MAIL MERGE GOOGLE SOFTWARE UPGRADE
The company says those additions show how quickly services can be updated to add features and functions that usually take providers of on-premise e-mail servers another software upgrade to add. Google says it has added more than 30 features and updates to Google Apps since rolling out in February. In the near future, the look of Docs & Spreadsheets will be overhauled to make it easier to search, locate and organize documents. Google also is aiming to establish parity between the offline and online capabilities of its productivity suite: Earlier this month it unveiled a set of APIs as part of a browser extension called Google Gears that will let Web-based applications work in a disconnected mode. Two weeks ago, Google said it will add a presentation application to its Google Apps lineup by the end of this year, and possibly could add other applications to its Office-like suite, including video, note taking, blogging and group discussion applications, according to Matthew Glotzbach, director of product management in Google’s enterprise division. Once transferred, the messages are searchable via Gmail's search feature. The tool also will convert existing mail folders into labels.
With the new mail merger capabilities Gmail will put messages into conversation threads and display the original sender, recipient and message date.
Google Apps Premier Edition currently includes Gmail with 10GB of storage, Google Docs & Spreadsheets, integrated instant messaging and search tools, Google Talk for instant messaging and VoIP services, support for Gmail on BlackBerry mobile devices, Google Calendar, a set of APIs and partner technologies to integrate with existing enterprise applications, and 24/7 phone support. But company officials also said their motivation was to build enterprise services and not attack Microsoft and IBM/Lotus.
Two weeks ago, Google offered other help for corporate users, saying emerging offline capabilities for Google Apps had been a “key missing piece” of its platform, especially for large companies running Exchange and Notes.