The first time I used Gmail I was hooked. It was quick, clean, and simple, exactly what I wanted from a webmail client. I’d been a Yahoo! mail user for quite a while (as well as Hotmail back before MS ruined it), but I converted over to Gmail as soon as I could. When I signed up for this domain I was still so enamored with Gmail that I went the quick and dirty route and just setup my domain mail to forward to my Gmail account.
Now I can do one step better! Enter Google Apps.
When I first heard about Google Apps, it was a fledgling service that allowed a select few participants to have Google host their email and use Gmail as their webmail client. Since then they’ve opened it up to Enterprises, Small Businesses, Schools, and Families/Groups, as well as adding their other Google functionality: Calendar, Documents & Spreadsheets, Web Pages, and Chat.
The absolutely crazy thing about it all is .. wait for it .. it’s completely free!*
(*Up to 100 users, pay more to be cool and get Enterprise features)
Luckily I don’t have a need for a hundred email accounts, so I get to have my cake and eat it too! Google manages the email for my domain for free, and I get to use my favorite webmail client, Gmail.
Setting it up was pretty easy, just need to do the following:
- Create a Google Apps account for your domain (or buy one during the process if you don’t have one already)
- Add the following CNAME’s to your domain host records:
- mail.[domain.name] –> ghs.google.com
- docs.[domain.name] –> ghs.google.com
- calendar.[domain.name] –> ghs.google.com
- start.[domain.name] –> ghs.google.com
- Then add the following MX records: (be sure to keep the period at the end)
- ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM.
- ALT1.ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM.
- ALT2.ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM.
- ASPMX2.GOOGLEMAIL.COM.
- ASPMX3.GOOGLEMAIL.COM.
- ASPMX4.GOOGLEMAIL.COM.
- ASPMX5.GOOGLEMAIL.COM.
- Now all that’s left is to follow the steps in Google Apps to enable all your services, which should be a cinch now that all your domain host records are already in order.
My experiences so far with Google Apps have been great, but everyone’s different, so YMMV.
0 Responses to “Gmail & Google Apps”