Blocking Gmail ads with CustomizeGoogle

As some of you might have noticed, CustomizeGoogle has been updated a lot recently. The reason is that when Google update their source code - sometimes CustomizeGoogle needs to be updated as well.

The last three CustomizeGoogle updates has been focused at blocking Gmail ads. I've been trying to remove the ads for a while, with different results for different users. A lot of CustomizeGoogle users has reported that Gmail ads are still visible. So my guess is that this is a popular CustomizeGoogle feature.

As a result, I've now released CustomizeGoogle 0.44 that should remove all Gmail ads/related pages. I hope that this update will work for everyone and that Gmail doesn't change their code in a while.

In any case, I'll try to keep up with future Google updates!

Gmail's new chat feature doesn't work with https

A popular CustomizeGoogle feature is the ability to ensure that Gmail uses a secure connection by redirecting http://gmail.google.com/ to https://gmail.google.com/.

If you have enabled this option (CustomizeGoogle > Gmail > Secure) you might have noticed that the new Gmail chat feature will not work.

From the Gmail help center:

Make sure you're using http:// when you log in -- chat in Gmail doesn't work in https:// quite yet, but it will soon.

In other words: If you want to use the Gmail chat feature you need to uncheck the Secure Gmail option in CustomizeGoogle.