February, 2021

Let me Google that for you!

Hello From IT!

This month’s Tech Bits is all about streamlining your Gmail navigational experience. We use Gmail everyday, and it's one of the most important tools we have for communication. Let’s highlight 5 things that will have you say “I didn’t know Gmail could do that!”

Google Calendar_Sidebar.

Chances are, you most likely have a tab of your Gmail and Google Calendar open at this very moment. Why not combine them! In Gmail, you have a sidebar where you can view your calendar. This is on the far right side of your Gmail.

You have a majority of the features of Google Calendar while still having access to your email. You can create an event, and change the view of the calendar to a schedule view or a day view! It’s really handy when you have a meeting ID for Zoom that you need to click on!

Right-Clicking your Gmail_Messages

When you right click on a Gmail message, you get a menu with many options such as replying, labelling, and deleting. One interesting and useful option is to find the emails from the person who emailed you.

Gmail will then search and show all the emails from that person. It is a quick way to search email from an individual instead of typing it in the search bar.

Creating an Email_Template

Do you ever find yourself creating the same email and sending it to different people? It is sometimes inescapable. However, you can save some time by creating a template of the email and then fill in the necessary information and changes! First, we need to enable it in gmail settings.

We start by clicking on the gear by the Episcopal Relief & Development logo in Gmail, then clicking on “See all settings”

Once in the Advanced tab, we go to the option that says “Templates” and click “Enable”

Once Done, scroll down to the bottom and click “Save Changes.”

Now you are ready to create a template! When you hit the Compose button to start a new email, write the information you typically need in your template. Then click on the 3 vertical dots on the bottom right of the email for “More options” You will see the option for Templates. Once you hover over it, click on the option to “Save draft as template.” Finally, name your template something that is relevant to what the content is about. You just made your first template!

Whenever you need that template again, compose an email and then click on the 3 vertical dots. Then go to templates and click on the name of the template you need!

Using Read_Receipts

To find out when an email you sent was opened, you can request a read receipt. A read receipt is sent to you as an email with the time and date of when your message was opened. When you compose an email, click on the 3 vertical dots on the bottom right of the email for “More options.” Then click on the option for “Request read receipt”

The recipient will receive an additional message in the email stating that you request a read receipt. Depending on that person's email service, they will either agree to that request or it will be sent to you automatically. Getting a read receipt doesn't always mean the recipient read your message however. How a receipt works depends on which email service your recipient uses.

Translating_Emails

Google Translate is a very powerful tool and application. It’s functionality is built into Gmail. Here is a message I received in Spanish.

To translate a message, you go to the right of the email where there are 3 vertical buttons. Once you click on those buttons you will see the option “Translate message”

Gmail will detect what language that the message is written in and put it into your default language (In this example the message was detected as Spanish and my default language is English) It translated the Title and the Body of the message.

You can even change the translation to another language! You click on your default language ( Above, it shows that English is my default language) Then choose the language you would like it to be translated to. In the example below I chose Haitian Creole as the language I wanted the translation in.

We hope you find this month’s Tech Bits enlightening and worthy to add to your workflow. We will see you next month!