Google giveth, Google taketh away
Google has given Gmail a few updates over the last few days, adding a new People widget, giving improved contact interaction, while at the same time disabling support for Google Gears-based offline mode in its Chrome browser.
This disabled support is part of Google's move to deprecate Gears; in place of that proprietary system, Google will be implementing the offline storage methods defined in the HTML5 spec, which the latest versions of Chrome, Internet Explorer and Firefox all implement.
On the additive list of Gmail changes, the People widget delivers a tighter integration between the email and contact data which Gmail stores. Placed to the right of the email box, the widget flags contextually sensitive information related to the contact, senders and recipients of open messages.
The widget aims to give quick access to previous conversations, both via email of Google chat, shared calendar entries, and other information that Google has access to, relevant to your emails, making it quicker and easier to communicate with your contacts. Along with such features as Priority Inbox, it's another step toward making Gmail one of the best, if not the best, email solutions around.
