What's the next action

Just a thought on startup pages

16 02 07 - 13:06 - Bookmark this post

When I start up my browser I have 4 tabs opened with different pages and statistics. That's great in the morning to start and get things going, but wouldn't it be nice to configure how you'd want to start up your browser? So for instance the first startup in the morning gives me the 4 tabs, but after that I only want to see my Gmail tab when I open my browser. But after 18.00 I would like to see the 4 pages again.

I don't leave my browser open all the time, so something like a Firefox addin for this would be great. Any thoughts on this? Is this usefull?

I like this idea! I used to have a newspaper as my startup page, but opening the same page time and time again irritated me. Then I tried a blank page, only to realize that the first thing I do is check my mail (usually), so I made GMail my home page. Right now, I’m linking to the “Ultimate Getting Things Done” index page, but again, I really only want to see that once or twice a day, so it might disappear too.

I love the idea of an extension for this. That way, you could actually try to emphasize productivity, e.g., the “fun” pages, like Blogs, etc. would only show up at the end of the work day, news first thing in the morning, mail only in the middle. Yup, I like that idea a lot.
GTD Wannabe - 16 02 07 - 14:34

Have you looked at the Morning Coffee FF extension ( https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2677/ )? Assuming your gmail tab is one of the 4 morning tabs just have your browser open to it every time. Configure the Morning Coffee extension to open the other 3 tabs you want.

The result: you can Open your browser then make a simple little click on the Morning Coffee icon and get all 4 (or any number) tabs you want.

Not fully automated but not a bad solution . . .
Dean - 16 02 07 - 16:07

Firefox has an Add-in called “Morning Coffee” ... it allows the user to predetermine tabs … click on the ICON and it loads those tabs … I use it for all of my NEWS pages.

Cheers.
JeffH - 16 02 07 - 16:35

I also don’t keep my browser open, and therefore I prefer to start with an empty page. I did however create various ‘dashboards’ in FireFox, which I open by using the ‘Open all in tabs’ option.
Jeroen Sangers - 16 02 07 - 18:37

A friend recently showed me this free tool that would fit your needs but I should warn you that I’m very technical and this maybe to bare bones for you but it is also more powerful. My friend goes to his computer and types “MORNING” and his email and several web pages open.

The tool is called SlickRun and you can check it out here: http://bayden.com/SlickRun/
Jim Clark - 16 02 07 - 19:25

Great comments!
Dean & Jeff: Excellent tip for the extension. Thanks a lot. Not fully automated, I agree, but a great way to customize it
Jeroen: That is also an option I was thinking about. I use the bookmark toolbar a lot for various pages and bookmarklets. I could also make different folders with various pages
@Jim: Now why didn’t I think of that? I use Activeword, almost the same as Slickrun but not free and I could use that to make various apps start up during the course of the day.

Excellent tips all! Keep’em coming!
Frank Meeuwsen - 16 02 07 - 22:21

Couldn’t you accomplish EXACTLY this with some Javascript? This is kind of technical, but I’m sure I could do it if it slipped into my projects list…

Create a local web page with some Javascript that uses cookies to determine if it’s been opened yet (today) and if NOT, pop a bunch of new pages, and if it has already been opened, forward to a different page.

???
Ian Hunter - 17 02 07 - 04:16

Completely unrelated to the content of your article, but isn’t it strange that this newest page of yours still has an ad for Backpack as your “recommendation for organisation” while you describe in this article from 14-01-07 why you don’t use Backpack (and others) anymore?

OTOH, perhaps one should appreciate your honesty in the linked article despite 37s funding your site with ads.

BTW: My question about how you exported your 40 pages in the comments of the linked article is still unanswered ;-)
Alex - 18 02 07 - 14:27

Alex, you are absolutely right. I still have to answer a lot of questions I got from the article including yours. For the ad: Perhaps I should take it off or perhaps I should put my own opinion beneath it. What are your thoughts?
About exporting from Backpack: I never exported the pages. I just went through the pages and copy pasted what I needed and deleted everything else. Most of it was already stale or done in the past so no need to keep it. For instance, I had a list of possible names for our daughter in Backpack, but she’s already four months old :-)
Frank Meeuwsen - 18 02 07 - 18:16

Frank, I wanted to answer to your last post but something I wrote triggers your spamblocker. No idea what. I’ve sent you a mail.
Alex - 18 02 07 - 20:42

I have a blank startup page but use my bookmarks toolbar extensively. I’d suggest putting the 4 pages together in a folder on your toolbar, and use [Open All in Tabs]. Maximum control, 2 clicks to use, fewer plugin bugs.

I used to have a page on my drive that I would edit. It was a small amount of effort but I had lots of control over what went where.
Richard - 19 02 07 - 16:04

Quick and dirty solution for this. Create a shortcut in Windows and when it asks the location enter your URLs in seperated by the pipe character “|”. Firefox (if it’s your default browser) will open each one in a tab in sequence then.
Art - 22 02 07 - 18:27