To bring together essential communication applications. To improve productivity and communication. We can focus on student needs and adding value to the campus IT experience while Google focuses on building excellent products, maintaining the feature set, and innovating our communication options for tomorrow.

Our goal is to offer you a reliable, practical, secure, feature-rich webmail environment. We think Google can help. We can focus on the core values of our school, such as student relationships, and let Google leverage its extensive operational experience with security and privacy. 

Our IT staff can utilize an administrative set of APIs to build on top of Google Apps rather than starting from ground zero. All of this can be done at less expense than our previous email system while increasing the functionality, service, and connectedness of our campus' communications.

Visit UNC Asheville's Start Page at my.unca.edu and click Sign In in the upper right corner.

At the sign in screen enter your username (the part of your email address before the @ symbol, i.e. username@unca.edu) and Google Account password, then click the Sign In button. That's it!

What services are included with my Google Apps for UNC Asheville mail account?

If you want to visit Google services directly, bookmark the Start Page as your browser's homepage. On the Start Page, you can preview your latest email messages, calendar events, and documents. You can even chat with people on your Contacts list.

• Start Page - my.unca.edu - For more information on the Start Page click here.
• Email - webmail.unca.edu - For more information on Gmail click here.
• Calendar - webcal.unca.edu -For more information on Google Calendar click here.
• Docs - docs.unca.edu - For more information on Google Docs click here.
• Chat - You can chat in your email account, but you can also download the Google Talk client at http://dl.google.com/googletalk/googletalk-setup.exe - For more information on Google Chat click here.

You have one username and password for all services in the Google Apps package. Once you log in to one service, you can easily access all others.

Rely on the Start Page to provide access to the rest of the services. The Start Page is publicly available, but won't display personalized content until you log in. You can see a recent snapshot of new mail, calendar events, and updated documents.

Within your email account, you can chat with your contacts. You'll receive invitations for calendar events and to collaborate on documents and spreadsheets.

1. Sign in to Gmail.
2. Click Settings at the top of any Gmail page, and open the Accounts tab.
3. Click Google Account settings.
4. In the new window, click Change password under the Personal information option.
5. Enter your current password and your new password.

What options do I have for accessing email?

The primary option is webmail - http://webmail.unca.edu 

It's packed with exciting features and integrated with other Google services. In your online email account, you can chat with your contacts, create filters to organize your inbox before new mail arrives, schedule calendar events, map addresses in your messages, and track postal packages.

Alternative access options include:

What do I need to know about documents and spreadsheets?

It's a web-based word processing and spreadsheet application. It can help us collaborate on projects from anywhere. Your documents are stored online. You and anyone you invite to collaborate can access the document from any internet-connected computer, and make changes simultaneously. Multiple people can make changes at once, and everyone's changes show in real-time.

You can get started right away by creating a new document or by uploading a file from your computer. Since the products are integrated, you can use your email account Contacts list to invite people to view or edit your documents.

More Tips
Revision history -- Individual edits are kept so you can see who made changes and revert back, if necessary.
Search -- Just like the rest of Google products, you can harness the power of Google search to look for a document you haven't edited in months.
Security and privacy -- You choose who sees your document. Other users can only access your document or spreadsheet if you add them to the list of collaborators or viewers, or if you decide to publish the document.

What about mail merge operations?

One of the only operations that is not easily done natively in Google Apps are mail merges. If you must perform mail merge operations we suggest that you follow the directions below for migrating from Outlook and continuing to use Outlook. You can still use the Google Apps native web interface most of the time if that is your preference, but when you need to perform a mail merge Outlook will be there and properly configured for those operations.

Are Google Apps services accessible by students with disabilities?

The "basic HTML" view of GMail is fully compliant with accessibility standards. Google Mail and Calendar services are both common standards-compliant and may be accessed by the client software of one's choice.

What about privacy and security?

Check out the Google Apps Privacy Notice here and read more about Google Apps security here. Your information is yours and Google understands that - it's all part of their corporate Code of Conduct which you can read here.

I already have a personal Gmail account and I forward my current UNC Asheville email to my personal Gmail. Can I combine these accounts or move my email from my personal Gmail account into my new UNC Asheville Google Apps account?

Google has created methods of exporting/importing data that can be used to migrate data and settings from personal Gmail accounts to Google Apps accounts. At this point almost everything can be exported from a personal Gmail account and imported to a Google Apps account; a notable exception to this is Gmail Labels. Below are a few links to get you started. Please note that ITS does not support personal email accounts, even personal Gmail accounts. These links are provided as a courtesy, use at your discretion. 

• Use Google Mail Fetcher to import mail from other POP email accounts, including Gmail. (Please note this imports only email).
• Here's how you can export contacts from your personal account and then import those contacts into your UNC Asheville account.
• You can also export your personal calendar and then import the events into your UNC Asheville account calendar.
• Here's an extensive list of ways to import/export various types of data to and from Google Accounts.
• A few specific tips on how to export data from select Google's services.

Where can I find more information?

Help Center: www.google.com/support/a/users

Frequently asked questions updated daily by product experts, tutorial videos of key features, user interface screenshots, active discussion groups, and more.