
Show HN: Gmelius – No Ads and Better User Interface for Gmail - xpressyoo
http://gmelius.com/?#showHN
======
bausson
TL;DR Selling a product which basically remove ads from another service does
not sit well with me, should be two separates products.

I REALLY hate ads on web-based gmail client, but I suppose they are a
necessary evil.

The an ads-removing feature send the wrong message.

I may buy (or donate for) a gmail-client-enhancer. I may buy (or donate for)
an ad-remover plugin (well, I already use ABP and ghostery, and donated for
the former) But I wouldn't give money for a gmail-specific ad-remover, that
doesn't feel right (even if I am using ABP, maybe the 'specific' part?)

I may be wrong, but distributing it at two separate plug-ins may be better.
Removing the "ad-removing" part would be the easiest way, because interested
people almost all already have ad-blocker.

Even if you chose to let it in, not making it a major marketing point would be
smarter. just let it there as an option (activated by default or not, I don't
know).

PS: Attachment icons would be real nice, though, I love that feature.

PS2: Yes, I know, using ABP and not wanting to pay for that app because of
this feature sounds like hypocrisy, in fact it is, but that's how I thought
about it (I have build-in hypocrisy), and I may not be the only one.

~~~
chmars
You can use Gmail without ads if you pay USD 50/year/user for Google Apps for
Business:

[https://support.google.com/a/answer/60758?hl=en](https://support.google.com/a/answer/60758?hl=en)

~~~
jkrems
Unfortunately those will come at the price that your Google account works
slight differently (in regards to G+, YouTube, Maps, GTalk, Docs, ...). It's
more than just removing ads. Unfortunately. I was very close to moving my
personal Gmail Apps for Business with my domain but decided against because of
all the side effects. I really wish Google would offer a clean "Pay for your
personal Google account". Just no ads anywhere. That's all.

~~~
RankingMember
I think the adoption of something like this would be pretty low, the return on
which may not even cover the outlay on marketing to make it known that a pay-
for-no-ads option exists.

I don't disagree with those of you who were a bit surprised to find this
application blocks all ads indiscriminately. I also find Google's ads to be
the least intrusive on the block. One need only login to Yahoo! Mail to
realize how unobtrusive Google's ads are.

~~~
randuser
Microsoft thinks it's worth $20 for an Ad-free Outlook.com.

[http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/ad-free-
outlook](http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/ad-free-outlook)

------
kyro
I use a native app for my gmail so I'm not the target (although I'd certainly
be interested if I were using the online interface), but here's some feedback
on your homepage:

-Make your headline a different color other than white, because it's very hard to see with that background image.

-It took me scrolling "below the fold" to find out what it is this product does. I'd change your headline to something more concrete, like "Gmail, the way you want it" while also finding a way to move up some of the product-specific content higher up on the page.

-You also have way too much text and the two paragraphs that start with "Gmelius, pronounced 'Gmail'-'jus'..." seem unnecessarily long and distract me from finding out more about your project. I actually read that and just skipped past that whole block of text and later realized I had also overlooked your donation box.

-There's also too much text explaining the features, making those screenshots look tiny in comparison. I think you could just get rid of the descriptive text and keep the feature titles, like "Restore the old compose window" and "Experience Gmail without ads" without losing any of the message.

-Minor point: That red download box should explicitly tell me it's not supported for Safari, if you're detecting my browser. Right now it says "Free Download for Safari" in bold text with "Browser not supported" in a lighter typeface underneath. Like I said, minor, but I found it a bit confusing.

Hope that helps!

~~~
xpressyoo
Thanks a lot for the feedback kyro! Your idea of headline sounds better indeed
:) Regarding the amount of text, you have a point... Will try to prioritize
pictures and key features. Thanks again. Best.

~~~
hanley
Also, a lot of the wording in the feature paragraphs is strange. I'm not sure
if English is your second language or if you're just trying too hard to
explain things. If it's the latter, just keep it simple. For example - "In
Gmail, labels are placed at the very left of emails subjects. _This has for
main consequence to decrease the visibility of the content of your emails._ "
The second sentence there reads like an output from Google Translate.

------
patrickaljord
Kind of ironic that a page that offers to hide adsense on gmail uses adsense
on its own site to support itself. It's almost as if they knew gmail couldn't
exist without adsense and yet still offer their users to hide those ads while
cashing on adsense themselves. Maybe the right word is shameless, not ironic.

~~~
ozh
Ironic or shameless or whatever, this goes against Adsense TOS: you cannot
promote a service of theirs (here: Gmail) and explain how to hack that
service.

I was recently "kindly" asked by Google(had 48 hours to comply) to remove
Adsense from a innocuous post on my blog because said post was just a couple
lines explaining how I used some online service to download a video from
Youtube (which, apparently, hurts their TOS and feelings)

~~~
yelnatz
I don't know if you can compare this to what you did.

This seems more like a client side hiding and moving things around with
CSS/javascript.

~~~
gcb0
And his just like client side moving things from the cache directory to the
download directory...

------
bbx
This is probably a good approach to the permanent "How to fix email" problem.

"Add-on" is the keyword here. Instead of disrupting your workflow by offering
a distinct native app developed from scratch, this simply enhances an already
great experience. I consider Gmail's UI very efficient and actually quite
close to perfection (speed, reliability, labels, filters, multiple inboxes,
keyboard shortcuts...). Gmelius just corrects the small annoyances that remain
or have appeared lately.

This reminds me of a sentence in Dropbox's YC application: _" With Dropbox,
you hit "Save", as you normally would, and everything just works."_ The
worflow isn't altered. It's just better.

Of course, Gmelius is _just_ and add-on, with no clear business model. But
maybe that's all we need after all.

~~~
eloisant
Yes, that's called "writing an email client".

Then, we can find some kind of standard protocol between the client and the
server so you can use your client with any email provider. We could call it...
IMAP!

~~~
herge
IMAP doesn't search as fast and as well as gmail, and probably never will.

~~~
sergiosgc
Why not? If an IMAP client issues a "SEARCH TEXT foobar" command, why
shouldn't Gmail answer as fast and as well as it does online? Nothing in IMAP
precludes good efficient search.

Reference: RFC 1730@6.4.4

~~~
comex
In fact, it probably does. Also, Gmail IMAP has an IMAP extension to allow
using Gmail's full search syntax if desired
([https://developers.google.com/gmail/imap_extensions](https://developers.google.com/gmail/imap_extensions)).

------
shalintj
I've always loved the idea of making Email better vis-a-vis the hyped rants of
replacing Email. Sorry! Email is going no where and neither do existing email
services & mail clients completely suck at managing email. Yes, there are some
gaps in them and that's what we should try to solve. The whole approach of
solving the problems with existing email services & clients vis-a-vis the idea
of completely replacing it.

We built MetisMe around this philosophy of making it very easy to search and
share attachments inside Email. www.metisme.com .

The next thing that we're targeting upon is can we give more context to the
content which is already there inside Email.

------
Surio
Heh, I suppose I was one of the early adopters of this one... IIRC, I have
been using this since 2010 or so. This is one of the first FF addons (along
with Adblock and Stylish) that gets installed on any new FF installation for
me. Wonderful utility, thanks Florian!

I think I emailed him at some point if it would be possible for him to offer
this for Yahoo! Mail as well. Since then, Yahoo have modified their own UX for
the better, but the request to extend this to Yahoo mail still stands from my
end (pretty please, Florian) :-)

------
hengheng
I'm not too familiar with web development, so please forgive my question: Is
this just a style sheet that the browser knows how to apply, or am I giving
you read access to my e-mail?

~~~
onion2k
It's a browser extension - a bit of code that runs some scripts, in this case
modifying the style of the page when you go to a specific domain (gmail).
Extensions are run inside of the security sandbox for that domain with a
higher privilege level than normal webpages - consequently, the extension
_could_ send all your email and activity from other tabs to a 3rd party. The
Gmelius website says they don't though. You could, if you were so inclined,
check the code inside the extension package if you wanted. If it was doing
anything dodgy they'd be found out pretty quickly.

tl;dr Yes, it could read all your email. I doubt it does though.

~~~
tempestn
Even easier than checking the source code, you could use a program like
Fiddler2 to watch the network traffic from your browser, to double-check that
the extension isn't sending home any private data.

------
munimkazia
Just installed it! Really happy with the options page which allows me to
enable and disable only the options I want. For example: I actually prefer the
new email compose for my work inbox, because I usually have to go around
searching and referring to other emails while writing.

Anyway, it is already looking much cleaner and nicer, and I hope it saves some
time and makes my emailing experience more efficient. I'll try it out for a
week or two, and you will hopefully get a small donation from me :)

~~~
xpressyoo
Glad you like it. Do not hesitate to send me any suggestions/ideas via the
support form ! Best.

~~~
curiouscats
I like it too. It is so annoying that companies like Google fail to do this
(give users the popular options you do here). The new compose it horrible,
horrible, horrible. But Google-borg doesn't care - you must submit to their
wishes (you don't want G+ to overtake and break all sorts of your G stuff -
too bad).

Your service proves it isn't difficult not to deny users decent Ux options.

Getting rid of IM is also very nice, I am not really sure what the removing G+
stuff does but I know I don't want any G+ stuff interfering with my email
client, so I clicked that too.

I do agree with those that say the removing ad thing is not good. It seems
fair to me to be stuck with the ads if you use a service that is offered as ad
supported.

I tried paying Google but the process of using their $50 a year option is
horrible. It isn't just pay $50 and ads disappear, it is pay $50 for our
separate app with lots of issues that makes things annoying, breaks, has all
sorts of problems when you want to reverse out. Thankfully I just tested it on
a brand new account for 2 years and could just let the whole mess die an ugly
death. Don't consider it without reading all the horror stories people have
had moving their primary email and then trying to get out of the mess created.

I can see Google making the plugin not work or making it really difficult for
people if they see too much use since ads are removed - though using gmail
with desktop clients doesn't show ads as I understand it so maybe Google will
let it go.

------
mrleinad
If header is removed, you lose the option to Undo after performing some
operation. That should be fixed.

------
vezzy-fnord
Couldn't have this served its purpose as a simple Greasemonkey script?

------
codyZ
This is an excellent service/Chrome extension that I have been proudly been
using for over two years (I think...) I donated then and I will donate now
again. Keep up the great work. It is wonderful.

edit: two years

------
porker
I've been using "Minimalist for Everything" [1] for over a year, which comes
with a great set of rules to clean and customise GMail's interface.

This seems to go further (and allow icons to be customised, which I'd like) -
look forward to trying it!

1\. [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/minimalist-for-
eve...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/minimalist-for-
everything/bmihblnpomgpjkfddepdpdafhhepdbek)

~~~
eitally
I have been, too. One of the things I really like about MInimalist for
Everything ist that I can eliminate the branding from Gmail entirely. We use
it for work on an Apps domain, and when traveling I prefer shoulder gazers not
to see immediately who I work for.

------
lnanek2
Wow, a lot of these are things I would do myself (remove the styled font
garbage, the hidden email addresses, ads, bring back the good compose window,
cleaner print). I have doubts about a browser extension modifying a page
working long term, though. Especially when they remove ads and thus place
themselves as a negative to Google. I'm more tempted to just switch to an
email client.

------
ozh
Old Compose. _OWWWW YEAH_

~~~
josteink
And now you are effectively fighting against the direction which the software
you are using is heading, while the software should actually be supporting
you.

If you weren't already. For me Gmail became a slippery slope of "I don't like
that _either_ " incidents.

When I decided to leave it had become an easy decision to make, and once I
left it honestly made me feel glad.

~~~
paulgb
What do you use now?

~~~
josteink
Fastmail which is _increedibly_ fast and lightweight compared to Gmail. It
feels like going from Hotmail to Gmail all over again, if you're old enough to
remember what that was like.

At home I stick to Thunderbird, which leaves a decent local copy with ability
to connect to CardDAV and CalDAV which I handle via Baikal.

Hopefully Fastmail will live up to their promises about providing CardDAV and
CalDAV themselves, as that would leave me one less thing to worry about.

------
andyhmltn
Looks like a great product!

One annoyance I have with the page itself though: The top three links are
pretty pointless.

Download does nothing unless you scroll down but then that hides the header.

About scrolls down a tiny bit and features just a bit more. The features is
probably the most useful of them all but even then it's cutting it short. Why
not make the header fixed and actually give some point to those links? :)

------
reustle
I feel like I'd install this extension, only for google to break it in a few
days (via code changes or take-down notice)

~~~
wlj
I've been using this for a little over a year now and on the occasions that
changes have caused issues, Florian has fixed them quick enough for there not
to be any real hassle.

Now that it supports the old compose interface too, for me, it's incredibly
useful.

------
Jacqued
Genius ! I ticked nearly all of the options as I had grown to find the Gmail
interface a complete PAIN. Thank you so much

------
dmd
In the settings interface, "Gmelius gives you the possibility to regain some
space and to clean your inbox by removing or disabling:"

... it's not entirely clear in the UI whether checking a box there ENABLES or
DISABLES the feature, because normally

[x] feature means "enable this feature", not "disable this feature"

------
degenerate
"Move attachment icons from the right to the left of your inbox"

\-- sold!!! ... and a bunch of other ones I like too :)

------
k-mcgrady
Really nice. For me the best part was allowing me to turn off all the crap
related to chat. I don't use Google Talk/Hangouts and don't know anyone who
does (might be a regional thing). Being able to hide everything related to
chat and status instantly made Gmail much cleaner.

~~~
eitally
Which region are you in?

~~~
k-mcgrady
Northern Ireland. I've yet to meet anyone using Talk (of course this is just
my personal experience, maybe it's big and just the people I know don't use
it). Most messaging occurs through SMS, Facebook and now 3rd party apps (Viber
is pretty big).

------
ekimekim
I've been using Gmelius for quite a long time now (a year? more?). I couldn't
be happier. Every time I happen to open my gmail in another browser, I'm
shocked at just how weird it looks with all the extra clutter.

Thanks for the awesome work!

------
aetimmes
Gripe: One of the options that I selected reverted Hangouts to the old Google
Chat system without explicitly saying so.

EDIT: It was the Old Compose feature, which admittedly is in beta. Still, I'm
not a fan of losing the group chats I have open.

------
wildermuthn
> To be clear and to the point, Gmelius will never access, read, store, alter
> or transmit your personal data.

I'm a trusting person, so I believe them. But privacy is a big issue these
days. Not sure a one-liner is enough to assuage doubts.

------
__xtrimsky
There are a lot of chrome extensions to improve Gmail UI. Most of them have
the same features as these ones.

I went through your list of features, but didn't find anything I'd really be
interested in. Not for me.

------
sidcool
I understand people's dislike for ads. But how is it possible for Google to
provide a free and robust email service to millions without any revenue model?
I am asking out of sincere curiosity.

------
joeblau
The YouTube video helps explain the product a little bit better.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D44zaBoaKu0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D44zaBoaKu0)

------
erikb
I don't know one person, who is not "happy enough" with Gmail as it is. I
think therefore it would be better if title and starting screen of the website
show what is the problem.

------
snowpalmer
Interesting ideas. Attachment icons seem nice. Other than that though the rest
of the features aren't helpful for me (or at least not enough that I'd want to
install it.)

------
bjourne
I love having the old compose both for writing new mails and replying back.
Thanks! Any chance you could setup a donate option that doesn't involve
paypal? :)

------
revisionzero
Does this not support the latest safari? Looks awesome and would love to try
it but it says it is incompatible with my browser, Safari Version 7.0
(9537.71).

------
kevind23
Is it possible to have the extra half of labels auto-expand, when chat is
hidden? There is a lot of extra space in the sidebar now.

------
xerophtye
Personally i am already very happy with the GMAIL interface. The ads are a
very minor distraction. And none of the features they show have much appeal to
me (except the attachment icon perhaps).

But then again, that's just me.

~~~
ScottWhigham
I don't understand why people take the time to write anti-OP messages in HN
threads. Is HN really a better place if, on every post, someone (or 50 people)
makes a post about how they like the exact opposite of what the OP is about?
It's an opinion - you have one, I have one, but it doesn't always have to be
publicly expressed, does it? The people reading the comments here are probably
doing so because they agree with OP - so why even bother commenting that your
opinion is completely opposite theirs? I genuinely do not understand posts
like this, yet I see them time and time again on HN.

------
prawn
It's like PowerToys for Gmail.

------
pkhamre
Is it compatible with Firefox 24?

~~~
xpressyoo
Yes it is: [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/gmail-ad-
remo...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/gmail-ad-remover/)

------
ehm_may
Cool greasemonkey script, bro

------
jpadkins
I use it. Love it.

------
pvinis
what does the premium offer?

