Business
Mobile Gmail gets a slight facelift
The mobile version of Google Gmail has been updated with animated transitions, higher resolution icons, and the ability to pull down to refresh.
The mobile version of Gmail is the recipient of a small but significant makeover that doesn't add any features, but definitely makes e-mail look and feel a little better on smaller screens.
The changes, according to the Google blog entry, are as follows:
- Pull down to refresh - Much like any number of iOS social networking apps, just drag down on the screen and release to check your Gmail. This only works on Apple iOS (read: iPhone and iPad) and BlackBerry PlayBook devices, apparently.
- High resolution icons - Apple iPhone 4 users are privvy to new, higher-resolution icons that take advantage of the Retina display.
- Transitions - There's now an animated "slide" effect when going between the inbox, conversations, and the menu, to make the whole thing appear smoother.
"On the mobile team, we strive to produce web apps which look and feel just like installed apps," Google Mobile Software Engineer Daniel Brotherston writes in that blog entry.
Apparently, the updates have been rolled out quietly over the last few weeks, so it's possible that you've already noticed one or more of these changes. And it's only natural that Google would gussy up the mobile browser version of Gmail, even as it works on unifying the design of the desktop browser-based Google Apps.
What else do you want to see Gmail tackle on mobile devices? Let us know in the comments below.