UW-Madison G Suite - Getting Started with Google Groups
This document provides a high-level introduction to UW-Madison Google Groups.
Topics
Introducing Google Groups
Google Groups is a free communication and collaboration service that gives you the ability to create the following:
- Email lists
- Web forum (discussion board)
- Q&A forum
- Shared inbox
- Manage group access to shared Google files (ex: Docs, Sheets, Shared Drive)
When you create a Google Group, the group’s email address will have the following name format: groupname@g-groups.wisc.edu .
Eligibility
- Faculty/staff
- Students
- Alumni
Benefits
- Not owned by a single UW-Madison G Suite account.
- Not affected by account deactivation.
- Can be used to create permissions to manage group access to Google App files (ex: Docs, Shared Drive, etc).
- Allows group moderation.
- Allows membership to include both UW-Madison (internal) and non-UW-Madison (external) email addresses.
Limits
The maximum number of members you can add to a Google Group has not been published by Google. Currently, we have yet to reach a maximum number in our testing.
View additional information about Google Group's policies and limits here.
Quick start
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- View additional resources on how to manage a group below.
Reminder: Make sure you are logged into your UW-Madison G Suite account, not your personal Gmail account, when accessing or managing your UW-Madison Google Group.
Email delivery
You can email your Google Group at groupname@g-groups.wisc.edu to start collaborating with your colleagues. When you email your Google Group, that message will be delivered to the following inboxes:
Message delivery
Google Group Archive inbox
- Note: The archive feature may not be enabled by default. Learn how to view your Google Group’s archive feature status.
- Archiving must be enabled to receive a copy of all messages sent to the Google Group.
- Enabling archiving is beneficial when troubleshooting message delivery issues.
- Note: The number of views and unread/read status for archived messages only reflects activity done on the Google Groups archive page. It does not reflect activity done by a recipient's email client. Google Groups does not offer email tracking.
Mailbox associated with the email address used to add member to the Google Group
- Message delivery will depend on the member’s Google Group email subscription setting (ex: daily notifications, email digest)
- Message delivery can be affected by the member's email settings such as rules, filters, spam/junk, etc.
Suppressing "out of office" messages
- Internal email address - out of office messages sent from an @wisc.edu address (ex: bucky@wisc.edu) will be suppressed.
- External email address - out of office messages sent from a non @wisc.edu email addresses (ex: daniel@tech.com) will not be suppressed and will be sent to the Google Group.
Learn more
UW-Madison G Suite account - Basics
- Distinguish between personal Google account and UW-Madison G Suite account
- Switch between UW-Madison account and personal Google account
Google Groups - Basics
Google Groups - Additional settings
Distribution lists