Google Is Retiring Its Gmail Basic HTML View In January 2024 (bleepingcomputer.com) 79
Bill Toulas writes via Bleeping Computer reports: Google is notifying Gmail users that the webmail's Basic HTML view will be deprecated in January 2024, and users will require modern browsers to continue using the service. After that date, all users of the popular webmail service will automatically be redirected to the more modern Standard view, which supports all the latest usability and security features.
The basic HTML view is a stripped-down version of Gmail that does not offer users chat, spell checking, keyboard shortcuts, adding or importing contacts, setting custom "from" addresses, or using rich text formatting. This feature is designed for people living in areas with internet access, using older hardware with limited memory, or using legacy web browsers that do not support current HTML features.
However, one of the biggest reasons users use HTML view is that text-to-speech tools used by users with visual impairment are more reliable, as the Standard view introduces technical complexities that are harder for these tools to manage. Nonetheless, Google has decided to retire Gmail's HTML view without providing specific reasons.
The basic HTML view is a stripped-down version of Gmail that does not offer users chat, spell checking, keyboard shortcuts, adding or importing contacts, setting custom "from" addresses, or using rich text formatting. This feature is designed for people living in areas with internet access, using older hardware with limited memory, or using legacy web browsers that do not support current HTML features.
However, one of the biggest reasons users use HTML view is that text-to-speech tools used by users with visual impairment are more reliable, as the Standard view introduces technical complexities that are harder for these tools to manage. Nonetheless, Google has decided to retire Gmail's HTML view without providing specific reasons.
The Reason (Score:5, Insightful)
....has decided to retire Gmail's HTML view without providing specific reasons.
Because Fuck You, that's why.
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It certainly helps, though.
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You don't have to be high to be stupid/incompetent.
You do need to be high to think MBAs are wise though. ;)
Re: The Reason (Score:2)
Came to the comments just to see people whining about losinga free service.
FTFY
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Re: The Reason (Score:3, Insightful)
Nonetheless, Google has decided to retire Gmail's HTML view without providing specific reasons.
Uhm, because they are tired of funding it? It's a free product, it's their call. Perhaps if you wanted to pay for it...
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Money, that's why. It *always* comes down to money. It costs them money to maintain it, and they're tired of spending money on a one-off that provides no real benefit to them.
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Because Enshittification Must Go On.
UK disability legislation (Score:3)
It seems that this might fall foul of our disability legislation [pinsentmasons.com].If your website does not meet certain design standards, then you could be sued for discrimination. Does google not care about people with poor eyes ?
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Most blind people don't use tools like JAWS but rather use iOS devices and Voiceover (which is built into iOS). Voiceover generally handles sites written in react with minimal issues when they are viewed with Safari.
Android seems to work for blind people who have a high degree of technical savvy. (Blind programmers I know seem to be about 50/50 iOS vs Android, everyone else is on Apple devices)
It also means that you can test your website for accessibility by simply enabling Voiceover in the accessibility se
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Re: UK disability legislation (Score:5, Insightful)
I cheated, I read the partial to the end:
For people who need accessibility features, Thunderbird is known to work well with the Jaws, NVDA, and Windows Eyes screen readers and offers a range of display and text size adjustment options that enhance usability for people with visual impairments.
As a bonus, those alternatives don't need alive connection to the internet to process email for a screen reader...
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You don't need to have a readable website to meet disability requirements under this law. You need a website that follows the accessibility standards. Can the website be read with screen reading software? Yes? Then they are catering to people with poor eyes.
I'm all for a good scandal but this law is insanely weak when it comes to the internet.
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thank fucking gawd (Score:2, Troll)
thank fucking gawd for this
there has been a rare bug in gmail for years that kept hitting me personally over and over again that would force me into basic HTML view, which is also missing 90% of the gmail functionallity, despite being on a modern desktop using modern browsers. none of the help support "fixes" would work either, such as using the magical "go back to normal view" URL, logout/in, etc. it was annoying as all fucking hell, and it hit my account several times.
GOOD, i'm glad this shit is going awa
Re:thank fucking gawd (Score:4, Interesting)
"missing 90% of gmail functionality"
That's called a feature. gmail turned to AIDS and I've been using the HTML view as I still maintain some old gmail accounts.
Re:thank fucking gawd (Score:4)
So instead of redirecting you to the basic HTML view, it will just error out entirely.
Re: thank fucking gawd (Score:3, Insightful)
I suspect it will advise the user to upgrade from Windows XP and run a current browser.
Is there a reason why these users can't just run a basic imap email client and keep a simple interface?
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Is there a reason why these users can't just run a basic imap email client and keep a simple interface?
THIS! I don't know how/why you got modded off topic.
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Because there are reasons someone couldn't do that. Perhaps their employer's IT won't let them. Perhaps their parents won't let them. Perhaps they use an operating system they don't know how to install such things on, or even what an IMAP email client is.
Linux snobs will, of course, poo-poo such people are meaningless subhumans for not being as Linux literate as themselves, but Linux desktop is such a tiny part of the market that Google doesn't give a damn what their opinion is. They're not contributing a m
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This has nothing to do with Linux, and you obviously don't know what a basic imap email client means.
Some basic imap email clients:
* Mozilla Thunderbird
* Microsoft Outlook
* Apple Mail
* Pine / Alpine
* Mutt
* Opera Mail
* K-9 Mail
* Mailbird
* Elm
* Eudora
There are even web based IMAP clients. Most web based email providers have support for pulling in email from other servers via IMAP.
Not knowing is not a reason someone couldn't do it.
Re: thank fucking gawd (Score:2)
Your problem isn't solved, the standard interface still has the issues you are complaining about, but now there's no Google alternative, you'll just get an error...
Is that really better?
Piss on KISS (Score:1)
I remember when the browser version of MS Outlook first came out, they reinvented their own spell-checking system rather than rely on the browser's built in one. It was slow, clunky, and buggy. It's gradually gotten better, but why do so many wish to reinvent the wheel? Control? Such as sticking ads in the spelling pop-ups? The Suits have to piss on everything.
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Make Joe a bet.
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Oh trust me, the basic HTML version did not in any way save you from being tracked.
Do not care (Score:2)
"Retiring" (Score:1)
Basic HTML Gmail is not going to go live on a farm. Fuck your euphemisms.
You will use bloat and like it! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: You will use bloat and like it! (Score:3)
I doubt any significant percentage of users is still using it. I used to use it when I was on a local WISP in lake county because their service was so very bad. I stopped when I moved to Mendocino and went on exede satellite. On that service if normal Gmail didn't work, the HTML interface didn't work either.
That was a bunch of years ago and Internet access has only gotten better since.
If I'm on a poor connection now, I'll use IMAP. You can configure it not to pull much automatically.
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What a wild conspiracy theory. Google wants you to experience bloat... Because annoyed customers is good for Google... For reasons.
More likely it's just that they don't want to keep maintaining it, for the tiny number of people who use it.
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Does anybody remember when Google's advertisements were plain text?
Did it work really on outdated browsers? (Score:4, Interesting)
Some years ago I tried to log in to my Google account with Konqueror, and Google did not let me, complaining it used an old WebKit.
And they make it suck for 3rd-party clients too (Score:5, Interesting)
Gmail also sucks for thrid-party email clients too. You have to jump through loads of hoops to enable IMAP access and click through multiple warnings which claim that IMAP is "insecure." Then when you finally get it working, Google breaks it every few months and you have to go through a similar process to make it work again.
Gmail has become the poster child for why we shouldn't rely on anything in "the cloud." It's a damn shame because Gmail was their killer app for over a decade.
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Gmail has become the poster child for why we shouldn't rely on anything in "the cloud." It's a damn shame because Gmail was their killer app for over a decade.
Right product, wrong lesson. Gmail is the poster child for why customers who think something should be "free" generally get what they pay for. I have none of the issues you describe with any paid cloud service, including, ironically, Google Workspaces. :-)
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Regardless, though, Gmail still sucks for third-party clients.
Re: And they make it suck for 3rd-party clients to (Score:2)
They are getting rid of one of multiple user interfaces, they are not "killing" Gmail.
Beyond certain blind users with screen reader apps and folks running extremely old browsers or dial-up modems, who really used this basic interface?
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Not all of us are lucky to live somewhere with fast, reliable internet access. There have been plenty of stories right here on Slashdot highlighting this fact.
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You have to jump through loads of hoops to enable IMAP access and click through multiple warnings which claim that IMAP is "insecure." Then when you finally get it working, Google breaks it every few months and you have to go through a similar process to make it work again.
I access it via this method and yes it took a few steps to enable, but no nothing breaks. I've not changed settings or gone through a similar process in about 7 years and it still works just fine. Same with my parents.
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I haven't had to touch IMAP access after setting it up. On the other hand, my *outgoing* mail broke multiple times before finally giving up the ghost; I have to use a third-party SMTP provider now.
Re:And they make it suck for 3rd-party clients too (Score:4, Funny)
I've not changed settings or gone through a similar process in about 7 years and it still works just fine. Same with my parents.
I too find that once you get the settings for your parents right it's best not to mess with them later. With luck the folks will go on for years without needing an upgrade!
That's gonna suck for some people (Score:4, Interesting)
At one of my previous jobs, the office internet connection was incredibly overloaded, to the point that if I attempted to use the standard Gmail interface in one tab, my entire browser session would bog down on every tab, to the point that it was almost entirely unusable. My normal habit is to literally always have Gmail (as well as several other tabs) open... so it took me a while to realize that the cause of the issue was exclusively Gmail. When I did, it was a matter of seconds after that to determine that the solution to my problem was their basic HTML view... apparently because basic doesn't perform the same "always on" constant pings back and forth that the standard interface uses to keep your inbox up-to-date at every moment. Night and day difference, after figuring that out; suddenly all of my problems just completely went away, and all I had to do was give up a few modern features during the workday.
So yeah... thankfully, I no longer work at that office -- but I'd have to imagine that other users of similarly overworked shared network connections aren't going to love seeing basic go away.
Re: That's gonna suck for some people (Score:2)
The answer to that situation isn't using primitive UI to access email...
Re: That's gonna suck for some people (Score:4, Interesting)
The answer to that situation isn't using primitive UI to access email...
It may not be your answer, but it is one potential answer. But to be completely clear: the employer in question maintained an iron fist on their computer base... installing third party software (such as a standalone IMAP or POP3 email client) simply wasn't an option that was available to me. So the options that most people would probably accept as the most obvious and/or best solutions aren't always necessarily available or viable for one reason or another.
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It seems like the better solution would be to upgrade the 28.8k modem.
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It seems like the better solution would be to upgrade the 28.8k modem.
Sarcasm aside: I never had the conversation with the network guys about the real source of the problem, but my suspicion was that it had less to do with bandwidth and more to do with poorly tuned multi-threading settings on the individual workstations. Windows would lock up entirely for minutes at a time, while Gmail tried to do its thing -- but absolutely nothing else I did on that workstation had that same impact on performance; it was literally just Gmail. It was admittedly very odd.
Webmail sucks (Score:4, Interesting)
I do have a gmail email address. I never use the webmail site to read it, though. I use getmail to grab it periodically via cron and put it on my own IMAP server.
It was a little annoying setting up the OAuth2 crap, but in the end I just made getmail pretend to be Thunderbird by pulling out Thunderbird's client ID and secret (which you can grab from the Thunderbird source code [github.com].)
Pain in the ass, but at least I can use my preferred IMAP client to read my Google mail.
Re:Webmail sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
I didn't agree to any ToS for Thunderbird. I visited the GitHub web site and saw the client secrets.
How am I violating Gmail ToS? I have valid OAuth2 credentials and am using them. This is no more a violation that if I downloaded Thunderbird and modified it to pull my mail into my IMAP server, something that is allowed given that Thunderbird is open-source.
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I am not identifying a modified program as Thunderbird. I'm identifying it as mojibake.apps.googleusercontent.com.
Anyway, this is moot because I went back and checked my configuration. It turns out I enabled "less-secure" application passwords and am using that, so as long as Google permits that, I won't need to copy Thunderbird's client ID. I recall now that I had to use Thunderbird's ID for a work gmail setup which didn't allow application passwords, but since I'm now retired, I no longer need that s
Re: Webmail sucks (Score:2)
Why not just use POP client to pull down the emails?
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Why not just use POP client to pull down the emails?
That's what dskoll does with CLI POP/IMAP client getmail. Except gmail makes it very annoying to configure to work, because google does not approve getmail by default. You have to log into the google account, activate developer mode, create a new project to use the G API, activate suitable API for gmail. I followed this tutorial https://shallowsky.com/blog/te... [shallowsky.com] and it seriously took 1 hour clicking around until the project was created. And anyway it was an annoying experience. It seems google does not mind
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Yes, getmail-xmail-xauth-tokens does the refreshing for you automatically.
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Can you describe the advantages over forwarding from Gmail? I use the later since it does not require any external cron job.
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I guess forwarding would work too. I just had this set up and working, so I left it alone.
Raw Email & Header data (Score:4, Insightful)
people living in areas with internet access (Score:2)
This feature is designed for people living in areas with internet access
Methinks people living in areas without internet access do not use gmail that much.
IMAP mail clients (Score:2)
Last I checked , google supports IMAP very well. And last I heard/read about it, many email clients work very well with asistive devices for the blind. Heck! Some email clients are actually designed for that precise use case... so, except for very narrow cases (like a blind person going to a blind friend's house where all is set up except the mail client) I fail to grasp how this affects blind people
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Except security nonsense makes it break. As long as gmail will forward mail to a reasonable place for me, I don't care what their pos iu is on the web.
Mobile (Score:1)