Google: Leave No E-Mail Behind

Google has added another weapon to its arsenal to help programmers move data from the productivity applications of Microsoft and others.

Launched Nov. 15, the Google Apps Email Migration API is an application programming interface that lets software developers create tools that can move e-mail from any data source to Google Apps Premier, Education or Partner editions.

The new software opens up e-mail migration to the broadest range of possibilities and builds on an e-mail migration tool Google launched June 25 that lets administrators move e-mail from their IMAP mail systems to Google Apps.

"Since then, more than a hundred million messages have been migrated," Google Apps Product Manager Gabe Cohen wrote in a Nov. 15 blog post. "But this solution didnt solve the whole problem. If your existing solution didnt support IMAP, you were out of luck."

The new API solves that problem.

To read more about Google Apps Premier Edition, click here.

Some Google partners have already used the tool, Cohen wrote. For example, LimitNone has built a tool called gMOVE, which moves calendars, e-mail and contacts from Microsoft Outlook into Google Apps.

The e-mail migration API is based on GData, a standard protocol for reading and writing data on the Web based on the Atom 1.0 and RSS 2.0 syndication formats.

The software is also the latest in a series of quick, recent steps designed to improve the experience for users of Google Apps, thus making it a more attractive alternative to Microsoft Office and IBM Lotus Notes applications.

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Googles Postini security unit Nov. 13 introduced new content policy management capabilities to its Email Security service, including protection for Social Security and credit card numbers.

During his keynote at Interop New York Oct. 24, Matt Glotzbach, product management director for Google Enterprise, unveiled IMAP support to let users synchronize their Outlook, Thunderbird and even iPhone e-mail accounts with Google Apps.

On Oct. 12, the search and software maker boosted Gmail storage to 25GB for businesses subscribing to Google Apps Premier Edition.

Consulting services vendor Capgemini is one of the early believers; the company is currently using Google Apps to improve customer service.

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