Gmail apps: Text your contacts

Google Gmail users now have the option to send text messages to mobile phones. The experimental app, found in Gmail Labs, was made available to all users Thursday night.

The feature is very similar to chat – find your contact (if the mobile number is saved in your contacts list) and the option to send an SMS will be available. The text message will appear on the person’s phone as a number from a 406 area code – which will be associated to your account and the number to which all incoming texts to your Gmail account will be sent. Although free for the Gmailer, mobile plan charges may apply for the person on the other end.

Gmail Labs has recently introduced some interesting apps to heighten the Gmail experience. Google Goggles, the email app to test your frame of mind when sending emails after hours, was introduced earlier this month. Met with mixed reviews when tested on drunk emailing (it seemed almost anyone could get through the simple math questions, no matter how inebriated), the overall concept seemed interesting when used to slow you down (and cool you down) before hitting “send.”

Although a great way to — umm — waste time, Google Apps and Gmail chat are not just for personal use and can actually be useful tools in the office. In an official Google blog post by Matthew Glotzbach, product management director for Google Enterprise, more than 1 million businesses have selected Google Apps to run their business, and tens of millions of people use Gmail every day.

The cloud computing-based system did have a glitch in August, when an outage halted emails for a few hours, but according to Glotzbach, Gmail has a 99.9% reliability score. According to the research firm Radicati Group, companies with on-premises email solutions averaged from 30 to 60 minutes of unscheduled downtime and an additional 36 to 90 minutes of planned downtime per month. With Gmail’s one glitch in the year, it suggests it’s more reliable than other enterprise email solutions like Novell GroupWise and Microsoft Exchange.

It’s all about communication – and it seems Google is making communicating within the workplace easier with creative apps and (fingers crossed!) great reliability.

Interested in more about Google and cloud computing in the midmarket? Watch SearchCIO-Midmarket.com’s recent video interview with Glotzbach.