Terminal Diary | techblog: gmail

16 May, 2011

Download your gmail inbox to harddisk for offline usage in Ubuntu

I don't know when i have started using gmail. But now, i am wondering why it doesn't makes me bored eventhough i am watching the same appearence and 'looks of gmail' for more than five years. Gmail is something more than the 'appearences' since it provides a secure and fully fledged mechanism to communicate your personal and business affairs. That may be the reason why i haven't googled for something like 'best online email service' for those past years where i experienced the power of Gmail.

Here i am introducing an application named 'Gmail Backup' that helps you to download and back up all your mails from the Gmail inbox to your computer's hard disk. The collection of mails that you backed up can be viewed and read offline with the help of some text editors, browsers or email applications such as thunderbird without going online...

Setup and Installation

Since the Gmail Backup is a python based application you may need some additional python libraries for running the gui. So first install the latest version of wxPython on your ubuntu box with the help of Synaptic package manager or apt. The installation with apt pacakge manager using terminal is given below.

# First import the key into your apt's list of trusted keys (we both hate warnings !! and this is how we remove the warnings about the digital signature)

$ curl http://apt.wxwidgets.org/key.asc | sudo apt-key add -

# Add the following lines to your /etc/apt/sources.list file. Change 'natty' to the suitable one if you are using an ubuntu distribution other than Natty narwhal.

#wxWidgets/wxPython repository at apt.wxwidgets.org
deb http://apt.wxwidgets.org/ natty-wx main
deb-src http://apt.wxwidgets.org/ natty-wx main

# Run the this command to update your local copy of the packages meta-data.

$ sudo apt-get update

# Now install the wxPython packages using the following commands.

$ sudo apt-get install python-wxgtk2.8 python-wxtools wx2.8-i18n libwxgtk2.8-dev libgtk2.0-dev

The packages libwxgtk2.8-dev and libgtk2.0-dev may need to be installed if a 3rd party application requires wxWidgets when building from source.

# Inorder to access the gmail with such an application you need to enable the IMAP option on the gmail settings. Go to your gmail inbox with your browser. Navigate to the Forwarding and POP/IMAP section on the gmail settings page to enable the IMAP as shown in the figure.

Now download the gmail Backup application from the link here. Extract the zipped file. Using your terminal navigate to the location of the zipped file.

# Use the ls command to list all the files

$ ls -l *.sh

# Run the file named gmail-backup-gui.sh to start the gui interface of the Gmail Backup application shown below.

$ ./gmail-backup-gui.sh

# Enter the required information and press the backup button to start downloading the mails. You can view the mails with the help of a browser/text editor/email application[kmail,mozilla thunderbird]. All the mails are stored in the specified folder seperately as eml files.

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14 May, 2011

Does your Gmail account hacked yesterday ??? who knows

You knows !!! Gmail is considered as one among the best email services today, so people are using it for both business and personnel usage. Then comes the issue of security that protects the mails in your inbox. Make sure that your gmail account is safe and open to you only. Google offers activity information mechanism for finding weather your gmail account is hacked or not. Its simple.., you don't need to be a geek. This post will help you to identify weather someone else is accessing your inbox.

Navigate to the bottom side of the gmail inbox. I just pinned the snapshot of mine here. Check for the line starting with the sentence 'Last account activity : x hours ago at IP x.x.x.x'. There you can find a link labeled 'Details'. Click their to see the log information on your gmail inbox and make sure that you are the only one used that account.

Make sure that the IP addresses listed are the same ones that you used. Check the country, date, time and access type also, and identify weather it matches with your usage. Once i have seen a log from a different ip address on my gmail's log. It appeared to be one from Aisanet's network. (That was a my first experience of being hacked). Later i found it was not an accidental one. This unwanted access was from an internet cafe once i used 2-3 days before the hazard, and what really happened was i really forgot to logout from my gmail account when i quit the cafe. If you feels the same, then understand this is the right time to change your google account's password. Do it now itself, else you may be the next victim. Changing the passwords frequently is always refered as the best methode to escape from hacks and unwanted access to your personals kept on internet...

Finding ip adress of your machine

If you dont want to go technical just visit the website tracemyip to know your ip address and related details.

If you are a unix guy, use the ifconfig command on the terminal to know your ip. The field shown as 'inet addr' corresponding to your mode of connection (eth, wlan, ppp) is the ip.

and, If you are windows guy, use the dos command ipconfig in the command prompt window to view your ip.

Note :

Ip address may not be the same for every time you connects, if you are not using a static connection..

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05 June, 2010

How to setup your mobile phone to recieve email alerts (for Nokia)

You can read or write emails from your mobile phone without any phone browsers (wap/web) by following this post. All the gprs enabled mobile handsets of Nokia comes up with an email client which is similar to outlook express or evolution or thunderbird but with basic inbox features such as sending and receiving only. Inorder to get this client working properly you should have a gprs /edge connection to get connected to the pop server.

I started setting up my email client of Nokia 5200, which is a java based mobile phone. This tip is possible in almost all the java phones. The email client in this phone has 3 custom folders, an archive folder and a junk folder..

Activating the email account

1. From the Menu select the Messaging option. Scroll down the list to find the E-mail option.

2. Select the new account option to start. Then the phone will ask for email service that you have. Multiple accounts are possible. Let select the gmail now. Enter your account details in the text boxes. Dont append the @gmail at the end of the username.

3. On the next window you have to enter the incoming and outgoing sever information...

Incoming server

servertype: POP

servername: pop.gmail.com

incoming username: your_username@gmail.com

Outgoing serever

servername: smtp.gmail.com

username & password : select the option 'same as the incoming '

4. On the next window the phone will ask for retrieval settings. On the secure login option check the radio of 'automatic option'. This will prompt for the password when start retrieving the emails. Click on the OK button to complete the current step.

5. You can add the signature portion to each of the email by clicking the optional advanced setting. Press OK to complete the settings and to start receiving email on your phone without any wap/web browsers.

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03 June, 2010

How to add Twitter and Facebook gadgets to gmail inbox

This is simple technic lets you to add both the facebook and twitter gadget to the left side of your gmail inbox. You can see the tweets, direct messages and perform all the twitter activities from within your gmail account. The case is same for the facebook also...