Wow, Google Apps is really really cool!

I have been thinking lately about how much of a pain it is to run my own mail server. Well, it really runs itself, but it’s annoying that I have to rely on my computer being on all the time, and my Internet connection being up all the time. The latter isn’t a problem (my ISP is pretty reliable), but the former is becoming more and more of an issue the older my computer gets. I’m also interested in energy conservation, and the next major hurdle there is figuring out a way to not run my computer 24/7.

Enter gmail. I was just browsing around last night, and I found something about Google apps for your domain. I have had a gmail account for some time now, but I don’t use it because it has a long and awkward name, and I already have my own vanity domain. I didn’t know that I could transfer my domain e-mail to gmail, and it would work just the same as it does now. Just the same, except for the fact that Google handles it, and I can access my e-mail over the Web from work. Up until this point, I would read my e-mail through ssh, using mh as my e-mail client. From home, I can use POP3 if I want to even bother downloading the e-mail from Google.

Wow. It was incredibly easy to set up, and I can get my e-mail from anywhere without having to connect to home, or even having my home computer on. I’m going to try it for a while before transferring e-mail for the other domain over to gmail. If all goes well, I could reconfigure her e-mail client to get the mail from Google and she wouldn’t even notice! I probably won’t do that though, because that would involve messing around with her e-mail settings, and she would probably be annoyed about me doing that without letting her know.

August 8, 2007. Technology.