There’s a reason I use gtalk and not the integrated talk in gmail – notifications. I can’t constantly keep on checking my browser to see if I have received a new mail or if someone has pinged me. It seems Google has finally decided to alleviate the sufferings of people like me.
A nifty new feature in HTML5 enabled Chrome browser allows you to be notified on your desktop through pop-ups about any new mail or chat you receive. To turn this on, you simply have to click on the Settings link at the top right corner of your Gmail and scroll down to the “Desktop Notifications” section. You can customize the sort of notifications you receive – chat messages and priority or all email messages.Another new feature which I personally find very useful is the new unread messages notification. Even though the tab header has the number of unread mails, it gets lost when you open up a plethora of tabs, a thing which I usually do. The answer provided by Google is in the form of a Gmail labs feature where the number of unread mails is integrated with the tab icon. All you have to do is enable it. Here’s how it looks.
(Notice the gmail icon. The (9) next to Inbox is because of another lab feature I use)
The only drawback to the new mail and chat notification is that it is compatible only with the Chrome browser, but support for other HTML 5 browsers is promised. Third party notification apps have been around for some time, but not many people used them. If you don’t use Chrome, you can always use third party apps. It is good that Google has recognized the need for this feature, although it is quite late and should have been introduced a long time ago. Still, the number of innovations from the Google stable has been many and most of them have been fruitful. What do you think? Source: WatBlog