I’m tickled pink. I used to use a Greasemonkey script with Gmail that added colors to labels. Later, I changed to the Better Gmail addon that simply made every label a bright red. Easy to see, served the purpose. Trouble was, that was one script that made loading Gmail take longer than it probably ought.
So, I pleasantly surprised to discover a couple of days ago that Google had added the option to color your labels. And even better they’ve provided a limited (24) but stylish set of colors that blend well, rather than clashing with everything else on the page. Suddenly my inbox is dressing a little flashier than before, and it’s become easy again to find specific emails of note.
Fabulous.
Tags: better gmail, gmail, google, greasemonkey
I think Google changed something in relation to Gmail yesterday evening. I use two Firefox addons to make managing my email a little more efficient – Better Gmail and Gmail Manager – and as of yesterday, both addons now seem to be broken. I first noticed a problem when Gmail tried to refresh and issued a ‘Could not build contacts’ error and subsequently logged me out. No amount of cajoling or urging could get me logged back in. Initially I thought it was a Gmail problem, but when I tested it out, I found I could still login normally from IE7 and Safari. My next thought, then, was that maybe somehow the Better Gmail addon I use with Firefox to restyle Gmail and add a few convenient functions might have broken. I disabled it and restarted Firefox, and sure enough, I was logged back in just fine. I’m a little annoyed now that some of the features that Better Gmail added are currently unavailable, but I’d much rather not have them than not have access to my email at all.
The other plugin that no longer functions is Gmail Manager. This little addon puts a little module on Firefox’s status bar that allows to check and manage multiple Gmail accounts quickly and easily. Well, Gmail Manager no longer works, showing all emails accounts as having no email, despite there being mail in most of those inboxes.
My guess is that Google changed something in their Gmail API that has caused most, if not all, Firefox addons for the service to break. I haven’t had a chance to do much in the way of research into the issue yet, so I don’t know how widespread this issue is and if it’s affecting everyone or if it’s just something screwed up with my particular instance of Firefox.
If anyone knows anything about this, do please let me know. I’ll try to keep you posted in the meantime.
Update: Turns out this is a known issue. There is a comment from the Better Gmail developer that Google rolled out a new version of Gmail recently. They are currently working on developing a new version of the addon to be compatible with Gmail. No word yet on whether Gmail Manager is being updated.
Tags: addons, better gmail, firefox, gmail, gmail manager, google
Google has made me a very happy camper recently. It started about the time I finally landed one of those much coveted Gmail beta-tester accounts – I’ve never been happier with email. Then, I discovered how powerful the Google search engine really is – Google Search is now the only search engine I’ll ever use.
Recently, I switched my RSS feed reader over to Google Reader. I’d been looking for a suitable replacement for Mozilla Thunderbird – much as I love Thunderbird, it was just a little bit too difficult for me to use it on multiple computers, even as a portable app. My computer at home is actually a bit too slow to handle running any applications from a flash drive (I really need to upgrade to USB 2.0 one of these days). I’d started using a server-side feed reader, but it didn’t automatically update the way I wanted. Then, I’d heard about Google Reader updating their services, so I decided to give them a second try (the first time around I was less than impressed). Now, I’m very satisfied with this program, and it fits very nicely into my Firefox browser, making it very easy to add new interesting feeds as I stumble across. It updates automatically and organizes everything in a logical manner.
Add to that one more service I think I like – Google Sync. This is a slick little add-on for Firefox that allows you to use Firefox on several different computers but keep your browsing session in sync on all of them. This includes history and saved passwords (encryped, of course), bookmarks, history, and tabs and windows. I’ve been using it for about 24 hours now, and so far I like what I see. Eventually, I’d like to simply run Firefox Portable from my flash drive everywhere I go, but again, that requires USB 2.0 to be really effective. So in the meantime, this is an effective solution I can live with.
I’ve also been keeping my eye on Apple recently. This is one company that continues to dish out some really neat products. My wife has had her eye on a G5 for quite some time now – she has a background in multimedia and video work and would love to be able to set up at home. I’ve had my eye on either an iPod or an iPod Nano. Now I come to find out that Apple has produced the iPhone. I’ve kind of kvetched recently about combining too many digital devices into one thing, but I have to say that this iPhone idea holds a bit of a glamour for me. This one looks like it might actually be usable. Of course, I don’t really have much interest in owning a cell phone, so the iPod solution is still probably the best one for me. But if I were to get a cell phone, the iPhone would certainly be one I’d be interested in.
Tags: apple, firefox, gmail, google, iphone, plugins, software, Technology
