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The Gmail team has updated its Web app for Chrome with settings controls for its HTML5 offline main storage. Users can now set it to store 7, 14 or 31 days of past email offline. Email work done offline - on an airplane, for example - is synced next time you connect.

Today's update also stores attachments for offline use, enables Gmail keyboard shortcuts offline, improves performance and fixes bugs. The Gmail offline app is available in the Chrome Web Store, and existing users will be updated automatically.

GetApp.com, an independent marketplace for online business software has released an infographic comparing online project management software solutions to help businesses choose the right product. There are some interesting trends and data on the chart, including their age and size, their emphasis on social media, and whether they offer integration with Google, Intuit and Salesforce products and have their own API as well. There is also information about whether Android or iOS versions of each app are available.

On Friday Google announced its Cloud Transformation Program, a quick way for larger enterprises to get started with a series of Google's cloud-based services. Included in the initial set are App Engine, Google Storage, Apps Script and Prediction API. The company is working with six MSPs to implement the program: CSC, Cloud Sherpas, Cognizant, Opera Solutions, Razorfish, SADA Systems and TempusNova.

Google is finally getting around to adding offline access back to Gmail, Google Docs, and Google Calendar.

Today the company announced that it was adding offline capabilities immediately to Gmail, and offline features for Calendar and Docs will be rolling out over the next week starting today. The catch is, you might have to switch browsers or wait even longer.

For small businesses and startups, the selection of Web-based tools available for things like communication, productivity, finance and IT is seemingly limitless, with new products launching left and right each week.

In a recent survey, business app advice startup BestVendor asked 550 startup executives and managers which tools they most preferred for a variety of business-related functions.

Google has one of the largest and most secure clouds in the entire industry. You do not often hear of a successful distributed denial of service attack against Google and rarely are Google applications hacked (unless, of course, it reportedly comes from the Chinese government). How does Google keep the data centers that comprise its cloud so safe and are they the gold standard in data protection?

Adam Swidler, senior manager for Google Enterprise, laid out how the company keeps its cloud safe at the Cloud Control Conference in Boston this week. The measures that Google goes through are quite thorough. For instance, no Google clients or federal regulators are allowed inside of Google's data centers. When it comes to tough nuts to crack on the Internet, Google's cloud is about as tough as it gets.

The Google Apps team announced today a new feature for the Google Apps for Business and Google Apps for Government versions of Gmail: read receipts. If enabled by your Google Apps admin, you can now monitor the read status of sent e-mails.

This brings Google Apps a little closer to feature parity with Microsoft Outlook, which offers a similar feature.

Nimble, the social CRM startup founded by Jon Ferrara (creator of Goldmine, one of the first CRM systems), has made its SaaS available through the Google Apps Marketplace. We previously profiled Nimble as a cloud startup to watch and took a deeper look at the product here.

Today, as expected Office 365 came out of beta. Office 365 is Microsoft's consolidated cloud-services system that combines hosted versions of Exchange Server, SharePoint Server and Lync Server.

So how does it hold up to two older offers, Google Apps and Zoho?

Today Google announced a new tool for Apps Script, the scripting language for Google Apps: Apps Script GUI Builder. Apps Script lets admins automate tasks and extend the functionality Google Apps (see our coverage). The new GUI Builder tool will make it easier to build forms and other interactive elements into Google Apps.

You can find the new feature in the Apps Script Editor by clicking on File and then "Build a user interface."