Tired
of stingy ISPs imposing arbitrary email restrictions on you? Yeah, so
are we. 1MB attachment limits, 25MB storage limits, and restricted SMTP
servers are sooo 1997. For a 21st-Century mail experience, step up to
Gmail.
We know what you’re thinking: Webmail is webmail. But
with 2.7GB of storage, 10MB attachment allowances, and an array of easy
hacks that let you customize your mail account in almost any way you
like, Gmail may be the most powerful e-mail tool the world has ever
known. But enough of our yammering. Here’s how to turn your Gmail
account into a messaging dynamo, and more.
1. Use Gmail as an Online Storage Vault
Need
to keep important files handy? You don’t necessarily have to shell out
100 bucks for a high-capacity thumb drive. Instead, use Gmail’s free
2.7GB of storage as an off-site backup for the files you need access
to. The easiest way is to simply attach your file to an email and shoot
it to your Gmail account. Then you can retrieve it at any time just by
logging in and running a quick search of your inbox. Of course, Gmail’s
10MB attachment limit means you won’t be able to archive massive
documents. But it’s a great way keep your most essential files handy
wherever there’s an Internet connection.
To take even greater
advantage of Gmail’s free storage space, you’ll need to download a
helper app. Firefox users can download Gmail Space from Mozilla’s Firefox Add-ons library,
which turns the web browser into an easy-to-use file explorer. The
extension lets you drag and drop files directly into Gmail’s storage
space, without having to worry about the attachment size limit.
Alternatively, you can download Gmail Drive Shell Extension
(free) for more ubiquitous access throughout your Windows PC. Gmail
Drive Shell Extension sets up your Gmail storage space as a network
drive on your PC, which you can access simply by double-clicking the
GMail Drive icon in My Computer and then entering your Gmail username
and password. Once you log in, your Gmail storage will act just like
any other drive on your PC. It even works with Windows Vista.
2. Filter Your Mail with Positive Thinking
The
lowly plus sign gets little respect in this crazy, mixed-up world. But
if you use it the right way with Gmail, it could become your new best
friend. By adding a plus sign and a filter tag to your own Gmail
address, you can figure out which of the sites that you’ve brazenly
given your address to are turning around, stabbing you in your tender,
fleshy backside, and selling it to every half-witted Pr0p3cia spammer
on the net.
This little hack doesn’t require a single tweak to
your Gmail settings. Instead, just use the plus/tag every time you
enter your address into an online form. Our favorite method is to use
the name of the site you’re visiting as the tag, so it’s easy to track
later on. So if you buy some vintage kicks at Raresneakers.com, enter
your email address as username+raresneakers@gmail.com.
Gmail
ignores the plus sign and everything that comes after it, so messages
sent to that address will still make their way to you. But if that site
sells your address to its spamifying associates, you’ll know just by
peeking at the To address in the header. How you choose to exact
revenge is entirely up to you.
You can also use this tip to set up filters for registration codes, listservs, and anything else!
3. Take Notice with a NotifierYou
don’t have to log into Gmail every time you want to see if you’ve got
mail. Instead, download a Gmail notifier. Although it isn’t prominently
featured on the Gmail site, Google’s own Gmail Notifier is a free download. If you’d rather not install a system tray icon, you can always use a Gmail plugin
for Firefox. Gmail Checker is a low-profile plugin that requires barely
a second thought to keep track of. But if you want to check multiple
Gmail accounts from within Firefox, check out Gmail Manager.
4. Import Your Old Mail into Gmail
If
you decide to switch to Gmail completely, you’ll probably want to bring
your old contacts and messages along for the ride. Importing your
contacts is easy (just click Import in the upper-right corner of the
Contacts screen and select a CSV file exported from your old mail app).
Importing your old email takes a little more doing.
One of the
easiest ways to get your old mail into Gmail is to download Mark Lyon’s
Gmail Loader (aka GML), which you can download from
www.marklyon.org/gmail/. This simple little utility will transfer
messages in the mBox format (including Thunderbird, Eudora, and
Netscape mailboxes) into Gmail. Transferring your mail is as easy as
downloading the app, launching it, entering your Gmail login info,
browsing for your mailbox folder, and clicking Send to Gmail.
To transfer Outlook mailboxes, try Outport,
which can transfer messages from Outlook to a host of other mail
readers, including Gmail. Like GML, Outport has a fairly simple GUI
that’s easy to navigate, so you can get the job done quickly and with a
minimum of mucking around.
Sadly, Gmail will stamp all the
imported mail with the date on which you do the import, rather than
preserve the original received dates from each of your imported
messages. However, you can still find imported messages by date,
because the original received dates are retained within the body of the
messages. So simply searching for “Nov 06” will help you find all
messages from November of 2006.
5. Turn Gmail into an MP3 PlayerIn
the interest of convenience, Gmail has its own built-in audio player
for use with file attachments. You can put it to work as an online MP3
player by using labels and mail filters to sort your files.
First,
set up a label called MP3. Next, set up a filter that searches for MP3
content by clicking Create a Filter at the top of the screen. Enter
“mp3” in the “Has the words” field and check the box marked “Has
attachment.” This will search for any messages with music files
attached (including any you may have uploaded using the GMail Drive
Shell Extension mentioned earlier). Now click Next Step and check the
box marked “Apply the label” and choose the label MP3. Now any time you
want to pump up some jams, you can click the MP3 label on the left side
of your screen and pick a tune from the list.
6. Email Impersonator
Just
because you’ve switched to Gmail, that doesn’t mean you have to give up
your old email address. Gmail lets you send messages that appear to
come from another address. In the settings pane, click Accounts and
then choose “Add another email address,” then enter the address you’d
like to use. To prevent you from ruining someone else’s life by
masquerading as them on the Internet, Google will send a test message
to verify that the address belongs to you. Then you can choose to make
that new address your default identity, so nobody needs to know that
you’re really sending from Gmail. To complete the transformation, set
up a forwarder for your other address’s account, so that all of your
mail reaches your Gmail account.