Google spring cleans Gmail features list

Google is hoping to improve Gmail's ease of use

Google has reshuffled a number of Gmail features, retiring some and promoting others, based on customer feedback.

Google software engineer Mark Knichel explained in a blog post that the firm's Gmail Labs, where new features are tried out, began with just 13 features and now has more than 60.

"Today, true to the original intention of Gmail Labs, we are graduating six more features and retiring five. These decisions were made based mainly on usage, taking feature polish and your feedback into account," he wrote.

"We have also tweaked some of the graduating features to improve them before making them default Gmail features. For example, we've combined Go To Label with Search Autocomplete, making it easier to find what you're looking for."

Other 'graduating' features include suggestions in the Gmail search box, a 'forgotten attachment?' feature that looks at the text of an email to assess whether the user might have forgotten to attach something, YouTube previews with emails, automatic auto-respond settings that refer to the calendar to show when a user is away, and a new colour palette for custom labels.

A number of features will be consigned to history, however, which Knichel said is "always a tough decision".

"We invest in building and maintaining them, and we realise that some of you are probably fans of some of Gmail's lesser-used features. But Labs are experimental features," he added.

"Over the next few days, you will see Muzzle, Fixed Width Font, Email Addict, Location in Signature and Random Signature stop working and disappear from the Labs tab."