TheNitai

Given gMail has one of the best web application interfaces (for its usage) and can sit happy in your browser tab, it is after all still a web application and can not interact with your local address book, offers no drag and drop possibility and desktop notifications.

Furthermore, Gmail offers some really useful features like threaded conversation view, saving of chats, starred items and archives. Features that anyone who has used Gmail for more then one day has come to love and cherish. Since, those functions are just so useful many are just using Gmail in the browser, after all it is free and it works.

Still, I set out for a quest to find a desktop client and an iPhone app for gMail for the obvious reasons mentioned above and… …to say upfront, I found (for me) the perfect Gmail experience on the Mac and on the iPhone. So, read on…

Synching
We as Mac users like our iCal and our Address Book. They might not be the perfect solutions, but to be honest, they are the best we have and they come with MacOS X and are tightly integrated with the system. Thought, Apple made some improvements to iCal (adding WebDAV) and subscribing to other calendars it does not come close to experiences that some have with Outlook and Exchange server. Let’s not even talk about the Address Book which is somehow closed in itself (yes, I know you can lookup LDAP, but does a private person have LDAP installed?). What we (I) really want is to have a easy synchronization of my Calendar (iCal) and my addresses (Address Book) with Gmail. It is not too much to ask, right?

The desire to do so, is fortunately not only mine, but also that of the developers of SpanningSync. In short, SpanningSync allows you to sync your address book and calendar(s) (yes, more then one) with your GMail contact/calendars. Best of it all, you don’t have to do anything at all to make it work, simply install it, set it up once and forget it. From then on SpanningSync, syncs everything in the background for you.

For me, not one thought crossed my mind not to get it. They offer an annual license or a onetime license.

iPhone & gMail

Besides browsing to the mobile gMail site within Safari and then save it as a book mark site (which then appears as a custom app on the iPhone) there are two gMail applications, one is called iGmail and the other Mailroom.

Honestly, I have been using iGmail for some time and even slashed out $5 for having it work with my Google App account. But recently I experienced random lockouts, as such that I could not login anymore (even after restarting the phone) and once I was able to re-login I experienced random crashes. Another thing is that on slow connections (like on EDGE) the application did not work at all. Obviously, I was looking for an alternative.

Today, Mailroom had gotten the top spot on my iPhone. Mailroom is by far the best gMail application and works every time I have to use it, be it on a slow network or not. Mailroom does even more then the “normal” gMail mobile site. Some of the things are;

• Multiple Accounts
• Threaded Messages
• Using Local Address Book
• Offline Support

Personally, I don’t regret for once second that I bought Mailroom. It works every time and does what it promises.

Desktop & gMail

Of course, you can have your Apple Mail set up with gMail over IMAP (recommended) or POP3, but for me Apple Mail does not work so well. I like the gMail interface, but still want the desktop feeling and the convenience of attaching any document by drag/drop. The only application that offers me all that is Mailplane. I can’t say anything else, then that Mailplane does all the things you are accustomed to from a desktop application and some more. That and the user interface from gMail makes it a clear “must have” for any serious gMail user.

Some of the benefits of using Mailplane are;

• Having notification (Growl)
• Drag & Drop attachments
• Having different account and switch to them on the fly
• Individual formated signatures for each account
• Access to Address Book
• Create screen shots within Mailplane
• etc.

The Conclusion

Having a perfect workflow in sync with gMail, MacOS X and iPhone is something that can easily be achieved with the outlined tools above. For me, my current set up works flawlessly for many months now and supports me 100% in my work. In short, I use SpanningSync for having my calendar and address book in sync with gMail, iCal and Address Book. On my iPhone I got Mailroom and on MacOS X I use Mailplane.

I like to keep myself informed on different topics, as such RSS feeds are a great way to keep informed. They allow you to follow a site, without having to visit a specific website and scan for the latest articles. Moreover, it can keep you updated of software updates or news that would not enter your radar.

Over time, I have accumulated around 600 RSS feeds and the challenge to manage them all was a challenge in itself. Thought, today I have a very satisfying setup which I like to share.

The old workhorse

In the past I would go nowhere without NetNewswire. I’ve been a huge follower of NetNewswire for a long time. I can’t remember the companies name of the past, but it was one guy doing the whole work and the application was great. Then he sold it do Newsgator and they had this very great setup with their online RSS client which would sync the read statuses with the desktop client. Furthermore, they also had a iPhone client. All in all a winning team.

After some time, they gave up this setup and recommended all their customers to use Google Reader and use NetNewswire, both on the desktop and on the iPhone, to sync with Google Reader. Thought, I did not like Google Reader at first I have to say that i use Google Reader as my main “RSS server” nowadays.

Unfortunately, or let’s say fortunately, the move from the Newsgator platform to Google Reader has also brought new opportunities and ways in my RSS reading workflow, I would have never experienced with NetNewswire alone.

This brings me to my current setup.

The new workhorse

Today, I have replaced NetNewswire on my iPhone with Newsrack (it used to be called Newsstand). Newsrack is a full featured RSS reader, displays your news in a news stand like display (I don’t use it and simply like the “standard” view) and it is blazing fast in loading the feeds.

The big plus, apart from syncing with Google Reader is the ability to share the feeds by eMail, with my Google Reader followers, post it to Twitter, Delicious or Instapaper.

Sure, Newsrack itself is not a free app, unlike NetNewswire, but for my taste NetNewswire just did not scope it anymore for me. It did not sync properly anymore, the displaying of ads bothered me after some time, but apart from that, it was just painfully slow in syncing with Google Reader.

All in all, I’ve been buying Newsrack after around 2 hours playing with it and never regret it in any way.

I’ve looked into other RSS readers that have the option to sync with Google Reader, but could not find one that would work well for me. Especially the sharing feature and the way it works, just does it for me.

On to the Mac Desktop.

One might wonder why I would want to use a desktop RSS reader if Google has made Google Reader so easy to use in the browser and especially with Google Chrome the reader is just plain fast. Still, for me, desktop apps have benefits over their web counterparts. Some of the benefits are the possibility to read the feeds offline, be able to easily drag and drop them to an email client and post to a blog with MarsEdit.

So far, I have used NetNewswire also for Google Reader replacement, but here also, I experienced slow syncing and the ads really were annoying. Thus I set out on my quest for a replacement. Foremost, I did *not* want an AIR application (don’t get me started on AIR’s RAM usage). Luckily, it did not last long until I found the perfect Mac desktop Google Reader. Enter Gruml…

Gruml is a pretty young project (Version 0.9.17) and (surprise?) comes from a person in Germany. But what really got me hooked on Gruml is the usability that just makes it so much fun to use. Also, for just about every action you have shortcuts. Want to post a article to Twitter? Hit shift+T, Want to spread the news with ping.fm? Hit shift+G. Best of it, it opens a new tab with the build in browser.

But one of the really neat feature is the icon in the menu bar of MacOS X itself. First it lets you now how many unread items you got and when you click on the icon it gives you a preview of the feeds in its own window. Me thinks, that is really slick!

Moreover, I have found that Gruml is really in sync with Google Reader all the time. In my testing I saw that it syncs almost instantly with Google Reader and as such you have Google Reader, Newsrack on the iPhone and Gruml in sync almost by the beat.

Of course, one of the best selling points for Gruml is the price -  free by the means of Gratis, pay nothing, enjoy and follow the feeds

The recent eMail von Jason Calacanis and his blog post entitled “The Case against Apple in five Parts” brought a little up stir in the Apple world. The recent reply came from Marco.  You can read their back and forth on Jason’s take on Apple and make up your own mind. I have read all the blog posts so far, but I have been missing one simple thing!

The one single thing that makes me use Apple products is that they simply work!

I have used Windows, Linux and MacOS X over the last couple of years. Hell, this blog post is even being typed on a Thinkpad with Windows XP, but nothing has ever been an hassle free experience then with using Apple products, be it hardware or software.

When has there ever been a more relaxed operating system update then with MacOS X? All you have to do is to pop in your DVD, run the update and know for sure that it will reboot safely with the new update. Moreover, with the applications itself you don’t need to run trough a “painful” installations with minimum five “OK” clicks (I know you Windows guys don’t see this as a problem because you are used to!), on MacOS X you simply drag and drop an application to the place you want. Nothing else!

iPhone is another topic that people like to argue about. Sure, the hardware is behind the current standard. Bluetooth does not work with cars and you might have to reboot your iPhone sometimes. But, have you ever used a Windows Mobile and did you every try to sync it with your Windows OS? I hate to repeat myself, but with the iPhone all I have to do is to hook it up to my Mac, sync it with iTunes (including Music, Photos, Videos, etc.) it even takes over my eMail settings and my eMail and Calendar just works. Symbian based phones and Windows Mobile ones require you to spend at least an hour fiddling with setting and try and error attempts. I don’t think I have to start arguing about the usability of the iPhone. Apple has done something, that for many years no one could. It brought a phone that simply works and is easy to use.

Remember the “plug und play” wording? Well, what is a “myth” in the Windows and Linux world is a fact with MacOS X. You got a new digital camera? All you do is connect it and the system recognizes it, iPhoto opens and there you got your photos. No hunting for a updated driver , no installation, no reboot needed, nothing else, just plug it in and start working. Isn’t that worth the little more money you got to pay?

Regarding the price, I do have to say that a Dell Lattitude E6500 with the same configuration as an Apple MacBook Pro 15″ will cost you about the same (at least in Switzerland). Price is not everything. And when it comes down to usability you save a lot more then with the initial cost when you use something that simply just works.

For me, and I’m sure for many other people, it is the Apple eco system that saves us money in the long run because it just works!

Usually, I’m a happy camper with my MacOS X and with the built in applications (not that I use them a lot, but when I do I like how well they are built and “feel”). The only application I use a lot of the built in applications is Apple Mail.

Lately, Apple Mail, has been acting up a lot. As such, that when it tried to sync with my mail server it just hang up and sucked in all available CPU and my MacBook was heating up like anything. The only remedy was to Force Quit Apple Mail (if you don’t know, just press the “Apple Key (cmd) & Alt (option) & Esc and you get a handy dialog to force quit any running application).

How I got my Apple Mail running healthy again? Here are the following steps I did;

1. Repair Permissions
   Actually, repairing permission should be done at least once a month. It just keeps your system healthy and rules out any problems. What “Repair Permissions” does, is to simply correct all permissions on files that system owns and needs to run smoothly. To repair permissions lunch the Disk Utility application, select your startup disk and click on “Repair Permissions”.
2. Remove the cache files of Apple Mail
   If you see a problem with syncing and updating the cache directory within Mail it could be that the cache files are corrupt. Go to your home Library folder, then to the Mail folder and remove the “DefaultCounts”, “Envelope Index” and the “LSMMap” files. Some have reported that removing the “MessageUidsAlreadyDownloaded3″ as well. So you will have to experiment a bit.

The next time you start up Apple Mail it should ask you to reimport all messages and it will rebuilt the index. Hopefully, you are back up and all is well.