Google__ The Missing Manual - Kevin Purdy [39]
Tags me in a photo. It’s usually fine to keep this setting on because, even though only people in your circles can tag you in photos without your explicit approval, it’s nice to see pictures that people post of you.
Tags one of my photos. This is another one you’ll want to keep turned on so you can make sure the tagger got the right person and isn’t playing a mean joke. (Tagging Photos explains how to tag other people’s photos.)
Comments on a photo after I comment on it. Like the “Comments on a post after I comment on it” setting, these notifications can quickly get annoying if you comment on a popular photo. If someone really wants you to see their comment, they can mention you (Mentioning People in Posts), so you can probably turn this setting off.
Comments on a photo I am tagged in. Keep this turned on so you see both the funny and snarky responses to photos you’re in so you can do damage control, if necessary.
Comments on a photo I tagged. Like the previous setting, you’ll probably want to keep this one turned on.
Messenger. Messenger is a tool available through the Google+ app for cellphones and mobile devices (see Chapter 8). It gives people a way to quickly send notes to each other that’s much more convenient (and less awkward) than a chain of reply-all emails. You can read more about how Messenger works in Chapter 8 (Starting a Messenger Session (Apps Only)). There’s only one Messenger-related setting:
Starts a conversation with me. The Phone checkbox for this setting is turned on automatically, and you can’t turn it off because that’s how Messenger works: via your cellphone. You’ll probably want to keep the Email checkbox for this setting turned on, too, so you don’t miss any messages because you don’t have your phone handy. If you start getting intrusive Messenger requests from people you don’t know, there’s a separate setting to limit who can send those; flip to Starting a Messenger Session (Apps Only) for details.
NOTE
If you’ve created a Google+ Page for a brand, business, or other organization, you’ll also see a fifth category: “Communications about Pages.” You can find more info about Pages on this book’s Missing CD page at www.missingmanuals.com/cds.
Making Notifications Less Intrusive
SO FAR, YOU’VE LEARNED how to control whose actions result in notifications and how to turn on or off most of the notifications you can get by email or on your phone. But some notifications, like the ones you get when people add you to circles, will always show up in your Google+ notifications stream and in the little red box in the Google toolbar described on The Notifications Panel. And sometimes it just happens to rain activity on Google+, and your inbox, phone, or any web browser open to a Google-related page will keep making noise, vibrating, or displaying new red numbers, again and again. Here’s a few tricks you can try to limit the cacophony.
Filtering Email Notifications
Most email programs can filter incoming messages based on who they’re from. In desktop email programs like Microsoft Outlook and Apple’s Mail, you use rules to tell the program to put messages from a certain address into a particular folder. If you use a web-based email system like Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or Hotmail, you can use filters to send messages to a certain folder or, in Gmail, assign the message a label. (The exact details of setting up rules or filters depends on your email program; if you have trouble, the program’s help files can guide you.)
Using rules or filters, you can keep Google+ notifications out of your inbox, but still keep ’em around so you can check them at your convenience. Google+ notifications all come from different addresses (they start with “noreply-” followed