In a post on the Mailplane Google Group he explains:

Until recently, a Mailplane single user license was limited to two Macs. Because many users needed Mailplane on more Macs, I’ve decided to lift this limitation:

• Single-user license: *Install on all Macs you personally use.* Use it at home, school, work: just anywhere. *Limitation:* Make sure you’re the only user. Please do not share your license with anyone else.
• Family license: Allow up to five (5) family members *living in the same household* to use Mailplane on their Macs. As with the single user license, there is no machine limitation for any of the five users.
• Site license: For a number of users working at the same organization. Again, each user may use it anywhere.

As a result individuals will pay only USD 24.95 to use it on as many Macs as they own. The family licence costs USD 39.95. For a site licence covering 20 users or more, the price per licence drops to USD 17.95.

Mailplane is not just a slick way into Gmail’s web interface. It adds additional features like “drag and drop” attachments, the ability to integrate multiple Gmail accounts, enabling new mail notifications, sending screenshots and integration with the productivity app OmniFocus through a bespoke plugin.

If you are tempted to be unfaithful to mail.app and start an affair in the Cloud with Gmail (as I am from time to time), Mailplane is a very good investment.

It was good value for money before. Now, for people with more than two macs (like me), it is even better.

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Along the way, he considers what to make of the current “email is dead” meme, how to assess objectively the impact of the facebook phenomenon, why Gen Z (or whatever we are up to) still needs its email addresses, the innovative nature of Gmail’s design and also hazards a guess at what Google Wave might mean.

It’s worth reading. Check it out at TidBITS: “Why Email Remains the King of Internet Communications”

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The result is a sleek little app called “Google Quick Search Box”.

It has nothing like the power and range of Quicksilver, but it does provide a way to launch applications quickly and to perform a few other time-saving tricks:

As the name suggests, QSB is focussed on finding things. It doesn’t have the flexibility that Quicksilver enjoys, but it is good at searching. Of course, as one might expect, it excels at searching your Gmail archives and Google Apps documents.

But it can also find a bookmark in Safari or Camino and launch it, find a song in iTunes and play it, find a contact and display the information or start a new email to that person, and so on. It can find a document and offers the option to do one of six things with it:

A few weeks ago, extra plugins for the app began to appear, written by users, that expand its power and reach.

Aaron Ecay has written plugins for Firefox bookmarks, and two more that allow the interface to execute shell scripts and Applescript.

Martin Kühl has written plugins that access Leopard’s Services, search inside your Smart Folders and gain access to your Dock items. He makes these available on the github social coding web site where they are listed down the left-hand side.

(UPDATE: Nathan Parry has written a plugin for delicious.com that allows you to search and manipulate your bookmarks and tags.)

With these plugins QSB gains something like the power of Quicksilver.

For example, using Martin’s Services plugin, you can find a document, “tab” into it and type the first few letters of a Service to apply it to that object.

Here I am quickly emailing a text document to a student using the plugin:

Google’s Quick Search Box is freeware and Leopard-only. Like all software that is still in development, and especially one that works together with third-party plugins, you will come across an occasional glitch.

The latest builds are available from its project page on code.google.com. There is also a Google Group that keeps you up to date with conversations between users and the development team, and with even better plugins that are sure to appear in short order.

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With the launch of Firefox 3.0, there is now another way for Firefox users.

All you have to do is enter the following text into Firefox 3.0’s address bar and hit return:

This will register Gmail as the default handler for any mailto: link you click on in Firefox. Of course it doesn’t work for mailto: links in other apps—say, a web archive or note in Yojimbo.

To undo it, just reselect Mail.app as the default in the Applications tab of Firefox’s Preferences.

For a comprehensive solution, you still can’t beat Webmailer which is easy to use and free.

[Via Torben Brams ]

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Despite this, developers of third-party Address Book-Gmail syncing apps are soldiering on. Both SpanningSync and Syncman developers point out that 10.5.3 offers this only for Leopard users and, even then, only for Leopard users with an iPhone or iTouch device.

Jeff Nichols, Syncman developer, has just released a new improved version of his sync app, lending credence to his claim that Wateree (his software firm) is a “small and agile company that can adjust quickly to our customers needs and desires”.

Syncman 1.1 can now be configured to run as a menubar utility and to load automatically when you fire up Mac OS X.

Behind the scenes further tweaks have improved the way Google Talk address are mapped to Jabber addresses in Address Book, and improved treatment of how Address Book’s Last Name field is handled.

But the number one request of users was for scheduled syncing, and Syncman delivers on that too.

The Preferences allow you to set the period of the sync and to customise the level of confirmation you want before it makes any changes:

Confirmation is another nice feature of Syncman, that is lacking in Address Book’s default sync option. As Jeff puts it:

Syncman respects the effort you’ve put into maintaining your Address Book, and therefore gets your confirmation before making any changes that could potentially cause you a whole bunch of headache.

So Syncman offers a confirmation dialog displaying potential changes before it makes them:

SpanningSync has also recently launched a 2.0 beta of its software, which is addition to syncing iCal and Google Calendar, will also sync Address Book data, including photos (Syncman is promised to have this feature soon too). The beta is free (but is a beta, so backup!).

SpanningSync costs either USD 25 for a year’s subscription or USD 65 for a once-off, unlimited licence.

Syncman is shareware and costs USD 15 (€9.95). You can get a 30-day free demo from Wateree’s web site.

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This plugin won’t work with all Hotmail accounts, only older ones. But in a clever move it tells you whether it works or not. Either it does, or it gives an error message saying that the account needs to be updated to Hotmail Plus (in which case, see Gmail )

From the FAQ and readme notes included in the disk image, it seems that there are currently two kinds of Hotmail accounts, pre-WebDAV ones (really old), WebDAV ones (less old). I think I read somewhere that 2004 is the magic date.

In any event, as Hawk Wings readers know, all Hotmail accounts will soon (but not as soon as 30 June) become DeltaSync accounts.

In the meantime, if your Hotmail account is old enough, this may be the solution for you.

I could only find an older version, 1.49, on the plugin’s sourceforge page . The most recent one is available from MacUpdate though.

[I should confess that I don't have a Hotmail account and--in breach of the usual Hawk Wings policy--haven't tested this for myself.]

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Microsoft has relented and deferred the transition from WebDAV to its own DeltaSync standard. This means that Mail.app users with HTTPMail and MacFreePOPs plugins won’t be cut off on 30 June after all.

After listening to customer feedback from the original accouncement, Microsoft told its users “it became clear that you needed additional time to evaluate alternative solutions”.

Still, this only postpones the executioner’s axe. Don’t fritter away all the extra time Microsoft has given you in making a decision.

With apologies for any distress.

[Via The Fastmail.fm Weblog ]

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Along with a raft of bugfixes, the new version (0.9.2) can now turn the browswers into menubar items for even greater flexibility.

Longtime Hawk Wings readers will remember the small flurry of site-specific web apps two years — Michael McCracken’s WebMail app for Gmail and Chip Cuccio’s GCal app for Google Calendar. With no bookmarks, other windows and other temptations, these apps allowed users to focus on their productivity without distractions.

Fluid works on the same principle. Based on Mozilla’s Prism app , it creates a site-specific app, complete with its own Dock icon, menubars and other individual settings.

Here are some that I made earlier for Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs, mint and facebook:

Now, when I want to get the email done, I open the Gmail app, when I want to unwind I turn to the facebook one. I am never tempted to work when I should be relaxing, nor to relax when I should be at work. (That’s the theory; as every “Getting Things Done” fan knows deep in their heart, in the end no app can save you from yourself!).

The ability to run Greasemonkey scripts inside these Fluid apps is very cool. Previously only really available to Firefox users, Fluid now lets me load my two favourite scripts from userscripts.org so that I can use Gmail with killer keyboard macros and some of the noise taken out of the Gmail interface:

Fluid’s free-standing apps can each have their own preference settings. The overall behaviour of the window is also customizable — overlaid on the Dashboard, normal, floating or embedded in the Desktop. Here, for example, is my mint in Fluid’s simple black HUD style:

A Flickr group – Fluid Icons – offers lots of nice looking Dock icons for various web sites. I scored most of the icons in the screenshot above from there.

The possibilities seem enormous, and this article only scratches the surface of the app’s potential.

This updated version lets you turn a browser into a menubar utility, so that clicking on its menubar icon opens its window–instant, roll-your-own to-do lists in a Fluid-generated Remember the Milk or Stikkit app!

Fluid is freeware and available from the Fluid web site .

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In April Microsoft announced that it would be terminating WebDAV access to its Hotmail accounts at the end of June this year and replacing it with a proprietary service of Microsoft’s own creation (DeltaSync).

This is bad news for Mail.app users with Hotmail accounts, who have been using utilities like HTTPMail and MacFreePOPs to access their email. After 30 June, they won’t work. (There are reports that 10.5.3 has broken HTTPMail for some users, merely hastening the inevitable).

For those unwilling to let go their Hotmail email address, another solution beckons. While the plugins might not work any more, a web-based service is offering the same function.

IzyMail , so it claims, “enables you to access webmail from major providers such as AOL, Yahoo, MSN, Hotmail, Windows Live, Fastmail or Gmail with any eMail application”. It even has a special page on setting up Hotmail on the iPhone.

It provides users with incoming and outcoming servers that can be plugged into Mail.app’s Accounts preferences. IzyMail does the heavy-lifting behind the scenes, and delivers fresh Hotmail into your Inbox via POP.

It offers free accounts (with some limitations) and a paid option (c. USD 18/year):

Or perhaps it’s time to take another look at Gmail.

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This is the Better Gmail extension that works with the new Gmail interface.

The new version adds four new features: One Click Conversations (quick access to previous emails from a particular sender), Hide Invites Box, Google Reader Integration (in the Sidebar) and Rollover Highlight Messages (which highlights message rows as you mouse over them).

It also marks the return of skins. Users can now choose between a Blue Skin and a Grays and Blue Skin (screenshot below):

The updated version is available from Lifehacker or from the Mozilla Extension Repository . Needless to say, it is freeware.

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