Blackberries are nice, no great, in fact it seems like everybody has one these days right?
One of the nice features that comes along with the blackberry is the push email comes along with it. You get an email address like [email protected] when you subscribe to the pda plan with ATT. This is fine, but what if you do not want to tell all of your contacts of your new email address? That could be a real hassle.
Instead how about setting up gmail on your Blackberry and making it so that it acts the same as the push email that comes along with it.
Setting up Gmail
One of the faster ways to use Gmail on your Blackberry is with the installable Gmail application. I will explain the fastest way later on in this post using a sort of gmail “push”.
To download this free app, visit http://m.google.com/mail from your Blackberry web browser.
Then, launch the application with the red “M” icon from your Blackberry home screen or from the applications folder.
If you also have a personal username@gmail.com account, you can add it to this application so you can access both Gmail and Google Apps email accounts from the same place.
Hotmail and forwarding.
Ok so you havea hotmail account and want to get your emails on your blackberry, well its not super simple because Microsoft makes you pay for IMAP/POP access. I suggest just getting a gmail account then forward your hotmail to that then your gmail to your blackberry. To do this, once you have a gmail account setup, just login to your hotmail account and look for Options > Forward mail to another e-mail account then enter your gmail email address.
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NOW IF YOU WANT EVEN MORE FUNCTIONALITY…
To get that “push email” type feeling with gmail, like your blackberry.net email address gives you, first go here https://bis.na.blackberry.com/html?brand=mycingular&locale=en
Log in with your blackberry username and password or create a new account.
Once you are in, you will see your valid blackberry email account. Choose Edit, the REPLY TO will be your gmail account.
Now log into your gmail account.
Click on settings, then Forwarding and POP/IMAP
Enable pop and imap if they are not already. ITS FREE WITH GMAIL !!!
Choose to Forward a copy of incoming mail to yourusername@att.blackberry.net and leave a copy in gmails inbox
Thats it – done.
What this simply does is allows you to get your gmail emails as soon as someone sends them to you and you will not have to constantly log into gmail from your mobile to check.
The emails will be essentially pushed to your mobile like the emails that are sent to yourusernam[email protected] already do.
In even simpler terms. When someone emails you at your gmail address, it will get forwarded to your blackberry address which is pushed to your blackberry mobile instantly. Then when you reply, the user will see that it came from gmail and when they reply you will get it instantly.
I recommend users to never use hotmail as they do not allow unlimited space (gmail space grows daily), you have to sign in at least once every 120 days so that your account doesn’t get deleted, and no pop3 access. In general they just suck.
Setting up Yahoo
Yahoo! Mail is one of the most popular solutions for web based email. It’s easy to see why, it’s got a decent spam filter, lots of storage space, and it’s been around forever. But to get access to POP and forwarding, you need to upgrade to Yahoo Plus, currently about $20 a year.
Fortunately, there’s a way to get your Yahoo email on your Blackberry without upgrading to Yahoo Plus. And if you’ve upgraded to BlackBerry Internet Service 2.0, it’s extremely easy to set up. Now you can get your Yahoo Mail sent directly to your Blackberry from your free account.
Once you have upgraded to BIS 2.0, you can link to your free Yahoo Mail account either by using the BlackBerry device or by using the web page for your BIS.
From your BlackBerry, there should be an icon called “Personal Email SetUp”. Launch that application and a web page will appear where you can log in to your BIS account. If you don’t have an account yet, you can create one right from your Blackberry.
Once you have logged in, select the E-mail Accounts link. This will take you to a list of your existing accounts. Click the link to add a new account, and then enter in your Yahoo Mail email address and password.
If successful, when you navigate back to your home screen, a new icon will appear for each email account that you set up. Congratulations, you have now linked your free Yahoo Mail account with your BlackBerry! This same process can also be used for Gmail accounts as well, but the gmail app is nicer.
There is some sort of yahoo app available, but I have no experience with it.
http://mobile.yahoo.com/bb/mail/get
Other nice things to install while we are at it are:
Google Talk
There’s a handy Google Talk application that lets you see who’s online and instant message with contacts from your BlackBerry.
To download and install Google Talk for free, visit http://www.blackberry.com/GoogleTalk from your BlackBerry web browser.
Then, launch the application with the Google Talk icon () from your BlackBerry home screen or from the applications folder.
Google Calendar
You can sync information in Google Calendar with your BlackBerry calendar, so whether you add new appointments from your phone or from your computer, you always have access to your up-to-date schedule.
To download and install Google Sync for free, visit http://m.google.com/sync from your BlackBerry web browser.
Google Docs
To access your documents and spreadsheets when you’re not at a computer, you can sign in to Google Docs from your BlackBerry web browser.
Just visit docs.google.com/a/your-domain.com , but remember to replace “your-domain.com” in this address with your actual domain name.
Hope this article was informative to the many blackberry users out there worldwide.
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