Combined Exchange/Gmail solution

[devonair]

I read an earlier forum post (possibly not here -- I forget where) about someone who had setup their iPhone with 2 email accounts: a Gmail using IMAP, and a MobileMe account. The Gmail was forwarding to his MobileMe so that he would get push notifications, but his reply-address was his Gmail account -- so recipients would just see the Gmail address and continue writing to it. He only used the Gmail IMAP to search through older messages/threads.

I like this idea, as it is similar to what I do on my current WinMo device. My only difference is that I'm using a free Mail2Web account over Activesync (but also with my sent-from address set to my gmail account). I have almost the same result, but without having to pay for MobileMe. I'm strongly considering ditching my WinMo device for an iPhone, but am wondering if this solution would work. In other words, an Exchange account setup on the iPhone w/my Gmail as a reply-to/sent-from (is that option even in the iPhone's mail.app?)...

Anyone try this yet?

 

[Wyatt]

You have to redirect your Mail2Web email to Gmail for that if Mail2Web has that functionality.

 

[devonair]

@Wyatt ...haha, forgive me, but you lost me there...

With a paid account, Mail2Web does allow you to setup a custom smtp server on their end -- that way people don't really see your Mail2Web address and get confused. But what some mail2web users (using WinMo at least) discovered was that you could just change your "sent from" address in your Activesync settings on the actual device. The result was the same: the mail recipient that you are sending to sees the message as coming from Gmail, and not from Mail2Web (the preferred outcome, in this case).

My question is this: in the Activesync settings on an iPhone, is there a field or option to specify a different sent-from or reply-to email address? There is in Windows Mobile, and I would guess (am hoping? haha) that the same would be true of any Activesync client (including the iPhone's). If so, this would pretty much solve the biggest obstacle keeping me from switching over... as I could use the iPhone to work with my email in the same way I've been using my WinMo Treo for 2 1/2 years...

 

[devonair]

Okay, in an attempt to answer my own question, I stopped by an Apple store to play with an iPhone... Hopefully someone can confirm or deny whether or not I found my answer...

I went in to the settings to add a new Exchange account, and noticed that the first line was for "email address" -- with the username, password, etc below. This sounds like I could put my Google-hosted email address in that field, but setup the server and login credentials to be my Mail2Web exchange account. I already forward all of my Gmail to this Mail2Web account to get push email on my WinMo phone (which is setup with my gmail account as my sent-from address). This way I can reply to messages and compose new ones and it still looks like its just coming from my Gmail account. Looking at the settings on the iPhone, am I wrong in thinking that this would create pretty much the same setup? If so, that's exactly what I'm looking for...

I didn't want to actually set up my account on the device as there is a paranoid part of me that started wondering if my settings would somehow get accidentally "stuck" in the phone... and if I would thereby giving any random person who played with that particular phone access to my exchange account, haha. I may have been a bit overly careful, but I'd rather not put my login and password on a display device like that. =P

 

[yildi]

I an probably missing something here. Why don't you simply use the GMail SMTP to send messages from your phone? You can normally do this even if you receive messages through send2mail, no?

 

[devonair]

Lol, that actually makes a lot of sense! On my Winmo phone, I don't do this because the built-in storage memory would choke if I had both accounts setup (i.e., both the Mail2web and Gmail accounts -- just not enough memory to hold both inboxes). This is why I'm glad for a community forum like this, where I can ask these questions to people who already have iPhones (and who aren't looking at the iPhone like someone who is used to WinMo ways...). I completely forgot to take into consideration the simple fact that I would have plenty of space to make use of on the iPhone, and could therefore comfortably have both accounts configured on the device. Thank you! =)

 

[yildi]

Well, l am in fact coming from the WinMo world ;-)
I have not tried it, but it is maybe possible to set different service providers for POP (mail2web in your case) and SMTP (GMail). Have you tried this?

 

[devonair]

...don't have an iPhone to try it on yet. =) But Mail2Web is Activesync/Exchange only (which is actually why I use it; to get its "push" capability). If I do try to re-create this setup on an iPhone, I'll most likely just create two accounts (one Exchange for Mail2Web, and one IMAP for Gmail). I'll end up having to manage duplicate copies of messages in two different inboxes, but that's worth the hassle to me if I can retain this push functionality AND use my Gmail as my primary address.

 

[thelarster]

devonair - I have my iPhone set up similar to what you are requesting I believe. I have my Gmail (from certain addresses) forwarded to my me.com account so I can get push/instant notification.

On my iPhone I have me.com as the incoming/exchange but I have my Gmail as the SMTP and the sending address so really no one even knows I have a me.com account.

Let me know if you have more specific questions.

 

[JustinHorn]

I do this with gmail -> ymail to get push. I have both accounts setup on the phone so I can reply directly from ymail as gmail by selecting the from address and changing it to gmail.

 

[S Joe]

Having just switched from a BB (with T-Mo) and web mail via T-Mo that (in combo with the Blackberry) allowed me to use a custom reply to email address and being frustrated by your lack of push problem. Another guy has encountered this problem as well.
Setting a different reply-to address in Gmail on iPad/iPhone | Eric Cheng’s Journal

Here's what I did with my new iPhone 5

I created an "Exchange" email account on my iPhone 5 using my gMail credentials. I called that account XXX Exch (for the nickname of my account as an Exchange account on the phone)

See, e.g. Set up Google Sync with your iOS device - Gmail Help
But note that the setting the reply to address feature in gMail did NOT override the "lack of being able to set the custom reply address" on the iPhone.

So, now I've got push (via Exchange) but still have annoying can't change the reply to email address problem.

Next, I created/added a second account on the iPhone for the exact same gMail account I set up in the exchange steps above. Rather than setting it up as an Exchange Account or a gMail Account, I followed these instructions
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/1707425?start=0&tstart=0
This process allowed me to set up the account using my chosen "reply to" address and the "reply to" address 'sticks' in the iPhone's settings. I called this account XXX gMail (for the nickname of my account as a gMail account on the phone with the custom reply to address)

So, now I have the same gMail account in my iPhone twice.

In the iPhone's "Mail Contacts Calendar" settings, I be sure to scroll down to the bottom and make sure my Default Account is the XXX gMail.

So, now, on my iPhone, I'm getting the benefit of Push via XXX Exch.
And, when I compose a message 'fresh' (e.g. not as a reply to an earlier message), the default account (XXX gMail) is used and my recipients never see my gMail address but rather see my custom reply to address.
There's only two small 'buts' to this problem:
1) In iPhone Mail's "All Inboxes" - every message appears twice. However, I never really use "All Inboxes" I just go to the respective Inbox I'm interested in.
2) If you're looking a message that came in via push (e.g. a message in the XXX Exch Inbox) and choose to reply or reply all to it, the "default" email From: Account is my gMail Account rather than my custom reply to address. But, if you click on that address, a scroll wheel comes up with a choice of all your email accounts you've added to the iPhone, so I just select my custom reply to address and I'm sorted.

I really wish Apple would improve this aspect of iOS to include this custom feature. Alternatively, I wish gMail and Apple would work together such that Exchange accounts pushed through a gMail account allow the custom reply to address feature of gMail's setting to "stick" and include the custom reply to address rather than the gMail account.

But, for now this is a simple (and free, compared to Web2Mail) solution to the push v. custom reply to address problem.

 

[Massie]

All of the details confused me a bit, but doesn't the gmail app do both Push and Send-As? Might be worth a look.

 

[AllanRosen]

If I understand the issue correctly, yes you can have gmail push and enable the "send mail as" feature as well. It is a three-step process.
1. Set up your gmail account as a Microsoft exchange account on the iPhone.
2. Then enable the "send mail as" feature on your gmail account on the computer.
3. Then go to https://m.google.com/sync on the iP...mail as" on the standard iPhone email client.