With the end of the semester upon us, I decided to take some steps in my plan to "go google." Google has replaced the "Personalized Home Page" with "iGoogle." This seems to be mostly a marketing change, though the new service has themes (that change with the time of day and with the weather) and a gadget maker, which is pretty cool. My new home page includes Google Calendar, Google Reader, and Gmail, among other gadgets.
I am particularly excited about Google Calendar. This afternoon I exported entries from Outlook to Google (using these handy instructions) in about two minutes. The ability to create multiple calendars is a nice feature, and my plan is to start entering "Family" dates tonight. Of course, that Family calendar can be shared with my wife and children, meaning that any of us can view or update it.
The Google Reader displays entries from all of my favorite blogs. The new iGoogle also allows for the creation of multiple tabs, and I plan to gadgetize several pages for other websites that I frequent.
Finally, I have integrated my work email with gmail. This took a bit longer than setting up the Calendar and Reader, but only because I had to track down the server settings. I confess that of all of the Google programs on my target list, Gmail is the one that I find least exciting, though I haven't used it much. Once I get it customized, I suspect that it will work just fine.
UPDATE: Ok, I just discovered something about Gmail that I dislike and (apparently) cannot change. I wanted to send all of my messages from my work email, but when I send a message from Gmail and the recipient reads the message in Outlook, she sees this in the "From" line: "myusername@gmail.com; on behalf of; Gordon Smith [gsmith@law.wisc.edu] <myusername@gmail.com>." According the Gmail Help, that's just the way it is. Yuck!
UPDATE2: As luck would have it, Jeff Nolan blogged today about a hack that loads Google Notebook into the sidebar of Firefox.
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8345157d569e200d83533880d69e2
Links to weblogs that reference Going Google: Progress Report:
1. Posted by Jason on May 2, 2007 @ 18:34 | Permalink
I consider that an Outlook "Yuck" (among many) more than a Gmail "Yuck".
2. Posted by Brock on May 3, 2007 @ 10:08 | Permalink
Gordon:
Under Settings, Accounts, choose the radio button that says: "Reply from the same address the message was sent to." That's what I do, and it works like what it says. You can also use a pull-down menu in the compose window to choose the outgoing email address. You may need to use the web-interface to do this, but trust me: the web interface is far superior to using Outlook.
In Calendar, make a new calendar for each type of thing. For instance, you might want a calendar for faculty meeting - this way you can share that calendar with any colleagues who also use Google Calendar. Eventually they will input things into that calendar, and partially relieve you of the burden of maintaining it. As an example, my wife has a "Softball Games" calendar, which she shares with some other women on her team. They can all edit it to keep it current. Calendars can be very granular. We have a "public" family calendar so anyone can see birthdays and bbq's, but our "nights out" calendar is private.
3. Posted by Gordon Smith on May 3, 2007 @ 11:05 | Permalink
Brock,
Re gmail, it still shows the obnoxious line. This appears to be a problem only with Outlook, and I am tempted to side with Jason rather than blaming gmail. It's still yucky.
Good tips re the calendar. I was having similar thoughts last night as we constructed the family calendar. I am sure that as we use it we will get more granular.
4. Posted by Avi player on December 26, 2011 @ 5:35 | Permalink
I always had troubles with Outlook, so I started using gmail for my business contacts. It's way more simple now. Thanks for the tips on calendar by the way!
| Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |||
| 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 |
| 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 |
| 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 |
| 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
