, Delete, or Move?
One of the great innovations introduced by Gmail is its Archive feature — but many people don’t understand how it works. Basically, it allows you to get a message out of your inbox, but still keep it forever. This is incredibly useful: it’s like having a huge memory to back-up your brain in the cloud.
So in a nutshell…
- Some messages you don’t want to keep forever: for those you useDelete. When you Delete, Gmail removes the messages from your inbox and adds a special “Trash” label, which will be emptied after 30 days.
- The Delete and Archive features in Mailstrom work the same as in Gmail.
- Sometimes it’s helpful to Archive and Label something at the same time. In Mailstrom, this is called Move. Select the messages you want to move and click the Move button, then select a label (some mail environments call this a folder.) The messages will be removed from your Inbox and moved to the folder, but they’ll still be stored (and searchable.)
- Relax: Mailstrom never does anything immediately destructive with your mail. Even if you delete mail, you can still find it in your Trash folder (until your provider permanently deletes it.) See our Frequently Asked Questions for more information on how we work our magic.
We’re just getting started. Let us know what you think. Reply to this email (or any email we send you) with ideas about how to make Mailstrom better. We’re listening!
I use and am a huge fan of gmail. I had no idea this feature was available and SO easy! Gizmodo shows us
The Best Secret Gmail Feature Is Hiding In Plain Sight
There’s a Google Mail feature you have to use. Seriously. You must. Because copying an entire chain of messages after your reply doesn’t make any sense when people can scroll down to see all the messages, chained one after the other. What makes sense is to only provide the snippet that you are actually replying to. And that’s why you need to do this:
1. Select the text you are replying to in Gmail.
2. Hit the reply button.
3. Boom! Only the selected text will be quoted. Reply at will.
I know. This is common in all mail programs, but most people don’t know it exists in Gmail too. I discovered it by chance a long time ago, assuming it would work, but today I discovered that most people don’t know about it.
So start using it, please. Pass it around and enjoy the love of your correspondents, who will be grateful forever for your neat replies. [JGC via Twitter]
Here are some great tips on migrating from one Google account to another. Use this if you need to change from fuzzycatpaws to something more legit! Details from Lifehacker:
Dear Lifehacker,
I have multiple Gmail accounts and a Google Apps account. I have to sign in to one for Google Voice, into another for docs and Gmail, and use the third for Google+. I’d really like everything in one place so I don’t have to keep switching again and again. How can I do this?
Sincerely,
Google Nonplussed
Dear GN,
I’ve been there. Actually, this sounds like a question I was just asking myself yesterday (and many, many times before that). Google did their best to make this a simple procedure, and for the most part it is, but because you’re moving around so much information and their are security concerns when it comes to transferring your identity from one account to another the process can seem much more complex than it is. Some services have their own tools for migrating data from one account to another and others just use a simple export and import process. Let’s take a look at the specific first, and then go over how you can migrate everything else with a tool called Google Takeout.
Migrate Your Google+ Profile, Circles, and Other Information
Migrating your Google+ profile and data from one account to another is actually very easy, but it’s a very particular process. In order to get started, you need to do the following:
- Decide which account you want to transfer your profile and circles from (the source account) and which account you want to transfer your profile and circles to (the destination account).
- Create a Google+ profile on thedestination account. Google cannot transfer a profile to an account that isn’t signed up for Google+, so you need some sort of profile. It can be pretty much empty and just your name, but it has to exist.
Once you’ve taken care of those things, here’s how to initiate the transfer:
- Sign into your source account and visit google.com/takeout.
- You’ll see a list of all the data you can export, but we’re not going to bother with all of that right now. In the list you should see an option called Circles, and underneath that option a link called “Transfer your Google+ connections to another account.” Click that. (If you can’t find it, see the picture to the right for an indicator.)
- If you forgot to sign into your source account, or Google just wants to re-verify who you are, that’ll happen. If not, or when you’re finished signing into the source account, you’ll be taken to a page that will ask you to sign into your destination account. Do that as well.
- Confirm that you definitely want to make this transfer. Google wants you to be sure you didn’t mess anything up.
Technically you’re done with your part, but now you have to wait seven days. Although Google doesn’t explain why this holding period exists, it’s likely due to security reasons. For seven days, both accounts will show that a transfer is pending and either account can cancel that transfer at any time. This is likely so an unauthorized data migration can be stopped by either user if they weren’t expecting it.
When the seven days pass, the transfer will have occurred but the source account will still maintain the original data. You’ll need to remove the profile manually if you don’t want a duplicate.
Transfer Your Google Voice Number and Data
Google Voice existed for many years with no way to transfer your data and phone number to another Google account, which was pretty frustrating. Now a process is available, it’s pretty simple, and only takes about five minutes. In order to get started, however, you’ll need to do the following:
- Choose which account you want to transfer your number and data from (the source account) and which account you need to transfer the number and data to (the destination account).
- The source account undoubtedly has a Google Voice number associated with it, but the destination account may not. This is okay, and actually makes the transfer easier. If both the source and destination accounts have Google Voice numbers associated with them, however, the destination account’s number and data will be completely replaced—and this is irreversible. You can (and should) visit google.com/takeout if you want to archive any data in the destination account.
- If you do have a Google Voice number associated with the destination account, make sure the number’s voicemail PIN is not the same as the source account’s. If it is, the transfer will fail.
With all of that taken care of, here’s how you initiate the transfer:
- Visit the Google Voice Transfer Assistant. You’ll be asked a series of questions (basically telling you the previously mentioned risks and tasks required to make the transfer). When you’ve answered them all, you’ll be provided with this link.
- If you aren’t signed into any Google accounts, you’ll be asked to sign in. If you’re signed into one of the accounts (either the source or destination), you’ll be asked to sign into another as you need to have two simulatenous sign-ins in order to complete the transfer.
- Once you’re signed into both accounts, you’ll be asked which account is the source and which is the destination. If you only have a Google Voice number associated with one account, Google will make assumptions about the transfer for you, but be sure to double-check that everything looks okay before you confirm
- The transfer will take start. Just wait until it’s done. It only takes a few minutes.
When you’re done, everything will have transferred to the destination account immediately. That means your source account will not work with your Google Voice number anymore. You’ll need to change your account information on all your computers and devices in order for Google Voice to continue working everywhere.
Migrating Your Various Other Google Services
If you want to move any other data from one Google account to another, you can use a tool similar to the Google Voice transfer tool to do it. (In fact, this tool can even transfer your Google Voice account as well, but because those instructions require some preparation it has its own section above.) Here’s what you need to do:
- Sign in to the source account (the account you want to transfer data from) and visit google.com/dashboard.
- At the top you should see a notice in yellow that says “You can move data out of this account.” Click the link to get started.
- Google will take you to a page that shows your source account and that you’re signed in. You’ll also need to sign into your destination account in order for the data to have a place to go.
- Once you’re signed into both accounts, you’ll have a long list of services currently on the source account. If you want to transfer any of them to the destination account, check off the boxes next to their titles.
- After you’ve made your selections, you’ll need to check off a few more boxes in a gray box at the end of the page. This is just to tell Google that you know what you’re doing and understand what’s going to happen during the transfer process.
- Click “I accept. Move this data.”
The transfer will initiate, and when it’s done the data will no longer be in the source account and only exist in the destination account. This process will not will not transfer your Gmail or Calendars, however, so please consult this guide for information on transferring those services.
Export Your Other Google Data with Takeout
Migrating your other data is generally pretty easy because you can just download whatever you want with Google Takeout and import it into your other account. Let’s just take a quick look at how this works.
When you visit Google Takeout, all you have to do is click the “Create Archive” button at the bottom of the page and it’ll download every bit of data in the list above it. That includes your Picasa web albums, contacts, docs, and various other information. It does not include your Gmail or Calendars, however, which is why we have separate sections for those types of data above. If you don’t want to download all of your data, you can also choose specific types by clicking the “Choose Services” tab at the top of the page. From there, just select any services you want to download. When you’ve finished making your selections, click the “Create Archive” button.
This will initiate the archive creation and a download will begin when Google has everything ready for you. If you open the archive, you’ll find data that’s mostly readable. A lot of the files come as HTML files, and any contact information (whether through Circles or just your regular contacts) are saved as VCF contact cards (which is a standard for most address book software). While some of the data you’ll download via Google Takeout can only really exist in your personal archives, as it has no other use at the moment, you’ll be able to import contact cards and documents into their respective Google apps just like any regular data. Your +1s can also be imported into most web browsers as bookmarks. If you’re using Chrome, Google will be able to sync them. Although Google Takeout could be a bit more comprehensive, and it would be helpful if it also served as a hub for the various migration tools available, it’s a good start when you need to download or move data around in your Google accounts.
Migrating data from one Google account to another can be a bit of work, but once you know what you’re doing it’s not very hard and doesn’t take much time. If you follow these instructions, you should have one Google account to rule them all in no time.
Love,
Lifehacker
I’ve always wanted to learn more about the powerful keyboard shortcuts within gmail – and now there is a Chrome extension to help! Pretty cool – details from Lifehacker:
Chrome: Gmail has tons of great shortcuts, but they’re only as good as how often you remember to use them. Shortcuts for Gmail is a Chrome extension that will let you know every time you do something that you could have done with a shortcut by displaying the shortcut on-screen. With luck, you’ll remember it for next time.
Shortcuts for Gmail is much like previously mentioned Eve, a Mac app that does the same in the OS. Every time you perform an action for which there’s a Gmail shortcut, a pop-up alert like the ones in the image above will appear in the lower-right corner of your Chrome window, letting you know how you can do the same thing without taking your hands off the keyboard. You’ll have to have shortcuts enabled in Gmail (under general settings and “keyboard shortcuts”) for Shortcuts for Gmail to work.
The extension is available now in the Chrome Web Store, and it’s from an validated publisher, but be warned: the permissions it needs to work are pretty hefty (although they make some sense) so that may put some people off of it. If you’d rather learn the hard way, remember you can always press “?” in any Gmail window to bring up an overlay with every Gmail shortcut listed in it.
Shortcuts for Gmail | Chrome Web Store via The Next Web
More good utilities for GMail – this one gives you stats about how you are using GMail – from the Official Gmail Blog:
One day I was looking at how many messages I have in my sent mail, and realized there are a lot of things I wanted to know about my email habits. How much of my emails do I read, and do I reply fast enough? As luck would have it, Romain Vialard, a Google Apps Script Top Contributor, developed a tool called Gmail Meter powered by Google Apps Script.
Gmail Meter is an Apps Script which runs on the first day of every month and sends you an email containing different statistics about your Inbox. In a similar way to how recently introduced Google Account Activity gives key stats about how you’ve used your Google Account, Gmail Meter gives you different types of statistics that will help you analyze your Gmail habits.
- Volume Statistics show you the number of important and starred messages, the number of people who sent you emails, and more. Volume statistics can be very useful in determining how you are using email efficiency tools like Priority Inbox.
- Daily Traffic gives you an estimate of when you receive messages and when you send them during a given month. For example, in the graph below you can see how the peaks in my “Sent” curve indicates that I write emails in spurts.
- Traffic Pattern lets you get a sense of your overall email activity over the past week.
- Email Categories tells you how you are managing your Inbox. In the pie chart below, you can see that the majority of my emails are labeled. My Inbox is tiny compared to other labels which indicates that I keep a lean and mean Inbox.
- Time Before First Response shows you how long it takes you to reply, and how long it takes others to reply to you. By looking at this chart, I can infer that I reply faster than others I communicate with.
- Word Count tells you whether you are writing long emails. The example below shows that most of my emails are shorter than 200 words.
- Thread Lengths help you understand whether you participate in long conversations resulting in long threads. Top Senders and Top Recipients help you identify who you communicate with more frequently.
How to Setup Gmail Meter
It is easy to set up Gmail Meter. First, go to Google Docs and open a Spreadsheet. Click on Tools > Script Gallery. Search for “Gmail Meter” and click Install. You will now see a new menu item called Gmail Meter on your spreadsheet. Click on Gmail Meter > Get a Report. You can then choose the type of report. Preparing a report may take some time and you will get an email once the report is ready. If you would like to know more about how this script works, be sure to check this tutorial.
Learning about my email habits has helped me become more email efficient. So, before you read that next article on “Writing Effective Emails,” be sure to learn more about your own email habits using Gmail Meter.
I need this! I keep way too many emails. This is a really cool and easy and free way to see what is taking up too much space in your GMail inbox – from DigitalInspiration:
Update: If you have any problems with the instructions below, try this – it worked for me!
(from the source article):
Please make a copy of this doc: [docs.google.com]
the GMail menu should appear in 5-10 seconds
What do you do when your Gmail account is nearly full? You can either purchase additional storage from Google (they charge $5 per year for 20 GB) or a cheaper alternative is that you scan your Gmail mailbox for messages that contain large file attachments and delete (or forward) all the useless messages to recover precious space.
The problem is how do you find these bulky messages in your mailbox when Gmail doesn’t offer an option to sort and filter messages by size?
In the past, I have shared both software tools and web apps that help you quickly track the space-hogging emails in your Gmail account but there’s a new option now that requires no setup and you don’t even have to grant access to your Gmail account to a third-party for analysis – this option is called Google Docs.
Sort GMail Messages by Size of Attachments
The idea is that your Google Docs will connect to your Gmail account and compute the size of every message that’s present in your mailbox. If it finds a bulky message (size > 1 MB), it will make a note of it in the spreadsheet.
Once the sheet has a list of all the bulky message, you can sort the sheet by the Size column to find the big ones. Or use the Filter option (the Funnel icon) to find messages that are within a particular range (5 MB < size < 10 MB). Click the “View” link to open the corresponding message in Gmail, forward it to a secondary email address and delete it from the primary Inbox to recover space.
That’s all the theory you should know, let’s now put this program into action:
- Create a copy of this sheet in your Google Docs account.
- A new Gmail Menu will appear in the sheet after 5-10 seconds. Select “Reset Canvas” from the Gmail menu to initialize your sheet.
- Accept the authorization screen and then choose Grant Access to let Google Docs access your Gmail Inbox. This is completely safe because your own Google Docs account is requesting access to your own Gmail account (see source code).
- Once the permissions have been granted, choose “Scan Mailbox” from the Gmail menu to start the scanning process.
Sit back and relax as the last step may take time depending on how big your Gmail mailbox is. Also, if the program is stuck or if you accidentally close the browser tab, open the same Google sheet, choose “Scan Mailbox” again and the script will resume scanning from where it left off.
Once all the mails have been analyzed, use the sort or filter options in Google Docs to find the biggest emails, apply a common label and then use bulk auto-forward to send all these messages to your secondary email address. That’s it!
Troubleshooting tips: If you get an error that says “Service invoked too many times for one day” or “Exceeded maximum execution time”, you may want to wait for some time before re-running the program. These are Google Apps Script limits to prevent abuse.
Interesting, I use a lot of Google’s products (Gmail, GCal, GRead, GVoice, GDocs. Chrome, etc. etc.) and this new report and analysis from Google sounds interesting! Details form Lifehacker:
Google’s freshly released Account Activity Dashboard creates a monthly report that lays out how you’re using Google, from your Gmail activity to your account sign-in locations.
Obviously the most interesting stat for most of us will be the Gmail analysis, though Googler Andreas Tuerk offers a broader view:
[M]y most recent Account Activity report told me that I sent 5 percent more email than the previous month and received 3 percent more. An Italian hotel was my top Gmail contact for the month. I conducted 12 percent more Google searches than in the previous month, and my top queries reflected the vacation I was planning: [rome] and [hotel].
Lastly, it’s a potential gem for running a monthly security audit.
For example, if you notice sign-ins from countries where you haven’t been or devices you’ve never owned, you can change your password immediately and sign up for the extra level of security provided by 2-step verification.
You can sign up for the new Account Activity Dashboard here. It probably won’t blow your mind off the bat, but it could be a handy—or at least interesting—tool to keep in mind.
Giving you more insight into your Google account activity | Official Google Blog
