good things -- gmail edition

If you don't have one, get a gmail account. If nothing else, it will give you a new perspective on e-mail. We are so accustomed to seeing every e-mail client look the same, that gmail's "conversation view" can be quite jarring at first. However, I think I speak for many when I say that you learn to love the conversation view. The search capabilities are, of course, unsurpassed.

By the way, you won't find 'folders' in gmail. Don't bother trying. What you will find is 'labels.' Labels are WAY more powerful than folders. Why? Because any one e-mail can only exist in one 'folder' in traditional e-mail clients. However, that e-mail can have multiple 'labels' and thus, can be viewed/searched/retrieved/clustered along with other e-mails sharing the same label. It's a thing of beauty, really.

E-mail is, after all, just a file (with possible attachments) that gets passed from one computer to another. Gmail took the big leap and made the UI different than the Outlook UI. Then, they made it easy to search your files.

Then, get the gtdgmail extension for firefox--you are using firefox, right?

I've seen people ask the question "If I'm using gtdgmail, then what do I use for my Calendar (hardscape)?"

uh........Google Calendar, of course. It integrates well with gmail (you can add event details from any e-mail). I even forward my appointments from other systems. Gmail automatically recognizes an appointment (at least from Groupwise--I suspect from others as well), and allows me to add it to my calendar with the click of the mouse. The really great thing here is that I now have one calendar tool that can merge all of my calendars in a truly GTD fashion. Even better, I can create multiple calendars--some for appointments, and some to be used as GTD tickler files. My whole family can (and does) share calendars. I can then view just my appointments, or mine along with the rest of the family's in order to be able to see a bigger picture.

Now, is Google reading my e-mail? Well, they say they're not, and I hope not. However, one would assume that if they are reading everyone's e-mail, they are suffering from severe information overload. I mean seriously, how many times can you read "I just found out about Microsoft's e-mail tracking beta program that will pay you.....?" bleeccchhhh.

--Og