Become A Gmail Power User

Gmail is without doubt a popular email service which can largely be attributed to the fact that it is run by Google and that it offers lots of additional features and options to tweak the interface and speed up the workflow.

Google has released a Gmail Ninja guide to further that popularity.

The guide is divided into four different grades: white, green and black belt as well as Gmail master that begin with the basics and slowly build up to advanced tips that even expert Gmail users might not have heard about.

Update: The guide itself appears to have been pulled. This is a bit unfortunate, and the link it pointed to is now loading a features page that highlights some of the features of Gmail instead.

White Belt:

Use stars to indicate a note is special.
Reply by chat.
Organize your email with labels.
Clean up your inbox using "Move to" -- it works just like folders.
Search your mail instead of sorting.
Archive messages to tidy up your inbox without deleting anything.
Import your email and contacts from your old address.
Spice up your inbox with a theme.
Join forces to rid the world of spam.

Green Belt:

Talk face-to-face with video chat.
Use Tasks as a handy to-do list.
Use filters to control the flow of incoming mail.
Highlight important emails using filters and colored labels.
Send email from your phone.
Preview attachments without downloading them.
Avoid email gaffes with Undo Send.
Tell your friends what you're up to with a status message.
Never forget an attachment again.
Tell everyone when you'll be back with vacation responder.
Nothing says "I'm excited" like a bouncing happy face emoticon.
Save notes in your drafts

Black Belt:

Get through your mail faster with keyboard shortcuts.
Use search operators to find the exact message you're looking for.
Filter your email with personalized email addresses.
See which messages were sent right to you.
Make Gmail go where the internet doesn't.
Quickly add multiple attachments to an email.
Add "(EOM)" to the subject of one-liner messages.
Set up canned responses instead of typing the same reply over and over again.
Click less and watch more using YouTube, Flickr, Picasa, and Yelp previews.
Use quick links to get anywhere in Gmail with one click.
Send and archive in one step.
Send and receive mail from multiple addresses
Show people who you are with a picture.

Gmail Master:

Bring Google Calendar and Docs to Gmail.
Send SMS text messages right from Gmail.
Forget to sign out of a public computer? Sign out remotely.
Personalize your RSS feeds in web clips.
Search for superstars by name.
Use Gmail on your own domain.
Shift-click to quickly select multiple messages.
Set Gmail as your default email client.
Emphasize the important words in chat.
Quote selected text to respond to a long thread.

Most of the tips contain a short description and then either a link to a detailed explanation or a video that explains the tip in detail. The tips are definitely worth checking out even if some of you might know most of them. [Gmail Tips]

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