I feel like it is time to talk about my favorite free email provider, Gmail. I talked about the new layout last year but today let’s look at some newer features you may not have thought about or tired yet. This will not be all of the newer neat things you can do with Gmail; however, these are those I appreciate most.
The first one I would like to mention is "Smart Compose." To me, this is an amazing new addition to Gmail. When you are typing a new email, it will sort of – finish the thought for you. For instance, when I am typing a new email in the morning and start it with, "Good" it will auto compose and add, "morning" to the sentence. When I am replying to an email from Cindy it will complete "Good, " with "morning Cindy." It will also compose other sentences and phrases as you type the entire email.
If you do not want to use the suggestion(s) you only need to keep typing and that suggestion vanishes. If you do want to use the suggested slogan, tap the "tab" key on the keyboard and it completes the phrase. It will also add the correct punctuation where needed. It does take a few emails to get into that habit but after a while, you will be a pro.
You may also wish to switch on Smart Compose personalization. It will do what you think. It will watch and learn how you word phrases and type. It will then incorporate your way of writing into Smart Compose so that some of your most used phrases will pre-fill for you, too.
These and the following are started and stopped by clicking on the gear in the upper right corner of Gmail.com. Then select Settings and scroll down the list of features in the General tab.
Next, I will tell you about "Smart Reply." This algorithm from Google will pick up on specific words from an email you are replying to and make suggestions. I got an email once that asked if I wanted to meet around 7 pm. I had three suggestions from Gmail; "How about 6 pm?" "Let’s meet at 8 pm," or "Sounds good." A little scary perhaps but I like trying this out. If you read the previous paragraph you can see how to cut it off. According to current stats approximately 10% of all Gmails are replied by Smart Reply.
Next up, Nudges, which are not quite as creepy, if the other two creeped you out. There are two settings there. The first works if it believes you may have overlooked an email that you should have replied to, but did not. It will move the email to the top of the inbox and remind you. The second setting will pop an email you need to follow up on to the top of your inbox.
Now, I will make what I believe to be a true statement, although I have no scientific proof. I believe as we use this tech and others like it, we will not have to think like we did in the past. This will make us more ignorant over time. Disagree if you wish, but I have seen it happening over the past few years.
Don’t be a hater.
