In a time when there are almost countless ways to keep track of our friends, family and co-workers, it can be hard to keep track of everyone. You likely have some friends on Facebook, others with Twitter accounts, while still others post information on Google+ and others on MySpace. You have people you deal with via email, only you have numerous email accounts. It can be a chore just keeping in touch!
While Gmail-Notify certainly doesn't alleviate all of the problems associated with today's social Internet, it does a good job of one task: keeping you informed when you have a new email.
Gmail-Notify works with GNOME, KDE and other desktop environments, and has little in the way of extra requirements, other than a few small Python libraries. It is not supported by Canonical (Ubuntu's parent company), but is in the Universe repositories, which means before we install it, we need to ensure those repositories are enabled. The process for doing this varies from distribution to distribution, but it will be something similar to the way shown below, using KDE.
First, open up your Software Center. In Kubuntu, this is the Muon Software Center, while Ubuntu uses the Ubuntu Software Center and other varieties use Synaptic.
The next part will vary slightly from program to program, but find an option to view and edit your Software Sources. In Muon, the Configure Software Sources option is found in the Settings menu.
Now, simply make sure the checkbox for the Universe repository is checked. You'll notice below that other repositories have been activated, but for the purposes of installing GMail-Notify, the Universe checkbox is most important.
Now launch the Terminal.
Since we just activated the Universe repository, we need to make sure its contents are up-to-date, so type sudo apt-get update to refresh all your enabled repositories.
Now simply type sudo apt-get install gmail-notify to download and install it.
We're now ready to start configuring Gmail-Notify, so launch it, either by finding it in your menu system (as shown below), or by typing "gmail-notify" (without the quotes) into a Run dialog.
The first thing you'll see once Gmail-Notify launches is the configuration window.
As you can see, you'll need to configure – at the minimum – your username and password for your Gmail account. You can also set a proxy, the interval between checking for new messags, how long the new-mail popup stays visible, and more.
Once you've done this, click the large OK button. GMail-Notify should immediate check for new messages. If you have no new emails, you'll see a red Gmail icon.
If you have new messages, the icon will be blue.
You'll also receive the popup mentioned in the Settings dialog.
When you have new email but missed the popup, simply clicking the icon will show it again. Right-click on the icon to bring up a menu.
From this menu, you can launch your browser to take you directly to your Gmail inbox, as well as recheck for new message, view the configuration window, or quit the program entirely.
As mentioned at the top, there's certainly nothing Earth-shattering or life-changing about Gmail-Notify, but for those of us with frankly way too many ways to keep in contact with our friends, relatives and co-workers, it's a start.
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