Google Rolling Out Gmail Redesign

Today Google announced a redesign of the Gmail inbox. Citing a high volume of email which makes it hard for users to focus on what's important (or what they want to focus on at any given moment), the new inbox will automatically group incoming emails into categories, which will appear as tabs at the top of the inbox. 'You can easily customize the new inbox — select the tabs you want from all five to none, drag-and-drop to move messages between tabs, set certain senders to always appear in a particular tab and star messages so that they also appear in the Primary tab.' Speaking to The Verge, Gmail product manager Alex Gawley said, 'It became obvious to us over time that this notion that the inbox was more of your master than your servant was becoming more widespread. It wasn't just the people receiving hundreds of emails a day — more regular users were starting to feel stressed out by their inbox.' The announcement notes that if you aren't interested in the new view, you can switch off all the tabs to go back to the classic inbox view.

Comments

No!

[Anonymous Coward]

Please stop fixing what is not broken. Please.

Re:No!

[cayenne8]

Please stop fixing what is not broken. Please.

No shit.

I mean, what is so difficult about reading all my incoming emails in the order I see them...like I've done with email since I first got email on the internet in about '93.

What has changed so much that they need to potentiall fsck up the interface yet again?

I think by now, we've pretty much gotten email front ends and MTA's done about right, not much need for new tinkering that I can fathom.

Re:No!

[gl4ss]

Please stop fixing what is not broken. Please.

my other account had just rolled over to the new(ehm old??) design in last month.

was nothing wrong with the older one either. it's not like I think it's a terribly great idea to write new messages in a fucking chat box on bottom right corner, wtf is up with that? is it making it more IM for fooling the cool kids??

Re:No!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm confused; it says clearly in the summary and the article that people can go back to the classic view if they choose to do so. Therefore, they're simply giving people an option as to how they want to view their inbox, and if you like the current version, you can keep it. So what are you upset about? More options is always a good thing, especially if one option is to keep things the way they are.

Re:No!

[dougisfunny]

I know right? I hate it when I have new options on how to look at things. I mean, when someone sends me mail I want to go get it out of the mail box and open an envelope, not mess around with some newfangled electronical mail.

Re:No!

[twisted_pare]

Optional will be tomorrow's mandatory. That has been the typical beta test to roll out of Gmail updates so far.

Re:No!

[EGenius007]

I mean, what is so difficult about reading all my incoming emails in the order I see them...like I've done with email since I first got email on the internet in about '93.

Yeah, I mean, just like back in '93 when I used to get all those facebook invites to my email. And the craigslist responses. And the messages from my state government about my license plates needing renewed. The updates on the status of my federal income tax return. Messages from PayPal about changes to policies on availability of funds on their system. Notification from my bank about my checking account balance. Statements and bill notifications from all of my utilities providers. Receipts for pizzas I ordered online, as well as information about when the delivery was expected.

You'd almost think that in addition to attracting a larger mass of personal correspondence due to the ubiquity of internet access for the whole world, we're generating more automated messages of varying degrees of import by consuming goods and services that somehow haven't always been around.

Re:No!

[BradleyAndersen]

exactly.

gmail keeps pushing not insignificant changes, and calls them 'optional'. my experience is they later remove the options.

Re:No!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm confused; it says clearly in the summary and the article that people can go back to the classic view if they choose to do so. Therefore, they're simply giving people an option as to how they want to view their inbox, and if you like the current version, you can keep it. So what are you upset about? More options is always a good thing, especially if one option is to keep things the way they are.

Because if it turns out people LIKE it, then the GP and GGP might wind up having to admit they're the outliers and no longer represent the views of the internet. This is an unacceptable solution, as it would be tantamount to admitting that the internet, being a melting pot of humanity never before seen in history, has evolved to something the GP/GGP doesn't recognize, and that, in turn, would be the first step in realizing that they're OLD (with a capital OLD) and behind the times, AND that they can't stop the progress of time any more than the music labels and movie studios can.

Therefore, the objective is to whine loud enough so that the choice to change things is somehow removed. This will preserve their fragile egos, which I'm certain they can agree is worth holding back any possible conveniences, unless they themselves are initiating it, in which case everyone else is old. And the fact that old people can agree on it is all that matters.

Re:No!

[Patch86]

You assume that people in the earlier days of the internet weren't getting lots of emails too, just with different content. Have you ever been on half a dozen active mailing lists at the same time?

I'm still quite happy with "everything turns up in my inbox with metadata I can filter by". That plus some auto-move rules does me just fine at work (where I'm a 100 emails a day man) and at home (pizza receipts and all).

I've actually found the last new Gmail interface such an unpleasant pain to use that I just don't use the webmail interface at all any more; I only ever interact with it through Thunderbird or my Android email client, except for in emergencies. Some people (my wife for example) seem to really like the (old) new interface, but I just can't make myself like it.

Re:No!

[magic maverick]

You'd almost think that receiving large quantities of email from known senders was a solved problem. Oh wait, it is a solved problem.
They are called filters. You can filter mail: from senders (e.g. you-stupid-user@facebook.com); to addresses (e.g. you can give a different address to every site & company (e.g. slashdot.org.2013.may.29@example.com, assuming you own example.com and considering you can get domains for $2 a year, it's easy to own your own domain); based on subject line (e.g. if it's got [BEST SCAT PORN] in the subject); etc.
You filter them into different folders, and then you deal with each folder as you like. Some folders you'll just regularly delete (e.g. maybe all the Facebook junk). Some you'll mark as read, without actually reading. Some you'll scan the subject lines. And some you can open up individually and read (e.g. the scat porn).

Filters, they work. (They may not work with Google Mail, but would mean you should get your own bloody mail system.)

Re:No!

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

LOL, OMG, Email (in general) is broken, and has been, for years. Please start making Email into something new.

Gmail is trying to make sense of the countless amount of pure garbage sent to your inbox, even from your friends, family and co-workers.

Even at work, 90% of the email I get is only valid for the 5 minutes after it was sent, and is usually something I can toss away. In fact I have gotten used to the idea of being able to Ignore entire conversation threads in Outlook based purely on the fact the original message is meaningless to me, but I got CC'd on it.

While Google is trying to organize and make sense of it, I think that email in general needs to change. Its become a kind of sms/message service where people feel the need to try and maintain some kind of real time conversation, and email inbox's are just not designed for that.

I can't comment on the new Gmail until I use it, but email clients have to move beyond just a flat list of mostly useless content and evolve into something a little smarter.

Re: No!

[EGenius007]

My point wasn't that sources have changed, but that the breadth of importance, urgency and information content has changed. Though I think the real mistake I made was in assuming people might be interested in discussing this topic rather than essentially saying "I have found a sufficiently capable methodology to solve this problem for myself, using existing tools which haven't always existed. But anyone who thinks other tools should continue to be developed is an idiot."

Re:No!

[Georules]

"To focus on a consistent user experience and consolidating our products, we regret that we are phasing out classic inbox."

Re: No!

[Grishnakh]

It's no so much the team of developers, as it is their management. Managers are always trying to find stuff to make themselves look important and necessary to an organization, even if it's really just make-work. Managers want ever-larger budgets and ever-larger teams to manage, to justify their existence and make themselves look good and justify a higher salary for themselves, so they push unnecessary projects on their bosses to achieve this. You're not going to find any corporate managers who say "OK, we're all done with this big product's development and roll-out, and we consider it done, so let's plan now on how to scale back the operation to a maintenance mode, and move extra people into other development jobs working on other products for the company." Companies do put things into maintenance mode, sure (remember IE6 when MS stopped all development of it?), but only because the top management directs this, not because the managers who are heads of those product divisions request it.

Re:No!

[Anonymous Coward]

Hear, hear. Google's 'designers' are assholes of the highest order. As you say - they will FORCE this shit on us tomorrow, precisely because MOST of us turn it off and don't want their crap - and hence the 'designers' will be out of a job, unless they FORCE this bullshit on everybody. Unbelievable.

Re:No!

[jxander]

My first reaction too; "Stop helping me!!"

Re:No!

[brentrad]

You're actually wrong on both counts:

To get rid of the "Important" mailbox in the web interface: Go to your Gmail settings, Inbox tab, and set your Inbox to "Classic".

In the Android Gmail app, go into the settings for your Gmail account, and uncheck "Priority Inbox".

Re:No!

[seanvaandering]

These are people (including myself) who don't want my interface played around with BY DEFAULT. I would rather have the option to OPT IN rather than OPT OUT of any new changes. I would even go so far as to check an actual setting that forbids new changes and makes it a default OPT IN requirement. Amazing that NO ONE has ever figured this out - it would be very popular.

Re:No!

[Omestes]

You must be new here. Welcome to Slashdot, the land of ironic techno-luddites. If it isn't a monotone command line, it is broken and needlessly complex.

I don't get it either, I'm looking forward to this, since right now Gmail somewhat frustrates me, since it is hard to divide messages into useful groups, beyond "starred", "important", and "everything else". I would like to keep all my work related mail in one area, all my invoices and shipping info in another, my social updates in another, useful "bulk" mail in another, and actual, important, personal correspondences in a primary area. I would love them to be separated, so I can focus on one at a time.

I'm a minimalist, so I can't stand having a huge messy list of messages, it overwhelms me (I also generally only have 5-6 icons on my desktop, and my office is almost completely plane, with no clutter on any surface not related to an immediate project). I also generally keep around 25-30 "working" messages, where either their status is still pending (appointments, shipping, reservations), or I haven't bothered with them yet. This list can get a bit overwhelming. This option works for me. And if it doesn't work for people, turn it off. Right now Gmail still offers the classic inbox, so I doubt that it, or the priority version will be going soon.

People will complain. Any change is the end of the world. We're addicted to the status quo, which is odd in computers, since things change so damn fast. Looking at what I grew up on in the '80's, to what we have now is rather overwhelming, but somehow I've managed to adapt and survive. Things are better now than when I was dialing into ugly ASCII BBSs on my 300 baud modem, waiting 2-3 minutes for just the login screen to load, back in the C64 days.

Re:No!

[Omestes]

So the 'internet' is one thing now, with no room for minority views or preferences?

Depending on the size of the minority, then yes. There comes a point where it isn't worth spending the money for niche needs. This isn't to say it is a fun experience (please don't kill Reader, or iGoogle), but it comes with free and proprietary services. If only 5% of people use X, but it costs more than 5% of of your operating expenses to maintain, why not kill it?

I'm sick of internet entitlement. Sure, Google is killing a service I love (not offering an alternate, optional, GUI, but KILLING), but I can't get upset. It is a free service. It is "in the cloud". I knew it was temporary, and subject to the arbitrary whims of Google (or MS, or Apple, no difference)... This is just how things work. It annoys me from time to time, but generally it has worked out well (look at where we are now, compared to where we were ten years ago).

Unlike killing... again... this is an OPTIONAL GUI change. Go set things to "Classic" if you don't like it. Go find another provider. Go use an offline client. Go forward Gmail to a better service. Go use an actual mod of Gmail (they are out there).

Personally, I like the new interface. Why should the minority keep it from me, especially when they have the option not to use it?

Sounds Horrible

[MightyYar]

I'm very happy that Google is willing to conduct these grand experiments to solve age-old problems.

That said, this sounds just as bad as their last attempt, with the stupid "Priority" email box. All it will mean is that you have to occasionally open a new tab to make sure nothing got misfiled. Just like things that got excluded from the priority email box, and for that matter the automatic spam filtering.

Re:Sounds Horrible

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't have to use that stupid "Priority inbox", it's optional. As long as they keep these experiments optional, I'm fine with it, but Google has a tendency of removing options instead of adding them.

Re:Sounds Horrible

[NJRoadfan]

Use an IMAP client of your choice than.

Re:Sounds Horrible

[adolf]

Yes, basically: It's another spam filter. Has always worked great for me once I got past the newness-deprecating "WTF?" moment.

With minimal training and setup my "important" stuff is the only stuff that that makes my phone notify me of email, which is actually useful to me, while "unimportant" stuff can be read or ignored some time later.

All of this conspires to make email less annoying.

Re:Sounds Horrible

[idontgno]

The point of gmail is email. Free email, frankly. The web interface is less than useful. It's an active impediment, but thankfully I don't have to use it. I can use their storage and their SMTP hosting with proper IMAP support for free with a proper MUA.

Re:Sounds Horrible

[recoiledsnake]

The point of Gmail is to get you signed into Google.com so that they can track your search keywords across different machines to show ads related to them. e.g. at home and work.

I already make my own categories

[XnavxeMiyyep]

I already make my own categories using the tags feature in Google apps. If this is broken I may migrate my email to another service.

Re:I already make my own categories

[Gavin Scott]

So what's the best alternative to gmail thse days?

Re:I already make my own categories

[Vanderhoth]

Pine?

Re:I already make my own categories

[sl4shd0rk]

So what's the best alternative to gmail thse days?

Dovecot+SSL+postfix

Riiight

[Lunix Nutcase]

The announcement notes that if you aren't interested in the new view, you can switch off all the tabs to go back to the classic inbox view.

Uh huh. Until they decide otherwise and force it on people like they did with the current redesign.

Re:Riiight

[steelfood]

"We're Google and we can do whatever the fuck we want because we're so cool and if you don't like it you'll just have to suck it up and deal."

That's how they currently approach every product. And when I say every product, I mean every product. They're not even trying to compete anymore.

Re:Riiight

[Mashiki]

That's how they currently approach every product. And when I say every product, I mean every product. They're not even trying to compete anymore.

That line of thinking didn't work for the automotive industry in the 70's and 80's. It won't work for google either, all it will take is consumers being fedup and an alternative.

Re:Riiight

[CanHasDIY]

"We give our shit to you free, and you use it willingly."

So, you mean they're not creating massive databases filled with the private information of their users in exchange for use of the service?

FYI, just because you're not handing them legal tender does not automagically make it a "free service."

Re:Riiight

[Lunix Nutcase]

Free? So they're going to pay me back the ad revenue they generate?

Re:Riiight

[Obfuscant]

FYI, just because you're not handing them legal tender does not automagically make it a "free service."

The fact I'm handing legal tender to my ISP, who decided with almost no notice that they were outsourcing all their email services to gmail and are thus passing some of that legal tender over to gmail, makes gmail much less than a "free service".

"Let me just take care of that for you."

[Anonymous Coward]

It's kind of like having someone come in and reorganize your music based on their own crazy thought process.

At least you can turn it off... for now.

But this is endemic of a larger problem using Google products, they're tinkering with the things that aren't broken and shutting down projects that people use.

There's something not quite right with that attitude.

Re:"Let me just take care of that for you."

[wdef]

It's kind of like having someone come in and reorganize your music based on their own crazy thought process.

At least you can turn it off... for now.

But this is endemic of a larger problem using Google products, they're tinkering with the things that aren't broken and shutting down projects that people use.

There's something not quite right with that attitude.

You got it. It's designer-driven change for change's sake. The same problem as Gnome with Gnome3 and the same problem that MS have with Windows 8. Changes that nobody wants or needs - except bored designers.

Re:"Let me just take care of that for you."

[dmt0]

You got it. It's designer-driven change for change's sake. The same problem as Gnome with Gnome3 and the same problem that MS have with Windows 8. Changes that nobody wants or needs - except bored designers.

Change for change's sake? I don't think Google is as mindless as that.

A list of emails that a person gets only says so much about the person. You don't quite control what other people are sending you - they do. On the other hand the way that you interact with your email and how you categorize and prioritize it (did you find that "mark as important" feature useful?) tells so much more about you.

Of course that feature is there only to alleviate the stress from you and stop the inbox from being your master, nothing more.

Remember

[Anonymous Coward]

You can always use GMail with IMAP. You choose the UI.

Re:Remember

[Overzeetop]

My most sincere condolences.

(I stopped using TB at about 3GB of mail, when it was incapable of storing and indexing all of it)

Browser Reminders

[redbeardcanada]

Google, please, please, please get rid of the IE8 is an out of date browser reminder. I know it is, I am forced to use it right now at work. Your constant reminders are going to drive me away from gmail...

Re:Browser Reminders

[Cro Magnon]

Not on a work computer, at least in some workplaces.

Re:How about letting us easily see unread messages

[robmv]

Enable the "Quick Links" labs, I use it for exactly the same query. You can add any query you want

I had been doing this with labels

[SuilAmhain]

I had painstakingly created labels and filters such as "social junk" that marked mail read upon arrival and were easy to delete.

I like this it's a good idea the inbox can fill with crud shockingly quickly.

This sort of incremental innovation shows that even email can still be improved and that people are looking at ways of doing improving it.

Google copying AOL? 8-/

[macraig]

So Google plans to copy what AOL was trying to do with Alto? Sheesh. I have an account at altomail.com; I wasn't very impressed and haven't been using it.

Re:Can they maybe start by fixing gmail search fir

[Obfuscant]

If it was another company I would let sleeping dogs lie but this is f'ing Google. Their web search is SOOO good and improving all the time, that makes the gmail search so ridiculously outdated in comparison.

Thank you, citizen, for your support. We will be moving your email over to the general Google search software in the near future, which I am certain you will accept as a vast improvement over the current situation. This change will allow you to read your email anywhere you have a browser, using a simple Google search for your own email address.

Unfortunately, this means that deleting your email will require the full "remove a link" process that the current Google indexing system uses, as well.

Thanks again for your support and constructive and beneficial ideas for making the Google Experience® more rewarding.

Signed: The Google Staff

Error: tepples@example.com does not use Gmail

[tepples]

If I have to do that what's the point of even having a Gmail account?

To get past the "does not use Gmail" screen when using some other Google services. Android Market prior to Android 4.0, for example, required a Gmail account; an ordinary Google account wasn't enough.

Re:Fix the compose window

[MightyYar]

Yeah, I can barely tolerate the new compose. It's bad enough that I might want to Greasemonkey that mother.

Yes!

[Piata]

There's actually a lot of room for improvement with email. It's one of the more clunky and archaic parts of the web and I'm really glad Google keeps pushing the boundaries on this as they seem to be the only ones doing so effectively. I personally have a hard time keeping my email organized and sorted so any attempts to improve email clients are welcome in my books. Even if the changes aren't necessarily better, trying new approaches and getting feedback on those changes will create an overall better product.

If you want a static and unchanging email experience you might be better served with Outlook. At my job we just switched from Corporate Gmail to Outlook after 6 years and Outlook has hardly changed since I last used it. It's downright ancient!

Re:Yes!

[lahvak]

Actually, what google is doing now is how email was always ment to be read. It is how we read and organized email 20 years ago with procmail and a decent reader like mutt or gnus. Google is just creating more firendly interface on top of it.

Re:Yes!

[excelsior_gr]

Gaaah!

I thought that the whole idea behind Google's email was "don't sort, search". And I thought it was brilliant. And now they want to sort things? WTF?

Re:Yes!

[hobarrera]

There's little "pushing the boundaries" here. I've had several inboxes where different stuff is filtered to for about a decade. RSS feeds into on mailbox, bulkmail into another, notifications into another, etc.

Google has just added pretty icons to this.

Re:Yes!

[t0rkm3]

The problem is... what if you WANT to sort, like sending bugtraq emails to a folder to catch up on later?

As far as I can tell there isn't a good way to remove those emails from the current view other than Label->Archive.

labels = folders; you == uninformed;

[cblack]

Many people are wrong-headed on this, labels are superior to folders.
With folders, an email message can be filed to one and only one folder.
With labels, any number of labels can be attached to a message.
This means you can have labels like "vendors" and "Project X" and a single message can be labelled as both.
In addition, you can easily set up filters in gmail to apply labels, set read status, etc.
In gmail the idea of "inbox" right now is just a label that gets applied to (most) incoming email. You can archive it out of your inbox by removing that label.

Regarding filtering, if you are going to slam gmail for missing a feature outlook has, at least don't be completely wrong.

You also seem to misunderstand the new mailbox and thinking about "tabs".

RTFM.

Screw it up yet again

[ChrisMaple]

The COMPOSE window is now tiny and can't be resized. What the hell is wrong with you guys?

worst web email client ever

[TomR teh Pirate]

I realize this sounds antithetical to a technical discussion, but Yahoo's email client is FAR more user-friendly than Google's. The downer is that people sort of assume you're a technical dullard if you have "yahoo.com" in your email address. I wonder if it's possible to use the yahoo client to read my gmail...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Don't trust them

[frovingslosh]

The old Compose interface was fine. I find the new Compose interface crippling, there are several things that I do in Gmail that just don't seem to be there in the new Compose interface, at least I can't find them with a lot of searching. Yes, you can switch back to the old Compose interface, I did that months ago. Lately I've started getting messages that the old Compose interface is going away and I better learn to use the new one. Not that I object to learning something new, although I shouldn't have to if the old one is fine, but the new one doesn't seem to support some very basic functions. Of course, this isn't presenting a problem for the people at Google who help us out and support the product, because there is no one at Google who supports the product and apparently no way to even give them feedback on the problems with the new interfaces.

Re:Don't trust them

[ahabswhale]

I'm with you. I hate the new compose interface. In fact, I'm considering dropping gmail over it. The only reason I haven't is that I'm not super impressed with the alternatives. Eventually my dislike for compose will override those reservations. I give it about three months.

Re:How about letting us easily see unread messages

[jatoo]

You might find that priority inbox can work for you. If you go to settings -> inbox then set the mode to priority inbox you can set the first section to be "unread" emails. Which sounds exactly like what you want.