BLOG SEARCH

15 May 2008

Why Gmail?

I don’t exactly remember anymore when I first had my Google offered email service. During those times, the service was available only on invitation. I still do remember my request to one of the frequent IRC chatters in DALnet to send me the Gmail preview version. I had my Gmail account probably in June or July 2004. But I rarely use the service then.

One of the reasons (I told myself) was this – it does not allow me to create folders. I extensively use the Filter and Folder options in Yahoo! Mail service to tidy up my clogged Email Inbox. It seems the email space provided by Gmail did not appeal me very much without my treasured option in Yahoo! Mail.

However, to my pleasant surprise I later (a year or so later) found out that Gmail also had such features I wanted. I should say the discovery to this feature was accidental. Since then, I rarely check my other email accounts (though sometimes I do) but Gmail.



I use the Filter and Folder for this useful reason:

I let the Filter option to filter incoming emails based on either the Senders’ Email ID or Subject. When it filters the incoming emails, the emails are then dropped on their appropriate Folders. I subscribed to a dozen Yahoo Discussion Groups and also multiple Google Alerts. You can imagine my obsession for this particular Email option in Yahoo! Mail.

As I have shifted most of my email correspondence to Gmail now, this is what and how I do to keep my Gmail Inbox more organised and tidy using it's Label, Filter and Archive features:

  1. I create a Label (works almost like a Folder).
  2. I clicked on the Create Filter.
  3. Specify the Filter Criteria.
  4. Clicked on the Next Step button.
  5. Checked the Skip the Inbox (Archive it) box.
  6. Checked the Apply the label box and then apply an existing Label from the dropdown or Apply a New Label:
  7. I then clicked the Create Filter button. Based on my Filter Criteria, there is another option which asked me whether to also apply filter to the past conversations/email exchanges. You can checked that if you want.

Two other features I like of Gmail are:

  1. Its way of Grouping email conversations based on the Email Subject.
  2. Its inbuilt Chat feature.
I have been wanting to write this Gmail stuff a very long time ago. At last, I did it. Huis!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gmail have what Yahoo doesn't have, i also choose gmail better than yahoo...

Lalremlien Neitham said...

oh hi tris! thanks for passing by and also for the comment. ;-) muah!

Rail_Traveller said...

Gmail doesn't have Yahoo's window Pane reading option just like Outlook express. And Yahoo too has an inbuilt chat feature !

Lalremlien Neitham said...

rail_traveller: yes, that true. you cannot expect different services to have the same features unless it is a common one. the outlook like window pane is not attractive to me. also, the inbuilt chat feature is a new feature of ymail copied from gmail ideas. performance wise, the new ymail is way too slow. and then, the anti-spam in gmail is more active than those of ymail. :-D

Joyful Thiek said...

I did not know there are such features as to creating folders and filtering, etc before...not in Yahoo nor in Gmail. I should check it out; sounds interesting.
Thanx, Lal