GmailVault v1.0.5 is released.
This is a minor release, fixing an update issue that some users faced, while attempting to update to v1.0.4.
While GmailVault auto-updates itself, you can also do this manually by going to Settings > Auto updates and click on Check for updates.
GmailVault v1.0.4 is released.
This is a minor release, focused on user convenience.
Along with a couple of enhancements, it updates older MS-Windows installations of GmailVault to start in the background (on user login to the Windows account).
While GmailVault auto-updates itself, you can also do this manually by going to Settings > Auto updates and click on Check for updates.
GmailVault v1.0.3 is released with some important improvements.
1. On MS Windows, GmailVault auto-starts, when a user logs into Windows. Before this release, the browser would open up and display the GmailVault screen. This could get a little annoying, so from this version on, the auto-start of GmailVault happens in the background, without the browser launch. Manually starting GmailVault will launch the browser, and automatically connect to the running instance of GmailVault.
2. There is some enhancement in the handling of Unicode label names.
3. There are significant speed improvements in the downloading and restoring of email.
While GmailVault auto-updates itself, you can also do this manually by going to Settings > Auto updates and click on Check for updates.
Gmail suffered a major outage yesterday. The disruption caused inconvenience to millions of people across the world.
Some of the headlines across the Web said:
You’re Not Crazy: Gmail is Down
Having problems with Gmail today? Don’t worry, it’s not just you
Gmail down: Google confirms Monday disruption
Unfortunately, these things happen.
We like Google, and we like Gmail. But, as is evident, they are not infallible.
The question therefore is: what can a user do minimize disruption in a situation like this?
For communication, a user can have a fallback email service, rely on another Internet channel (Skype, WhatsApp, FB, Twitter, etc.), or simply use another mode, like the good ol’ telephone! Easy.
However, the more challenging issue is having access to relevant data when you need it, a lot of which lies buried in reams of email, in over flowing mail boxes, now unfortunately unreachable for a while. Surmount this challenge with GmailVault!
Don’t procrastinate. Download it now. Start your backup. It’s easy, secure and you’ll sleep better! 
We assume you have downloaded and installed GmailVault for your Operating System. And made the necessary settings in your Gmail account.
For the impatient, the short story
That’s it.
The longer story: step-by-step, with pretty screenshots
GmailVault has been specifically designed to be very easy to use, even by non-techies. In that spirit, this section does a step-by-step walk-through, along with screenshots (click them to enlarge).
First run
GmailVault is a web-application and includes a small, embedded web server. When you run GmailVault for the first time, it brings up your web-browser, which in turn opens a connection to the internal web server. At this point, you may be asked by your computer if you would like to allow GmailVault to accept incoming connections. Please say yes!
Initial settings
The Initial Settings screen is where you configure the port GmailVault listens on and the directory (folder) where the downloaded email will be stored. The defaults are fine for most cases and you can simply accept them.
GmailVault will restart automatically. If it doesn’t, simply start it once again manually.
Gmail credentials
In the next screen enter your Gmail Username and Password. Click Test Connection.
If the connection is successful, press Backup to start your backup.
GmailVault main screen
GmailVault gathers the necessary information from Gmail and begins the backup process.
You can see the folder list appear on the left-hand side.
Click All Mail to see your email (as much as has been downloaded).
This is the main screen and work area for GmailVault. Feel free to explore.
Grab a coffee and relax
At this point, you may wish to grab a coffee (actually any beverage of choice) and relax, or go about your other work.
The initial download can take quite a while, depending upon how much email you have in your Gmail account. In case you need to shutdown half-way, no problems. GmailVault will pick up from where it left off.
Subsequent downloads are incremental in nature and will be much faster.
Now, feel good and secure about having a local backup, with complete offline access
GmailVault on OS X requires Oracle Java SE 6 (either the JDK or the JRE) to be present on your system.
Java may not be installed automatically as part of the OS installation. Sometimes attempting to use a software that needs Java will automatically trigger the download and install.
More information and instructions to install Java on OS X can be found at Apple’s support site: support.apple.com/kb/dl1572
Quite a few of you have asked us for GmailVault on OS X. Here is the first port.
This has been built and run only on Mac OS X 10.7.5, 64-bit. Please let us know about your experiences.
Installing GmailVault on OS X is as simple as downloading a zipped file, uncompressing it in a convenient location, and running a shell script.
We know that this isn’t the regular way to install an application on Mac – we’ll get there sooner or later – but we wanted to make this available at the earliest. GmailVault will store all it’s configuration information in the correct, OS X approved locations. It’s just the install process that’s primitive for now 
So download GmailVault, use it and tell us what you think.
Last week, Google’s services faced a brief, unprecedented outage. An outage lasting between one and five minutes only, but one that reportedly caused Internet traffic to drop by 40% and, possibly cause the company to lose about $500,000 in revenue.
That’s the scale at which Google operates!
From a technology point of view, considering the complexity, service levels and scale of their operations, their recovery time was commendable. No two ways about it.
However, if the outage had lasted longer and if you as a Gmail user had needed to find some old email or attachment, or refer to a past chat conversation, you would be so out of luck.
Unless, of course, you happen to use GmailVault In which case you’d have lightning fast, offline access to all your email, attachments and chats.
Prevention is better than cure. Back up your email.
GmailVault for Linux requires Oracle Java SE 6 (either the JDK or the JRE) to be present on your system.
If not already present, it’s a simple matter to install using your distribution’s package manager. Here we list instructions and pointers for the some distributions.
Ubuntu 12.04, 12.10, 13.04
1. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/java
2. sudo apt-get update
3. sudo apt-get install oracle-java6-installer
If you already have some other version of Java or another JDK (like OpenJDK) already installed on your system, then set the newly downloaded Oracle Java to be the default on the system, with the following command:
4. sudo update-alternatives –config java
CentOS 6.2
Download the JDK or JRE RPMs (current version is JDK 6 Update 45) from the following link (free registration may be needed):
Note: Select the appropriate rpm.bin package (example jdk-6u45-linux-i586-rpm.bin, jre-6u45-linux-i586-rpm.bin, jdk-6u45-linux-x64-rpm.bin or jre-6u45-linux-x64-rpm.bin).
1. Become root: su -
2. sh jdk-6u45-linux-*-rpm.bin
3. alternatives –install /usr/bin/java java /usr/java/jdk1.6.0_45/jre/bin/java 20000
This instruction set will grow over time, so in case you’ve run GmailVault successfully on a Linux distribution not mentioned above, please do share your feedback and instructions for the benefit of other users.
We said this was coming soon. Now it’s here!
With v1.0.2, GmailVault is available on Linux. Currently it’s available for Ubuntu and has been tested on the following distributions:
Ubuntu 12.04, 12.10, 13.04
Releases for other distributions will follow soon.
Running GmailVault for Linux is as simple (and basic ) as downloading a zipped file, uncompressing it somewhere in your home directory, and running a shell script.
