Inbox by Gmail for Educators Part 2

In part 1 we looked at some of the new features that Inbox brought to email. You can read about it HERE. In part 2 we will look at some of the other features that Inbox uses. Some of them are new, some of the features are in Outlook, but in my opinion Google has done a better job of implementing it.

Quick Replies
How many times have you received an email and just needed to reply with a "yes", "no", or "ok"? It happens more frequently than you might think. Inbox came with Quick Replies built in.

It will "read" your email to see if a quick reply can be used. Inbox learns overtime your style of writing, so the emails look like you typed them. So now instead of clicking on reply and typing, you click on the response you want and hit send. Inbox has these small features that save little bits of time that add up over the course of the year. Regular Gmail just started to implement the Quick Replies as well.


Recall Sent Emails
Here's another nice feature, you send an email and as soon as you click "Send",

you realize that you forgot some information. Instead of typing a new email, Inbox has a feature to stop the email from being sending. When you send an email in Inbox, a small window appears in the bottom left. If you click undo, the email pops back up like you never sent it. This might also help if you accidentally send an email that you shouldn't have sent. The window stays open for about 5-10 seconds.  This feature is also in regular Gmail, but has to be enabled in the settings. For Inbox, it is turned on by default.


Preview Attachments without opening the email
We've all had this happen. We get an email and we see the little paperclip, so there is an attachment.

If we want to see the attachment, we have to open the email and then open the attachment. Inbox shows the attachment below the subject and you can open the attachment without opening the message. This is extremely useful if you are just expecting a file and don't want to read the generic "Here you go" message that goes with it.


Pin Emails
This is a feature that is available in Outlook. Some might like the way they implement it, others might prefer Inbox's method. In Outlook a pinned email goes to the top of the inbox and stays there until you delete the email or unpin it.

Inbox works a little differently. You pin the email, but it doesn't move to the top. It stays where it was delivered. If you mark it as Done, it goes away. Inbox has a small toggle switch at the top. When you switch it on all of you pinned emails appear, whether they are marked as done or not.

Each version has their pros & cons. I don't pin emails as much with some of the other features like Snooze, but it is there.


Spam Filter
This is something else that is built into Outlook, but Inbox's version just works better. I get a ton of junk email in my main inbox that Outlook just doesn't identify as spam. Inbox picks up almost all of it. And once I identify it as junk, I never see it again.


Search
Another feature that Outlook has, but once again Inbox just works better. With Outlook, I find myself just waiting for the search to finish. Inbox's search pops up almost instantaneously.


Google has found a way to re-invent the wheel. Email has been around for awhile, but instead of keeping it the status quo, they pushed the boundaries and tried something new. Inbox gives you more control over your email. All of the tiny shortcuts to save time add up and really makes you more efficient.

Inbox by Gmail for Educators Part 1

Email is something that has always just worked. We never really stopped to think if it was efficient or not. We just accepted it. We get an email and if we need to look for it later we just search and scroll around til we found it.

Well someone at Google decided to change the way we think email should work. Enter Inbox by Email. Inbox came out a couple years ago and like everything else with technology I jumped in. I used it with my personal email accounts for a few days and decided it wasn't for me. I can't really point my finger at one thing, it was just different. Then a few months later it was available for GAFE accounts.

Our district uses Outlook for email. I have never been a fan, so I decided to try it out. I simply

forwarded the Outlook account to our GAFE account. And within a few days, I found out that email could be "re-imagined". There is something nice about opening up my email and seeing this screen. Whereas my old email box always seemed cluttered and busy, Inbox works for you and only puts the important emails front and center. Inbox makes email more useful and introduces new ways to think how email should work.

So the question you might be having right around now is, why should I switch? Well, I have put together a list as to why you might want to make the switch and look into using Inbox. This first part will look at some of the new features that Inbox brings to email.

Snooze

This is probably one of the strongest features introduced with Inbox. Ask yourself if this sounds familiar, you have a special bell schedule for an assembly. You are sent the schedule a week in advance. Then the day of the schedule comes up and you don't know where the schedule is. You then spend a few minutes trying find it. Snooze takes care of that problem. Now when you get that email, you can Snooze it to the day of the assembly. Inbox will basically "re-deliver" the email again. So it will pop up again like it is being delivered for the first time. 

That in itself is impressive, but Snooze can also be used with locations. If you have the app installed on your phone, you can Snooze an email to come back when you get to a certain location. Have a meeting at the district? Is there an agenda attached to an email? Snooze it to come back when you reach the district. As soon as you reach your destination, Inbox will use your phones location and re-deliver it.

Done

This is another new feature Inbox has. Done is what allows you to keep your Inbox clean. Right now if you want a clean inbox, you need to either delete the emails or move the emails into folders. Inbox focuses on the emails you want to see. If you don't want to see them, you can just mark them Done. The nice thing about Done is that the emails aren't deleted. They are just moved from the main Inbox. This keeps your Inbox clear of any junk or unimportant emails that are in there.

Bundled Emails

Bundled works to put all the emails into a separate folder. Now this feature has a similar function in Outlook, but Inbox takes it a little further. First off, it is easy to set up. If you put an email into an existing Bundle, Inbox will ask if you want to do this all the time.  The killer feature that Inbox introduces is the ability to have Bundles appear in your Inbox when you want them too. For example, I get a lot of newsletters from certain sites. I don't have time to look at them as they come in. So have Inbox set up to put the emails into a Bundle and only have that Bundle appear in my Inbox once a week. 

Reminders

Ever read something and write a post it note to remind yourself of something? Well Inbox has a Reminder feature built in. This has replaced post it notes for me. I get something and simply create a Reminder. Reminders are automatically pinned to the Inbox. And like everything else, you can set your Reminder for a date/time or location. 

Those are some of the new features that Inbox brings to email. It will seem different at first, but give it some time. Inbox will change the way you think of email. The next part will focus on some of the other features that make Inbox worth the switch.