Blogs on Gmail and Google Accounts

If you are, like me, a fan of the Gmail Basic HTML view, then you must have noticed the following splash screen trying to access Gmail through its Basic HTML UI in recent days. When I saw it for the first time, my heart sank. As someone who started using Gmail a month after its launch, the Gmail Basic HTML view was the first Gmail UI I was introduced to and it was love at first sight. I loved the cleanliness of the layout, the placement and the functionality of the search box, quick access to the Contacts and the various links at the top and the bottom of the inbox screen among other things. With time, other features were added to the view, until in 2011, the Gmail team decided to overhaul the default Gmail UI to a more polished UI, which was called the Gmail standard web view to differentiate it from the Gmail Basic HTML view. Since the majority of the users back then used browsers to access Gmail, the change in the UI caused a big discussion in the Gmail help forum and resulted in th

The above is either the title or the gist of plentiful threads I have seen posted in both the Gmail and the Google Accounts Help Communities for the last several months and noticing how the volume of such threads has continued to increase, I feel it is time to take a deep-dive into this topic to explain certain things in great detail. For better management, we are going to divide this article into three sections. Section 1: What typically happens Section 2: Why does this happen Section 3: What are the available options for account recovery when this happens Section 1: What typically happens It typically begins when you forget the password of your Google account. So, you decide to reset the password through the Google user-verification process; which then sends a code to the mobile number listed on the account and once you put that code in and click on next, surprise, surprise, a code is sent to the same email address you are trying to recover!!! Section 2: Why does this happen

Often we see threads in the Gmail Help Community where we are asked to explain the difference between the Category labels and the Inbox category tabs in Gmail. We begin the discussion by visually highlighting what we mean by the Inbox category tabs and the Category labels and where they are located. Now, we are going to take a look at the differences, with examples. So, let's begin. Commonly, if we click on one of the Category labels, say Promotions, we see a list of messages that Gmail internally categorizes as such, based on various signals such as how they are marked up, what they contain, the domain they are sent from, etc.  As shown in the screenshot above, it also generates a search query for our better understanding - category:promotions  and it is important to remember this little detail. Similarly, when we click on the Promotions tab in Gmail inbox, it also shows a list of messages, in fact, the same set of messages in this case. So, where's the difference? To demonstr