How to 'Google' Your Life!

[bbcentral]

Apologies for the lame title

This is something I've been thinking about for quite a while, how you can use Google and their associated products to get more out of your life online!



Gmail
Many of you are already using Gmail to host your email. But there are also a lot using Hotmail, Yahoo, SBCGlobal, AOL, Sympatico and hundreds of other providers. Most of the time this is because you get a free email account with your internet provider and you use that, other times it's because you've had your address for years and you don't want to change.

Firstly, let's look at some of the benefits of using Gmail:

1. It's completely free (they show advertisements on the side of the page)
2. You get more than enough storage space (7293MB/7.2GB, I have 20,000+ emails and I'm still only using 0% of my space!)
3. Gmail can be accessed via POP3 and IMAP, making it completely compatible with Outlook/Thunderbird/iPhones etc
4. You can search through your emails just like using Google.com
5. You can import mail from other email accounts
6. They have automatic filters and labels
7. Gmail has superb spam and virus filtering
8. PDF attachments can be viewed online WITHOUT installing extra software (ie Acrobat Reader)
9. They now have Labs and Themes
10. If you change internet provider, you don't lose your Gmail address!

Here's a screenshot of Gmail (edited for privacy):


It's fairly simple, your folders are on the left, labels directly underneath, emails in the middle. You can also "Star" important emails, and then find them easily later. Notice how some emails have a colored box next to the subject, this matches the label. So all emails which come from Amazon have the same label color. If I want to find all emails from Amazon, I can click the "Amazon" label in the box on the left. I also have a "Hotmail" label which applies to any emails sent to my old Hotmail account, so I can see who is still contacting me through my old address.

Across the top is also a list of other Google products I have access to, including Calendar, Documents, Photos, Reader, Web & More.

Clicking Settings gives you access to all your Gmail options, first of all is Filters:


As you can see, all emails sent from eBay, Amazon, HostGator and Jelsoft have labels applied. Emails from Hostgator and Jelsoft are important, so they always bypass the spam filter. Emails from Jelsoft also have a Star applied.

Clicking "Labs" gives you access to some of the new Gmail features, I'm using around 5 of them at the moment.

Clicking "Themes" lets you change the look of Gmail to match your taste, I'm using a theme called "Planets":


Some themes display different images depending on the day/location/weather.

When viewing an email you'll see Google text ads on the right side of your screen, but these really don't interfere:


They're still miles better than the flash animations and videos you're subjected to by other email providers!

Notice how there is also a "Map This" link above the ads. It's located an address in the email and automatically given you the option to view it on a map

There's dozens of other useful functions in Gmail, but you'll need to discover them yourself! Head on over to http://www.gmail.com and setup a free account for yourself!

[bbcentral]

Google Reader

Another very useful product is "Google Reader", which can be found here:
http://www.google.com/reader/
(Same username/password as your Gmail account!)

This is great if you regularly read news items from different websites and you don't want to have to keep checking them every day. If the site has an RSS feed, subscribe to it in Google Reader and then you'll only need to visit one site per day!

Here's how it looks:


As you can see, I'm subscribed to "Digg", "Proton Charging", "Diggnation" and "GateWorld News". New items appear in bold, and I can click on the ones I'm interested in to read them. If I view "All Items" at the top, I get a list of every news item from all 4 sources, and I can also share stories/articles with my friends. If you see something you'd like to bookmark for later, just click the "Add Star" link under the article and you can access it in your "Starred Items".

[bbcentral]

Google Calendar

This product practically runs my life! I use it to store basically everything, it's my long term and short term planner, it organises everything I do and helps me avoid scheduling conflicts. It even stops me from missing my favorite TV shows

Let's take a look at a completely filled calendar:


Now obviously this looks more messy because of all the black censored bars, and also I have 7 calendars, but I assure you it's extremely easy to work with!

Let's break it down, the search box at the top lets you Google your calendars to find a particular event. The My Calendars box on the left shows you all of your calendars (color coded to make them easier to browse), you can click on them to show/hide individual calendars. The center of the screen is your calendar, I'm using the "Month" view but you can also use the tabs to switch to "Day/Week/Month/Custom/Agenda" views.

In the example above I'm using the calendar to track my work shifts, because I work on a rotating 6 day roster. As soon as I receive a new roster from work I quickly throw my shifts into Google Calendar. The "Work" Calendar in red shows which days I'm working and what time. The blue "Days Off" calendar shows the days where I don't have to go to work, simple enough It makes planning social events much faster and avoids double booking!

I also have a "Gigs" calendar (in orange), so if a band is playing that I want to see I just add them here.
"Personal" (in green) tracks things like Pay Day (Recurring every 2nd thursday), when my bills are generated (on the same day recurring every month), parties and birthdays. This is useful because if I put in the expected due date of my bills every month, and I check my calendar only to find I have a bill due in 3 days which I never received, I can contact the company and find out what's going on before it becomes overdue

TV/Movies (in purple) is obviously for TV shows and movies, notice how "Diggnation" recurs every week on Saturday at 10am. This is to remind me to download the latest episode every week.

There's also some public calendars, "Australian Holidays" just automatically adds public holidays to my calendar (other countries are available too). "Weather" shows the weather for the next 4 days on my calendar.

You can also add the Google calendars for your friends/family (if they share them with you), this can help you coordinate what you're doing with everyone else.

Here's how it looks when creating/viewing/modifying a calendar event:


Firstly, you have "What", which is just the name of the calendar event.
"When" is obviously the start/end time and date of the event. Tick the "All Day" box if no specific time applies.
"Repeats" is whether or not the event is a once-off, you can go "Does Not Repeat", "Daily", "Every Weekday", "Weekly", "Monthly", "Yearly" etc. Great for Birthdays, Anniversaries, etc. You can customise the repeating event using the options below, for example if your Power bill is only issued every 3 months you would say "Repeats: Monthly" and "Repeat every 3 months". You will then be given options to repeat by "Day of the month" (ie every month on the 13th), or "Day of the Week" (Monthly on the first Wednesday etc).
"Where" is simply the location of the event, this can be an address if applicable. I use it to also store web addresses and TV stations
"Calendar" is to let you choose which calendar the event should be saved under.
"Description" is simply a text box to put any additional details for the event, including things like ticket prices, attire, etc.

The "Guests" box on the right lets you send an email invitation to your friends/family. They will receive an email giving them the option to accept/decline. You will then see a list of who is attending.

"Options" lets you receive reminders by Email and SMS. You can choose multiple reminders for each event at different times. In the above example, I would receive a text message reminder 10 mins before Diggnation starts. (SMS are free but may not work on all carriers worldwide).

There are many other features in Google Calendar, but you'll need to explore these on your own

[takkuneg]

I don't like Gmail simply because of the "conversations" bit. I think it's weird, and I like regular format better.

[Vinnie Blues]

True that having one or several email accounts at providers like Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and countless others, is very practical when :

- changing internet provider : that's my second internet provider but my email addies remain the same, unlike the provider-given email addresses.
- these accounts can be checked from everywhere.
- one can create addresses for specific purposes, which can be accessed by several people in a group, independently from their own internet provider. I mean, I created one for our neighborhood committee and I will do so for our condo council.

Thing is, I am with Yahoo but I don't want to change because I am used to it. Heck, I feel weird when using the French Yahoo account, so changing to another account provider...

[Dauber]

You can't forward a bunch of messages at once with GMail.

[dinosaurexx]

i have msn and yahoo.. and im just fine :] but then again, i really only use this, myspace, and youtube... and sometimes IMVU.. >_<

[bbcentral]

Originally Posted by takkuneg

I don't like Gmail simply because of the "conversations" bit. I think it's weird, and I like regular format better.

It's weird at first, but after using it for a while you get used to it and you find that it's much faster to find what you're looking for, especially if (like me) you're constantly corresponding with a lot of people at once. The only complaints are when you get the same message multiple times, such as new LiveJournal comments or new private messages. But I always delete these as I get them so it never causes me any problems.

Originally Posted by Vinnie Blues

True that having one or several email accounts at providers like Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and countless others, is very practical when :

- changing internet provider : that's my second internet provider but my email addies remain the same, unlike the provider-given email addresses.
- these accounts can be checked from everywhere.
- one can create addresses for specific purposes, which can be accessed by several people in a group, independently from their own internet provider. I mean, I created one for our neighborhood committee and I will do so for our condo council.

Thing is, I am with Yahoo but I don't want to change because I am used to it. Heck, I feel weird when using the French Yahoo account, so changing to another account provider...

Yahoo isn't bad, but I was surprised at how many ads they subject everyone to. And they're not text ads, they're actually animated GIF images and Flash animations.

Mind you, GMail has just added the ability to import all your contacts from Yahoo and Hotmail, which is quite cool.

Sometimes you have to step outside your comfort zone and give new things a try, I had a GMail account for nearly 2 years before I actually started using it, and I could never go back to my old Hotmail/ISP accounts

Originally Posted by Dauber

You can't forward a bunch of messages at once with GMail.

Can't do that with Hotmail or Yahoo either, it's usually a feature only found in your mail program (Outlook, Outlook Express, Thunderbird, etc) as opposed to webmail. But then you can always run GMail through one of those programs anyway. I use Mozilla Thunderbird personally

Originally Posted by dinosaurexx

i have msn and yahoo.. and im just fine :] but then again, i really only use this, myspace, and youtube... and sometimes IMVU.. >_<

There's more to Google than just GMail, there's a lot of programs you can use online. Google is pushing the way towards having online applications, I've been working with them heavily lately and found they're much better than having to download and install a program on my PC. It also means I can access everything from my PC, my laptop and my work computer.

All mail sent out by Blues Brothers Central is sent via GMail's servers, it's more reliable and doesn't get blocked like when I sent them out myself.

I'm posting this partially because I'm getting a lot of bounced emails, usually for things like full inboxes (which will almost never happen with GMail). Also the new Blues Brothers Central is going to have more Google integration, to try to get news out faster to the community.

And another handy feature GMail has, which you don't get anywhere else, is called Address Aliases. I use this all the time when I sign up for a website.

Let's say your email address is myemailaddress@gmail.com, and you're signing up for a new website (let's say MySpace). You sign up with myemailaddress+myspace@gmail.com, so they send all their emails there. That way you can setup filters/labels easily, and if you start getting Spam at that address you'll know MySpace gave away your email address to the spammers!

myemailaddress+bbcentral@gmail.com
myemailaddress+youtube@gmail.com
myemailaddress+facebook@gmail.com
myemailaddress+twitter@gmail.com
and so on

[Jo_Pierce]

I am a big fan of google, but I also have yahoo accounts and a university account. I must admit, I have about 7 e-mail accounts, each for different purposes. I strongly recommend a SPAM account - that way you can use that address for all those nasty sites where you have to register, but you don't want to get the associated SPAM garbage that's bound to come afterwards...

I use gmail for professional things, since I get really large engineering files that take up a lot of space. Gmail is the only account I have that can handle such big files.