I’m not happy with the changes. The new Gmail gadget now opens within the same window instead of opening a new window (or tab). You can work with e-mails by replying or forwarding, but if you need to click on any web links you have to copy the link and paste it into your address bar. Moving the tabs from the top to the left also has some problems. Google’s blog post describes the move so you can “access to any gadget with one click.” It may be so, but it would have been nice to have some notice of the change.

(left, old design. right, new design. Click for larger versions.)

Don’t get me wrong, I like some of the new apps. The Weather app is particularly nice. However, this design has the feel of being rushed. Maybe it was hurried because of Yahoo’s upcoming redesign?

The hardest part of this process was to figure out how to get my addresses out of Exchange and into the Address Book application on my Mac. When you delete the contact syncing on the phone it removes them from the device, so syncing the contacts from the phone into Address Book was out of the question. There’s no good mass “export from outlook” and “import into Address Book” option either. My solution actually came from Entourage, proving that it is actually good for something. Entourage has the ability to sync with the local iApps, and it worked out really well. As you can see you can sync calendars and notes as well, but I only chose the addresses as I didn’t need notes and my calendar was already synced.

For Calendar syncing, I discovered BusySync. It can sync my Google Calendar with iCal, and include the multiple calendars I subscribe to as well. BusySync costs $25, but is well worth it. Updates to any of the calendars are quick as long as it’s running.

If that were all I needed, then I would be done with the only cost being the $25 for BusySync. However, to sync with my iPhone I had to pay for MobileMe. I got it with my new Mac for $79, and you can get it from Amazon at that same price. MobileMe syncs my local addresses and calendars with their servers as well as between their servers and my iPhone. I was hesitant at first after hearing horror stories when it launched, however I haven’t had a single problem with the syncing. Updates are fairly quick from phone to MobileMe, and from MobileMe to iCal.

It is frustrating to have to use two applications to get all my services synced, but in my opinion it’s worth it. I use Thunderbird, iCal, and Address book on my Mac, Gmail and Google Calendar on the web, or my iPhone when I’m running around and everything is up to date.