A dedicated, distraction-free browser for Gmail
Michael McCracken likes Gmail a lot.
But he finds 
that reading it in his normal web-browser is too distracting. Bookmarks, other open windows and the Google search are constantly tempting him away from his work.
So he created a dedicated WebKit browser that loads only Gmail without the distractions:
This gives him the focus that he is used to in an email client like Mail.app.
He has made it available for download from his web site .
If you are going to use it a lot, you might want to give it a distinctive icon, like one of the Gmail icons in the Mayosoft collection (or this recently posted one at InterfaceLIFT). Then a glance in the Dock tells you what it is:
UPDATE: Michael has some more things to say.
Similar Posts:
- Finally, a nice icon for Gmail
- Gcal.app: Distraction-free Google Calendar WebKit client
- More on WebKit Webmail.app
- Distraction-free Gmail in Camino/Firefox
- Fluid 0.9.2: Make your own site-specific web apps
Tags: email, getting things done, GMAIL, Productivity, WebKit
May 13th, 2006 at 12:33 am
What a cool hack. Also, just to point out, Webkit is open source and you can download nightly builds to try out. The URI is:
http://webkit.opendarwin.org/
May 13th, 2006 at 2:08 am
Can anyone point me to a simple, step-by-step tutorial on building a Webkit-based desktop/web app like this? Obviously I mean something truly minimal, semi-functional, not polished, a starting point.
Thanks!
May 13th, 2006 at 2:25 am
Avi: http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Cocoa/Conceptual/DisplayWebContent/index.html
The first 4 articles in the TOC give you about all you need to know to write my app.
May 13th, 2006 at 5:13 am
Avi,
MacDevCenter had a series called “Build Your Own Browser”. It a bit older now but here are the links:
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/mac/2004/01/23/webkit.html
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/mac/2004/05/28/webkit.html
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/mac/2004/06/04/webkit_3.html
May 13th, 2006 at 7:51 am
Nice hack. To add a note to the wish list, I’d appreciate if it remembered window size and position when the app is quit. It opens each time with a window that is larger than my 12-inch iBook screen. After resizing the window, Webmail doesn’t remember the size, probably because it’s a mini Web browser.
May 13th, 2006 at 9:30 am
This is way cool. I downloaded the GMail icons from the Mayosoft collection. Now, how do I get an icon to be the one that is displayed when WebMail executes?
May 13th, 2006 at 10:04 am
Stan, just follow the same method you would use for changing the icon of Mail.app itself:
http://www.hawkwings.net/2005/10/17/change-apple-mails-dock-icon/
May 13th, 2006 at 10:25 am
OK. When I followed the procedure outlined in the link, the application’s icon changed from the default application icon (pencil and ruler on top of a stack of papers) to the default image icon (a couple of photos on a piece of paper with the top right corner folded down). When I did it with the .png icon file, the letters “PNG” are on the icon below the photos and when I did it with the .ico file, the letters “ICO” are on the icon. Any ideas?
May 13th, 2006 at 11:27 am
Ah, my bad. I forget to mention that the Mayosoft icons need to be turned into Mac icons first. You should never blog with one hand while rolling out playdough for your daughter with the other.
You can do that with an app like Iconographer
, or you can use the Mail.app-like Stamp one, which I have already fixed, and I have now uploaded onto Hawk Wings.
May 13th, 2006 at 4:46 pm
OK, so here’s the latest in this saga. I checked out Iconographer, but decided not to spring for the $15 for this one-time task. I tried to access your posted link to “the Mail.app-like Stamp one” but got an “Error 404 – Not found” message. I eventually discovered that Apple supplies a nifty app named “Icon Composer” that comes with the developers tools. I used it to create the .icns file of the image in the various resolutions that are required. But to no avail. When I paste it to the icon image in the Info dialog box, the only thing that happens is that the letters on the default icon image change to “ICNS”. Sorry if this is getting a little off topic.
May 13th, 2006 at 4:56 pm
Arghh, typo! Now the link to the one I created works. Sorry to make this such a trial.
May 13th, 2006 at 11:38 pm
What a totally great idea. I love this concept of ‘desktop apps’ that live on the web. I think people are starting to now make sense of the boundaries of what’s useful and what’s not about running -everything- in the one web browser. One of the biggest usability problems of doing everything in one browser at the moment is accidentally closing a bunch of tabs at once. Another area that I think needs major improvement is right-click context menus for web-apps: there aren’t any. This imposes a weird over-discpline on web-app developers where everything must be accessible via a left-click. Quite unintuitive if you’re an experienced computer user.
May 14th, 2006 at 12:43 am
The application is great, the only problem so far is that I can’t get the gmail notifier to stop using safari and use WebMail.app instead!
I guess the problem is that the gmail notifier uses the system wide default browser and I’m not willing to change that to WebMail.app. Any ideas?
May 14th, 2006 at 1:05 am
Thanks Tim for fixing the link. But even with your icon images, I still have the problem that the icon is the generic one with the letters “ICNS”.
May 14th, 2006 at 12:03 pm
I used the Gmail notifier as my icon. Notifier doesn’t show up in the dock, so it’s pretty clear what the icon is for.
An easy way to copy an icon from one application to another: find the application you want to copy from in the finder, select and hit Apple-I. Then, click the icon in the information window and click Apple-C. Then find the application you want to copy to, and bring up the information window for that application. Select the icon, and hit Apple-V. Presto – you’ve copied the icon from one app to another, without all that pesky resource folder business.
May 15th, 2006 at 1:45 am
Tim – Thanks for ‘fixing’ the “Mail.app-like Stamp” icon! I had already found an alternate icon to use, but really preferred yours. I too was pulling my hair out for a while trying to get it to work but, as you already know, until you ‘fixed’ it, there was no way it would :(.
Michael – Thanks for a really cool and nifty little app – it does perzackly what I need, no more, no less :). I too agree though, a big help would be if it remembered window size – I can live with it though :). Yes, I know ‘perzackly’ isn’t actually a word :).
Thanks guys, very much appreciated!
Don (aka ~ MrSin)
May 15th, 2006 at 2:01 am
Here is another feature that would make this good app better: the ability to send an attachment. Currently the file picker does not function (at least as far as I could tell).
May 15th, 2006 at 11:03 pm
I’ve been using a javascript bookmarklet to load a new window for Gmail in Camino. Then I make a new tab and load Google Calendar in it. Now I have a minimizable all-in-one email/calendar window much the same as your WebKit app. The difference is, links open in Camino, etc.
It is:
javascript:(function(){javascript:window.open(‘https://mail.google.com/mail/’,'Gmail’,'width=1000,height=700,location=no,toolbar=no,status=no,menubar=no,hotkeys=no,directories=no,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes,screenX=’+(screen.availWidth-410)+’,screenY=’+0);})();
May 16th, 2006 at 8:34 am
OK, after trying Justin’s version, I’d say that it’s the better version. Just as clean, just as fast, and more compatible with Google Calendar.
May 16th, 2006 at 8:41 am
I’m tempted to agree, although wih Michael’s version you have the benefit of it being a separate app.
With Justin’s bokmarklets, your Gmail and GCal are just two windows among many.
May 16th, 2006 at 10:07 pm
You should just load one bookmarklet, mine is for Gmail. Then I open a tab, and load gCal in the new tab (by dragging a gCal shorcut onto the new tab). I’m on a Mac so I can minimize that window to the dock, and it is basically just like a new App. Windows people would have to deal with an open window on the task bar.
May 16th, 2006 at 10:54 pm
Not a bad work-around. Thanks.
May 25th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
Is WebMail.app secure? e.g. HTTPS?
May 25th, 2006 at 6:58 pm
Nick – no, it was using HTTP. I did a tcpdump to see if anything was obviously cleartext, and it seemed OK but I’m not a security expert. It works fine if you just change the http to https in the code and recompile – I think I’ll release a version – 2 with that and an error-handling bug fix I found recently, at some point soon.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:42 am
[...] Gcal för att få Google Calendar till Desktopen Gmail.app för att få Goggle Mail till Desktopen [...]
July 26th, 2006 at 9:20 am
I would love this tiny app even more if all the links inside Gmail worked. For some reason I cannot get the “Delete all spam messages now” button to work.
July 26th, 2006 at 9:32 am
Hmmm… Neither can I. I hadn’t noticed that before.
I got that sense that Michael wasn’t doing to develop this any more, otherwise I would suggest dropping him an email (address on his web site).
February 27th, 2007 at 8:46 am
Here’s a version based on XULRunner:
jinsync.com — Gmail.app
March 24th, 2008 at 11:13 pm
[...] the menus, toolbars and accoutrements of a normal web browser. Some people have called it a “distraction free browser” because none of the typical browser chrome is used. An SSB also has a tighter integration [...]
May 29th, 2008 at 4:23 am
[...] the menus, toolbars and accouterments of a normal web browser. Some people have called it a “distraction free browser” because none of the typical browser chrome is used. An SSB also has a tighter integration [...]
May 11th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
[...] life quite a bit; if you’re mixing up GTD with ADD (as so many of us seem to be), an SSB can help limit your distraction horizon while you’re trying to maintain focus and [...]
May 15th, 2009 at 2:36 am
[...] life quite a bit; if you’re mixing up GTD with ADD (as so many of us seem to be), an SSB can help limit your distraction horizon while you’re trying to maintain focus and [...]
June 2nd, 2009 at 6:30 pm
[...] toolbars and accoutrement’s of a normal web browser. Some people have called it a “distraction free browser” because none of the typical browser chrome is used. An SSB also has a tighter integration [...]