Blogs on Gmail and Google Accounts

Wendy Durham  (CWD in her  A Gmail Miscellany  blog and wdurham in the  Gmail Help Forum ) was a Product Expert and a prolific contributor when it came to explaining the intricacies of Gmail and Google accounts. Due to changes to Gmail and Google Accounts, some of her well-known blog articles are no longer applicable. The three most used articles have been updated here to be consistent with the current version of Gmail. This will keep them useful going forward as a tribute to her dedication to user education. When folks come to Gmail for the first time, they instinctively expect it to work in exactly the same way as the other email services and email clients they have grown used to. But when Google created Gmail back in 2004, they had an opportunity to re-define email and how it worked from the ground up. So - being Google! - they did. The result is a pretty sleek and efficient email management system, with no duplicates, no folders, no separate ema...

Wendy Durham (CWD in her A Gmail Miscellany blog and wdurham in the Gmail Help Forum ) was a Product Expert and a prolific contributor when it came to explaining the intricacies of Gmail and Google accounts. Due to changes to Gmail and Google Accounts, some of her well-known blog articles are no longer applicable. The three most used articles have been updated here to be consistent with the current version of Gmail. This will keep them useful going forward as a tribute to her dedication to user education. One common theme running through all the Help Forums is confusion about Google accounts and what you can and can’t do with - and to - them. So what exactly IS a Google account? A Google account is an entity that is permanently linked to a unique and specific ID - always an email address (and not necessarily a Gmail address - see below) - which you access by signing in with that unique ID and a password. It can house one or many Google products, such as Gmail, YouTube, ...

A few new features made it to the Gmail web standard view recently. Introduction of "Undo", "Redo" and "Strikethrough" options in the Gmail Compose window. Option to download messages as EML files allowing users to add these downloaded messages as attachments in their emails. Additionally, the Gmail Android app is also updated with a new look which is described as the "Blindingly Bright Google Material Theme". It is more white, easy on the eyes and refreshingly different to look at from the earlier red-themed design and provides a consistent look and feel to what we see in the Gmail web standard view.