10.4: Use Safari's RSS reader as a GMail notifier

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Fri, May 6 2005 at 9:22AM PDT • Contributed by: maddys_daddy

I've been a long-time Firefox devotee, but with Safari 2.0 in Tiger, Firefox is quickly becoming my secondary browser. One thing that I missed, however, was a GMail notifier, a la the Firefox GMail Notifier extension, since I spend a lot of my computing time in my browser.

While checking my GMail today, I noticed the RSS icon in Safari's address bar. Clicking it resulted in a GMail login sheet, with an option to save the info in my keychain. To make Safari's RSS work as a notifier for you, simply bookmark the RSS feed on your Bookmarks bar (or even a folder on the bookmarks bar with multiple RSS feeds). The number of unread RSS entries for the feed (your GMail inbox, in this case) will show up next to the bookmark (or bookmark bar subfolder that your RSS feeds are in) at the interval you specify in Safari's prefs. Viola! An instant GMail notifier on your Safari Bookmark Bar!

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Nice hint.
Authored by: jscotta on Fri, May 6 2005 at 11:27AM PDT

And for those that don't know it yet, you can also set up OS X's Mail to handle your Gmail account. That is my preferred method.

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Windows because I have to. OS X because I want to.

Nice hint.
Authored by: vdanen on Fri, May 6 2005 at 1:23PM PDT

Really? Got more info on this... I'd love to have gmail showing up in Mail rather than having to deal with the web interface.

Nice hint.
Authored by: genericuser on Fri, May 6 2005 at 1:44PM PDT

Just click preferences in Gmail for POP. It gives instructions including for Mail.app.

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Do this in NetNewsWire
Authored by: KingDoom on Fri, May 6 2005 at 12:58PM PDT

You can use NetNewsWire and the lite version (and likely other RSS readers) to indicate whether you have a new gmail message.

Do this in NetNewsWire
Authored by: maddys_daddy on Fri, May 6 2005 at 11:09PM PDT

True enough, but like I said, since my computing time is about evenly divided betweenmy browser and work-related productivity apps, Safari's RSS feature is incredibly handy for me, and I just thought it would be for others as well.

10.4: Use Safari's RSS reader as a GMail notifier
Authored by: sheqman on Fri, May 6 2005 at 1:48PM PDT

I don't have Tiger yet but I think gmail status should still work. Gmail status puts a little icon on your menu bar which turns red when you have new mail. If you hover over the icon you can see how many messages you have. Even better, it allows you to see how many messages you have in each "Label" folder which is useful if you filter your inbox. It also supports growl notification which gives you some cool desktop notifications when you get new mail.

GmailStatus vs. In-browser notifier
Authored by: gingi on Fri, May 6 2005 at 3:09PM PDT

GmailStatus more than gets the job done. As great as FireFox is, it doesn't make use of Mac OS X's integrated approach to desktop computing the way Safari does. Instead of adding extensions to the browser itself, you can integrate standalone desktop services. Spelling and thesaurus are stellar examples of this behavior. GmailStatus informs you when you have new mail and lets you open a browser window to Gmail (heck, you can have it launch FireFox if you wish). You can also specify a keyboard shortcut to bring up Gmail from anywhere. You don't even need the browser to be running. By the way, the Windows Gmail Notifier from Google works in a similar fashion (run Windows at work). I like it more than the FireFox extension.

GmailStatus vs. In-browser notifier
Authored by: maddys_daddy on Fri, May 6 2005 at 11:13PM PDT

Yes, but I use a 12" PB, and menu bar real estate is at a premium. I've got enough stuff in my menu bar already. Especially since half the time I can't see a few of my menu bar items, since the menus of the productivity apps that I use overtake a good 3/4's of my menu bar. So GMail Status is useless. All I gotta do to check if I have any GMails is expose or Cmd-tab to my always open Safari window.

10.4: Use Safari's RSS reader as a GMail notifier
Authored by: Swift on Sun, May 29 2005 at 1:47PM PDT

This worked for me perfectly until this weekend. Now it's asking me for my password over and over, every half-hour. Maybe they're changing the service somewhat.

At the same time, my Google maps now don't print corrrectly. They lop off the right third of the map.

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since 1749

10.4: Use Safari's RSS reader as a GMail notifier
Authored by: magnamous on Sun, Jul 17 2005 at 4:11AM PDT

I decided this was the greatest thing ever until just now. I read the password request message in Safari, and it says that it sends your password as clear text (unlike using gmail itself, which uses https). Something to be aware of if you're going to use this hint. I actually may stop using it because of this�

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