8 New features in Gmail

Google may have disappointed some of its users lately with frequent outages, however, the company is all set to please them with a slew of new features. The company recently added eight new features in Gmail.

Presently, a third in global email marketshare, Gmail is striving hard to increase its turf. So here’s looking into all the new features that Gmail has added in the recent past in its endeavour to climb up the ranking ladder

1. Import mails and contacts from other accounts:

Find the process of importing your emails and contacts from other accounts to Gmail troublesome? Gmail’s just added a new feature that promises to simplify the process for you. Google has added a new feature

which will let Gmail users easily import all their emails and contacts from Hotmail, Yahoo, or AOL accounts. All a user needs to do is enter his Webmail account details (username and password) into Google’s service and over the next 24 to 48 hours, all his emails and contacts will be automatically imported to his Gmail account. Google now also lets you test drive gmail. The company offers a 30-day test-drive mode for users to decide whether they like Gmail or not. The feature, presently available to new users, is likely to be extended to current users soon

2. Google Search comes to Gmail:

Search engine giant Google has added a search widget in Gmail, which enables users to search the web without opening a new browser. The new feature shows a search box onto the left side of Gmail inbox. When a user types in a search, a window (like a chat window) appears at the bottom of the screen with search results. The feature can be activated by clicking settings tab, followed by selecting the Labs feature, and enabling the Google Search feature option. Google says that new feature aims to help users to copy and insert any required URL and send it to others using email or Gmail chat.

3. PowerPoint and TIFF file viewing:

After adding online viewing option for PDFs, Google has extended its support to TIFF and Microsoft PowerPoint document formats too. With this functionality, users can now view TIFF and PPT files online, directly in the browser, without having to save the files to the computer. There is also no need to buy, install, or wait for any software to start up.This means users can view all PDFs, PowerPoint (PPT) presentations as well as .TIFF-formatted images that have been received as attachments in Gmail’s HTML, multi-page document viewer. According to software engineer Marc Miller, “Gmail has rolled out this viewer with a richer set of features than the older ‘View as slideshow’ version: users can now zoom in and out, select text to copy and paste, and ‘print’ the presentation to a PDF document. And, unlike the old version, we no longer require you to have a Flash plugin installed on your browser.”

4. Suggest more recipients:

You may have many a times mistakenly left someone important out of an email? Or you keep on thinking who all from your long list of contacts need to be sent this mail? Gmail aims to solve this problem for you. Gmail Labs new feature called “Suggest more recipients” is intended to do just that. On enabling the feature from the Labs tab under Settings, a user can see a suggested recipients list while composing a message. Gmail will suggest contacts that a user might want to include based on the group of people they email often

5. Inserting images:

Here’s a feature to help users get users rid of attaching images in email. All that a user needs to do is just turn on “Inserting images” from the Labs tab under Settings, and users will see a new toolbar icon. On clicking the image icon, users can insert images in two ways: by uploading image files from computer or giving image URLs. Gmail doesn’t show URL-based images in messages by default to protect users from spammers. So if a user is sending mail to other Gmail users, they will have to click “Display images below” or “Always display images from …” to see the embedded images

6. Automatic message translation:
Need help in reading that email from your French friend? Gmail’s here to help you.

Google is offering one-click automatic translation for Gmail in 41 languages. This will let Gmail users read emails in languages such as Turkish, Thai and Estonian. To activate the feature go to the Settings tab and then click the Labs tab. Here enable the Message Translation option. Jeff Chin, product manager for Google Translate says, “Each person can write messages in their native language and the recipients can translate the messages into their respective native languages.”

7. Tasks in Calendar:

For long users have been wanting integrated tasks list in Google Calendar, especially after Google launched Tasks in Gmail Labs. Google recently integrated Tasks into its Calendar service. To enable the feature, a user needs to open Calendar and click on the “Tasks” link on the left hand side. The usual task list will appear with some Calendar-specific additions. Once you activate the feature, the Tasks that have due dates will automatically appear on the calendar. To create a task with a due date in Calendar, click on an empty space in month view or the all-day section of week view, and select the “Task” option

8. Contact manager:

With user’s contact information spread across various programmes and devices, Gmail’s contact manager comes as a handy addition. The feature enables users to import all contacts across devices and software platforms to Google Contacts. Gmail contact manager lets users create groups, add multiple email, phone, or home addresses and even adjust chat preferences for contacts. Users can import their contacts from other sources or export the ones they have currently.

Incidentally, contact manager is a standalone functionality which lets users manage their contacts even if they don’t use Gmail. To use the service, users can access the standalone contact manager.