Lovin' Goolge Apps Pack
I have often said that Google could take over the world and I would be right behind them. Google is by far my favorite internet mogul and I can’t think of a single thing that they do that I don’t like… still thinking… ummm yeah, I’ve got nothing. All of my obsessive love aside, I wanted to take the time and share the newest, coolest thing that that Google has released: The Google Apps Pack.
The Google App Pack is a neat set of icon shortcuts that you can install on your windows machine. They bring your Google Calendar, Gmail and Google Docs right to your desktop using Goolge Chrome. The really cool thing about the Apps Pack is that you can run these sites as mini-applications. There’s no messy url bar or web browser navigation buttons, and no other clutter; just your Gmail. Your Gmail will no longer get lost in your endless stream of open tabs in FireFox because it runs in a Chrome window. Also when you run the Gmail App for the first time you are asked if you would like to make Gmail you default mail client. That to me is sweet bonus I wasn’t even expecting.
Not only can you now rock your Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Docs right from your desktop, but with Google Chrome you can set ANY website to work the same! And it is super simple.
- Navigate Google Chrome to the site you want to ‘app-lify’.
- Click on the icon to the right of the url bar that looks like a page
and choose the first option “Create Application Shortcuts”. - You will then get to decide where you want the shortcut to placed including the desktop, as a quick launch and the start menu.
Ta-Da!!! You are done. Enjoy your new Apptastic shortcuts. With brand-spankin new Google features there are some place to improve, but I am sure that Google is working on these improvements as I type (well maybe not right now because it is Sunday… but). There are three little things that need to be worked out. Two that Google will need to take care of and one that we can do ourselves. These icons are not yet compatible with Google Apps for web servers, they are windows only (good luck with those two Google), and they use the 16×16 fav icon image scaled up for the desktop icons of website that you make into apps. This is the one that I am happy to say I can fix.
Come back next week and I will walk you through making a new icon for you favorite sites turned apps.
Grab your Goolge Apps Pack Here:
http://pack.google.com/intl/en/pack_installer.html