Gmail

Did you know that digital pollution contributes almost (opens in a new window)4% of the world’s global greenhouse emissions – double that of the global aviation industry? At UCD, Gmail and Google Drive account for a significant portion of our digital carbon footprint.

• Don't hesitate to (opens in a new window)delete emails you know will never be needed again, especially those with large attachments.
• You can (opens in a new window)create filters to delete certain email categories, e.g. emails with attachments or over a certain size.
• Archived email is still counted towards your account storage, delete to remove from your account.

Regularly declutter your email inbox by unsubscribing from newsletters and promotional emails you no longer read.

If your unsubscribe request is not effective, you can (opens in a new window)create a filter to automatically delete emails coming from a particular sender - that way, these emails don't even hit your inbox.

Use a received email to create a filter and automatically delete future emails from that sender

Did you know that you can customise your Gmail inbox views? For example, you can display a reading pane, or separate categories of email into different tabs. You may update these at any time. These change the email display in your own inbox and do not change settings for anyone else. 

1. On your computer, go to (opens in a new window)Gmail.
2. At the top right, click the Settings cogwheel icon and the Quick Settings pane will open on the right. 
3. From here, you may customise the mail density, select your inbox type (Default, Important first, Unread first, Starred first, Multiple inboxes or Priority Inbox) and/or display a reading pane.

Learn more in this (opens in a new window)support article from Google Workspace. 

Labels in Gmail are like folders, except you can apply more than one label to emails. You can also search your emails by label.

Use labels to...

• Track the status of people's tasks. For example, create the labels In Progress and Done to indicate emails that you are working on or have completed.
• Organise email by nesting labels like subfolders. For example, create the label Tasks. Under Tasks, create nested labels by person.
• Identify email that needs follow-up.
• Identify email that can be read later.

You can use filters to categorise emails and then apply a label to those categories.

Learn how in this Google Workspace (opens in a new window)support article.

If you have a message that includes information that doesn’t change frequently, you can save the message as a template in Gmail and reuse it. This can be very useful for messages you send often, such as responses with student information or directing people to resources. 

You need to enable this feature in Gmail settings before using it. 

• Learn how to create and use email templates in this Google Workspace (opens in a new window)support article.