HC Google Tips

Here you will find Google tips that have been shared at faculty meetings or just questions people have asked, or tips people have suggested as useful for others.

Let Gary know if you have one to suggest.

Some of these might only work when using Chrome as your browser, not Firefox or Safari or ....

General Google Tips

1. One of the ways to add a Gmail or Calendar icons/link to your bottom task bar row

2. The Remove Formatting button can save you tons of time when copying / pasting text.

3. Five tips on how using G Suite can help with meetings

4. If you are leaving employment at HC, your Google account will stay active thru the next semester after the semester during which you left. For info on migrating info from your HC Google account to a personal Google account, check this out.

Gmail

1. Read Receipt function. If the person you are sending an email to is inside the HC domain and if they are using a Gmail or a Google app to read the the email, you can ask for a "read receipt" to get notified that they have read (well, at least opened) the email. But if those two "if"s don't apply and you really want to know, you can do this longer process to get read receipts

2. Using Gmail Groups and how to make your Groups tool work like they way they did, before they "upgraded" it.

3. Using labels as folders for your email. With Google's great search tools in Gmail, its not as critical to be organized, but it never hurts.

4. "Canned response" having different canned responses are great to use as the basis for email content you send often

5. "Undo Send" How many times have you sent an email and then said "Wait, I forgot..." and want to add something or change something?

6. When you reply to an email, if you want to edit the subject line or add your comments in between their original email

7. To change the default size of window when composing an email message and also how to request notification if the user (inside the HC gmail system) has opened your email

8. Two ways to either mark emails as important, or to keep them open in front of you

9. Adding a signature to Gmail

10. Google's name is synonymous with searching, so learn how to conquer your Inbox with Gmail Advanced Search Operators

11. Limiting email distractions

12. How to set your "out of office/vacation" auto reply

Calendar

1. Marking your calendar so that it really shows you are busy all day.

2. Do you have some of your calendars not showing up on your iPhone or iPad. Try this.

3. At the Nov 2016 Google Lunch, Heidi H showed how the Writing Fellows use the Appointment Slots feature in calendar to have students schedule appointments. Here is Google's text tutorial and here is a video one.

4. Calendar Reminders are notes to yourself that carry over to the next day until you mark them as done, and unlike using a "Event" to remind you to do something, Reminders don't show that you are busy at that time.

5. Adding attachments to a calendar event so everyone has the same info needed for the event/meeting.

6. When you create an event, you can add guests and then by the "find a time" or "suggested times" it will give you possible time options. That is if people are putting their schedules in Google Calendar.

7. Note: when you save the event, it will tentatively put it on their calendar so they will see it.

Google Docs/Drive Tips

1. April 2018 Google Tips on: activity dashboard, voice typing and columns and grids

2. When using Google forms to get survey info, don't put the questions inside the email. It works fine for users accessing via a web browser, but not good at all for those accessing their email via their phone

3. You can search inside just a specific Google Drive folder

4. To transfer your HC Google files to another Google drive

5. Should I use Microsoft Office or Google's products?

6. Using Microsoft Office docs in Google drive or the topic of working on joint documents with others

7. Sharing a Google doc or folder

8. If you would like a Google "Team Drive" created for your department or committee, contact Gary O.

9. Sharing a folder so your students can put their document or videos in the folder for you and others to see

10. Doing a "Shift Alt 5) allows you to put a strikethru through the text, but you might want to also checkout the "suggested edits" tool, similar to Word's "track changes". Good for those collaborating on a document or writing instructors and their students.

11. Google Doc can automatically insert the citation according to the style you want ( MLA or APA, or Chicago)

12. Switching from Dropbox to Drive

1. Googles instructions on how to Create a survey using Google Forms

2. Print and video tutorials on Google forms for teachers

3. Five Great Add-ons for Google Forms (Oct 2017)

4. List of educational uses of forms