Mailplane

New Gmail Lab Feature: PowerPoint and TIFF file viewing

Friday, April 24, 2009

Google has improved Gmail's attachement "viewer" again. Now you get better support for TIFF (Fax) and PowerPoint:

This viewer provides a richer set of features than the old "View as slideshow" version: you can zoom in and out, select text to copy and paste, and "print" the presentation to a PDF document. And, unlike the old version, we no longer require you to have a Flash plugin installed on your browser.

Link to official Gmail blog post.

New Gmail Lab Feature: Suggest more recipients

Here's another Gmail lab feature you may find useful:

Gmail will suggest people you might want to include based on the groups of people you email most often. So if you always email your mom, dad, and sister together, and you start composing a message to your mom and dad, Gmail will suggest adding your sister. Enter at least two recipients and any suggestions will show up like this:

Click on a suggested name, and they'll get added to your email.

Link to official Gmail blog post.

Posted by Ruben on 04/24 at 10:40 AM
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“Macstories” reviews Mailplane

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Ticci at Macstories has just written a nice Mailplane review:

The idea behind Mailplane is to fill the gap between Gmail and desktop, a lack that Google still (strangely) did not remedied. Mailplane gives you the power to access to all Gmail accounts that you have, quickly switch between them, attach files from your Mac via a simple drag & drop and more, with all the future that Google provides to his service. Mailplane is a sort of mini-browser, exclusively designed to access Gmail with all the obvious convenience of a desktop application.

Check out the full review in either English or Italian.

New Gmail Lab Feature: Inserting images

Friday, April 10, 2009

Again, a new Gmail lab feature! Allows you to insert images into a message body. You can upload and insert image files in your computer, or insert images by URLs. Great stuff!

To get it working:

1. Enable the Inserting Images lab feature
2. Update Mailplane to at least 2.0.9 or the latest 2.1 beta version
3. Make sure you use "Rich text" in your message
4. Click the "Insert Image" button...

Mailplane 2.0.9 released

Here's a quick release before the Easter Break:

Release notes:

• NEW: Support for the new "Inserting images" Gmail lab feature.
• FIX: Pictures didn't get optimized (since 2.0.8)

New Gmail Lab Feature: Sender Time Zone

Thursday, April 09, 2009

Google just published another useful Gmail lab feature: Sender time zone.

There's a new feature in Gmail Labs called Sender Time Zone that can help. Turn it on from the Labs tab under Settings, and you'll see green phone icons next to people who are probably awake and readily reachable (if it's between 9:00 am and 6:00 pm in the sender's local time zone) and red ones next to those who could be sleeping or out of the office. Click "show details" and you can see when a message was sent in the sender's time zone as well as what time it is for them now.

Mailplane 2.0.8 released

Wednesday, April 08, 2009

Mailplane 2.0.8 is a maintance release, here are the changes and fixes:

• UPDATE: Spanish translation
• FIX: Safari 4 beta/Chat in a "popped out" window did scroll when typing.
• FIX: Advanced attachment feature didn't always work.
• FIX: Obsolete scrollbars when composing in a separate window.
• FIX: CMD-clicking "Open as Google document" link opened the document in the default browser instead of Mailplane.
• FIX: Talk Window/Safari 4: Console messages when hiding application
• FIX: Command-L stopped working because of Gmail changes
• NEW: If you have Flash 10 Mailplane will use "Advanced attachment features" to upload attachments.
• FIX: Resize problems after monitor resolution changes
• FIX: Error 407 when using a proxy server requiring authentication.

New Gmail Lab Feature: Gmail search autocomplete

"Google" searching your inbox is one of Gmail's highlights. With the lab feature, it even gets better:

Turn on Search Autocomplete from the Labs tab under Gmail Settings, and you'll get suggestions as you type in the search box. One of the most popular searches in Gmail is for names or email addresses, so the first kind of suggestions you'll see are contacts. Some names are not easy to remember (my last name is an excellent example!) — with this new Labs feature you can just type a couple letters and select the desired contact from the drop down list. Easy and quick as that.

Gmail Labs goes global

Hooray! According to the "official Gmail blog" Gmail lab features are now available in all supported Gmail languages - not just English!

Currently, there are 43 different lab features. I love and use these Gmail Lab features:

• Offline Gmail! If you like to try it, you'll need Mailplane 2.1-beta.
• Youtube, Picasa, Flickr previews in mail.
• Quick Links: Adds a box to the left column that gives you 1-click access to any bookmarkable URL in Gmail. You can use it for saving frequent searches, important individual messages, and more.
• Fixed with font: Adds an option to the reply dropdown menu that lets you view a message in fixed width font.
• Navbar drag and drop: Allows you to reorder the items in your navbar using drag and drop.
• Forgotten attachment detector: Prevents you from accidentally sending messages without the relevant attachments.
• Vacation Time: Lets you specify starting and ending dates for the vacation autoresponder.
• Custom Label Colors: Lets you create your own combination of colors for labels.
• Search Autocomplete: Provides search suggestions for contacts and operators as you type in the search box.
• Google Calendar gadget: Adds a box in the left column which shows your Google Calendar. See upcoming events, locations, and details.
• Google Docs gadget: Adds a box in the left column which displays your Google Docs. Shows recent docs, starred docs, and has fast search.
• Add any gadget by URL: Adds a "Gadgets" tab to Settings, where you'll be able to specify the URL of any gadget. This gadget will show in a box in the left column.

However, please do not use these lab features with Mailplane (they are not compatible):

• Custom keyboard shortcuts
• Hide Unread Counts
• Any signature feature (if you use Mailplane 2.1-beta HTML signatures).