How To Customize GMail’s Functionality And Look

Being a Web 2.0 enthusiast, I am all for web based tools. My email tool is no exception. I was lucky to be among the first to try GMail following its first beta launch, and I have been using it since then. GMail also happened to be an effective tool to manage my to-do list using the GTD (Get things done) methodology. More on how to use GMail for implementing GTD can be found here.

Over the time, I started to look into a way to add features to my GMail as well as customize its look and feel. My main concerns were its somewhat cluttered look and the fact I wanted to save my most used GMail searches.

Being a Firefox user, I decided to leverage Greasemonkey in order to customize my GMail. Greasemonkey is an add-on that lets you modify the way your Firefox pages look and run.

After installing Greasemonkey, I searched all over the web in order to find some scripts that will allow me to customize GMail. Apparently, I wasted my time. Gina Trapani, Lifehacker’s editor, has created Better GMail, a nifty compilation of the best Greasemonkey scripts that will allow to add new features to your GMail as well as customize its look and feel.

Features

Better GMail allows you to add a comprehensive suite of enhancements to your GMail: skins, saved searches, keyboard macros, secure access, attachment icons, attachment reminders, label colors, signature floating and more.

Installation and Configuration

1. Better GMail runs only on Firefox. If you don’t have it installed yet, you can get the installation files from here.
2. Download and install Better GMail.
3. Restart Firefox.
4. Go to Tools and select Add-Ons.
5. Use the Messages and Sidebar tabs in order to add or remove features from GMail.
6. Use the Skins tab in order to customize your GMail look. I personally like the Super Clean skin).
7. Once you are done, hit Apply
8. Restart Firefox, you are done :)

Enjoy!

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