It's encouraging to see Google expanding their Mac software offerings with Google Notifier. Notifier lives in the menu bar and provides notifications of incoming Gmail and Google Calendar events. As email arrives, a black translucent window appears with a summary of the message; it automatically fades after a delay or when clicked upon. In addition to mail, Google Calendar events can now get your attention more readily by playing a sound and popping up on your screen. The menus also provide a summary of recent mail and upcoming events including links to the appropriate Google pages.
Unfortunately, the app is not without its quirks. First of all, rather than being a "real" menu extra, Notifier is actually a normal application located in the Applications folder. This means it doesn't behave as other menu extras do - e.g., ⌘ (command) clicking and dragging the icon doesn't allow repositioning or deletion as it does with other menu extras. The colorful icons are also against Apple's standard menu shades of grey, and a little too big - hence they look slightly out of place.
Notifier checks for updates every minute, but this setting is not customizable in the preferences. When waking the computer from sleep, it often checks before the internet connection is fully active and annoyingly reports an error condition in its menu icon.
Even given the flaws, this program is a good start and worth taking a look at if you use Gmail or Google Calendar. Things can only get better from here.
- By Google.
- download
- screenshot
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