gmail issues

I use gmail and its changing and I want to make more useable, but I am lost about how to do some functions,I'd appreciate some help

1 The color of NEW mails(unread) is the same as old(read) mail, so I have to look at the date or just click to make sure I've read it before. what did I do?

2 on the left side, my options, keep changing, evidently my CONTACT LIST/chat list moves over my options, is there a way to just make this go away? I dont chat much on gmail and def don't need to have to put my curosor over the list, to make it go away so I can access a option thats hidden under it

3 is there a way to make the screen/email biggger so when I write an email, Im not writing it in a small box the size of deck of cards?

4 search? I swear the search options used to be more helpful, If I want to find all emails by OBMAMA that contain the term $17trillion, how can I do that without having all emails that have one of those terms appear? I only want the emails sent from OBMAMA that contain "17trillion"

I might have more later....thanks for the help, this is not at all obvious to me

 

oh, great!
instead of a box with labels to fill out
from
keywords
date
you have to use code ie hacker type code...IE the reason I dont use DOS
http://support.google.com/mail/answer/7190?hl=en

why is it like this? why not have a box to search like they used to have?
I remember 7-8 yrs ago, AOL had the ability to search ALL aol user profiles, so I could find other people in my city who went to my school who had aol, etc
then they changed it and you couldnt do that, and I stopped using aol

you cant even search for people with similar keywords via facebook, much less Instant message them,
man, I'd pay for that.

 

I don't get this. Read and unread messages are not the same color on my gmail messages. Surely, they haven't done away with this feature. Perhaps you need to adjust brightness or contrast on your screen.

Chat can be turned off. See https://support.google.com/chat/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=161823

Yes. Visit https://support.google.com/mail/answer/2645922?p=newcompose&hl=en&rd=1 and scroll down to Window Size.

The search box you see at the top of your gmail screen only searches your email messages; it does not search the Internet.

 

Yes, but if I want to search for emails from obmama containing the phrase "trillion", in stead of filling out a search form that asks FROM and CONTAINS THE PHRASE,I need to write code in the form of: "Trillon" Frombmama
I think that's right, I'm wondering why they did away with their advanced search form?
why make it hard?

 

Huh??? You do not need to "write code in the form of: "Trillon" Frombmama". The FROM and CONTAINS THE PHRASE boxes are available by clicking the small downward-pointing arrow at the right end of the search box.

They haven't. See above comment.

 

THANKS!
I didnt know that was there!
now, how how do i make unread emails a different color than the read ones?
I was able to have them on top, but I cant figure how to change the color?

 

They are a different color. I must say that if you see no difference, then you have a vision issue, not a gmail issue. I don't know what else to conclude since gmail features no setting to turn off the normal differentiation in read vs. unread. You could access the Themes panel and select the High Contrast theme to see whether it makes the difference noticeable for you.

 

yes, the color shades of READ VS UNREAD are not the same. however, I am attempting to make their difference much more blatant.
I have tried out several "themes" and then played with several settings to get the difference biggest, but I cannot find anything that makes it obvious, like

GMAIL
UNREAD
UNREAD
UNREAD
UNREAD
READ
READ
READ
READ
READ

actually, I'm going to try this, so I might have questions later
http://lifehacker.com/5972519/creat...hat-forces-you-to-take-action-on-each-message

 

If I had to write a post on this site in a small box that was 2inches by 8 inchesm, I wouldnt post much/anything
so why is my email,(gmaiL) force me to write emails in small little boxes?
do I have it set up wrong?

http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z271/watchntv/majorgeeks_zpsd6068e62.jpg

 

Your email setup is completely normal and there is not a great deal about it that you can change. The box is the right size and it will expand as you enter information. Even if your email was five pages long you would still be able to enter it in the space provided.

Methinks you are creating issues that don't exist!

 

not really
why is the screen here so big?
why isnt the screen here the same size at in gmail? It's because having a screen that is so small isnt fun to write in,

they have a new layout and it asks at the top of the email to try the new layout
then in the new layout, you can make the screen as big as page

ok nevermind!

 

If you want to try the Gmail Basic HTML go to
https://mail.google.com/?ui=html

When you Compose in Basic HTML you can click on the bottom right corner of the compose box and drag the corner to make the box bigger. But, this is not a permanent change and it will go back to default size next time you open Compose.

If you prefer Basic HTML then click on Set basic HTML as default view at the top of the page and don't click on Standard View in the future

 

The gmail composition panel is the size it is because Google designed that way. That's all there is to it. By the way, the message composition panel here in the forum is rather small too. But, once your message becomes larger than what can be displayed at one time in the box, a scrollbar appears at right side and you can continue writing your message. So, this is really no different than composing in gmail.

But, keep in mind the gmail panel you're complaining about is Google's current default email composition panel. If you hover your mouse over the small drop arrow at the lower right corner of the panel, you should see "More options" appear in a tip box. If you click on it, you'll see a menu with an option to "Temporarily switch back to old compose". If you choose that, you'll have a much larger panel in which to compose your message.

Edit: Oh, there is one other option to alter the size of the panel. At the upper right of the default panel, you see an arrow pointing diagonally up and to the right. If you hover over it, it says "Pop-out". If you click it, you'll have a larger panel.

 

You can always use a alternative program to load up google mail emails. I currently use Opera browser with it's built in mail client to control google emails.

 

Yes, but he needs to know that he would have to enable POP or IMAP in his gmail settings. Then, any email client (Opera Mail, Thunderbird, MS Outlook, etc.) can be used for gmail.