Gmail Rocks
So, tonight I set my dad up with gmail. He has been moving around a bit and moving ISP’s nearly as often. The changes to his e-mail clients were constantly causing him to reconfigure them and each time it seemed like such a struggle. Of course, I’m the tech guy who has to assist.
I approached him about using gmail about two years ago, but my brother was set against it claiming that gmail would not yield the experience he was used to.
This time around I just did it, and did it in a big way. I didn’t just set him up with just any o ld gmail account, I decided to change the entire domain name to direct e-mails to gmail. This is what Google calls “Google Apps for XYZ Domain”. The configuration is pretty intense and not something the average user can set up. However, once it’s set up you essentially have the following.
Google gets all mail directed to your domain. You get to keep your domain and you get to keep your existing e-mail address.
You get a control panel where you can create a homepage, manage google chat, create web pages, manage e-mail accounts, create online calendars, and have access to Google Docs (docs, spreadsheets and now presentations).
My Dad mentioned on numerous occasions that he loves some of the glitzy features of his “Incredimail” e-mail client and I knew that although gmail was the ultimate in reliability and usability, he might not even see that if he could not send his emoticons.
So, I did three things to make him feel more comfortable.
First, I enabled POP access so he can have his cake and eat it to. Doing this assumed that using gmail’s POP and SMTP server would be “easier” to configure than the trouble I had with my domain hoster. Time will tell.
Second, I populated his contact list with all of his family members and added pictures so he’d see as much visual jazz as I could possibly muster.
Third, I created this friendly ad of his grandson saying, “Gmail Rocks!”
