Gmail and Google Calendar FAQs

Consult IT's Google Workspace Knowledgebase for instructions, submit an IT Help Ticket, or stop by the eLearning desk in the Learning Commons if you need help.

Unlike Outlook, when you create an all day event in your Google calendar, it is not visually apparent during the working hours displayed (but is visible as a bar above the working day). Check out this link to set an out of office event on Google calendar that populates the whole day.

Although your Outlook contacts converted, any lists you may have previously created did not. To create a list in Gmail, go to Google Contacts. This can be easily accessed from Gmail using the Google Apps menu at the top right.

From Directory

To create a list of LCC employees, select "Directory" from the navigation on the left side of your screen. In the search bar at the top of the screen, find one of the names you want on the list. Be sure to select the "@lowercolumbia.edu" version of the email. Select "+ Label" or "+ Create label" if you already have at least one label in place. Create or select the label you want, then click "apply." Repeat for additional entries.

Once you've created a label for someone, you can add more by clicking on the icon that looks like a pencil.

Pro tip: if you can't seem to get past the "@lcc.ctc.edu" directory listing for someone, edit the contact, change the email address to "@lowercolumbia.edu" and then use the "merge and fix" function to get rid of the duplicate entry.

From CSV

1. Create multiple contacts using the Create Contact -> Create multiple contacts button.
   
2. You can type in the names and email addresses of your contacts here (separated by commas), but it may be easier to import them from a .csv file. To do so:
   1. Create an Excel sheet with two columns, labelled: Name and Email
   2. Add all of your contacts' information for this group to the columns.
   3. Save the document as a CSV.
   4. Return to the Create Multiple Contacts dialog in Google Contacts, and click the "Import Contacts" link.
   5. Click the select file button and choose the CSV you created in step 3.1.
   6. Once the file is uploaded, create a label for this contact group.
   7. Click Import.
3. If you entered the contact info manually instead of importing from a .csv, make sure to add a label before creating the group.
4. If you didn't label your group, there will be a new label in the left sidebar of Google Contacts titled "Imported on (date)". Rename this label.
   
5. Now, when you create an email, you can add this label to the "To:" field to include the whole group in the message.

If you leave conversation threads on in Gmail, you may delete the entire thread if you delete any email within the thread. To turn this function off, click on the gear shift icon near the top right on your screen and scroll to the bottom of the "Quick Settings" menu. Uncheck the box that says "Conversation view" under "Email threading."

Institutional distribution lists are called "Groups" in Gmail. You can access groups through the "waffle" (nine dot) icon near the top right on your Gmail screen. The display defaults to "My Groups" but you can also click on "All Groups" if you don't see what you're looking for. 

To reverse the order of messages in a conversation thread so you're seeing the most recent information at the top, 

New labels don't automatically appear in _Inbox, which was a mechanism IT used for the transition from Outlook. If you want your new label to appear there, be sure to designate _Inbox as the "parent" under the "nest label under" option when you create the label. If you already created the label and can't find it, look for it under the "more" category at the very bottom of your label list on the left, click on the three vertical dots to the right of the label, then select "edit." Check the "nest label under" box and select _Inbox then hit save.

"Folders" in Outlook are represented as "Labels" in Gmail. Not all Outlook "folders" were converted accurately to "labels" in Gmail. If you need to find a particular email, try looking in your "All Mail" folder first. To find "All Mail" click on the down arrow next to "More" under your "Drafts" folder and search for what you need. You can also scroll beyond all the labels in your "_Inbox" section and look for your xxxx@lcc.ctc.edu files, and your "Inbox" files below that. For many employees, there are three versions of your Outlook emails and you will need to do some reorganization if you want to get it down to just one copy of everything.

If you don’t see all the emails that you think you should in your inbox, Gmail may have organized older messages into another folder.

1. In the mailboxes sidebar, select “More” and then select “All Mail”.
   
   

   
2. In the top right corner of the window, there should be pagination arrows that will allow you to view older messages.
   

Check out this GMail Help Forum on how to delete outdated emails that are saved and auto-filling.