Today the Gmail team introduced Google Buzz, a new feature that lets individuals share links, photos, and other updates with their network of contacts – or with the whole world – right within Gmail. Google Buzz helps people kick off conversations around information that people find mutually interesting.
Within a few months, we also plan to make Google Buzz available to businesses and schools using Google Apps, with added features for sharing within your organization. Stay tuned, and for more information about using Google Buzz with your personal Gmail account, head over to the Gmail blog or visit buzz.google.com.
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Showing posts with label gmail. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gmail. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Monday, December 7, 2009
Offline Gmail graduates from Labs
Offline Gmail was one of the top requested features from businesses and schools considering Google Apps, and since launching this Labs feature almost a year ago, it's been been put through its paces, maturing along the way. We've made many improvements, including an option to choose which messages get downloaded for offline use and the ability to add message attachments while offline.
Today, Offline Gmail is graduating from Labs, becoming a core part of Gmail for everyone. You can turn it on and adjust your offline settings from the 'Offline' tab in Gmail 'Settings'.
Posted by Andy Palay, Software Engineer, Google Apps team
Today, Offline Gmail is graduating from Labs, becoming a core part of Gmail for everyone. You can turn it on and adjust your offline settings from the 'Offline' tab in Gmail 'Settings'.
Posted by Andy Palay, Software Engineer, Google Apps team
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Microsoft Exchange or Google Apps? One government agency goes Google
Editor's Note: Please welcome our guest blogger, James Ferreira, Chief Information Officer for the Office of the New Mexico Attorney General. He provides IT services to the largest law office in the state. James Ferreira has the privilege of serving the New Mexico public as Attorney General Gary King's CIO. Mr. Ferreira is tasked with the responsibility of facilitating the communication between the public and nearly 200 office staff, including attorneys. Additionally, Mr. Ferreira has served as a member on many committees including the NM Information and Technology committee, NM Technical Counsel, Department of Information and Technology Project Review Committee and the Conference of Western Attorneys General WAGGY committee.Please join us for a live webcast on Thursday, November 12, 2009 2:00 PM ET / 11:00 AM PT / 7:00 PM GMT where James will be on hand to answer your questions about his office's switch to Google Apps from Microsoft Exchange (3rd party registration required).
Attorneys rely heavily on documents like pleadings, deposition transcripts, exhibits, briefs and other legal materials. In the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office, we have 120 attorneys and 200 full-time employees whose jobs revolve around documents. And it's not just the attorneys. Imagine the news releases, media advisories, scripts and other materials that our communications department has to produce.
We essentially use email as our day-to-day file and case management system, so it is mission-critical. Our previous Microsoft Exchange email solution was falling short – especially regarding the need to safeguard and backup sensitive emails. We looked at moving to a clustered system of in-house email servers for failovers, but we calculated the cost at $300,000, not including continual upgrades.
We began searching for something with ample inbox storage, easy backup and data redundancy and perhaps most importantly, a system that offered high security and reliability. Google Apps Premier Edition emerged as the clear alternative. To put it in perspective, Google Apps and Gmail can support any attorney over the course of a whole career, storing and backing up every email he or she ever sends. Google Apps Premier Edition also passed muster with well-known third-party security auditing organizations.
The move to Google Apps took minimal time and effort, and our users now appreciate the reliability and large storage quotas of their new email system. We have realized many additional cost savings. For instance, we have created a prototype Google Docs archiving solution, using the Documents API. In addition, a few years ago, the department paid more than $50,000 for replication software to store data from a SAN to a disaster recovery site. It didn't work very well – but is no longer required with Google Apps. We also spend less time and money on licensing. In the past, I often joked that we needed to check if we needed a license for the license with our former software vendor. With Google Apps, we get the whole deal up front.
Google Apps Premier Edition was a good fit for the Attorney General's Office. It provides secure, available, and searchable access to documents and emails, while reducing costs and lessening workloads for our busy IT staff. It has reduced the "paper chase" across the board, from attorneys to our busy communications staff. I hope you can join me on a live webcast this Thursday where I'll take your questions about "going Google."
Microsoft Exchange or Google Apps? One Government Agency Goes Google
Thursday, November 12, 2009
2:00 PM ET / 11:00 AM PT / 7:00 PM GMT
Posted by Serena Satyasai, Google Apps team
Find customer stories and research product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Get your money's worth with cloud-based messaging
Do you know how much your email system is costing you? More than just the necessary hardware and software systems, email also requires substantial time and money for maintenance and upkeep. In-house email calls for patches, precautions to maintain high availability and disaster recovery, and the never-ending work it takes to secure and protect email from spam, phishing, and malware.
The research firm also found that the use of cloud-based email can allow organizations to focus more on their core business rather than devote resources to managing the messaging infrastructure.
In a September 2009 study, Osterman Research found that decision makers typically underestimate the cost of providing messaging services. According to Osterman, one-quarter of decision makers believe that their organizations spend less than $10 per seat per month to provide messaging services, while another one-third believe they spend anywhere from $10 to $15 per seat per month – but this cost estimate leaves out several important factors, particularly maintenance.
The research firm also found that the use of cloud-based email can allow organizations to focus more on their core business rather than devote resources to managing the messaging infrastructure.
Another analyst firm, Forrester Research, found that for a 15,000-person firm requiring archiving, the fully loaded cost of on-premise email was $25.18 per user per month compared to a cost of $8.47 for Google Apps.
But it's not all about cost savings – you need more than just a cheaper messaging solution. You also want one that can help your workforce achieve more. Moving to the cloud and Google Apps can help you streamline your IT infrastructure and provide a platform for innovation and increased employee satisfaction.
On October 8, join us for a live webcast as Google Apps expert, Rhonda Stites, walks through a simple financial model that evaluates the savings in adopting Google Apps. You will hear about real customer experiences, get your questions answered and have the tools you need to bring substantial value to your organization.
Register now to learn more about the potential cost savings for your organization.
Save Money with Cloud Computing and Google Apps
Thursday, October 8, 2009
11:00 a.m. PDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 p.m. GMT
We hope to see you there!
Posted by Serena Satyasai, Google Apps team
*Note: The pricing and features available in each architecture vary by provider. Download the full independent research report, “Should Your Email Live In The Cloud? A Comparative Cost Analysis,” Forrester Research, Inc., January 2009.
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
JohnsonDiversey: migrating 12,000+ users from Lotus Notes/ Domino to Google Apps in 48 hours
Editor’s note: Brent Hoag is Senior Director, IT for JohnsonDiversey, formed when Johnson Wax Professional acquired DiverseyLever. Its focus is on providing products to commercial businesses for food safety, housekeeping, and industrial cleaning. Throughout its history, the company has been dedicated to leadership in environmental issues, health, and safety. You can read more about the company's work in these areas in the post we shared a few days back.
Please join Brent and members of the Google Enterprise team for a live webcast this Thursday, September 17, at 2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT.
When we first decided to switch to Google Apps from Lotus Notes/Domino, we planned on using a typical IT deployment process. As a global company, JohnsonDiversey (JDI) conducts "go-lives" in its IT environment almost weekly, and therefore we are all old hands at managing rollouts to achieve a smooth technical transition and minimize business disruption.
Given that Google Apps would impact all of our 12,000 global users spread across 168 locations and 70 countries, we made two assumptions. First, we thought a phased migration would be best. We planned to migrate employee data and continue to support our two legacy local email clients at the same time. Second, we’d staff a command center to handle the flood of calls from employees trying to learn the new system.
Both assumptions proved totally wrong.
As we delved deeper into our migration planning and learned from our early adopters, we realized that we would be better off using a big bang approach. One major reason is that getting everyone onto a single system faster reduces the largest pain of having co-existence of two systems for any amount of time.
Google Apps is helping JDI, as a global company, communicate and collaborate better from a single platform. Under our old Lotus Notes/Domino system, even simple tasks like booking meetings were difficult, because employees could not easily see the details of someone's availability, an agenda or other participants. People’s inboxes were also filling up when they were traveling. With Google Apps, we realized we would solve many problems at once (read Part I of our story here).
What did we actually end up doing? We provided Apps to early adopters who became business champions – and ultimately helped others if they ran into issues. We decided to support only the web interface and provided early access prior to go-live to mitigate login issues. We also provided tools for self-service migration and put up a Google Site providing a centralized point of information. We offered global deployment support for the first two days after go-live.
Since deploying, we've received some nice feedback and results:
Moving 12,000 people over to any new solution can be daunting – but it can also be painless. We found that out the easy way. We would be happy to share our experiences with you. Join us for a webinar:
Migrating 12,000+ users from Lotus Notes/ Domino to Google Apps in 48 hours
Thursday, September 17, 2009
2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT
We'll share our story and be happy to answer your questions.
Please join Brent and members of the Google Enterprise team for a live webcast this Thursday, September 17, at 2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT.
When we first decided to switch to Google Apps from Lotus Notes/Domino, we planned on using a typical IT deployment process. As a global company, JohnsonDiversey (JDI) conducts "go-lives" in its IT environment almost weekly, and therefore we are all old hands at managing rollouts to achieve a smooth technical transition and minimize business disruption.
Given that Google Apps would impact all of our 12,000 global users spread across 168 locations and 70 countries, we made two assumptions. First, we thought a phased migration would be best. We planned to migrate employee data and continue to support our two legacy local email clients at the same time. Second, we’d staff a command center to handle the flood of calls from employees trying to learn the new system.
Both assumptions proved totally wrong.
As we delved deeper into our migration planning and learned from our early adopters, we realized that we would be better off using a big bang approach. One major reason is that getting everyone onto a single system faster reduces the largest pain of having co-existence of two systems for any amount of time.
Google Apps is helping JDI, as a global company, communicate and collaborate better from a single platform. Under our old Lotus Notes/Domino system, even simple tasks like booking meetings were difficult, because employees could not easily see the details of someone's availability, an agenda or other participants. People’s inboxes were also filling up when they were traveling. With Google Apps, we realized we would solve many problems at once (read Part I of our story here).
What did we actually end up doing? We provided Apps to early adopters who became business champions – and ultimately helped others if they ran into issues. We decided to support only the web interface and provided early access prior to go-live to mitigate login issues. We also provided tools for self-service migration and put up a Google Site providing a centralized point of information. We offered global deployment support for the first two days after go-live.
Since deploying, we've received some nice feedback and results:
- one employee told us "this is the first project that IT did for the users rather than to the users"
- our help desk volume has substantially dropped from our legacy steady state call volume and most of the questions are "how-to"
- our department has more time to work on strategic initiatives
Moving 12,000 people over to any new solution can be daunting – but it can also be painless. We found that out the easy way. We would be happy to share our experiences with you. Join us for a webinar:
Migrating 12,000+ users from Lotus Notes/ Domino to Google Apps in 48 hours
Thursday, September 17, 2009
2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT
We'll share our story and be happy to answer your questions.
Brent Hoag, Director, IT, JohnsonDiversey
Posted by Serena Satyasai, The Google Apps team
Find customer stories and product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Find customer stories and product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Friday, September 11, 2009
JohnsonDiversey goes greener with Google Apps
Editor’s note: John Matthews is Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs and Director, Office of the President, for JohnsonDiversey. The company is a global provider of commercial cleaning, sanitation and hygiene solutions and serves customers in the lodging, food service, retail, health care, and food and beverage sectors. One of four companies founded by the Johnson Family, JohnsonDiversey is located in Located in Racine, Wisconsin and has a long-standing history of dedication to environmental, health, and safety leadership.
Our CEO, Ed Lonergan, has challenged all employees to live by strong sustainability principles in everything they do. Last spring, we migrated over 11,000 global employees to Google Apps from Lotus Notes/Domino and Microsoft Outlook, moving us 73 tons closer to our goal of achieving an 89,000-ton reduction in carbon emissions by the year 2013. When we achieve our 89,000-ton reduction in carbon emissions, it will place us back at where we were in 2003, even as we continue to grow our business and add additional resources.
In addition, optimizing our IT infrastructure by moving to Google Apps has allowed us to decommission eight servers and avoid buying four more. As we reduce this reliance on hardware, we also gain a better and easier messaging and collaboration platform.
Google’s innovation in data center design and maintenance means that Google achieves more energy efficiency than our company could on its own – and Google’s commitment to carbon neutrality also reinforces our goals as a member of the World Wildlife Fund's Climate Savers program. The alternate IT solution would have increased our server count by 12, more than doubling our server count. This would have raised our CO2 emissions by 111 metric tons.
Beyond helping JohnsonDiversey achieve sustainability goals, Google Apps also helps us better communicate and collaborate. Our employees and contractors speak more than 26 languages across approximately 170 locations in 70 countries. Now, we all have the ability to literally work off the same page – wherever we are – with tools like Google Docs and Google Sites.
We also avoided significant capital outlays in upgrading from our on-premise Lotus Notes/Domino solution while improving our internal service levels with Google's commitment to be up and running 99.9% of the time.
Environmental stewardship is not only the right thing to do. It also makes good business sense. Our choice of Google Apps is a case in point. It's helped us reduce costs and advance our IT efficiency. If your enterprise is striving to reduce its environmental footprint and streamline IT infrastructure, hear how we did it at a livewebcast featuring our IT team.
You can learn more about our company and our use of Google Apps here:
Our IT team will host a live webcast next week on Thursday, September 17, 2009, 2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT on how Google Apps is helping us meet both our sustainability and business goals.
We'll also share perspectives from our IT team on the deployment in a blog post we'll publish next week (update: now published).
Posted by Serena Satyasai, Google Apps team
Find customer stories and product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Our CEO, Ed Lonergan, has challenged all employees to live by strong sustainability principles in everything they do. Last spring, we migrated over 11,000 global employees to Google Apps from Lotus Notes/Domino and Microsoft Outlook, moving us 73 tons closer to our goal of achieving an 89,000-ton reduction in carbon emissions by the year 2013. When we achieve our 89,000-ton reduction in carbon emissions, it will place us back at where we were in 2003, even as we continue to grow our business and add additional resources.
In addition, optimizing our IT infrastructure by moving to Google Apps has allowed us to decommission eight servers and avoid buying four more. As we reduce this reliance on hardware, we also gain a better and easier messaging and collaboration platform.
Google’s innovation in data center design and maintenance means that Google achieves more energy efficiency than our company could on its own – and Google’s commitment to carbon neutrality also reinforces our goals as a member of the World Wildlife Fund's Climate Savers program. The alternate IT solution would have increased our server count by 12, more than doubling our server count. This would have raised our CO2 emissions by 111 metric tons.
Beyond helping JohnsonDiversey achieve sustainability goals, Google Apps also helps us better communicate and collaborate. Our employees and contractors speak more than 26 languages across approximately 170 locations in 70 countries. Now, we all have the ability to literally work off the same page – wherever we are – with tools like Google Docs and Google Sites.
We also avoided significant capital outlays in upgrading from our on-premise Lotus Notes/Domino solution while improving our internal service levels with Google's commitment to be up and running 99.9% of the time.
Environmental stewardship is not only the right thing to do. It also makes good business sense. Our choice of Google Apps is a case in point. It's helped us reduce costs and advance our IT efficiency. If your enterprise is striving to reduce its environmental footprint and streamline IT infrastructure, hear how we did it at a livewebcast featuring our IT team.
You can learn more about our company and our use of Google Apps here:
Our IT team will host a live webcast next week on Thursday, September 17, 2009, 2:00 p.m. EDT / 11:00 a.m. PDT on how Google Apps is helping us meet both our sustainability and business goals.
We'll also share perspectives from our IT team on the deployment in a blog post we'll publish next week (update: now published).
John Matthews, SVP, Corporate Affairs
Director, Office of the President, JohnsonDiversey
Director, Office of the President, JohnsonDiversey
Posted by Serena Satyasai, Google Apps team
Find customer stories and product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Launched: Email retention policies and email delegation
A few weeks back, we let you know that Google Apps Premier Edition would soon support two new business-focused features: email retention policies and email delegation. Today we're happy to share the news that both features have been rolled out to Google Apps Premier Edition customers.
Email retention policies help companies comply with industry and government regulations by allowing their admins to determine how long an email should remain in the system before being automatically deleted. Email delegation allows employees to specify other users allowed to manage email for them – especially useful to executives and administrative assistants.
Premier Edition administrators can enable these features from the administrative control panel under the 'Email Settings' tab.
Posted by Rajen Sheth, Google Apps Product Manager
Email retention policies help companies comply with industry and government regulations by allowing their admins to determine how long an email should remain in the system before being automatically deleted. Email delegation allows employees to specify other users allowed to manage email for them – especially useful to executives and administrative assistants.
Premier Edition administrators can enable these features from the administrative control panel under the 'Email Settings' tab.
Posted by Rajen Sheth, Google Apps Product Manager
Find customer stories and research product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes/Domino.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Switching to Google Apps from Lotus Notes just got easier
What do Fairchild Semiconductor, Hamilton Beach, JohnsonDiversey and Valeo have in common? Together they migrated nearly 50,000 Lotus Notes users to Google Apps.
Today we're making it easier for Lotus Notes users to switch to Google Apps. We're releasing a new tool, Google Apps Migration for Lotus Notes, that migrates mail, calendar and contacts quickly and easily. The tool is a native Notes application and key features include:
Google partner CapGemini relied on the tool to migrate Valeo, a 30,000-employee automotive supplier. As CapGemini IT Project Lead Philippe Bonnemains says, "We used it for Valeo and for several other enterprise customers. Google Apps Migration for Lotus Notes is clearly a great solution for Notes-based companies that want to quickly and efficiently provide users with continuity of mail archives, contacts and calendars, while moving to Google Apps."
- Easy deployment Centrally administered server side migration process. No user intervention needed
- No downtime Users can continue to use Notes even during the migration process. After they're migrated, Gmail will open Notes links in Lotus Notes
- Global efficiency Migrate multiple offices simultaneously or separately. Assign administration controls at the organization and the office level as needed
- Trackable reports Centralized event logging to manage & monitor migration across any number of Domino servers and sites
See it in action in this short video:
These features and more make Google Apps Migration for Lotus Notes a simple and complete way to quickly switch your users to Google Apps. JohnsonDiversey used the tool in its recent migration of 10,000 employees, and the video below captures CIO Brent Hoag's satisfaction with the deployment process.
Google partner CapGemini relied on the tool to migrate Valeo, a 30,000-employee automotive supplier. As CapGemini IT Project Lead Philippe Bonnemains says, "We used it for Valeo and for several other enterprise customers. Google Apps Migration for Lotus Notes is clearly a great solution for Notes-based companies that want to quickly and efficiently provide users with continuity of mail archives, contacts and calendars, while moving to Google Apps."
If you'd like help with the migration process, or with overall project planning, deployment and training, several Google partners are ready to provide products and services to address your specific needs. If you're thinking about migrating your Domino applications to the cloud, this migration whitepaper will help guide your analysis.
If you're considering switching your users from Lotus Notes to Google Apps, talk to our sales team or sign up for a trial now. Or, if you're already a Google Apps Premier or Education Edition customer and want to migrate today, you can can learn more or download the migration tool here.
Posted by Chris Vander Mey, Senior Product Manager, Google Enterprise
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Template galleries for Google Apps domains
Since we launched the public template gallery last year for Google Docs, people who use Google Apps have been asking if they could have their own template galleries to share templates (everything from branded presentation designs to document letterhead to spreadsheet templates) with their co-workers.
Today, we've enabled these template galleries for Google Apps Premier and Education Edition customers. Anyone in your domain can submit templates created in Google Docs to your organization's own gallery. These templates will not be visible outside of your company domain. Templates can be any of the four document types in Docs (documents, presentations, spreadsheets, and even forms). Other people you work with can preview, use (making a copy of that template as a new document in their own account), and rate your templates.
Just like in the public template gallery, you'll be able to sort and narrow the templates by usage, rating, and document type. Administrators can also create categories of templates for the domain (for example: by function, region, or department) to keep templates organized.
Within Google, the most popular templates have been technical design documents and Google-branded presentation layouts. Teachers might share templates with other teachers in their school or district. For example, a teacher might submit a "Getting to Know You" form to send to students when school starts next year, and other teachers could use the template and customize it for their own classroom. Non-profits could create grant proposal templates that would give their employees a common starting point for proposals.
To submit a template, follow these steps:A few final notes: This feature is available in Google Apps Premier Edition and Education Edition only, and is available in all languages supported by Google Apps. Admins can configure the templates gallery service from within the Apps control panel (Control panel > Service settings > Docs > Templates).
Posted by Valerie Blechar, Software Engineer, Google Apps team
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Today, we've enabled these template galleries for Google Apps Premier and Education Edition customers. Anyone in your domain can submit templates created in Google Docs to your organization's own gallery. These templates will not be visible outside of your company domain. Templates can be any of the four document types in Docs (documents, presentations, spreadsheets, and even forms). Other people you work with can preview, use (making a copy of that template as a new document in their own account), and rate your templates.
Just like in the public template gallery, you'll be able to sort and narrow the templates by usage, rating, and document type. Administrators can also create categories of templates for the domain (for example: by function, region, or department) to keep templates organized.
Within Google, the most popular templates have been technical design documents and Google-branded presentation layouts. Teachers might share templates with other teachers in their school or district. For example, a teacher might submit a "Getting to Know You" form to send to students when school starts next year, and other teachers could use the template and customize it for their own classroom. Non-profits could create grant proposal templates that would give their employees a common starting point for proposals.
To submit a template, follow these steps:
- Go to Google Docs from within your Google Apps account
- Click New > From template to view your company's private gallery
- On the upper right-hand side, click the "Submit a template" link
Posted by Valerie Blechar, Software Engineer, Google Apps team
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Drag and drop, and organize your labels in Gmail
Organizing email can be a challenge, especially in the workplace where it's not uncommon to get hundreds of messages a day. In Gmail, labels are key to organizing, archiving and filtering messages, so we've made a number of improvements to make labels more accessible and easier to organize.
Hide and show
New location
Labels are now located above the chat list in Gmail, grouped with default labels like Inbox and Drafts for quicker access (no more scrolling for those of us who keep a large chat list).
If you have labels that you don't regularly click on, you can hide them so they only appear when you click the "more" link. That way, your left nav is only filled with labels you consider to be a priority. Show, hide or delete labels by clicking the down-arrow to the left of a label.
To make changes to multiple labels at a time, go to the "Labels" tab under "Settings" where you can edit labels in bulk.
Drag and drop
We've added drag and drop capabilities that let you do a few things:
- Hide and show labels by dragging and dropping them in and out of "more"
- Instead of using the "Move to" button, drag messages into a label to label and archive in one step.
- Instead of using the "Label" button, drag a label onto selected messages.
These updates are available across all editions of Google Apps.
For more details on this launch, check out the Gmail Team's announcement.
Posted by Joyce Sohn, Product Marketing Manager, Google Apps team
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Posted by Joyce Sohn, Product Marketing Manager, Google Apps team
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Improvements to Google Apps contacts
Today, we're happy to announce updates to contacts in Google Apps: new features that many of our enterprise customers have been asking for.
Shared contacts API
Enhancements to Contacts
For starters, we've launched a new API that, when combined with the existing shared contacts API, gives administrators the ability to maintain an updated and detailed global address list in Google Apps.
We've also updated the Contacts interface throughout the Google Apps suite – particularly in Gmail – making it easier for employees to find and start collaborating with all other users on their company domain.
We've also updated the Contacts interface throughout the Google Apps suite – particularly in Gmail – making it easier for employees to find and start collaborating with all other users on their company domain.
Global address list management
These GData APIs let administrators maintain and manage their company's global address list in Google Apps.
Administrators can retrieve and update profile information for all users on a company domain, giving companies the option to provide rich user information to make it easier for employees to find and contact each other.
This API (launched in December of 2008) lets administrators perform all of the above, but for users who do not have accounts provisioned in Google Apps, ensuring that all users (not just those with a Google Apps account) are accounted for in the company's global address list.
These APIs are available exclusively to Google Apps Premier Edition customers.
Enhancements to Contacts
Until today, the only entries that would appear in Contacts in Gmail were those that the user had either explicitly added or had previously emailed. Starting today, when you search for a name, you'll see relevant results from your company's entire global address list, not just people you've emailed with in the past.
We've also made some improvements to the Contacts interface. When administrators add user details (job title, office location, department, cost center, etc.) through the APIs above to the company's global address list, the additional information provided will also display, making it easier for users to get in touch with each other. This also ensures that you get the most updated contact for everyone in your company.
Posted by Florian Niemann, Engineer, Google Apps team
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
UPDATE: Please note that these changes are enabled for users of Google Apps Premier Edition and for users of Google Apps Education Edition. We apologize for the omission of educational users in our original post.
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
UPDATE: Please note that these changes are enabled for users of Google Apps Premier Edition and for users of Google Apps Education Edition. We apologize for the omission of educational users in our original post.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Updates to Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook
When we announced Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook a few weeks ago, we committed to improving it over time to make the Outlook experience on Apps as similar to the experience on Exchange as possible. We first focused on making mail, contacts, and calendar work really well, because those are the features that the more than one hundred companies who tested Apps Sync before launch asked for. Today we wanted to share a couple of updates on our progress in improving compatibility.
We worked closely with Microsoft to address two issues that we shared recently, and we appreciate their help. The Windows Desktop Search feature now works, so you can choose between the native Outlook search, which has been available since launch, and Windows Desktop Search to find information in Outlook. We've also worked with them to add support for accessing Windows Live Hotmail via the Microsoft Office Outlook Connector plug-in.
We also added an option to allow users to enable or disable autoarchive during installation, improved the two-way synchronization of notes in contacts, and improved our installation to make it more clear where data in other Outlook accounts is located. To access these additional features and fixes, current users are being updated automatically to the latest version, and it's available immediately to new users here. As always, you can find more detailed information about Apps Sync in our help center, and we're going to continue to add more advanced features in the coming months.
Since the release of this tool, many businesses have asked us for more information about switching from Microsoft Exchange, so we've pulled together a Google Apps resource site that centralizes information for businesses coming from an Exchange environment. It has information about Google Apps, answers to your due diligence questions, customer feedback from those who have switched before you, and more.
Posted by Chris Vander Mey, Senior Product Manager, Google Apps
Get timely updates on new features in Google Apps by subscribing to our RSS feed or email alerts.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Breaking down the language barrier: Instantly translate Gmail messages
Google is truly a global company. With offices in more than 30 countries around the world, I find myself exchanging emails almost everyday with someone whose native language is different from my own. Many of our customers – from small ten-person companies to large global multinationals like Valeo – work in the same way and use email to communicate with co-workers or customers from all over the world. That's why I'm really excited about a new feature in Gmail that will help to break down the language barrier.
Today we're announcing automatic message translation between 41 languages in Gmail Labs. If you receive a message in a language you don't understand, Gmail will translate it into your language with just one click.
Today we're announcing automatic message translation between 41 languages in Gmail Labs. If you receive a message in a language you don't understand, Gmail will translate it into your language with just one click.
Better yet, if your entire company uses Gmail, email communications between people in your company can take place in the language that's most comfortable for them – each person can write messages in their native language and the recipients can translate the messages into their respective native languages.
While our translation system is quite good, machine translation is a challenging problem and we know it's not perfect. However, it can be quite useful in providing a quick gist of a message, especially if you receive a lot of emails that aren't in your native language. If the translation is awkward or not quite right, you can quickly return to the original message by clicking "View original message" link.
With the power of cloud computing, this feature is available to all Gmail users – without having to buy servers, install software, or write code to integrate translation into email applications. The cloud also makes possible our approach to machine translation in which thousands of computers process billions of words of monolingual and bilingual text to build statistical language and translation models.
The cloud has enabled us to not only achieve very good results with our approach but also to quickly scale to more than 40 languages in just a few years and support millions of users. In addition, we're constantly working on improving translation quality and adding new languages, so Gmail instantly benefits whenever we update our translation system.
This is a Labs launch, so to get started, click "Settings" within Gmail, then the "Labs" tab, and enable "Message Translation." Standard Edition users can follow these instructions immediately, while Premier and Education Edition users will first need their domain admins to enable Gmail Labs from the Google Apps admin control panel.
Posted by Jeff Chin, Product Manager, Google Translate
Monday, May 4, 2009
Manage Contacts - outside of Gmail
We'd like to give you a heads-up on the recent announcement of the standalone version of a contact manager that lets you manage contact information across Google Docs, Google Calendar, and more – even if you don't use Gmail.
Debbie Leight, Google Apps team
To enable this service, just click on the link that says "Add more services" in the "Settings" section of the control panel. You'll then have the option to add this service. Here's a screenshot so you can see what it looks like:
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Theme scheme in Google Apps
Today we're excited to announce a little something to bring some flair to people's Gmail accounts for all editions of Google Apps.
Google Apps now offers more than 30 Gmail account theme choices ranging from weather themes that are customized for your location, to nature themes that change with your timezone, to themes that are just plain fun and funky.
Themes in Gmail give you a chance to customize your inbox, and your theme settings travel with you wherever you log in to your account, just like all the information in your inbox. You can customize your inbox by clicking 'Themes' in the 'Settings' menu once your account administrator enables the 'Turn on new features' checkbox in the Google Apps control panel.
Please note that not all Gmail accounts will have these immediately – we're rolling out Themes right now, and all domains with new features enabled by their admins will see 'Themes' in 'Settings' in the next few days.
Explore the Themes possibilities – they might make opening your inbox a little more fun.
Posted by Monali Narayanaswami, Google Apps Team
Google Apps now offers more than 30 Gmail account theme choices ranging from weather themes that are customized for your location, to nature themes that change with your timezone, to themes that are just plain fun and funky.
Themes in Gmail give you a chance to customize your inbox, and your theme settings travel with you wherever you log in to your account, just like all the information in your inbox. You can customize your inbox by clicking 'Themes' in the 'Settings' menu once your account administrator enables the 'Turn on new features' checkbox in the Google Apps control panel.
Please note that not all Gmail accounts will have these immediately – we're rolling out Themes right now, and all domains with new features enabled by their admins will see 'Themes' in 'Settings' in the next few days.
Explore the Themes possibilities – they might make opening your inbox a little more fun.
Posted by Monali Narayanaswami, Google Apps Team
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
New Status Dashboard for Google Apps
We made a commitment last year to increase transparency and communication with Google Apps customers in several ways. We heard your feedback around the need for better communication when issues like yesterday's Gmail outage occur.
Google Apps Help Forum. In addition to our own online support resources (see below), we have a vibrant community of Google Apps administrators who are always willing to lend a helping hand. To read tips and get help from your peers, join this discussion board for IT admins. This forum is moderated by Google Apps Advisors and fueled by the knowledge of expert Power Posters. Recent questions answered in the Help Forum include ones on IMAP functionality and MX record settings.
Google Apps update alerts. Whenever we launch improvements to any of the apps or add new administrative capabilities – whether it's a minor user interface tweak or the release of major new functionality – we publish a summary with usage instructions and links where you can find more details. For example, we recently shared information on new capabilities for administrators to authorize who can upload videos to Google Video for business and instructions for setting password strength requirements. You can automatically get this information either as email alerts to your inbox, or you can subscribe to the RSS feed.
Google Apps Channel on YouTube Here you can find product tutorials and overviews, as well as video testimonials from Google Apps customers and recordings of Google Apps-related talks and webinars. We recently posted a tour of a corporate intranet built by one of our customers and created a Google Apps Learning Center playlist to educate end users on topics such as "Webmail vs. Desktop," "Archiving or Deleting" in Gmail, for example. Take a look at the videos we've created.
The Solutions Marketplace. If you know that Google Apps is right for you but need some extra help, visit the Solutions Marketplace to find details about products and services from vendors whose solutions integrate and extend Google Apps. You can find vendors to help you with setup and deployment, data migration, integration with existing IT systems, user training and more. You can see how vendors have been rated by other customers and also read about customer experiences with partners.
I hope that this information helps you get the most out of Google Apps. One of the great things about Google Apps is the community that has grown up around it, thanks to you!
Posted by Tessa Prescott, Google Apps Sales Team
As part of that commitment, we're pleased to announce today the availability of the Google Apps Status Dashboard. Customers can use this Status Dashboard to check on the current service status of individual services such as Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Talk, Google Docs, Google Sites and Google Video for business. Administrators of Google Apps for their businesses, schools and organizations can also view the performance of the administrative control panel.
The Google Apps Status Dashboard represents an additional layer of transparency that we believe will be particularly useful for our business users, and it's also relevant to users of our consumer products. The Status Dashboard is the best place to check for information on service availability for Google Apps anywhere in the world. In my role on the sales team, I regularly talk with customers to make sure that they're getting the most out of Google Apps and I think that you will find this tool indispensable in managing your Google Apps deployment.
Google Apps Help Center. Our Help Center for Google Apps admins can answer questions on "getting started" and also help you troubleshoot or find out the status about known issues. Topics include everything from email routing to data migration. We update the information in the Help Center regularly so it's a good starting point for any questions you encounter as you setup and manage your Google Apps account.
Google Apps Help Forum. In addition to our own online support resources (see below), we have a vibrant community of Google Apps administrators who are always willing to lend a helping hand. To read tips and get help from your peers, join this discussion board for IT admins. This forum is moderated by Google Apps Advisors and fueled by the knowledge of expert Power Posters. Recent questions answered in the Help Forum include ones on IMAP functionality and MX record settings.
Google Apps update alerts. Whenever we launch improvements to any of the apps or add new administrative capabilities – whether it's a minor user interface tweak or the release of major new functionality – we publish a summary with usage instructions and links where you can find more details. For example, we recently shared information on new capabilities for administrators to authorize who can upload videos to Google Video for business and instructions for setting password strength requirements. You can automatically get this information either as email alerts to your inbox, or you can subscribe to the RSS feed.
Google Apps Channel on YouTube Here you can find product tutorials and overviews, as well as video testimonials from Google Apps customers and recordings of Google Apps-related talks and webinars. We recently posted a tour of a corporate intranet built by one of our customers and created a Google Apps Learning Center playlist to educate end users on topics such as "Webmail vs. Desktop," "Archiving or Deleting" in Gmail, for example. Take a look at the videos we've created.
The Solutions Marketplace. If you know that Google Apps is right for you but need some extra help, visit the Solutions Marketplace to find details about products and services from vendors whose solutions integrate and extend Google Apps. You can find vendors to help you with setup and deployment, data migration, integration with existing IT systems, user training and more. You can see how vendors have been rated by other customers and also read about customer experiences with partners.
I hope that this information helps you get the most out of Google Apps. One of the great things about Google Apps is the community that has grown up around it, thanks to you!
Posted by Tessa Prescott, Google Apps Sales Team
Monday, February 23, 2009
Making the switch: Migrating 3,000 users from Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps, and what one company learned
If you've ever looked at your existing email system and wondered if there might be a better way, tune in to Andy Nallappan's online review of his recent migration to Google Apps on Monday, March 2, at 10:00 AM PST (1:00 PM EST).
Andy, Director, IT, Engineering and Enterprise Infrastructure for Avago Technologies (which provides components and subsystems to equipment manufacturers) recently migrated 3,000 of his company's employees from Microsoft Exchange 2003 to Google Apps – and he promises to tell all.
Explore the questions and concerns he faced as he researched the migration, including global integration, technology capabilities and workarounds, feature tradeoffs, cost savings, and more. Andy will share how he found his answers, what he'd do differently, what his internal pilot revealed, and how, in the end, Google Apps is working for his users.
This will be a clear, first-hand account what it takes to move a large corporate email system over to an integrated Google solution – and what that means for email systems of any size. We hope you'll join us, no matter what email system you're currently using, for a real-world look on what's possible in email today and what it takes to get there.
The agenda includes time for Q&A, so bring your questions and learn from Andy's experience.
Register for this free 60-minute webinar . We hope that you'll join us.
Monday, March 2, 2009 10:00 AM PST / 1:00 PM EST
Webinar: Avago Technologies: from Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps Kevin Gough, Google Apps Team
Update (03/02/09): More than 200 participants joined in as Andy Nallappan, Director, Enterprise Infrastructure for Avago Technologies, reviewed how he moved 4,100 users to Google Apps, primarily for email, in Q408 through Q109.
Avago expects to realize $1.1M in annual savings from moving from Exchange 2003 to Google Apps.
Andy, Director, IT, Engineering and Enterprise Infrastructure for Avago Technologies (which provides components and subsystems to equipment manufacturers) recently migrated 3,000 of his company's employees from Microsoft Exchange 2003 to Google Apps – and he promises to tell all.
Explore the questions and concerns he faced as he researched the migration, including global integration, technology capabilities and workarounds, feature tradeoffs, cost savings, and more. Andy will share how he found his answers, what he'd do differently, what his internal pilot revealed, and how, in the end, Google Apps is working for his users.
This will be a clear, first-hand account what it takes to move a large corporate email system over to an integrated Google solution – and what that means for email systems of any size. We hope you'll join us, no matter what email system you're currently using, for a real-world look on what's possible in email today and what it takes to get there.
The agenda includes time for Q&A, so bring your questions and learn from Andy's experience.
Register for this free 60-minute webinar . We hope that you'll join us.
Monday, March 2, 2009 10:00 AM PST / 1:00 PM EST
Webinar: Avago Technologies: from Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps Kevin Gough, Google Apps Team
Update (03/02/09): More than 200 participants joined in as Andy Nallappan, Director, Enterprise Infrastructure for Avago Technologies, reviewed how he moved 4,100 users to Google Apps, primarily for email, in Q408 through Q109.
Avago expects to realize $1.1M in annual savings from moving from Exchange 2003 to Google Apps.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Folders and labels: the best of both worlds
New Google Apps users quickly notice that Gmail uses labels instead of traditional folders for organizing email. Why this design decision? Put simply, you can organize and then find messages more efficiently with labels.
Here's why: a message can be tagged with multiple labels like "Project Orion" and "Budget," so you can find that message in either context down the road. With folders, you'd need to pick the one best place for that message – let's say the "Project Orion" folder – making it harder to find later if you're looking for that same message in the context of budget planning.
We hear that the concept of labels can feel foreign at first, and, up until now, the way you had to first apply a label and then archive to move it from your inbox was a two-step process. Listening to users, we heard that people wanted the flexibility of labels but the simplicity of folders.
As of today we're making it easier for you to work with labels. From your inbox or when viewing labeled messages, you'll see a new "Move to" button that labels and removes messages from the current location in one step, just like folders. To apply a label without archiving or removing existing labels, click the "Labels" button.
For you keyboard shortcut diehards, V lets you quickly move, and L lets you label selected messages...but first make sure you've turned on keyboard shortcuts.
Jeremy Milo, Google Apps Product Marketing Manager
Here's why: a message can be tagged with multiple labels like "Project Orion" and "Budget," so you can find that message in either context down the road. With folders, you'd need to pick the one best place for that message – let's say the "Project Orion" folder – making it harder to find later if you're looking for that same message in the context of budget planning.
We hear that the concept of labels can feel foreign at first, and, up until now, the way you had to first apply a label and then archive to move it from your inbox was a two-step process. Listening to users, we heard that people wanted the flexibility of labels but the simplicity of folders.
As of today we're making it easier for you to work with labels. From your inbox or when viewing labeled messages, you'll see a new "Move to" button that labels and removes messages from the current location in one step, just like folders. To apply a label without archiving or removing existing labels, click the "Labels" button.
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