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Google Inbox

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Re: Google Inbox

#281

Post by cwilson »

I've been using this for the last 4 hours or so. I closed the old gmail in my browser and swapped default apps on my phone.

My quick thoughts on the iPhone app:

Good overall. It's just as good as most of the new line of productivity focused apps that have been released (and acquired) over the last year.

My quick thoughts on the web interface (inbox.google.com):

This is where it's really shining for me. Finally email doesn't feel like a spreadsheet with buttons anymore. It feels like Gmail should feel in 2014. Now that I've started using this, it would feel painful to go back to normal Gmail. You just kind of have to start using it to understand, but I really like it.

All of the new features (reminders, pinning emails, bundles, and one-button archiving of bundles like promotions and forums) are great . I've used almost every new feature already and they all feel like a natural part of a flow.

The only nitpick I have at the moment is the integrated chat in the web interface. It's defaulted to the Hangouts style chat, which I'm not a huge fan of. In old Gmail you have a choice of using the normal version of chat or Hangouts chat, and I've always turned off Hangouts chat. I really wish you could do that here, but I'm not seeing an option for it and my guess is there will never be one.

Overall however I'm really happy with this new version of Gmail and will continue to use it everyday.

Re: Google Inbox

#282

Post by cromwellian »

pcwalton wrote: post #261

Chrome only, it seems. Disappointing. https://twitter.com/brianleroux/status/524987137892954112

It doesn't use any Chrome specific features and it will work on FF, but it needs to be optimized to get buttery smooth 60fps animations. As you know, the logic for when the various browsers do layout, create layers, upload them to the GPU, etc is different, and that causes divergence rendering performance. It was hard enough to do this on Chrome, it just takes time.

We also ran into a recent difference in the way sparse JS arrays as handled. We use sparse JS arrays for some data structures, but array.splice(0) on Chrome runs much faster than FF when using this to clone a sparse array.

There's no intent to exclude Firefox, engineers are staying late in the office working on it.

Re: Google Inbox

#283

Post by mbesto »

tomkarlo wrote: post #273
GuiA wrote: post #19

Congrats to Google on shipping! Side question: am I the only person fully satisfied by my email workflow? I practice inbox 0- if an email is in my inbox, it means something needs to be done about it (whether it's replying, filing a bug report, writing a patch, etc). Once it's done, it gets archived. I star the stuff that I'll need to refer to later, like tickets for a flight or concert. I then have a few server side…

I'm an inbox-zero-er (and Googler) and I love using Inbox for that exact reason - it makes it even easier for me to deal quickly with emails I don't want to touch (e.g. promotional), and snooze emails I can't act on immediately so they'll come back next week or whenever I need to follow up on them. That means I can have an even more focused inbox that just contains things I need to think about / respond to right now.…

> IMHO, Inbox basically takes the stuff that inbox-zero folks had to learn to do manually, and makes a lot of it automated. It's particularly great on mobile.

But the manual intervention is precisely what makes my zero-inbox so effective. It's also agnostic to the device/application. If I leave something unread on a device it's unread somewhere else and vice versa. If one calls it "save for later", I don't know if that also means "unread".

Re: Google Inbox

#284

Post by k-mcgrady »

frogpelt wrote: post #210
k-mcgrady wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I liked Mailbox but Dropbox own it and I'm more and more concerned about how they handle my privacy. Add to that that for Mailbox to work your emails have to be stored on their servers (AFAIK, please tell me if I'm wrong) I switched away.

How much less trustworthy is Dropbox than Google?

Google already has my emails (Gmail). If I use Mailbox I'm throwing another party into the mix. Google continues to get them and now Dropbox gets some of them too. It would be best to use the service of the company that gets them either way (Google). Why give your email to two companies when you can give them to one and get the same features?

Re: Google Inbox

#285

Post by [deleted] »

zecho wrote: post #225
cromwellian wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've spent a lot of time optimizing for 60fps for the Web, it's not quite there yet for all browsers, due to different rendering/layout engine "gotchas", but we're working on rock solid 60fps everywhere.

Is that why Inbox requires Chrome?

[deleted]

Re: Google Inbox

#286

Post by cromwellian »

M4v3R wrote: post #213
KhalilK wrote: post #209

Meta note: That is one of the smoothest and pleasant scrolling experiences I've had on the web! Kudos to the web devs!

It's funny, because for me the scrolling on their page ( https://www.google.com/inbox/ ) doesn't work at all, on Safari 8.0/OSX.

I just tried it on Yosemite/Safari 8 and it seems to work for me.

Re: Google Inbox

#287

Post by berfarah »

dkulchenko wrote: post #143

Here's what I got in response to my invite request: Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently: inbox@inbox.gmrservice.ext.google.com Technical details of permanent failure: Google tried to deliver your message, but it was rejected by the relay gmr-smtp-in.l.google.com by gmr-smtp-in.l.google.com. [2607:f8b0:400e:c04::e]. We recommend contacting the other email provider at postmaster@gmr-smtp-in.l.google.…

I like the irony of using a conventional email message to request beta access to the next generation of email too.

Re: Google Inbox

#288

Post by stfu »

inoop wrote: post #17

I'm not sure what this 'inbox' does, but from judging from the video it's about a bunch of twenty-something hipsters from California high-fiving each other.

Same here. It seems that GMail wants now to "friendfeed" my mailbox.

I don't know what that whole "overwhelmed by email" issue is all about. If you are getting 100+ emails a day and believe these are all relevant for you, you either work as some sort of a customers service rep or there is something wrong with your life/priorities.

Re: Google Inbox

#289

Post by majgr »

afro88 wrote: post #101
egeozcan wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also found myself thinking about the lifestyle of the people in the video, instead of the product. I'm no marketing expert but I suspect that this is a bad thing for a successful campaign. I haven't seen anything in the video that's not already available with the combination of Google Plus, Gmail, Google Keep and Google Now - maybe that's why I feel that way. Can't tell.

Marketing like this is supposed to form a link between the context (Brooklyn hipster lifestyle) and the product. So next time you hear about Inbox you'll think of the lifestyle and subconsciously go "maybe if I have inbox my life will be more like those cool happy good looking rich Brooklyn hipsters on the ad". Their target market with this ad is people that want to be like or have this (or a subset of this). Apple i…

It is more like: If I show somebody Inbox I would be perceived as those happy, cool.. because this person has seen that ad[1].

(does email is cool, and happy?)

[1] http://www.meltingasphalt.com/ads-dont-work-that-way/

Re: Google Inbox

#290

Post by rakoo »

thedaveoflife wrote: post #245
Dirlewanger wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could sum up the post dot-com startup craze with "a bunch of twenty-something hipsters from California high-fiving each other". Nothing more than an unparalleled amount of resources thrown at solving first world problems that millenials have.

Yes because as we all know email is exclusively the domain of the young, idle Bourgeoisie

Well, that's who Inbox is targeted to with the given video, at least.
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