Look! Up in the air! It's a bird, it's Superman; no, it's Mailplane 2 Beta!

The wizards at uncomplex gmbh have posted a beta of an upgrade to Mailplane. In case you're not familiar with it, Mailplane is a "Mac-friendly" front-end to Gmail with a powerful feature set, and a quick fly-by of the upgrade revealed even more Gmail goodness:

• Full support for Gmail 2
• mailplane:// URLs for accessing and searching your Gmail database
• A free OmniFocus clipping plugin for creating new tasks containing links to conversations in Mailplane
• Better photo attachment customization
• Assign different notification sounds and colors to specific Gmail accounts
• The ability to post Google Spreadsheet forms
• Integration with Mac OS X Address Book
• A "Do Not Disturb" mode
• and a few dozen more improvements!

Once the beta program is complete, Mailplane 2 will be free to registered users or $24.95 for single users.

Thanks for the tip, Chris!

SyncMan is a simple application for syncing your Mac's Address Book with your Gmail contacts, a feature long desired by Gmail and Google Calendar users who may have other sync tools already in place. While we have noted that a similar feature is forthcoming in the more broad-based iCal syncing tool Spanning Sync 2, SyncMan concentrates just on contacts and is available now.

SyncMan is €9.95 (~$15.32) and a demo is available.

[via Macintouch / Daring Fireball]

Merlin Mann has been positing that at some point Google and Apple will (or at least should) join forces to bring the power of Google's online apps (Gmail, Docs, etc) to the iPhone. While of course you can access your Gmail account on an iPhone through the mobile interface (which was recently improved), it's a decidedly un-iPhone experience.

Enter iGmail - an Ruby on Rails application with a name that will almost certainly be forced to change by Google's lawyers.

iGmail is a simple view on your Gmail inbox, formatted to match the iPhone's native applications. You can try it yourself directly using their demo installation, however keep in mind that you're giving your Google ID and password to a third party.

iGmail is very pretty, but is definitely missing a lot of important features. For example, the current Todo list from the developer includes adding support for starring / unstarring messages, managing labels and contacts, and composing messages using JKeyboard.

Being that this is a Ruby on Rails application, to run it yourself you're going to need a web server that can run Ruby applications. For some people this will be a show-stopper, but if that's the case maybe you can seek out a friend with server space that is willing to let you access your email on the go using this method.

We've discussed the excellent stand-alone Gmail client Mailplane several times. While there remain a few holes here and there, I consider it a must-have application for anybody who needs to manage multiple Gmail accounts. After about half a year in beta, the developer Ruben Bakker has declared the latest Mailplane beta as ready for Leopard. In addition, he has announced that it will soon be released for sale at a price of $24.95. There will also be a "family option" for an additional $8 that allows users to install it on up to 5 machines in a single household.

Mailplane remains in beta "for a short while," and you can still request a beta invitation.

Though Mailplane is still in private beta, you can apply to be a tester.

Mailplane, the email client that integrates Gmail with Mac OS X, has released v1.5 with an updated iPhoto plug-in that brings compatibility for the new iLife '08 version. This now makes Mailplane's iPhoto plug-in compatible with versions 5, 6 and the new 7, which I prefer calling iPhoto '08 to avoid version confusion. You can simply use the Check for Updates command from Mailplane's application menu, and the developer recommends everyone update even if they don't have the latest iLife; turns out the current beta version expires on August 30th. A separate new version with bug fixes and new features is 'coming soon.'

As you may have read previously, I haven't taken the plunge on an iPhone yet (although I heard McNulty did the other day, which means I might be the only one left at TUAW). But I have been considering it a lot (more than is healthy, probably), and one of my considerations is email. Just a few months ago, I switched completely to Gmail, because I wanted one inbox for all my addresses that I could check and send from anywhere. And with an iPhone, I worry how reading messages will work-- I know I can log right into my Gmail account, but sometimes I have hundreds of messages, and I suspect things will get lost in the mix.

Catcubed had the same problem with his iPhone, and now has worked out what he calls the perfect solution. He's written up a tutorial to get Gmail, IMAP, and his iPhone all working together nicely. Basically, he's got it set up so that Gmail archives and checks everything, and then forwards messages that make it through the filter onto his iPhone via a special address that's IMAPped to Mail. Outgoing messages from the iPhone are synced back into Gmail (to be archived), and look like they're coming from the Gmail address. So while he's on the road, Cat can send and check directly from his email address via his iPhone, without having to wade through everything that comes in, and everything will still be kept in his Gmail when he gets back.

It sounds darn complicated to set up. But once it gets rolling, it sounds like I won't have any problem getting my iPhone email right. Now, I just need to come up with the $500 for my cell phone budget...

Thanks, SFSlim!

Uh oh, famed purveyor of the SuperSite for Windows and spinster extraordinaire Paul Thurrott is at it again with a third installment of his iPhone review that focuses on the iPhone's performance as an actual phone. Never faltering in his ability to spin a genuinely innovative feature into a mark against a product, Thurrott found a way to blast the iPhone's ability to sync contacts with Yahoo!'s address book for being the only web-based service that made the cut:

First and most obviously, Yahoo! is the only Web-based email/contacts store supported: If you use Hotmail, Gmail, AOL, or any other Web-based email service, you cannot sync between contacts stored there and the iPhone. This is a glaring functional lapse that the early Mac-using iPhone reviewers neatly skipped over

Boy, iPhone users sure are screwed, especially since, outside the Helio Ocean (whose site isn't clear on whether it actually syncs with Yahoo!), I can't think of another mobile phone OS - including Windows Mobile and BlackBerry - that syncs with a web-based email or contact service out of the box (note: sync - not simply 'allow access with some custom UI'). At least, not a significant or even publicized phone from any of the big players like Nokia, Motorola or Samsung. The simple fact is that most mobile phone OS developers haven't made that leap yet, primarily because the web-based services like Gmail and AOL haven't opened themselves up through an API (Application Programming Interface) like Yahoo! has for the iPhone. This is probably because, in the past, it hasn't been worth the effort. Most users who want to sync their contacts with a mobile phone are either power or business users, and they're already using desktop software like Outlook, Entourage or Apple's Address Book that is primed and ready for synching. Apple likely took a chance and opened this partnership to sync with Yahoo! because the iPhone is arguably the first consumer-friendly phone to bring the concept of synching to the general user. For those still wondering why Apple chose Yahoo!, it's likely because they are the leading worldwide webmail provider by a landslide; as of April 2007, Yahoo! Mail's market share doubles Hotmail's and, believe it or not, Gmail trails in an incredibly distant 3rd with 1/13th the traffic of Yahoo!.

Several of our readers have written in and asked how to make their iPhone stop sending them copies of their outgoing Gmail. Here's how. Go to Settings -> Mail -> (Your Gmail account) -> Advanced. Switch "Use Recent Mode" from ON to OFF. Be aware that the first time you do this, you may end up sucking a bunch of old messages into your iPhone inbox. (I had about a dozen old emails which shows exactly how little I use my gmail account.) It's a one time thing, though. After you get rid of those old e-mails by disabling "recent mode", your iPhone will stop sending you those outgoing copies.

Update: This option keeps getting weirder. TUAW reader digitalintrigue discovered that copies of outgoing mail sent from gmail's website still get sent to the iPhone although copies of iPhone-originated mail do not. I tried this out and confirmed the behavior.

Last week, Mike did a great job with Ask TUAW and we had a bumper crop of questions. We won't be able to get to all of them this week, but we'll be looking at a number of different issues including: shifting times in iPhoto, getting a Mac and HDTV to work well together, comparing the 24" iMac to the Power Mac G5 in gaming, setting recurring events in iCal, backing up, customizing Mighty Mouse tracking, and getting Gmail in Mail.app.

Remember: everyone's welcome to post questions for Ask TUAW; we're happy to help! Just leave questions for next week in the comments. Now let's get to it.

We keep teasing you with news about the as yet unreleased Mailplane, but this excellent dedicated Gmail client just keeps getting better. The latest update to 1.46 adds several very cool features, most importantly multiple account support. You can now use Mailplane to access different Gmail accounts, simply by double-clicking the account name in the drawer. This release also adds a menubar notifier, which very cleverly includes multiple accounts at the same time so you can check for new mail easily from either account. Finally, there's also a new text snippet feature that allows you to easily insert often typed text.

I've been using Mailplane for a few months and I must say that it is shaping up to be a stellar release. It's one that I'll spend my own hard-earned money on when it comes out. Unfortunately, Mailplane is still in closed beta, but you can apply to be a beta tester.

Since we last mentioned Mailplane, the Gmail client that integrates with Mac OS X, it's received a series of minor updates that have fixed bugs and added a few features. The most recent update, however, has added some significant new features such as a 'Mail PDF with Mailplane' print dialog plugin, customizable toolbar, clickable Growl notifications that take you to the specific message and - to my personal delight - simple instructions for enabling rich text editing when composing messages. This is big news because Mailplane uses WebKit - the same open source web rendering engine Safari is based on - to interact with Gmail, which means Mailplane is also limited by WebKit's inability to provide rich text editing features like bold, justification, colors, etc.

Fortunately, turning on rich text editing is as simple as downloading the latest nightly app build of WebKit and telling Mailplane where you put it. This won't overwrite Safari or interfere with it in any other way, so this process is pretty low-risk for gaining rich text editing, but seemingly only in Gmail (either in Mailplane or using WebKit itself as a browser). I tried surfing to a few other sites and couldn't get rich text widgets to appear in any of them.

Either way, this is great news for Mailplane users who want to join the rest of the internet in using some text formatting goodness when composing their messages. If you need a refresher on what Mailplane is all about, check our previous post and photo gallery for a brief tour, or head over to the Mailplane site to read more and sign up for the private beta.

Today Google announced the availability of Google Desktop for the Mac (download now available from Google's Mac OS X software page). What's Google Desktop, you ask? It is an application from Google, which indexes the contents of your hard drive (including applications, most files, PDFs, as well as web histories from Safari, Firefox, and Camino) and makes it searchable a la Spotlight. Our PC using friends have had this application for awhile, and it is nice to see that Google hasn't forgotten about us Mac users.

Google Desktop for the Mac is a Universal application, requires OS X 10.4 or later, and is free.

I know what you're thinking, 'Why do I need Google Desktop if I already have Spotlight?' That's a good question, and since our friends at Google sent me a copy of Google Desktop to test drive I can answer it for you. Check out our gallery for a bunch of pictures, and read on for a full feature run down and my thoughts on Google Desktop.

A recent update to the official Google Notifier app has added a slick (and apparently Mac-only) feature that should make it easier to add events to Google Calendar while you work. A new "Quick Add to Google Calendar" contextal menu item does exactly what you might think - it allows you to right-click a selected piece of text in most Cocoa apps and create a new event in gCal from it, set for the specific time you used said option. Now this might not offer the flexibility of the Google Calendar Quicksilver module we mentioned, but it's a really handy way to rapidly fire off events based on information and text you're already dealing with throughout the day, and you can easily visit your Google Calendar to organize and manage their specific details at your convenience.

There only way I caught this update, however, was downloading what I perceived to be the latest Notifier from Google on a new machine. Strangely, upon first running the Notifier, I was prompted to download an update which is what brought on this new feature. If you haven't been prompted yet, try restarting your Notifier to see if it kicks the update process into gear.

The fusion of web services and desktop software is a holy grail of computing bliss that few can claim. The web can often be clunky and limited by the constraints of a browser, while the data in your desktop software takes a swim with your MacBook when you drop it at the beach. Anyone who has ever gone back and forth on whether to use the convenience and innovation of Gmail on the web vs. the power and integration of a desktop email client like Apple's Mail.app knows what we're talking about. While the melding of these two universes might seem like an impossible hope to some, Mailplane is a new desktop Gmail client in private beta that just may be a light at the end of the tunnel.

Continue reading for the details on just what Mailplane is about, and be sure to check out our screenshot gallery for a taste of how well (so far) Gmail and the desktop are getting along.