Saturday 27 January 2007

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Gmail speed-up tips

Occasionally Gmail can trip itself up while interpreting all that behind the scenes javascript and this can lead to delays when serving up your emails. If you're as important and popular as I am you'll know 0.7 milliseconds isn't acceptable - you want your information now! Below you'll find some steps you can take to squeeze that last drop of juice out of your Google web mail:-

1. Disable the chat feature by clicking on the "standard without chat" text link in your inbox's footer.

2. If half measures aren't for you try switching to "basic HTML" mode.

3. Not quite bare-bones enough? For the Amish Gmailers among you there's always Mobile Gmail. You could even make it pop out of your browser in its own incy-wincy, ickle phone sized window. This is handy if you want to stay in the loop at work without drawing too much attention to yourself. You can keep your pseudo phone pinned on top of all your other applications using PowerMenu / reSizer (Windows) or Afloat (Mac).

4. Visit your 'settings' menu and on the 'general' page select 'No snippets - Show subject only' to disable inline previewing of email content. Chances are you'll know if you want to open up an email judging by who it's from and what's in the title. There's no need for information overload.

5. If you don't use your Gmail account for chatting, disable the chat history feature located under the 'chat' tab of your settings menu.

6. Move a tab to your right and opt not to 'show my web clips above the Inbox' to exterminate distracting sponsored link fluff. Even when customised, this is a poor substitute for RSSFwd if you ask me.

7. Activate keyboard shortcuts under the 'general' settings tab to eliminate all that incessant flitting back and forth between keyboard and mouse when performing common tasks such as archiving mail or composing a new message. The only thing missing from this time-saver is a quickie delete key combo. Considering Google's history of playing hide and seek with the delete button in the actual GUI this doesn't surprise me.

8. If you already know you're using a Gmail compatible browser you can skip the automatic browser check in future by accessing your inbox via this URL.

9. Pages will render faster if your inbox isn't clogged up with excess mail so make sure you archive anything you want to keep and chuck out the rest. Otherwise reduce the number of 'conversations' shown on each page by tweaking the 'maximum page size' option under the 'general' settings tab.

10. Spring-cleaning your inbox will increase the relevance of your search results, but putting it in the microwave probably isn't advisable.

1 comments:

Jack Bremer said...

Some great tips, still working three years on :-)