Gmail Makes It Easier To Get Things Done With More Quick Action Buttons

Gmail has added more “Quick Action” buttons to the inbox which helps you carry out tasks with nothing more than a click. Quick action buttons were first incorporated in Gmail next to specific kinds of messages. They are located to the right of the subject while viewing your inbox, and at the top of an open message. These time-savers allow you to perform an action in response to the email without opening the said email. The quick action buttons were introduced in May this year. The first batch included a RSVP button that let you respond quickly to a party...

Read the full article: Gmail Makes It Easier To Get Things Done With More Quick Action Buttons

The Art Of The Apology: How To Say Sorry With An Email (And Mean It)

Let’s face it; we all screw up from time to time. We’re humans. It’s part of what we do. Knowing how to display contrition and make amends is a very important skill to have. It allows the wronged party to move past any perceived slight, and more importantly it provides an opportunity for reflection on what caused you to upset another person. Email is a great medium for this. Although being a bit less personal than a face-to-face conversation, it allows you to compose your thoughts in a way which is unambiguous and direct, and reduces the need to be...

Read the full article: The Art Of The Apology: How To Say Sorry With An Email (And Mean It)

Gmail's New Attachment UI, Powered by Google Drive

An hour after posting about Gmail's new attachment UI, Gmail's blog announced the new feature:



"With today's update to Gmail, (...) you can view attachments and save files directly to Google Drive without ever leaving Gmail, making it easy to access them later from whatever device you're on - computer, phone or tablet. The next time you open an email with attachments, you'll see new previews of the files at the bottom of the email, from photos and videos to spreadsheets and PDFs."

Gmail now shows thumbnails for many file formats. Mouse over an attachment to download it or save it to Google Drive.

Gmail shows a list of Google Drive folders, so you can save the file to the right folder directly from Gmail. You can also download all the attachments or save all of them to Google Drive.

Click the attachments to preview files inline using Google Drive. The nice thing is that Google Drive Preview opens inside Gmail.

"This new attachment experience is available on desktop and will be rolling out over the next week," informs Google, which also mentions that Google Drive has 120 million active users.



{ via Gmail's blog }

Background Color Experiment in Google Mobile Search

Google experiments with a slightly different mobile search interface that has a different background color to emphasize the cards. "In this experiment, they've made the background darker in colour to add more contrast and make the cards stand out more," says Lee Jarratt, who noticed the new interface.

{ Thanks, Lee. }

Gmail Tests a New Interface for Attachments

Google tests a new interface for attachments internally. A screenshot from a Google employee reveals a Gmail attachment, followed by "Dogfood confidential - submit feedback on the new attachments experience".

The attachment from the screenshot appears to be an Excel spreadsheet and Gmail shows a thumbnail, the title of the file and an icon that's also used in Google Drive for Excel files. Here's the standard interface:

As you can see, the new Gmail UI uses a different icon and no longer displays options like "View", "Open as a Google spreadsheet" or "Download". It's not clear what happens when you click the attachment, but I assume it sends you to Google Drive, where you can preview the file or download it.



It's likely that Google wants to move Gmail attachments to Google Drive. Now Gmail and Google Drive use shared storage and Google Drive provides better ways to manage, search and share files.



{ Thanks, Florian K. }

6 Ways To Get Busy People To Answer Your Emails

When you walk by someone on the street and say hi, how does it make you feel when they don’t say a hi back? It’s amazing how small a lack of acknowledgement can make a person feel, but it’s also amazing just how much you can do to encourage a response. The same is true with emails. Now, imagine the reverse scenario. You’re passing someone on the street and they briefly glance at you, say hi, and then quickly look away. How likely are you to say hi back? Now imagine a person looking you straight in the eyes, smiling...

Read the full article: 6 Ways To Get Busy People To Answer Your Emails

Yahoo Mail Gets Multitasking With Keyboard Shortcuts To Help Your Productivity

Yahoo Mail brings multitasking to the web email interface. Yahoo Mail will display three different types of activities you have performed in your inbox. Click on Recent View (located just below the Folders link) to reveal messages you’re composing, recently opened emails and your latest search. The Recent View will enable users to switch from one activity within the inbox to another without opening another browser tab. The Recent View is a simplified way to multitask while working on your emails. The introduction of this feature has come from user feedback and the realization that opening too many tabs hardly...

Read the full article: Yahoo Mail Gets Multitasking With Keyboard Shortcuts To Help Your Productivity

Find Out If Your Email Messages Include Your IP Address

Find out if your email provider is including your IP address in outgoing messages as the IP address can reveal your geographic location to the recipients.

---

This story, Find Out If Your Email Messages Include Your IP Address, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 12/11/2013 under Email, Internet

Apple Spaceship, Amazon Sundays, Twitter Droids [Tech News Digest]

Today in Tech News Digest, Apple’s cult status is confirmed, Netflix and YouTube are shown to suck, Amazon announces plans to deliver on Sundays, Apple Maps steals users away from Google Maps, a new WoW expansion pack is revealed, WOT reaches 100 million downloads, Twitter turns from beta to alpha, and Blockbuster claims This Is The End. Apple’s Spaceship HQ Revealed Apple has, for a long time, faced claims that it’s some sort of cult. Not a real one, of course, but the fandom that the company elicits in its customers is reminiscent of that shown by followers to a...

Read the full article: Apple Spaceship, Amazon Sundays, Twitter Droids [Tech News Digest]

How To Open Windows Mobility Center In Windows 8.1

CLICK HERE TO SEE FULL POST



This past weekend, I assisted one of my friends in upgrading Windows 7 installation to the recently released Windows 8.1 version. The upgrade was smooth, even though the operation doesn’t keep installed programs and one needs to install all programs all over again after completing the upgrade. After upgrading to Windows 8.1, we reinstalled all […]

The Story of Stuff: Where Exactly Does All Our Stuff Come From Anyway? [Stuff to Watch]

You’re reading MakeUseOf, so you’re probably a bit computer-inclined. Chances are you own more than one, and all the extras too – so, where does this stuff come from? That’s a question with more than one answer – the simplified version, and the “spent my whole life researching it” extended version. The Story of Stuff is a 2007 short film about the material economy. It’s a politically-charged challenging look at the state of consumerism, prompting critics like Glen Beck, formerly of Fox News, to refer to it as an “anti-capitalist tale that unfortunately has virtually no facts correct.” That means...

Read the full article: The Story of Stuff: Where Exactly Does All Our Stuff Come From Anyway? [Stuff to Watch]