Gmail
Triage your Gmail inbox from inside blastbeat. Turn a Thread into a Task or a Note, archive it, snooze it, or reply to it.
Connect Gmail
Go to Settings, then Integrations, tick Gmail on the Google card and click Connect Google. If you have already connected Google for Calendar, turn Gmail on there and approve the extra access.
The Mail page asks which of your Gmail labels to show, and lets you give each an optional default Project.
Press gm or pick Mail in the sidebar.
Gmail asks Google for permission to read and modify your mail, which also lets blastbeat send your replies. It asks for nothing beyond that.
Mail appears in the sidebar only while an Instance has a mail Provider turned on. A mail account that is not Gmail connects over IMAP, if your Admin has turned that on.
Triage
Mail is for working through your inbox, not for keeping it. Each Thread gets a decision: make a Task, make a Note, archive it, or snooze it. The header counts Threads to triage, which are the unread ones in your Inbox.
Mail lists these views: Inbox, Unread, Starred, Has attachment, and Triaged, then Sent, Archive, Trash and Spam, then your own Gmail labels. Labels with a / in their name nest.
| Keys | Does |
|---|---|
| Enter | Open or close Thread |
| T | Make Task from Thread |
| E | Archive Thread |
| B | Snooze Thread |
| S | Star / unstar Thread |
| U | Mark Thread read / unread |
| ⇧X | Select to here |
| R | Reply to Thread |
N makes a Note from the Thread on the Mail list. J and K move down and up. Opening a Thread marks it read.
Make a Task from a Thread
T opens Add Task from email.
- The Task’s name is the subject.
- Its description is the latest Message, without the quoted history.
- It suggests Subtasks that you can edit or untick: Reply to the sender, Follow up on the subject, and Read the first attachment.
- It goes to the Project you set as the Mailbox’s default, or the Inbox.
- You can set a Due, Priority and Labels before you add it.
The Task stays linked to the Thread. The Thread shows a Triaged badge that opens the Task, and converting the same Thread again opens the Task you already made. The form has an option to archive the Thread once the Task exists.
Make a Note from a Thread
Press N on the Mail list. The Note’s title is the subject. Its body starts with the sender and date, then the latest Message as Markdown.
You can file it in a Project, a Folder and Labels, and pin it. A checkbox in the email does not become a Task. The Note keeps a From email link back to the Thread.
Snooze
B archives the Thread now and brings it back to your Inbox, unread, at the time you choose. The presets, in your Profile timezone, are:
- Later today, at 18:00, or three hours later if it is already past 15:00.
- Tomorrow, at 08:00.
- This weekend, Saturday at 08:00. It is left out on weekends.
- Next week, Monday at 08:00.
Pick a date and time for anything else. Snoozing a snoozed Thread again moves its time, and Unsnooze brings it back now. Snooze needs a mailbox that can archive.
Reply
R opens a reply to the latest Message in the Thread. It is a quick reply, not a full mail client.
- It is plain text. There is no formatting and no attachments.
- It can only reply to a Thread. There is no way to start a new email.
- To and Cc are editable. Cc starts with the other people on the Message, so it works as reply-all, and you can remove them. There is no Bcc.
- The subject is fixed as Re: and the original subject.
- The body starts with the Message quoted. It can be up to 100,000 characters.
- You can send up to 30 replies an hour.
- ⌘↵ sends. Gmail keeps a copy in Sent.
An IMAP account can reply only if it has SMTP settings. Without them, Reply opens your own mail app.
What blastbeat keeps
blastbeat keeps your Mailbox settings, and the links between Threads and the Tasks and Notes you made from them. It does not keep your mail. Threads and Messages are read from Gmail each time you open a list or a Thread.
A Message’s HTML is shown in a sandboxed frame, with scripts removed. Images from the web stay hidden until you choose Show images for that Message. Links open in a new tab. Attachments are listed, and open in Gmail.
Disconnect
Disconnect on the Integrations page deletes what blastbeat kept and withdraws its access. Your Tasks and Notes stay. Turning Gmail off while keeping Calendar does the same for mail alone. Both are covered in Google Calendar.
Email into your Inbox
A different feature: blastbeat can give you a private address, and mail sent to it becomes a Task in your Inbox, with the subject as the title and the message as the description. Settings, then Import, turns it on, if your Instance accepts mail.