I should say I was a long time holdout in reading my email on a shell (unix) account. After all, all of the key features being touted on the new web based or GUI based mail readers were available twenty years ago in programs like MH (now nmh) and filters such as Procmail, both programmable and endlessly customizable. I could do back flips and front aerials with my mail while the current crop were oozing their way out of the primordial sludge.

But, I have grudgingly entered the present day world, as Gmail (and Thunderbird, but that’s another topic) have made pretty good gains and I’m not yet prepared to set up my own personal mail server on my own linux box just in order to keep using a text based set of programs which admittedly don’t handle some things such as pictures all that cleanly (although that also meant that I basically never got email viruses).

Gmail Account

For the first three years, Gmail was invite only. Now it’s open to all. Of course, all the good names have been taken

Security

First of all, for any kind of web browsing of a relatively personal nature, I recommend making sure the session stays within https connections. In grossly simple terms, the “s” on https means the connection is secured from eavesdropping. One simple way to do this is to log in on Gmail from this address: https://mail.google.com which should thereafter retain the secure connection. I like to be absolutely sure of this, though, so on Firefox, I use a simple Greasemonkey script called GmailSecure to enforce the https connection. (It’s also extensible to force secure connections on an array of google related items.) Sorry Opera, IE, or Safari users, I couldn’t find comparable extensions for this (though an Opera widget called Gmail Checker has a feature request for this.

Second of all, as tempting as it might be to aggregate all new items into a feed reader for convenience, do NOT use a public web accessible reader such as Bloglines or GoogleReader to do so! These subscriptions become generally searchable on either service and while the full message can not be displayed, there’s chances that the excerpt will contain enough private information that can be viewed. I came across this security hole last year, and on re-checking Bloglines, I can still find gmail feeds hosted there. I’m at a loss as to why a feed is even offered in Gmail (or at least why not make it an option in the settings and default it off for security?) but since neither Gmail nor Bloglines have taken concrete steps in addressing this issue, I’ll put this warning down. Just don’t do RSS feeds of private email, and if you do, don’t use a public RSS reader to access them — use a personal one on a particular computer for the purpose. Oh, you wanted to be able to access the feed anywhere on the net? Then use Gmail’s web interface already, that’s what it’s for.

Notifications

There’s several ways to have Gmail notifications setup. Gmail itself provides small applets for Windows/Mac. The open source community has created an equivalent for Linux called CheckGmail (which is now available with some distributions, such as Ubuntu, so check the package managers first).

Opera and Firefox have various different widgets and extensions that provide notification. I use the Firefox Gmail Manager which has its own notification system besides much more: see below. Opera’s Gmail Checker is a small and simple widget solely for this purpose. I did not find any for Safari or IE on cursory check.

Favorite Firefox <-> Gmail Extensions

As a Firefox user, I like to search around at Firefox Add-ons for useful extensions. The ones I use are:

• Gmail Manager This is an essential script to handle multiple Gmail accounts. A small notification in the bottom tray of Firefox can be configured to display the current number of unread messages in the mailbox as well as a way to simply log into each account, with minimal switching around.

• Gmail Skins Fun to play with; note that some of the choices result in error messages, just uninstall, reinstall and choose a different theme.

• And of course I use the Firefox extension Greasemonkey. Saved Searches gives me dynamic folders, pretty useful. Hide Gmail Ads allows me to regain valuable real estate on my laptop where every centimeter counts.

Tips and Tricks

• Use a draft message (start a message and then save it rather than send it anywhere) to do quick file transfers between computers. I save the item into a draft on one computer, and pull it out from my login on another computer. It’s more convenient than emailing it to myself, and few home computers have a permanent IP address for ftp transfer and the like.

• I also use the drafts for “Notes to self” on particular emails. Sometimes I want to remind myself of things related to an email, and drafts attached to that email serve as a form of post-it notes.

• Sort everything! Any mailing lists should be slapped with a label and archived. This way I browse mailing lists at my leisure and I’m not distracted by constant incoming email. The only thing that should be popping up in my mail account are important things that I need to attend to relatively quickly. Gmail does provide pretty good filtering and labeling and other options for incoming email.

• Use the + feature in email addresses. The definition of mailing protocol means that addresses of the form somewhere+identifier@somedomain should be delivered t somewhere@somedomain . Not all mail providers adhere to this, but gmail does, and this can be a trick to sort incoming email from different sources. For example, when I’m forced to use my email address for something that I suspect will spam me later, I can use something like myemail+nyt@gmail.com to see. Since Gmail has reasonable filters, this is perhaps not as useful as it might have been at the start.

• Google itself lists several pretty cool Gmail related Greasemonkey scripts here; they’re all well worth looking at.

• There’s plenty of creative ways to divert items to Gmail: feeds can be sent via email through Feedster or Feedburner; that way I could if I chose have a daily weather forecast or my current to-do list emailed to me.

What would I like to see?

Gmail allows multiple email addresses to be forwarded to it, and to “reply” as those emails. However, those emails are still marked in the headers as originating from that particular gmail account. I would like to see it anonymized down to at least only knowing it’s routed through Gmail. Since the extra email addresses in question are verified before being added to Gmail’s list of alternate addresses, I don’t see why that can’t be offered.

Yes, a short list. Well, if it were longer, I wouldn’t be using Gmail in the first place Most of the time if I want a feature, I can find an extension of some type for it.

Miscellaneous Issues

One of the most annoying consequences of Google having assimilated Blogger is the effect it had on Blogger accounts versus Gmail accounts. I have a different “identity” on Blogger that’s well established, but not connected to my Gmail. Now, both accounts were retained in the merger, but they do not play well together. If I am logged into my Gmail when I encounter a Blogger post I wish to respond to, and I log in my old Blogger account, it logs me out of Gmail. I have not found a good way around this, although I have discovered that logging back to the original Gmail account often leaves the Blogger login available on other Blogger entries that I might respond to.