Gmail IMAP emerges, makes our day (and ninja milking)

a1 SELECT "IT Blogwatch": in which Google's Gmail gets better—now with added IMAP. Not to mention training ninjas to milk cows...

Chris Gilmer starts spreadin' the news:

When we checked Gmail Help database this evening, Gmail had said that they support POP, but not IMAP. Then a few minutes later, that doc was gone, and a stack of IMAP related help docs were up ... IMAP pushes Gmails benefits over the top. With IMAP, users can now access their email via a desktop application like Outlook or Thunderbird, read emails, make changes, delete, and have the changes made across platforms. [more]

Ionut Alex Chitu adds:

POP is nice, but IMAP is a much better option. Among the advantages, you're always connected to the server, more clients can connect to the same account, you can obtain the text from a message without the attachments and the state information is synchronized (you can add labels from the client, read or delete a message and Gmail will synchronize) ... you'll have to enable it in Settings ... Because the new feature is slowly rolled-out, you may not see it, but rest assured it will be available in the next days. [more]

Danny Mendez also helps out:

The downside of working with an email program and service that uses POP is that, if you use several devices/computers, you can easily end up with several machines showing different conversations. An email program with IMAP works with your email server in real time, so that every computer/device has the most up to date messages and conversations. Gmail Help is now featuring several IMAP related documents including one that details how to enable GMAIL with IMAP on your iPhone (or hacked iPod Touch with iPhone's Mail.app). [more]

Mark Hendrickson rethinks:

IMAP support has been the primary reason I have personally held back from using Gmail for my primary email account ... We’ll have to see how Google plans to monetize Gmail with IMAP, since enabling IMAP means that people like me will almost never bother to use the webmail interface, and therefore never see Google advertisements. Maybe they are betting that most people will simply not use IMAP, or maybe they have other advertising tricks up there sleeves. [more]

Matthew Miller cheers:

Gmail is FINALLY rolling out IMAP support. I started using Gmail 3 years ago ... even to this day, I have to forward my Gmail to my hosted Exchange and must managed Gmail email multiple times on the iPhone, BlackBerry, etc. With IMAP support my email will now be synced across all platforms and I will increase my productivity. The lack of IMAP has been especially bothersome for me the last 3 months on the Apple iPhone ... I’ll definitely be reevaluating my needs for multiple email services and hosted Exchange (syncing my calendar and contacts is still valuable, but again may be handled by Google too). [more]

MG Siegler wants the moon on a stick:

Now I have just a few more Gmail wishes to be fulfilled, #1 of which is easy account switching/linking for those of us with - ahem - several accounts. [more]

Michael Rose smells as sweet:

What this means for Mac users: better support for Gmail within Mail.app, Thunderbird and Entourage. For iPhone users: a way better Gmail experience over the previous POP or web client approaches ... First step: Don't choose the Gmail setup button, choose "Other..." instead. (Yes, they know, they're working on it.). [more]

Zoli Erdos eats crow:

For over a decade I was a faithful Outlook user, mocking my friends who used web-based email (typically Yahoo) for their personal accounts. How could they live with such a dumb, slow service? Well, times change: Outlook grew fat and slow, it needs a cornucopia of software fighting for CPU and memory … what a nightmare! I ditched the desktop and have never been more productive! I’m using Gmail natively, on the Web, and am quite happy with it, so IMAP means nothing to me.. [more]

Slashdot exploded with comments, including:

• HeavyD14: I went in and downloaded every header from my All Mail folder, right from "Gmail is different, here is what you need to know" from 3 years ago to my latest email from 2 minutes ago. It took a minute or two, but they all came through.
• jimmyhat3939: I just tested it. In fact you *can* use this to upload emails!!! hooray! Now I can use gmail as my primary/only email repository!!!!!
• frik85: You have to switch your language to "English (US)" to get the IMAP options in your GMail settings. Other interface languages will get the update and therefore the translation sync later, as usual.
• frdmfghtr: Recently my mailbox capacity was approaching 3 GB...it seems to have taken a big jump to 4.3 GB in the last week or two.
• Bert64: The more suckers the better ... have the robot summarize the most salient points of your life, from a marketing perspective, to whoever. Manually reading everyone's email would be tedious. Google has developed advanced tools so they can profit off you without needing to.

And finally...

• Why you should never send a ninja to milk a cow
  

Buffer overflow:

• Gadgetell: Sprint to launch WiMAX as early as Q2 2008
• Rational Survivability: Companies Must Update Thinking About Security Spending
• Jesse Robbins: Web2 Summit: Complexity + Tight Coupling = Catastrophe
• Ryan Paul: Microsoft to push functional programming into the mainstream with F#
• Eric Bangeman: OLPC looks for manufacturing scale, targets deep-pocketed donors
• Danny Sullivan: Mapping The Southern California Fires
• Jordan Golson: Earnings: Apple now worth more than IBM
• Xbox 360 Fanboy: Microsoft acknowledges Xbox 360 Arcade

Other Computerworld bloggers:

• Michael R. Farnum: Cybercrime Act of 2007 - good or bad?
• Jaikumar Vijayan: Protecting against the 'D’oh' factor can be hard
• Shark Tank: Whose idea was this, anyway?
• Douglas Schweitzer: Identity theft report and good old fashioned dumpster diving!
• Shark Bait: Focus on the right thing

Richi Jennings is an independent analyst/adviser/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and spam. A 20 year, cross-functional IT veteran, he is also an analyst at Ferris Research. You too can pretend to be Richi's friend on Facebook, or just use boring old email: blogwatch@richi.co.uk. z99 LOGOUT

Previously in IT Blogwatch:

• Microsoft settles Euro-anti-trust malarkey (and major-translator)
• Comcast resets BitTorrent users; net neutrality lovers lash out (and "Them" vs. "Us")
• Web 2.0 Summit: Microsoft, MySpace, Facebook, Cisco, Twitter, Flickr, Google... (and ZERO-factor auth.)