Despite being a bitter rival of Apple, Google still makes some of the best iOS apps on the planet. One of my biggest gripes against Google’s apps though has been if you click a link inside Gmail, it opens up a Safari browser version of YouTube or Google Maps rather than opening the app directly.
Google has finally fixed that big annoyance by adding link support to Gmail for YouTube, Google Maps, and Chrome. The free update was just pushed out to the App Store. Now when you click on those links, the corresponding app will open up. You can turn the feature off if you want, but users who live and die by Gmail will certainly appreciate this simple feature.
Mobile Safari has a great sharing feature, letting you send a web page to anyone via iMessage, Twitter, Facebook, or email. The bummer thing is, though, that if you hit Mail, your iPhone will wrest control from you and make you send via the built-in iOS Mail App.
But you don’t want to use Mail. You prefer the Gmail app, right? Of course you do. How the heck, then, can you send that adorable picture of a cute pug puppy via email using the Gmail app? With a secret bookmark, of course.
Google promised us it was coming, and after a lengthy Google Now today makes its debut on iOS. It’s available as part of an update to the Google Search app, and it’s exactly what users on Android have been enjoying for the past year.
If you’re one of the lucky ones to have signed up for Mailbox, Orchestra’s amazing new email client for the iPhone, you know how great it is. It allows you to re-think how you deal with email on a daily basis. Mail messages can be archived, set to remind you at a later time or day, or placed in lists you create yourself all with a swipe of your thumb or finger. Mailbox turns email into much less of a chore while on the go.
Here are five great tips and tricks to get you mastering the Mailbox app for iPhone.
One of the advantages of Mailbox only working with Gmail is that a lot of the conventions you’re already used to are present in this fantastic on-the-go email app for your iPhone. If you spend a lot of time on your iPhone using Mailbox, you might have wondered what it does with your mail when you archive, set to later, or add to a list.
Mailbox for iPhone lets you send each email to a list, set it to snooze for a certain number of hours or days, or even just archive the email if you want.
In addition, you can mark emails as read or unread, and star them, just like in Gmail itself. THis gives you yet another way to sort and classify emails on the go, which also transfers easily to the web version of Gmail, as well.
Having problems accessing Gmail, Google Drive, Google Docs, and other Google services this morning? Don’t worry — you’re not the only one. Google is currently suffering a partial service outage which is making these service inaccessible for some users, but the company assures us that it is working on resolving the issues as quickly as possible.
I have used Mailplane on and off for years. I love that it turns the great Gmail interface into a proper desktop app, complete with drag-and-drop attachments, notifications and an icon in the dock and tab switcher. But I never liked its super power of spinning the CPU of my Mac at all times, even when supposedly idle.
Now v3.0 is out, and it seems to have solved the latter problem, while adding a few new features.
One of the central conceits of new iOS mail client, Mailbox, is getting to Inbox Zero, a zen state of pure joy, in which you feel much better having dealt with all your email. The way the app does this is with swipes. Swipe partway across an email to the right and you archive it with a pleasant green checkmark. Swipe completely from left to right and you send the offending email to the trash. It’s lovely, and easy, and oh so nice.
But what happens when you make a mistake and long swipe to Trash when you really meant to short swipe to Archive?
Thanks to those leaked screenshots that appeared on Tuesday, we’re pretty confident that Google Babel is no longer just a rumor, but a real product that’s patiently waiting to get its grand unveiling. And according to sources that are familiar with Google’s plans, it’s worth getting excited about.
They claim Babel aims to be “everything we have ever asked for in a unified messenger service,” with cross-platform syncing and a “first class iOS experience.”
