Contact selection from "compose mail" screen
vonnie
Does anyone know if there is a way to select contacts to send an email
to after you've started to compose a new message? The only thing I
have figured out is to hit a letter and a list of contacts pops up that
start with that letter. But, that's a real pain to have to do that
every time!!!
Thanks!
Ian Betts
Ian
If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.
Moshe Dayan
Ian Betts
vonnie
the "compose" screen. Right now I either have to choose all my
recipients before I start composing. Or I have to go through the
alphabet 1 letter at a time to get the drop down lists. There is no way
to get a complete list to drop down?
(did i splain myself better this time?)
TTFKAS
get on Outlook as an example, which brings up the address book. This
brings up a contact list, but you still have to either start typing the
name, or scroll the list.
Seems to me the gmail way is more efficient. Not sure why you would
want to take the extra steps? Unless (like me sometimes) you don't have
a clear thought in your head of who you want to send the message to,
and want the list there to spark thoughts of people to add. But then
selecting the contacts before composing the message seems just as
viable.
Was I even close?
vonnie
Good point about the list - I guess the one situation I run into is if
I'm forwarding an email. I have go through each drop down list -
letter by letter - to make sure I'm forwarding to each contact that I
want. I'm most familiar with MSN Outlook and Outlook Express so maybe
they run a lot differently than all the freebie services that most
people use. ?? I'll stop complaining now and enjoy the free service!
TTFKAS
breaking the mold with their technique. An option, although requiring
more steps, is to drop out of the email you want to forward, go to your
contact list, pick the people, compose, cut those entries, go back to
the mail you want to forward and paste them in the to field.
Caleb Eggensperger
Caleb Eggensperger
Gogol
what you wanted. With TTFKAS reply and by looking at all the posts you
have made so far since getting your GMail a/c I have come to the
conclusion that the best advice I can give you to this and all your
posts is TAKE THE TOUR! //MAIL.GOOGLE.COM/SUPPORT?CTX=ABOUT
Sometimes, we all get into into habits when we are used to doing things
in a particular way and when presented with a new way of operating, we
react in unfavourable ways when it doesn't do what we are used to.
I use Windows, Linux and Mac in my life. I have used many different
email services, paid and free ( all the usual suspects ). I have seen
and presently see what Yahoo and Hotmail are doing with their Betas.
With that in mind, I can state that I find Gmail the best that I have
worked with. I note the implied criticism that a free service is
inferior and you think Gmail is therefore not as good as all that nice
Uncle Bill has to offer. That is your right. However, as all your posts
have been made at the same time, I would respectfully suggest that you
give Gmail time, get to know what it offers and you may change your
viewpoint, once you realise what the system offers you and all newbies.
It ain't all about the size of your email box. It is how you use it
that matters.
As to your specific posts in this thread, go to
MAIL.GOOGLE.COM/SUPPORT/BIN/TOPIC.PY?TOPIC=1529 then, examine all the
answers that refer to Contact Groups. The Groups element of Gmail was a
fairly recent addition to how Gmail operates, in response to those
customers who wished to send emails to a batch of addresses rather than
single person to person emails. Once you appreciate how Google
approached this aspect, you will begin to appreciate the potential of
what you have at your disposal. GMail is "breaking the mold" {TTFKAS}
It is still evolving. Yes and it is all for free!
yvonne bastion
Gogol
are continuing to look for answers, here, to questions that will show
you how to make it behave in the manner you would like, I can only say,
cease and desist. The words, "over", "hell", "when" and "freezes"
randomly spring to mind.
There is one way you could make it so (sound of stuck record) give
Google the feedback that this is what you would like. Sadly, they will
not provide the service you desire, instantaneously, just for you.
However, if enough GMail users keep asking for any particular feature,
market forces will dictate and, eventually, a proprietary Google
feature will appear within your, long-held, GMail to allow you to
communicate with your numerous friends and relatives.
Until that happy day dawns ( the same day when we can insert Smileys
into these forums to convey our unexpressed written thoughts to dear
readers) try the Groups feature.
Set up a group with a label e.g All my Aunties in Idaho and include
their email addresses within this group. Another Group. Another Label.
My Drinking Buddies. You can be as humourous{UK spelling} or rude as
you like in the Labels you apply to your Groups. It makes each group
more memorable and as you compose your email to the recipients only you
know what you REALLY think of them! I am self - censoring my potential
suggestions for Group Labels. It is your account. Your choice.
Individual addresses could feature in several Groups. The more the
merrier. As you devise the Groups, you can draw each one down as you
begin to Compose Mail.
Sure, a bit of work in setting up each Group but think of the fun you
can have! Groups are a more workable solution than an, accessible,
extremely long list of dropped - down addresses; particularly so as
your GMail box fills up to its limit, which could mean you have
accumulated a vast array of addresses from different correspondents.
Unless, of course, you have nearly 2.7GBb of emails solely from All
your Aunties in Idaho and therefore very few email addresses. Your
account. Your way.
Isn't the English language wonderful? You can write pellucidly, yet,
people can find words and sentiments that you never expressed - "chain
letters" Qui? Moi? Ce n'est pas vrai!
T. M. Tracy
On 4/25/06, yvonne bastion <ybas...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Wow. You sure have a lot to say. I'm at work so don't even have time to
> read it all. I was just looking for an answer to a question - not an essay.
> I guess I won't ask anymore....
> Have a nice day.
--
"Too close for missles, I'm switching to guns."
-TopGun
Ian Betts
Wow. You sure have a lot to say. I'm at work so don't even have time to read it all. I was just looking for an answer to a question - not an essay. I guess I won't ask anymore....Have a nice day.
On 4/25/06, Gogol <thejo...@gmail.com > wrote:
Chuck Tomasi
seem to thrive on the massive corporate address book mentality when in
fact, typing a few letters in a person's name and hitting Ctrl-K is
faster. Granted, if you don't know how to spell someone's name it's
nice to have a scroll list, but that doesn't lend itself well to a web
interface in most situations. My Google contacts aren't long enough
for me to wonder how to spell someone's name. Generally, if I can't
spell it, it isn't in my address book. :-)
--Chuck Tomasi
--Host of the Gmail Podcast
--http://www.chuckchat.com/gmail
dschwa...@gmail.com
and finding new, innovative ways to do old, cumbersome tasks, I can't
agree with the general reaction to this idea.
1. The anti-Microsoft bias, though well-earned, can (and has) become a
counterproductive fetish. Just because something is a feature of
Outlook doesn't necessarily make it bad on its own merits. There seems
to be a prevailing mentality that MS can't do ANYTHING right. I would
dispute that. While we're bashing them for their many failings, let's
also give them credit where it's due - which, if you really are
objective, is at least part of the time.
2. Sure, I could easily set up groups like All My Aunties In Idaho (a
null set) and All My Drinking Buddies (alas, not a null set). But
there are many times when I don't know who, exactly I want to send a
message to, but a list helps me think about the content and context and
consider my choices. Do I send this update on, say, my love life, such
as it is, to My Friends, my Drinking Buddies, My Exes, My Currents, or
is there some specific combo of people I think would be interested
and/or should know? Or do I create a specific group just for this
purpose....every time I face the situation? I go with the
individualized approach, which is what I thought Google was about
(fighting the big bad MS conformity principle). And it's too much to
expect this 50 year old brain to store and process 300+ contacts and
remember which first letters to type, unless you expect me to do it 26
times to make sure I don't miss anyone.
3. Similarly, smileys do indeed suck, but even there, if someone is
absolutely convinced they can't get their message across any other way,
why not humor (American spelling) them and give them the option?
Again, just because it's there doesn't mean you have to use it, or even
read messages that contain them (barf).
So let's agree to disagree, but I think a strong case can be made for
the feature suggested. Like other things I've suggested from time to
time, if it's not for you, don't use it, or ask Google to make it an
option you can turn off. Let's not get carried away by an unthinking
anti-MS bias. "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds"
- Ralph Waldo Emerson.
BTW Gogol I really do appreciate your delightful humour (British
spelling, I like it both ways) and you make some very valid points, but
you must know it comes across as a lack of respect - at least to tender
American ears. Even if that's exactly what it does represent, it
doesn't help your case.
Dan Schwartz
Gogol
interesting and useful site too! Then, you are a professional and I am
strictly amateur. It takes time + space ( for me) to explain what
Gmail Groups has to offer to the user. Hope all this helps vonnie and
all who read this thread..
BTW, On your shop I can see that the dog is made in USA but where is
its Tshirt made?!
Ian Betts
It is just not Google policy to copy old methods, whoever consructed them.
dschwa...@gmail.com
Express suggests anti-MS bias to me, and it's hard to deny that anti-MS
sentiment is everywhere (note all the references to M$ in other threads
and in other groups). Why is no one saying they don't want Google to
act like Lotus Notes [the standard at my last job, very different from
Outlook, and a stinker IMHO] or Novell Groupwise [the standard at my
current job, and surprisingly adequate]? Or, for that matter,
Thunderbird or Eudora [not full PIM's, I know]? Or the Palm OS? Or
Yahoo Mail?
In any event, the deeper question is, what if the old methods really
are the best ones? Another fetish is to assume that new approaches are
always better ones. There's a reason this old method has stuck around
for so long, and it's that people like it and know how to use it. Is
that bad? Why are so many people asking about it? For all its
technological advances, Google really hasn't rethought the search
engine, just improved it. That's great but not the kind of fundamental
rethinking Google wants us to believe in. If you want real innovation,
try A9, again IMHO. (Yes, I'm aware that Web search within A9 is
Google "enhanced", and I have a problem with the Amazon connection, but
the execution is still great.)
BTW to head off any thoughts of an anti-Google bias on my part, I use
Google, Gmail, Gnews, GScholar (fantastic help, better than PubMed),
GEarth (holy cow!), and other G's, and they're all radically good. But
just as there is plenty of anti-MS bias out there, there's also some
unthinking pro-Google bias. Let's not get carried away. The Google
folks don't have a lock on Best Methods and they've made plenty of
mistakes along the way. How Gmail plays out will depend in part on
their willingness to stick to what's tried and true when it's
appropriate.
Dan
Wingz¹²¾
GMail to have a glance at your entire contacts list while composing
messages, especially while forwarding. [You may try choosing the
recipients BEFORE initially composing new mails.] There is no 'easy'
way, but you MIGHT just find this more convenient.
You are already conversant with GMail's 'autocomplete' feature in any
of those To:/Cc:/Bcc: fields when you type in even a single letter. So,
please prefix ALL your contacts' 'Names' with a symbol such as * or +.
You may also use different symbols like * for colleagues, + for family,
$ for bankers, @ for acquaintances, etc. So now when you type just the
single symbol, you get your entire contact list prefixed with that
specific symbol as GMail's autocomplete feature. Voilá!
Not easy, but convenient and neat. But do you know what? You may still
need over 1425+ key presses to select the first 50 contacts from a
100-odd contacts list!
------------
Gogol
a simple keystroke - but it is still a "Label" attached to your
contacts. You have decided upon the coding, what symbol for which
group, but as I wrote - Your account. Your way.
Clearly others have different views. Their account. Their way.
Respect.
Gogol
otherwise of any system. I am too old, too tired and too talented to do
that. I joined all the groups in my profile for one reason and one
reason only: to help people with their problems, if I was able and if
my accumulated knowledge, to date, could be of some passing use.
I have read all the posts you have made in your profile and this is the
thread you have chosen to enter discursive mode about Microsoft and its
products. The thread began as an attempt to help one individual to use
her Gmail a/c in the way she wished and whose experience was confined(
on the information supplied ) to nice Uncle Bill's products. This is a
GMail forum. We are here to discuss Gmail and how to get the best out
of this service.
I have already written, I use Windows, Linux and Mac in my life. I did
not have to reveal that. I chose to do so. It should give an indicator
of my viewpoint and experience. I do not have a bias against any o/s or
any human being, including Steve Ballmer! ( vide:- what he would like
to do to Google) Remember Dan, this is a Gmail group, like the other
one you joined. So, we discuss Gmail and as a side issue, the products
of Google, when they are relevant to the point at hand.
Two lenghty posts from you and where is your input to help Vonnie meet
her needs?
Further, you then choose to impugn my character by saying I have shown
a lack of respect? How dare you! I could choose to adopt a wide range
of Americanisms I have learned but I did not join this or any forum,
i.e. Any Forum , which means Forums at other sites that have nothing to
do with Google and its products but have a lot to do with the company
you espouse, to engage in flame wars.
I will not be replying to any more of your posts. Period.
Wingz¹²¾
pertinent and appropriate observations.
In fact, sorry for not being able to see it, but I couldn't see the
point of your observation in your reply post to mine that
"... but as I wrote - Your account. Your way. Clearly others have
different views. Their account. Their way. Respect."
Where were any 'different views' expressed in these entire posts to
Vonnie's original Q? I had only offered a workaround, as I found that
the original Q was not addressed, much later? And did that have any
'disrespect' to anyone? So why the 'Respect'? Is it 'coz YOU had been
aptly asked to show it earlier by someone else?
You needn't reply, of course.
--------
lynxcom1
reading this one....
the spelling is my own erronious way of trying to communicate, however
bad or good.
..dave
Wingz¹²¾
-------------