5 ms·

Gmail down; Outage could last 36 hours for some

8 points by nickb 18y ago

gstar 18y ago
That's 3 strikes, and Gmail: you're out. I'm moving my domains off gmail as the primary MX. Is there a viable alternative to gmail for conversation view and search?
- rksprst 18y ago
  Not that I know of, though I've moved from google apps to hosted exchange with Sherweb and couldn't be happier. I love the fact that my calendar & address book sync wirelessly with my iPhone. Also, push email is great.
- onk 18y ago
  > Is there a viable alternative to gmail for conversation view and search? Mutt but you'll have to type "ot" to order by thread and "l~b<word>" to search (limit) by <word> in the body of your mail.
- lsb 18y ago
  Can your spam filters do better?
  - modoc 18y ago
    Mine do as well, yes. I'm not knocking GMail's spam filters, but it's absolutely possible to run your own mail server virtually spam free. I've had the same primary e-mail address for 11 years, posted it all over the place, and I almost never see spam in my inbox.
    - ROFISH 18y ago
      The problem is that you will still receive the mail. If you run even a semi-popular website, your domain is going to be hit by all kinds of bogus mail. Since I'm a programmer not a server administrator, the CPU and IO was constantly overloaded because of spam. Whenever I switched to Google Apps, the hard drive breathed a sign of relief. I'm sure if you take the time to properly administrate, you can run email on your own server. In my case it was too confusing, took too much effort, and I wanted to get back to doing real work.
      - modoc 18y ago
        Oh, I agree with you 100%. For 99% of the people out there, it makes far more sense to have someone else handle all that for you. You just have to accept there may be downtime that beyond your control. I was merely answering lsb's question and pointing out that GMail's spam filtering isn't magic or unique. It's merely very good. A skilled mail server admin can replicate the same level of spam filtering. I'm not recommending that everyone run their own mail server.
- modoc 18y ago
  Mail.app on OS X has a very nice threaded view. It's not exactly the same, but it's still very nice:)
- cubicle67 18y ago
  This mentality always strikes me as odd; like firing an employee when they make a mistake. The key factor to consider should be "Have they learnt from this?". The outage has happened. It won't unhappen. The question now is, will Google fix the problems that caused this, or don't they care.
  - gstar 18y ago
    The 3 mistakes in short succession show that they haven't learnt from this, and I should make provisions for myself. Somewhat similar to a staff member who has had 3 warnings is obviously not learning.
  - herval 18y ago
    You'd be right - if it happened only once. Or twice. It's not really like firing someone, though - if your bank keeps screwing you up, woudln't you consider opening an account somewhere else...?
- jaaron 18y ago
  Web or desktop? For desktop, a new entrance is Postbox, which takes a lot of clues from GMail: http://www.postbox-inc.com http://www.postbox-inc.com Personally, I use gnus: http://www.gnus.org http://www.gnus.org
tokenadult 18y ago
My Gmail is working considerably better than my access to HN recently. The safest course would be to keep some other email domain, download it locally with whatever email client one prefers (as I have long done) but have everything forwarded to Gmail. That's what I did after a local computer crash hosed my access to email for a while. But now I like accessing my Gmail through Gmail's interface, EXCEPT for the lousy way that Gmail implements adding new names to address lists for mailing to multiple people at once. I've had no service interruptions at all the last few times Gmail service interruptions have been in the news.
- drsnyder 18y ago
  For those of us who like the gmail interface this seems like a reasonable option. But, you still have to "push" the problem to another provider. Who do you rely on for your 'some other email domain'?
  - whughes 18y ago
    Gmail acts as a POP client too, if you want to wrangle with that. It's in the options.
- jaaron 18y ago
  I actually go the other way around. I have email forwarded to gmail before then getting forwarded to an email server on my own domain. I use GMail for spam filtering, archiving and sometimes for search and a quick web interface. Mostly I process email locally using gnus. I used to use GMail's POP3 interface, but I found it unreliable at times, so that's why I switched to my own email server.
jonknee 18y ago
FUD, it's only down for "a small subset of users". Works fine for me, both web and IMAP.
- martey 18y ago
  GMail's Wikipedia article suggests that 100 million people have used GMail. Even "a small subset" could be a substantial number of people.
  - jonknee 18y ago
    ... But yet the headline made it sound like all of Gmail was down when at best it's a small percentage. When the headline says "Gmail down" and I look over and see that Gmail is in fact not down, it's an incorrect headline.
- deleted 18y ago
  [deleted]
- vinutheraj 18y ago
  Err.. the apps page shows no message for me atleast !?!

8 points by nickb 18y ago

gstar 18y ago

That's 3 strikes, and Gmail: you're out. I'm moving my domains off gmail as the primary MX. Is there a viable alternative to gmail for conversation view and search?

rksprst 18y ago
Not that I know of, though I've moved from google apps to hosted exchange with Sherweb and couldn't be happier. I love the fact that my calendar & address book sync wirelessly with my iPhone. Also, push email is great.
onk 18y ago
> Is there a viable alternative to gmail for conversation view and search? Mutt but you'll have to type "ot" to order by thread and "l~b<word>" to search (limit) by <word> in the body of your mail.
lsb 18y ago
Can your spam filters do better?
- modoc 18y ago
  Mine do as well, yes. I'm not knocking GMail's spam filters, but it's absolutely possible to run your own mail server virtually spam free. I've had the same primary e-mail address for 11 years, posted it all over the place, and I almost never see spam in my inbox.
  - ROFISH 18y ago
    The problem is that you will still receive the mail. If you run even a semi-popular website, your domain is going to be hit by all kinds of bogus mail. Since I'm a programmer not a server administrator, the CPU and IO was constantly overloaded because of spam. Whenever I switched to Google Apps, the hard drive breathed a sign of relief. I'm sure if you take the time to properly administrate, you can run email on your own server. In my case it was too confusing, took too much effort, and I wanted to get back to doing real work.
    - modoc 18y ago
      Oh, I agree with you 100%. For 99% of the people out there, it makes far more sense to have someone else handle all that for you. You just have to accept there may be downtime that beyond your control. I was merely answering lsb's question and pointing out that GMail's spam filtering isn't magic or unique. It's merely very good. A skilled mail server admin can replicate the same level of spam filtering. I'm not recommending that everyone run their own mail server.
modoc 18y ago
Mail.app on OS X has a very nice threaded view. It's not exactly the same, but it's still very nice:)
cubicle67 18y ago
This mentality always strikes me as odd; like firing an employee when they make a mistake. The key factor to consider should be "Have they learnt from this?". The outage has happened. It won't unhappen. The question now is, will Google fix the problems that caused this, or don't they care.
- gstar 18y ago
  The 3 mistakes in short succession show that they haven't learnt from this, and I should make provisions for myself. Somewhat similar to a staff member who has had 3 warnings is obviously not learning.
- herval 18y ago
  You'd be right - if it happened only once. Or twice. It's not really like firing someone, though - if your bank keeps screwing you up, woudln't you consider opening an account somewhere else...?
jaaron 18y ago
Web or desktop? For desktop, a new entrance is Postbox, which takes a lot of clues from GMail: http://www.postbox-inc.com http://www.postbox-inc.com Personally, I use gnus: http://www.gnus.org http://www.gnus.org

tokenadult 18y ago

My Gmail is working considerably better than my access to HN recently. The safest course would be to keep some other email domain, download it locally with whatever email client one prefers (as I have long done) but have everything forwarded to Gmail. That's what I did after a local computer crash hosed my access to email for a while. But now I like accessing my Gmail through Gmail's interface, EXCEPT for the lousy way that Gmail implements adding new names to address lists for mailing to multiple people at once. I've had no service interruptions at all the last few times Gmail service interruptions have been in the news.

drsnyder 18y ago
For those of us who like the gmail interface this seems like a reasonable option. But, you still have to "push" the problem to another provider. Who do you rely on for your 'some other email domain'?
- whughes 18y ago
  Gmail acts as a POP client too, if you want to wrangle with that. It's in the options.
jaaron 18y ago
I actually go the other way around. I have email forwarded to gmail before then getting forwarded to an email server on my own domain. I use GMail for spam filtering, archiving and sometimes for search and a quick web interface. Mostly I process email locally using gnus. I used to use GMail's POP3 interface, but I found it unreliable at times, so that's why I switched to my own email server.

jonknee 18y ago

FUD, it's only down for "a small subset of users". Works fine for me, both web and IMAP.

martey 18y ago
GMail's Wikipedia article suggests that 100 million people have used GMail. Even "a small subset" could be a substantial number of people.
- jonknee 18y ago
  ... But yet the headline made it sound like all of Gmail was down when at best it's a small percentage. When the headline says "Gmail down" and I look over and see that Gmail is in fact not down, it's an incorrect headline.
deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
vinutheraj 18y ago
Err.. the apps page shows no message for me atleast !?!