Google CEO Sundar Pichai speaks at Google Cloud Next 2018. (Google/Alive Coverage Photo)

Google has made a lot of improvements to Gmail this year as it continues to build out its G Suite office productivity service, and rolled out new integrations Thursday that will make it easier to exchange files and information from other services within Gmail.

First unveiled earlier this year at Google Cloud Next 2018, Compose Actions are add-ons to Gmail that let users save email attachments directly to their Box or Dropbox folders, for example. Atlassian (which just unveiled the new Jira design Thursday) and Engyte are also part of the first round of add-ons, with additional ones planned in the future, Google said in a blog post.

An overview of how Gmail users can work with Box files thanks to a new add-on integration. (Google GIF)

G Suite is a key part of Google’s cloud strategy, as it looks up at Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure on the infrastructure side of the cloud. Web-based office productivity software is old hat to a lot of tech companies, but there are a significant number of companies that are still using desktop files and attachments to manage their workflows; some are even still using paper, a thin, flat substance derived from trees upon which information can be conveyed.

And so as those enterprise companies take baby steps into the digital era with cloud-based file services like Box and Dropbox, integrations like these are an easy way to make Gmail customers a little more productive and they also help the four companies extend their services into the places where people spend most of their time. More integrations are coming soon, Google said, and developers can also build their own Gmail integrations for homegrown applications.

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