Eight reasons we still need an iPhone Gmail app
(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)
Tuesday's release of a much-improved Web client for Gmail on the iPhone and Android handsets was nice, but it's still got me salivating at the idea of a native application for the iPhone. Over the last year we've hounded the Gmail team on whether one was on the way, and the answer is--in typical Google fashion, that there will be no discussion of products that have not been announced.
But that doesn't mean one isn't in the works.
So let's take a look at what a native Gmail application could give us over what Apple is currently offering and is set to release in the upcoming 3.0 firmware.
1. Push delivery/Push notifications
Gmail for Android does something no other client of Gmail does: push notifications. This means that the second you get a message it lets you know with a pop-up. The fastest you can set the iPhone's Mail application to refresh Gmail is every 15 minutes. So could a native iPhone application do the same thing as Gmail for Android? Probably.
An official Google spokesperson told us that no other platform has this push service (including desktop clients), and the other official Gmail native apps simply auto-refresh every few minutes. With the upcoming firmware 3.0, Google could offer the push notifications of new messages through Apple's push data stream either in the form of a badge that updates on the app's icon, or with a small preview that pops up with the first line or two of the message.
2. Offline/Gears
The new version of Gmail for Android has offline reading and composing, meaning you can go through your mail and get work done even when you don't have a connection. While the iPhone's Mail app lets you read, save, and compose messages, it doesn't download a big chunk of your in-box or all of the attachments that come with it, which means you can be out of luck if you can't get online to view a work document or spreadsheet. Which brings us to...
3. Attachment handling
The attachment viewing of Gmail on the desktop can be an absolute joy. PDFs, PowerPoint presentations and PDFs can be viewed in an HTML viewer that cuts down on the start-up time and the requirement for any special software. While the iPhone can natively view these, it doesn't include search or the option to save the file locally. A local app could offer both.
Likewise, when composing an e-mail in the native Mail app, adding attachments is limited to photos, which with the upcoming firmware is much simpler with systemwide copy and paste. However, if you're using the Web client, it's incapable of accessing your local files, which means you're stuck using the native app if you want to add or take a quick photo as an attachment.
4. Smarter archiving
Not all Gmail users archive their messages, probably because they don't understand what it does. Archiving takes a message out of your in-box while keeping it in your account, letting you search for it later. It's a handy feature, yet the iPhone native mail client gives the impression that we're deleting messages we don't want to see in our in-box, something which goes against the very principle of having 7GB of mail storage.
If you've set up Gmail using the iPhone's Gmail setup wizard you can in fact archive messages by selecting them and moving them to your "All Mail" folder. Alternately, for native app users who have set up Gmail using the special IMAP instructions the delete function does not actually delete the message but archives it. Confused? A native Gmail app might make a better differentiation between the two, and let you control what you want deleted and archived from the get-go.
Gmail's task list
5. A standalone task list
Gmail's task list is not the most full-featured to-do list app out there, but it's simple and handy. Having it as part of a native app would let you access it and make edits when offline. Google could even give users the option to create hard due dates for each item, which could be synced up to your phone's calendar and give you a buzz when they had to be done.
6. Combined contact look-up
Here's a problem: I have one contact list on my phone and another on Gmail. Sure Google has an official solution that will sync up both and combine them into one massive contact list, but what if I want to keep the two separated to keep my iPhone's phonebook a little smaller?
A native application would help sort that out by making use of the contacts I have on my phone and giving quick auto-complete-as-you-type suggestions for people on my Gmail contact list. Right now, typing addresses from the native iPhone will only bring up auto-complete suggestions if that person is on my contact list, or if I've recently sent them a message.
7. Built-in chat
Chat has become a big part of Gmail's desktop version, yet on the iPhone it's relegated to a finger-friendly browser version that will sign you off when you close your browser or switch tabs. That's not a good solution. Why not build it into a native version of Gmail on the phone like there is on Android?
(Credit:
Apple)
8. GPS and location awareness
Location is becoming an increasingly important part of mobile apps, and Gmail is no different. When Google puts advertising into the mobile version of Gmail you can bet there's going to be a play on location. Contextual information from inside of your e-mails is one facet, but if Google can figure out where you are and offer something more targeted, you can bet it will.
More importantly, it will open things up for some fun extras, like being able to announce your location in your signature. This is a feature that's available in the desktop version, but would be a whole lot more useful when your messages are coming from a mobile phone.
These are just a few reasons the iPhone is long overdue for its own native Gmail app. If you've got any of your own, feel free to leave them in the comments.
Update: Made a clarification about archiving items in the native iPhone client.
Josh Lowensohn writes for Webware.com, CNET's blog about Web applications and services. E-mail Josh, or follow him on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/Josh. 
Archiving is supported with the iPhone mail app when used with gmail imap server. Simply move mail to the 'All Mail' folder. Select the 'All Mail' folder to view archived mail.
Contact syncing with gmail works very well. Contacts in the 'My Contacts' list are synced through exchange to your iphone. Calendars or multiple calendars are synced through exchange as well. Both with push. If you have let your gmail contacts get out of control, 'All Contacts' and 'My Contacts' will be duplicates of one another. You need to clean up the 'My Contacts' before you sync. Another good feature is the contacts picture from gmail is synced to your iphone as well. You can also add or change their contact picture within gmail and save a ton of tapping on the iphone.
As far as push notification for email through gmail. It would already be possible through the gmail exchange server if google would implement it.
http://www.google.com/mobile/apple/sync.html
And yes contacts are synced through exchange, but that requires you to use Google Sync (www.google.com/mobile/default/sync.html) which merges with your phone's contact list with your gmail contact list which is not ideal.
While Google could create a native application for push email, they could just as easily make Gmail's actual mail available on their Exchange sync. They could also try to work with Apple to get push into the native Mail client (Yahoo Mail has had push since day one).
On attachment handling, searching through attachments (or mail in general is a place where the native Mail application fall shorts (I am an iPhone developer, so I've tried Mail's IMAP search, which works to some degree but is slow)) is very much needed. I'm not sure how a native application would be able to make any use of attachments that are saved locally, aside from offline viewing.
On the issue of archiving, the native Mail app *can* archive Gmail messages (when using IMAP). The statement "the iPhone native mail client we're simply stuck with deleting messages" is completely untrue since you can simply move an email to the All Mail "folder" (again, when using IMAP).
Overall, Lowensohn makes some points and great feature requests, but seems to show a lack of knowledge of what a proper Gmail and iPhone setup is fully capable as of today.
If you wish to archive a message in this new implementation, simply move the message to your [Gmail]/All Mail folder. This can be done by opening the message on your iPhone, tapping the 'Folder' icon located between the 'Trash' and 'Refresh' icons, and then tapping your [Gmail]/All Mail folder to move the message.
I'm using the iPhone Mail app to one of several "folders" that effectively tag a message with the "folder's" label. But, I get to tag a message with one Label in the Mail app, which is better than nothing in that regard, but that also effectively archives the message.
BUT THERE'S ONE THING THAT EVERYBODY'S MISSING - LANDSCAPE MAIL!!!!!!!!!! HELLO?!?!?
Compose a message in the web app, turn your iPhone sideways, and you've got a landscape-formatted interface!
You know, between the iPhone SDK and the Google Mail API, you can fairly easily create an application to your liking. Why don't you give it a go?
I go to my iPhone mail. I can click EDIT and then check off whatever I want to archive in a certain folder. Then i click on that folder. I have all the same folder options as in my regular Gmail. Don't know why you keep referring to trash as the only option. It really really isn't.
Archiving is just a fancy way of saying folder, and they are all there on my iPhone.
it couldn't be easier to use.
I agree that gears would be great.
The iPhone does not allow tasks to wake in the backgound, so you would get the instant updates you want anyway.
It would be great if you could setup a filter that sent you an SMS message either with the e-mail or just that e-mail has arrived. This would allow one to be notified instantly for the messages you care about.
For my personal taste, improving the native app towards Josh's ideas would be more feasible.
Also, it was mentioned that a dedicated Gmail app would solve attachment files to be saved locally. That's unfortunately not true. Other than pictures, no kind of attachments can be saved on the iPhone. Plus picture saving is already available on the web client.
Just my 2c.
Pdf and ppt conversion to html?
No thanks, it's just crap ...
Is non sense to have a gmail app, just improve the one already in the phone and ask google to implement the exchange server protocol.
I pity u if you need 7GB of space to store your email. Why not reduce the clutter in your life and delete your emails?
- by BIGELLOW April 8, 2009 3:31 PM PDT
- This article would be better written if it were about additional features you would like to see on the web based Gmail for the iPhone. There is a new era of web-based apps that is over-taking stand-alone apps which is happening whether you're ready or not. By constantly trying to stick to "the old ways" is to grasp strongly onto your vinyl records. Sure, they worked... sure, they still work... but they're no longer in the mainstream.
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(20 Comments)As for the person who said that you should delete your emails and reduce the clutter... you obviously don't value information, which is your prerogative. Some, however, value information. For the same reason the Wayback Machine (Internet Archive) is very useful to many, so is the ability to search for information found in an email from 3 years ago. This is especially noticeable when it's time to do taxes... it's great knowing that you didn't accidentally throw something away that it turns out you needed later. If space isn't a problem, and the emails themselves don't actually "clutter" anything (because they are virtual and are neatly tucked away in an archive)... it's better to keep them. If you never need the email ever again, that's fine... then you likely won't ever see it again... but if, for some unforeseen reason, you need to reference that email... no worries... it's only a search away.