We’ve been clamoring for a dedicated Gmail app on iOS for thus long that, now that there’s one available , we couldn’t help but take it for a test drive. Once installed the item differentiates itself from the former, HTML5-based app via a darker, more mysterious black background for the app icon. Otherwise it is the same white and red envelope. Open that up and the app inside looks mighty familiar too. Join us after the break for some quick impressions.
Update: Google’s confirmed on its blog that the Gmail app encompasses a bug that breaks notifications, and it’s pulled the app while it fixes it. a brand new version is promised “soon.”
On either the iPhone or the 0 iPad 0 the experience is way just like the HTML5-based apps we’ve used before. At the phone (or 1 iPod touch 1 ) the principle view is a straightforward list of messages inside the current label. Tap “menu” and a black bar pops in from the left, enabling your choice of other labels. We’ve not yet found the way to specify which of these is kept in sync for offline viewing, but hopefully that’s something coming in a future release.
Composing new emails does allow for attachments, but otherwise this gives little more functionality than we had before, and no more than is located at the Android version — most notably, when you’ve got multiple accounts fed into your Gmail account, you can not choose which of these to send a message from.
At the iPad it is the same functionality just presented with a 3-column view: list of labels, list of emails inside the current label and a view of the present email at the far right. It’s clean and workable but sadly a section buggy. We needed to reboot our iPad before it’ll allow us to check in and we got notification-related errors upon launching both apps for the 1st time. We also had issues with content falling off the suitable side of the screen, partially obscured from view.
But, the excellent news is the apps do now support notifications, so you will always know when someone wants a reply. Ultimately the apps don’t rock the boat, but they seem to be a start and an encouraging step toward proper Gmail platform independence.
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