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Monday, 3 August 2009
Going Google
I just read an interesting short article on the official Google blog entitled "Going Google" with Google Apps which in just three short paragraphs sums up the benefits people experience by using Google Apps and other Google services. I'm a big fan of Google (as you may have gathered from reading my blog) and use a lot of their services.
Here are the first two paragraphs of that article:
Every morning, millions of people wake up to a very refreshing experience at work. They don't see "mailbox is full" errors in their email. They don't worry about backing up their data. They can get to any file they need from any computer, anywhere with Internet access and a browser. They can all access and edit the same documents and spreadsheets at the same time as their colleagues. They use Gmail and Google Calendar at work as fluidly and easily as they use their personal Gmail accounts. They video, voice and text chat with their peers globally as naturally as they send email.
The IT people at these companies and organizations don't waste time or money buying, installing or managing email servers. They focus on the smart, innovative stuff they want to work on, because they never have to bother with expensive and painful software upgrades, hardware compatibility issues or managing data centers. They have left many IT frustrations and costs behind and moved on to something better.
Hopefully that will give you an insight to how people benefit from using Google Apps, and why it is an ideal business solution.
The websites I run use Google Apps, which is a wholesome solution for companies or organisations for their domains. So say for my university canoe club's website (MMU Canoe Club), I set up Google Apps for the domain, which means we get as many club email addresses as we need (up to 50 for a free account) with a massive amount of storage; we get an online document collaboration tool which allows each committee member to add/edit documents, spreadsheets and other files online; and we can use a shared calendar and all add/change events.
Using these Google services doesn't require the user to use Gmail as their main mail account, use Google Calendar for their personal calendar, or have an Android phone - but if they do use any of these things they will continue to experience the benefits of Google Apps.
If, like me, the user uses Gmail as their main email account then they can set up forwarding (as I do) to ensure all their club mail goes to their main account and they can reply or send new emails from their club address without leaving their normal Gmail account. There's also the option to configure with Outlook (though why anyone would wish to do so is beyond me). If, like me, they use Google Calendar for personal use, then they can set it up to show more than one calendar's entries together (colour coded), so I could have my own calendar entries in blue and the canoe club's entries in red. If, like me, the user has an Android phone, then they can access their email on their phone at the touch of a button, and even be alerted of new mail. They can send mail, reply, search, archive and sort mail. Without going too far into the functionality of Android, they can do it all really easily. They can also access their calendars on their Android device, add/edit events and receive reminders of events on their phone.
Being a web developer, I need to look to find the solution the company I design for is looking for. If they don't have a company email system set up (say, for instance, they just use their own personal hotmail, yahoo or ISP email accounts) then I would suggest Google Apps as a solution. If they do have something set up (say, Outlook) then I would look at this and probably suggest Google Apps as an alternative if they would be interested in it.
Google Apps is simply a perfect solution for a business or organisation - and if they have fewer than 50 users then the free edition is open to them (for a small fee of $50/year they can get unlimited users and extra features) - why anyone would pay for someone else to provide them with email accounts and such, and pay for just a handful of POP3 email accounts, I can't understand. Nobody can provide a better service than Google and it's free, easy to set up and keep running.
Universities are a prime example of the perfect users for Google Apps - quite a lot of universities in America are using it, and Google have been working with education authorities in developing nations to give them the opportunities to have access to better learning resources. Unfortunatey my university has recently decided to "Go Microsoft" and opt for the evil alternative to Google Apps, Live@edu. It's launching in a few weeks so I haven't seen what it's like yet but I only hope I can have my email forwarded to my Gmail account like I did with last year's system, otherwise I'll be forced to use Windows Live Mail (ugh) and go out of my way to separately check my university email account.
If you don't use Gmail, give it a try. It'll change your life. Here's a video explaining what I just explained, but better, and in less than two minutes:
Labels: Android, Computers, Google, Internet, University
Posted by Ben Nuttall at 16:49 
