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I recently went through an acquisition where we transitioned from Google Apps to the Microsoft suite. I do not share your love of Microsoft's suite. Among the

by mierle 13y ago

I recently went through an acquisition where we transitioned from Google Apps to the Microsoft suite. I do not share your love of Microsoft's suite. Among the many problems I have with the Microsoft suite, Outlook is at the top of my list for generating the most frustration. GMail's priority inbox and new-style inbox where machine learning is used to sort out mail is a productivity booster for me. With Outlook, I regularly lose important mail because it is buried under the difficult to filter masses of other email. I could go on about how the lack of robust collaboration facilities are a direct time waster for my team, but I don't want to hijack this thread further...

freyr 13y ago
So, we all like what we're used to. To the OP, insisting that apps running in browsers will never match native apps in terms of UX, that's a very audacious claim. There are many powerful, competent, and well-funded entities with a vested interest in improving the web app experience (including Google). I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. This could be just another example of a disruptive technology, that's initially lacking in certain conventional metrics, but has a lot of room for improvement above and beyond the entrenched competition.
- gdulli 13y ago
  > There are many powerful, competent, and well-funded entities with a vested interest in improving the web app experience (including Google). I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. I've been using gmail for almost 10 years. I liked it from the start. But it's getting worse, not better. It's extremely slow compared to what I'm used to with Exchange and Outlook, and navigating around is more of a chore. How do I, for example, see who's in on an email list? I can't just right-click on the name of the list and see the members? (And don't even get me started on the new compose experience mess.) If Gmail was being continuously improved, I'd have a reason to be optimistic about it. I like being given free storage, but as far as usability goes, I have fonder memories of Eudora.
  - bhouston 13y ago
    Gmail UI sucks in part because they are going for the masses, not the power user. It isn't HTML5's fault.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - gdulli 13y ago
      That could definitely be part of it. Outlook isn't dumbed down because it's not primarily aimed at home users. Maybe Gmail makes sense for few people in the office the way Outlook makes sense for few people at home. That doesn't change the fact that the bandwidth/latency profiles are different going to the server room in the building than going out to the internet. But I might see a big improvement over what Gmail is now if Google was being designed for business users.
      - source99 13y ago
        What features would you add to Gmail to make it more useful for business users? What UI fixes would you make? How do I get started writing plugins for gmail to add the above features and fixes?
        ladzoppelin 13y ago
        For starters Google could of kept compatibility with the activesync protocol instead of making calender sync with outlook the horrific monster it is today. Actions like this are just one of the multiple reasons I tell people to not invest invest Google business products.
        dragontamer 13y ago
        Amen. Gmail has _lost_ features over the years, as opposed to gain any.
        deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
- Thrymr 13y ago
  Some of us don't like any of the current alternatives. In my opinion Gmail beats Outlook for mail, but Google apps are not really enterprise-ready for calendar and docs. Editing a document offline is not a feature that should just now be becoming sort of usable, it should have been fundamental from the beginning. Confusion between Google Apps and personal Google logins is common. Managing a Google calendar is painful, and basically has not improved at all in years. I have no desire to go back to using Office for everything, but I have very little confidence that Google is actually going to spend much effort in getting things right for these use cases either.
- wvenable 13y ago
  > I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. They are set back and certainly extremely limited from the start. Native means you have almost unlimited capabilities for interacting with the user and their system. A browser application by definition is much more limited. The experience is always improving but it's to get the point that native applications have always had -- and they still have a long way to go. And the nature of browser based applications might mean that it can never happen. The browser is layer between the solution and the user and it will always interfere in some way.
peter_l_downs 13y ago
I was about to write this comment!
falcolas 13y ago
> where machine learning is used to sort out mail A few minutes spent setting up filters goes a long ways to nullifying the (frequently wrong for me) machine learning advantage in sorting emails.
- riffraff 13y ago
  I think you forgot the pre-gmail days of setting up spam filters this way.
mathnode 13y ago
Not having to attach files for even the slightest change is so much better. I really miss working for a company that uses google apps. Everything was online and centrally controlled. Jira, Confluence, AWS, Github, MediaWiki (some of these were self-hosted), and google apps. I have always preferred centralised computing, you can visually see the headaches and frustration drop for IT support technicians when they don't have to deal with minor printer, file, or collaboration issues. The kind of issues that were created by the "PC" in the business environment.

by mierle 13y ago

freyr 13y ago

So, we all like what we're used to. To the OP, insisting that apps running in browsers will never match native apps in terms of UX, that's a very audacious claim. There are many powerful, competent, and well-funded entities with a vested interest in improving the web app experience (including Google). I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. This could be just another example of a disruptive technology, that's initially lacking in certain conventional metrics, but has a lot of room for improvement above and beyond the entrenched competition.

gdulli 13y ago
> There are many powerful, competent, and well-funded entities with a vested interest in improving the web app experience (including Google). I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. I've been using gmail for almost 10 years. I liked it from the start. But it's getting worse, not better. It's extremely slow compared to what I'm used to with Exchange and Outlook, and navigating around is more of a chore. How do I, for example, see who's in on an email list? I can't just right-click on the name of the list and see the members? (And don't even get me started on the new compose experience mess.) If Gmail was being continuously improved, I'd have a reason to be optimistic about it. I like being given free storage, but as far as usability goes, I have fonder memories of Eudora.
- bhouston 13y ago
  Gmail UI sucks in part because they are going for the masses, not the power user. It isn't HTML5's fault.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - gdulli 13y ago
    That could definitely be part of it. Outlook isn't dumbed down because it's not primarily aimed at home users. Maybe Gmail makes sense for few people in the office the way Outlook makes sense for few people at home. That doesn't change the fact that the bandwidth/latency profiles are different going to the server room in the building than going out to the internet. But I might see a big improvement over what Gmail is now if Google was being designed for business users.
    - source99 13y ago
      What features would you add to Gmail to make it more useful for business users? What UI fixes would you make? How do I get started writing plugins for gmail to add the above features and fixes?
      - ladzoppelin 13y ago
        For starters Google could of kept compatibility with the activesync protocol instead of making calender sync with outlook the horrific monster it is today. Actions like this are just one of the multiple reasons I tell people to not invest invest Google business products.
        dragontamer 13y ago
        Amen. Gmail has _lost_ features over the years, as opposed to gain any.
      - deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
Thrymr 13y ago
Some of us don't like any of the current alternatives. In my opinion Gmail beats Outlook for mail, but Google apps are not really enterprise-ready for calendar and docs. Editing a document offline is not a feature that should just now be becoming sort of usable, it should have been fundamental from the beginning. Confusion between Google Apps and personal Google logins is common. Managing a Google calendar is painful, and basically has not improved at all in years. I have no desire to go back to using Office for everything, but I have very little confidence that Google is actually going to spend much effort in getting things right for these use cases either.
wvenable 13y ago
> I wouldn't claim they're doomed from the start. They are set back and certainly extremely limited from the start. Native means you have almost unlimited capabilities for interacting with the user and their system. A browser application by definition is much more limited. The experience is always improving but it's to get the point that native applications have always had -- and they still have a long way to go. And the nature of browser based applications might mean that it can never happen. The browser is layer between the solution and the user and it will always interfere in some way.

peter_l_downs 13y ago

I was about to write this comment!

falcolas 13y ago

> where machine learning is used to sort out mail A few minutes spent setting up filters goes a long ways to nullifying the (frequently wrong for me) machine learning advantage in sorting emails.

riffraff 13y ago
I think you forgot the pre-gmail days of setting up spam filters this way.

mathnode 13y ago

Not having to attach files for even the slightest change is so much better. I really miss working for a company that uses google apps. Everything was online and centrally controlled. Jira, Confluence, AWS, Github, MediaWiki (some of these were self-hosted), and google apps. I have always preferred centralised computing, you can visually see the headaches and frustration drop for IT support technicians when they don't have to deal with minor printer, file, or collaboration issues. The kind of issues that were created by the "PC" in the business environment.