Updating your Gmail 2.0 add-ons

As a coda to last week’s post about turning on Gmail 2.0 for Google Apps, it is worth noting that doing so will effectively kill some Firefox add-ons that you may be accustomed to using to spiff up the appearance of your Gmail interface, including some commonly used Greasemonkey Gmail scripts and popular Userstyles.org Gmail scripts that rely on Stylish. You should update those, as needed.

For LSNC perhaps the biggest deal is having a solution for mailto links, so that the Gmail 2.0 “Compose Mail” page opens whenever the user clicks on a mailto link.

One of the easiest solutions to this dilemma is to have users install the Better Gmail 2.0 Firefox add-on.

To get the “Compose mailto Links in Gmail” feature to work with your Google Apps domain, click on the “Advanced” button in the Better Gmail 2.0 console and then simply add your domain. Problem solved. Well, for the most part. Once set, if the user has Firefox open and is already logged into Gmail, whenever the user clicks on a mailto link it will open to the Gmail Compose Mail page. If not logged into Gmail, clicking the link will trigger Gmail opening to its default Inbox page. Hey, but no harm, no foul.

With the Better Gmail 2.0 add-on you also get several other useful options, including a very helpful “Attachment Icons” display that substitutes file-type specific icons for the Gmail default paper clip icon. Useful stuff.