Comments on: I feel pretty!

I feel pretty!

Wolfdog — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:45:25 -0800

is a really slick CSS makeover for - you guessed - Gmail. It uses the Stylish Firefox add-on. (So yes, this is something you would need a computer, firefox, and gmail to care about.)

By: substrate

substrate — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:50:03 -0800

Gmail redesigned doesn't look pretty to me. What I'd really like is for better behaviour while it's loading. If I go to gmail and click on a label I usually end up in the wrong label because the chat box loads up after the label box does and ends up shifting it.

By: le morte de bea arthur

le morte de bea arthur — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:53:31 -0800

I'm not going to dispute the fact that this design could be considered a more attractive interface for Gmail (although to my eye it isn't). However, the default Gmail interface is designed with more than just prettiness in mind; Google design interfaces which balance clarity with the absolute minimum of bandwidth usage. By this measure (and also in terms of another important criterion, accessibility), the original interface is a far better design. And try getting that add-on to work on your Wii or your Blackberry....

By: kbanas

kbanas — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:53:32 -0800

Well, the little tiny image they have of the new look on their site did very little to persuade me to give this a try. However, Stylish actually seems to work with Firefox 3beta5, and so I was encouraged to try it anyway. It's kind of pretty and kind of neat. I guess.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:55:38 -0800

I'm not a fan of that design (it's all pointless gradient sizzle added on top of GMail's plain and simple elegance). But it does make me wish Google would allow custom stylesheets, in general, for Google Apps. Being able to customize the logo to match your org is a small step, but a custom CSS would be a whole lot nicer. That way you could tweak a little (font size? background color?) or a lot at your leisure. (Needing to add a particular third-party widget to one specific browser so that you can hack it in your own browser doesn't cut it, no.)

By: Wolfdog

Wolfdog — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:57:08 -0800

(Needing to add a particular third-party widget to one specific browser so that you can hack it in your own browser doesn't cut it, no.) aka "The MetaFilter Model"

By: hellphish

hellphish — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:58:17 -0800

I welcome this change. Thanks for the tip. Stylish sorta broke my hulu.com popouts though :(

By: Dave Faris

Dave Faris — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:00:00 -0800

I've been using it for a few weeks... probably about 2 months. It works well enough, and I think it looks better than the default. I tweaked it a bit, since I was having trouble telling when a email thread got a new message, but it seems to work great. And I have no qualms about add-on stylesheets, though I would imagine others not so familiar with css would be a little more wary.

By: Artw

Artw — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:00:16 -0800

It looks like a Windows Live theme.

By: cowbellemoo

cowbellemoo — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:03:33 -0800

I guess it's a little less ugly now. Thanks.

By: chuckdarwin

chuckdarwin — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:03:48 -0800

I really like it. Thanks.

By: rusty

rusty — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:04:11 -0800

I wish gmail had a little more whitespace. Just thought I'd share that.

By: Wolfdog

Wolfdog — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:08:37 -0800

(Personally, most of my email time is in PINE, so glitzy high style isn't a major priority. I had a student in here who was obviously distracted by my pine window and kept glancing it with an apparent and growing mix of suspicion and horror. Finally: "Yes?" "I don't know how you read that." "What do you mean?" "It's so... it's... I mean... it's all text.")

By: oddman

oddman — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:19:32 -0800

At first I was excited by this, but then I tried it. So, the fancy CSS really does nothing but change the colors? meh. Now, if someone could provide a stylish/greasemonkey/whatever add-on that would let me see nothing but the unread e-mails in gmail (or at least bring them to the top). That would be a little bit of magic that would greatly interest me.

By: drezdn

drezdn — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:21:39 -0800

Oh PINE, even in 97 (when I first used it), it was faster than webmail.

By: nebulawindphone

nebulawindphone — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:21:49 -0800

See, for me, a pretty computing experience is when I bring my laptop to that one coffeeshop by the river. I'll happily spend all day in a black-and-white terminal window if I can look up now and again and watch the water ripple. Then again, I'm also that guy at work who would rather stare out the window than decorate his cubicle. I suspect that being the cubicle-decorating type must be pretty nice. If a couple calendars or a pretty mail client were enough to cheer my cranky ass up, that would be awesome.

By: ryanhealy

ryanhealy — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:22:02 -0800

So, I just installed this. It's noticeably slower now. That combined with smaller fonts makes this useless for me.

By: KirkJobSluder

KirkJobSluder — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:24:10 -0800

Other browsers do usercss, and some of them got there before the Firefox plugin.

By: basicchannel

basicchannel — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:29:05 -0800

This is an argument against allowing users to skin interfaces. Horrifying.

By: Krrrlson

Krrrlson — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:34:28 -0800

Barf.

By: mike0221

mike0221 — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:37:20 -0800

I like it. Thanks!!

By: DecemberBoy

DecemberBoy — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:47:56 -0800

I like it as well. This is by far the best user style I've ever seen. I usually just use them to remove extraneous crap (ad sidebars, etc.) from websites I visit frequently and move various elements around, I've never seen one that totally redesigns the site. Most of the time I access GMail over IMAP with Thunderbird, but this will be nice for a quick login to the web interface. Has anyone made a cool user style for Metafilter?

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:48:36 -0800

You say "really slick", I say "an affront to all that is good in this world". Let's call the whole thing off.

By: echo target

echo target — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:56:43 -0800

Are gradients every which way still 'cutting edge' design?

By: mwhybark

mwhybark — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:00:35 -0800

"Google's design team is either incredibly lazy or extremely concerned with making sure old people, and people still using Netscape can check their email." The gradient-on-black thing just makes the UI look like a kid's toy, or something designed with Microsoft aesthetics in mind. I must be an old person! (Wolfdog, wouldn't it be cool to slap a green-phosphor skin on gmail, with, like, all that text?)

By: mwhybark

mwhybark — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:01:39 -0800

aw, booo for the font style unrendering! (my last line was all green and fixed-width-y)

By: mwhybark

mwhybark — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:03:31 -0800

Here's another one, FWIW.

By: dirtdirt

dirtdirt — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:13:19 -0800

I think those gradients are yucky, but I think the concept of this is neat.

By: Kabanos

Kabanos — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:19:07 -0800

Really slick? I'd say really ick.

By: BrotherCaine

BrotherCaine — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:28:32 -0800

Thumbs down on the aesthetic, but I appreciate the effort involved.

By: junesix

junesix — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:32:06 -0800

It makes Gmail look like a standard vBulletin or Invision forum theme.

By: Wolfdog

Wolfdog — Wed, 07 May 2008 15:34:11 -0800

Wolfdog, wouldn't it be cool to slap a green-phosphor skin on gmail, with, like, all that text? Dude I would be like totally whoa. (I prefer amber to green, but the basic premise is solid.)

By: Thorzdad

Thorzdad — Wed, 07 May 2008 16:08:09 -0800

Bad, bad, bad. All Web 2.0 prettiness at the expense of usability.

By: Jaltcoh

Jaltcoh — Wed, 07 May 2008 16:58:48 -0800

What possessed them to take the "m" from "Gmail" that looks like an envelope, replace it with a conventional "m," and put the envelope "m" at the end of "Gmail" so that it looks like "Gmailm"?

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 07 May 2008 16:59:38 -0800

At least they didn't refer to it as "hack". Maybe there's still hope.

By: KokuRyu

KokuRyu — Wed, 07 May 2008 17:15:42 -0800

Why is Vista black?

By: jack_mo

jack_mo — Wed, 07 May 2008 17:32:49 -0800

This is actually the worst of the many Gmail skins I've seen. I can't believe they wasted all that time and effort on making it harder to read email in Gmail, and making Gmail look uglier.

By: blastrid

blastrid — Wed, 07 May 2008 17:37:09 -0800

Not supported with the "Better Gmail 2" or the "Remember The Milk" extensions. FAIL. That and it's rather unattractive and certainly not an improvement.

By: bonaldi

bonaldi — Wed, 07 May 2008 18:42:50 -0800

But I think we can all agree - Google's design team is either incredibly lazy or extremely concerned with making sure old people, and people still using Netscape can check their email. I disagree. And, btw, there's not a damn thing wrong with making things work on older browsers. Don't be browserist, and perhaps your shitty sites with their cutting-edge javascript libraries won't crash even recent browsers.

By: decoherence

decoherence — Wed, 07 May 2008 19:00:39 -0800

Anyone know of an extension that will make my Gmail chat windows look like I'm typing to an email in Outlook or an Excel file?

By: zardoz

zardoz — Wed, 07 May 2008 19:11:16 -0800

Actually, there seem to be a lot of gmail tweak options.

By: Edible Energy

Edible Energy — Wed, 07 May 2008 19:23:06 -0800

Now, if someone could provide a stylish/greasemonkey/whatever add-on that would let me see nothing but the unread e-mails in gmail (or at least bring them to the top). That would be a little bit of magic that would greatly interest me. search for: +label:unread +label:inbox

By: treepour

treepour — Wed, 07 May 2008 20:39:08 -0800

Thanks, all you cranky folk for making me feel like a kid on your lawn. 'Cause I love it love it love it -- on ur LAWN! (And I'm well beyond the need-to-see-your-id age, thank you). *dashes away to play in the sprinklers*

By: gsb

gsb — Wed, 07 May 2008 21:15:26 -0800

Cleaner is better. More whitespace, good.

By: Cranberry

Cranberry — Wed, 07 May 2008 21:35:41 -0800

I would be happier with gmail if the boys would prevent the flood of spam instead of filing it in my accounts. Incredibly busy or incredibly lazy?

By: DecemberBoy

DecemberBoy — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:54:54 -0800

I would be happier with gmail if the boys would prevent the flood of spam instead of filing it in my accounts. Incredibly busy or incredibly lazy? Really? I've been using GMail since it was invite-only beta, and I hardly get any spam. A look in the spam folder reveals a hundred or more ENLARGE UR PEN1S and Chinese warez site ads per day, but rarely does one make it into my inbox. If GMail's built-in spam filtering doesn't work, try using it via IMAP with Thunderbird and using its junk-filtering features, which allows you to mark spam as junk and uses your input to predictively mark future spam. Or if you keep getting the same spam, you can write a rule to send it all straight to the trash based on subject, sender, etc.

By: aqhong

aqhong — Wed, 07 May 2008 23:25:14 -0800

I find the polarized responses interesting. Can someone post a high-res screenshot of this so I don't have to install it myself?

By: Cranberry

Cranberry — Wed, 07 May 2008 23:38:01 -0800

DecemberBoy - that is exactly what I am talking about. Tons of spam in gmail accounts, occasional spam in Comcast accounts, none ever in Yahoo! accounts. It can be done; surely Yahoo! is not the possessor of some arcane spam prevention secret that others can't duplicate.

By: aqhong

aqhong — Wed, 07 May 2008 23:40:12 -0800

Never mind, I just checked Google Images. I'm with Artw, it looks like a next-gen Hotmail. Can I have an Apple-redesigned Gmail instead? Thanks.

By: Civil_Disobedient

Civil_Disobedient — Wed, 07 May 2008 23:56:22 -0800

Wow. How ugly.

By: mary8nne

mary8nne — Thu, 08 May 2008 00:41:23 -0800

I agree. That looks horrible. the standard Gmail has a simplicity that is sorely lacking in other apps. why fix it if its not broke?

By: darkripper

darkripper — Thu, 08 May 2008 01:21:54 -0800

No one redesigning metafilter? C'mon I want this site to look like MSN Live too! No, seriously, stilish might be an interesting tool to see some of the metafiler redesign done for that contest awhile ago.

By: dickasso

dickasso — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:41:03 -0800

From the screen shots they seem to have put a load of gradient shit over the navigation section and made the fonts smaller while making each line of text take up more vertical space so you actually see less data (the chat window disappears, fewer emails are shown) on the screen at once. A giant leap backwards.

By: drezdn

drezdn — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:42:54 -0800

The whole point (I think) of letting you see the filtered spam if you want is to make sure you're not missing emails that were accidentally filed there. It really (as in almost never) happens to me anymore, but it's nice to know I can check.

By: jack_mo

jack_mo — Thu, 08 May 2008 06:59:43 -0800

Can I have an Apple-redesigned Gmail instead? Thanks. There is a skin floating about that does a pretty good job of making Gmail look like Apple Mail, but I'm having trouble finding it. Anyone know the one I'm talking about?

By: krautland

krautland — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:21:35 -0800

this is a prime example for what's wrong with the firefox community. it just doesn't look good, it just doesn't feel right. programmers (usually) can't design and when they try, a webpage ends up looking like a hippie pooped crayons. I like gmail as it is - simple and clear.

By: bonaldi

bonaldi — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:05:22 -0800

Can I have an Apple-redesigned Gmail instead? Thanks. I'd like one that looked similar to pre-Ajax .Mac webmail, but not like Apple Mail, which has gotten uglier and uglier since 10.3

By: nushustu

nushustu — Thu, 08 May 2008 10:41:44 -0800

There's a stylish script for an Apple-redesigned Google reader, but I have yet to see one for gmail.

By: jack_mo

jack_mo — Thu, 08 May 2008 11:14:59 -0800

Oops, that's what I was thinking of nushustu. Sorry to get your hopes up aqhong.

By: mwhybark

mwhybark — Thu, 08 May 2008 14:59:50 -0800

aqhong, jack_mo, how's this?

By: mwhybark

mwhybark — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:01:35 -0800

Or this?

By: oddman

oddman — Thu, 08 May 2008 18:37:15 -0800

"search for: +label:unread +label:inbox" - Edible Energy OMG! Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, (really, I can't thank you enough).

By: msaleem

msaleem — Fri, 09 May 2008 02:08:50 -0800

Mashable recently had a great collection Gmail Makeovers that shouldn't be overlooked.

By: aqhong

aqhong — Fri, 09 May 2008 02:49:20 -0800

If I could somehow overlook those after seeing them, I would.

By: trixare4kids

trixare4kids — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 09:37:19 -0800

I've been using this skin/style for a few weeks now at least, and I really love it. I'd like someone to make the same skin for google reader. Anyone, anyone....?