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Zoho Mail Launches with Offline Support

Raju Vegesna  October 10, 2008 06: 09 am    

Over the past three years, we launched several new applications in Zoho, but one particular application has been in the background silently making progress during its private-beta stage - Zoho Mail.

Today, Zoho Mail is stepping out of private-beta. This is an important milestone for Zoho as Zoho Mail plays a pivotal role in our suite’s evolution. There is lot to talk about, so let us drill down into details.

\With or without\

Features

Instead of talking about all the features in Zoho Mail, I’ll share the approach we have taken in Zoho Mail and let you explore all the features.

Zoho Mail supports folders (including hierarchical folders) - the ones you are used to. But then, we also see the value of having Labels in your mail client. So we added labels support too. We don’t want to decide what you should use. We want to give you the choice. So we added support for both Folders and Labels.

Along the same lines, we noticed that some users prefer seeing a list of their emails serially (Ex: the Outlook style) and some users prefer viewing the emails as conversations (Ex: Gmail style). Again, we don’t want to decide what you have to use. So we support both. In conversations, responses are listed hierarchically so that you can look at a conversation and visually see who responded to whom.

Threaded/Conversational View in Zoho Mail

These are couple of examples on the approach we used for Zoho Mail. We do support all the common features you’d expect from an email system. I have included the list of supported features in this document.

Zoho Mail also has Zoho Chat Integrated. We understand that you spend most of the time in your email app. It is important to have Chat integrated right into it. You’ll find the same version of Zoho Chat integrated with other applications like Zoho Business, Zoho Docs etc.

You can chat while you are in Zoho Mail

Apart from Zoho Chat integration, we also integrate our productivity suite. You can now open your attachments (like documents, spreadsheets) with appropriate Zoho Applications.

Offline Support

Zoho Mail also supports Offline mode. This means you can access your email when not connected to the internet. Like Zoho Writer, this functionality is built using Google Gears.

To use Zoho Mail in offline mode, you’ll notice the ‘Setup Offline’ link on the top. You’ll need Google Gears installed on your browser (IE & Firefox are supported currently) to use offline support. Once you permit access, your mails will be accessible offline. You can choose to download images & attachments as well in the offline mode.

Zoho Mail automatically detects your connectivity and switches to online/offline modes seamlessly. While offline, you can view your emails as you would normally.

We had a chat with Brad Neuberg from Google Gears team regarding offline support.

This page contained an embedded video. Click here to view it.

Mobile Support

Zoho Mail is also available on iPhone. If you login to zoho.com from your iPhone, you’ll find the mobile version of Zoho Mail optimized for the iPhone. We do plan to support other mobile devices soon.

If you have access to Zoho Business, Zoho Mail is also integrated into Zoho Business.

Zoho Mail is integrated with Zoho Business

Over the next few weeks we will be talking in detail about some of the key features in Zoho Mail. Meanwhile, please do give Zoho Mail a spin and let us know your feedback.

Popularity: 16% [?]

Comments

October 10th, 2008 | 10:55 am

[...] back to Zoho Mail. Zoho evangelist Raju Vegesna has a quick overview of the application’s features, and they sound pretty cool. For one thing, it gives you the option of seeing each email in the [...]

October 10th, 2008 | 10:56 am

[...] area of market focus for nearly a decade,” said Mark Barnekow, president and CEO of Amphire.Zoho Mail Launches with Offline Support.Zoho Mail has made much progress as it has stepped out of its rivate beta version. It now comes [...]

October 10th, 2008 | 1:31 pm

[...] to it (see TechCrunch Releases New Zoho Service: Invoice) the Zoho folks decided to play along and released their own [...]

October 10th, 2008 | 5:02 pm

I did give it a try and it is impressive compared to a lot of free mail clients and the features are quite good as well.

The issue I see for myself is, although it is a good email tool, it would be difficult for me to ditch my existing email and start using Zoho Mail.

October 10th, 2008 | 7:00 pm

[...] One last plus: Zoho Mail, like Gmail, has an iPhone version that does a nice job of squeezing the interface down into mobile form. Here are some screens I stole from the Zoho blog post on Zoho Mail: [...]

October 10th, 2008 | 9:32 pm

[...] open your attachments (like documents, spreadsheets) with appropriate Zoho Applications. It is also available for iphone, checkout Zoho [...]

kaflu
October 11th, 2008 | 1:35 am

so where can I create my own blog here??

October 11th, 2008 | 6:28 am

never heard about zoho mail… looks like a kool stuff..
hmmm… has evrything

October 11th, 2008 | 3:51 pm

[...] Friday marked the public release of Zoho Mail, previously in private beta. After poking around a bit yesterday, I will attempt to do a feature [...]

October 12th, 2008 | 3:27 pm

Great work with Zoho Mail guys. Also with the iPhone version of Zoho Mobile. If Tasks and Calender were added to Zoho Mobile it would be a seriously killer application.

October 12th, 2008 | 10:32 pm

Hi Enda Madden,

Thanks for your comments on the iPhone version of Zoho Mail. Calendar on Mobile (iPhone) is in the works and will be available very soon. Stay tuned !

Sathish
Zoho Mobile Team

Hugo Sanchez
October 13th, 2008 | 4:59 am

Very good job!

Two important issues:

1- It seems that filters are not working at all in Zoho Mail.

2- How could I select mails that have only one kind of flag (red, or blue, or green), but not all at the same time?

I am posting the last question to Mail forum.

Thanks

Hugo

October 13th, 2008 | 6:32 am

[...] release last week of a complete e-mail solution—including mobile and offline access via Google Gears (a feature Gmail has yet to [...]

October 13th, 2008 | 1:02 pm

[...] to it (see TechCrunch Releases New Zoho Service: Invoice) the Zoho folks decided to play along and released their own [...]

October 13th, 2008 | 10:57 pm

[...] Zoho mail verlässt prvate-beta Phase und kombiniert die Vorteile von MS Outlook und Google Mail [...]

KSV
October 14th, 2008 | 2:55 am

I have been looking into your site for various services you offer.

I want Writer and all your products go OFF Beta… Soon released with all of the best functionality that all of the best office and productivity suites can offer worldwide.

I wish You can do Off lines with out gears by giving a download or something…… WITHOUT LEAVING NO ROOM FOR SECURITY HOLES.

Willie Welford
October 14th, 2008 | 4:04 am

I’ve been using Zoho Mail for about 2 months now, integrated in Zoho Biz. This is way better than Gmail’s interface with Gdox. Multi user, offline access, online storage,…Keep on the good work!!!

Chuck
October 14th, 2008 | 4:16 am

Why does everyone support the iphone and not the Windows mobile/Blackberry market? There are five times more Windows Mobile/Blackberry users, 10,000,000, out there than there are iphone users. The T-Mobile android sold out of the first 1,500,000 units before they even went on the market!

October 14th, 2008 | 6:56 am

I like the Zoho mail very much. Now please integrate it with ZOHO CRM… Long overdue!

October 14th, 2008 | 6:59 am

Great job Zoho!

I’ve been testing the beta version for quite some time now, but only with one or two mail accounts. This latest announcement is incentive to add my other accounts there as well.

Now, if only we could have fully indexed searched inside of Zoho Projects (forum search especially,) then my online business suite would truly have everything.

Keep up the great work!

Martin
October 14th, 2008 | 7:20 am

Nice work, some of us can no longer bear the thought of email without conversation view.

Once Zoho Mail if FULLY integrated with ZohoCRM it will be the only SaaS CRM with an integrated email module that supports conversation view (don’t even think Salesforce/Gmail, I said “Fully†integrated).

Can’t wait!

M

dougd
October 14th, 2008 | 7:29 am

Where is the mail stored and is it safe? (safe from hackers, safe from the government, etc.)

October 14th, 2008 | 11:47 am

Fantastic application. No more Outlook or Gmail here. A couple of tips that haven’t been documented (or at least I haven’t seen anywhere). Maybe the Zoho team is expecting everybody to figure these out :-)
1. To toggle between Conversation (Gmail style) and serial (Outlook style) click on the Tree view. To toggle from serial style to Conversation, click on the Blue Callout to the left of the Sender.
2. To view the entire email, click on the subject.
3. To import your contacts from a .csv file (i.e. Outlook) you’ll need to concatenate the First and Last Names so that during the Import process both are imported into the Full Name. Use the Concatenate option in Zoho Sheet (or in Excel if you’re still using it).
4. Contact List shows contacts with either First Name or Last Name under the same letter. (better than a rolodex imo).
5. To consolidate all your emails in Zoho Mail, you’ll need to set up forwarding. In Gmail, you do so in Settings -< Forwarding and POP/Imap.

All simple stuff …

Thanks to the Zoho Team!

October 14th, 2008 | 9:26 pm

Zoho mail team is doing a fantastic job. Even before gmail goes offline with Google Gear, Zoho did it.

Offline feature has promote us to switch to zoho mail immediately.

Thanks Zoho.

Sharley
October 15th, 2008 | 11:07 am

I am having problems with my signature showing up in emails sent….I keep trying and it’s not working?????

October 15th, 2008 | 8:57 pm

Zoho mail sounds good ,I will give it a try.I hope it will all work out for me.

October 15th, 2008 | 9:39 pm

Zoho mail team is doing a fantastic job. Even before gmail goes offline with Google Gear, Zoho did it.

Offline feature has promote us to switch to zoho mail immediately.

Thanks & Regards,

Arif Mohammad Chhipa
{System&Networking Engineer}
Bhilwara-311301 (Rajasthan)
Mob.No.-+919414573173

November 4th, 2008 | 5:06 am

I’ve always been a gmail fan, however Zoho sounds like an interesting option.

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