Is this different than folders? Or labels? Is the primary benefit here that these categories are more prominent in the UI?
A new Gmail inbox
21–30 of 313 posts
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#22I'm encouraged that they seem to allow you to toggle this new inbox on/off as you wish. In contrast to the "new" compose box which will eventually be forced onto everyone.
I'm just gonna hijack this thread in case any gmail devs are dropping by. the new compose box is a joke - why would you force users to write emails in a small window in the bottom right corner?!
I actually prefer this as it allows me to check other mails while I'm typing. It actually bothers me that replying on a mail still uses the old compose.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#23It's not available to me yet, so I'm not sure how exactly it works.... but their example pic showing "Promotions" as one of the tabs is pretty disheartening. The post here says it's customizable, so I hope that is not mandatory.
Can you elaborate on why you feel it's disheartening?
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#24I'm encouraged that they seem to allow you to toggle this new inbox on/off as you wish. In contrast to the "new" compose box which will eventually be forced onto everyone.
I'm just gonna hijack this thread in case any gmail devs are dropping by. the new compose box is a joke - why would you force users to write emails in a small window in the bottom right corner?!
> why would you force users to write emails in a small window in the bottom right corner
Seconded. It's actually very painful to write on the bottom right corner; also at times pasting large amount of text in to the box screws its interface. When you've some formatting on the text pasted there, something goes crazy.
I recently quit accessing my primary Gmail account and this is one of the main reasons for it.
Other being the amount of spam that started coming in, in the name of notifications, deals and whatever "my friend has unlocked...".
I also found Gmail forcing a lot of G+ around the header of my inbox, and tonnes of services that I have never opened or would not be interested in. Unable to switch those off.
That said, I do find this label-tab option interesting. Will definitely give it a go.
[Edits] Added thoughts.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm just gonna hijack this thread in case any gmail devs are dropping by. the new compose box is a joke - why would you force users to write emails in a small window in the bottom right corner?!
I guess the rationale is that they let you navigate your gmail in the background, flipping back and forth between conversations etc, while composing the new mail. I just wish the compose box was freely movable. On a very large screen it is indeed awkward to type in the bottom right corner only.
You do know that you can popout the compose box, or even the other chat boxes into popups which you can expand as you wish?
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm willing to guess that GMail is among the top 3 most used products by HN's readership. This is a substantial change in the experience of that product, as well as deployment of what seems to be some pretty nontrivial technology powering that. It's also the kind of feature that will impact any startup that uses email as a communication channel with its customers (to wit: All of them). If that's not relevant to the H…
Ok, I'll bite. What do you think the other top 2 products are?
GitHub and Google search, I'd guess.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#27It's not available to me yet, so I'm not sure how exactly it works.... but their example pic showing "Promotions" as one of the tabs is pretty disheartening. The post here says it's customizable, so I hope that is not mandatory.
Can you elaborate on why you feel it's disheartening?
It comes off as something being masked as a "feature," when in actuality it is just something that is trying to get me to spend money. It seems like it blurs the line between the "content" of my inbox and advertising.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#28Is this different than folders? Or labels? Is the primary benefit here that these categories are more prominent in the UI?
Unlike labels, which require fixed rules (or manual action) to place emails into them, the tabs sort emails algorithmically.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#29Wait, are these categories fixed? If so, more proof that gmail is now made for kids: "We get a lot of different types of email: messages from friends, social notifications, deals and offers, confirmations and receipts, and more." That doesn't remotely begin to describe my inbox, but then again I haven't been in high school for a long time now. Where is the tab for "bills"?
> Where is the tab for "bills"?
It's a label you create with a filter that has all the email addresses of your providers, so everything skips your Inbox and gets sorted automatically.
Who said GMail has to be designed for engineers? The majority of people have no idea what a filter is and wouldn't be able to figure one out even if you told them where to find it.
As long as the features that I need are there, I don't care what fluff they add on top, so long as I can turn it off. And I can turn this off.
Re: A new Gmail inbox
#30So they're giving me sub folders ("tabs") for my inbox folder. How very 1999. What Gmail is really doing is adding more layers of complexity. Now they have hard wired folders (inbox, sent, etc), labels (aka custom folders), tabs in the inbox, and importance markers (starred / not). They're making the same mistake that consumed many of Microsoft's email efforts: adding complexity thinking that's how you add 'power con…
not forced to use it. What would you rather they add?