Kloudless: Two Way Access To Files In Gmail, Dropbox, Google Drive And More

With Google introducing its Chrome OS, an entirely cloud-based system that leaves nothing on your hard drive, it would seem that one direction today’s gadgets are heading in is a purely cloud-based one. We’re spending less time on our desktops and more time in the cloud – and file storage is certainly no stranger to that concept.

A couple of months ago, we introduced you toCloudy, a Chrome extension that allows you to upload files to your Gmail account directly from your cloud-based storage accounts like Dropbox, Google Drive, Box and more.  Kloudless is a new Chrome extension that offers the same feature – removing that unnecessary extra step of downloading a file from the cloud only to upload it as an attachment – but takes things one step further, by also allowing you to save files directly from your Gmail account to your cloud storage accounts.

Kloudless closes the gap between email and cloud-storage, creating a link that makes perfect sense, is incredibly convenient, and is one of those features that you won’t know how to live without once you get it set up. Kloudless serves several functions – one of which is to automatically back up your email attachments to cloud-based storage accounts.

When you first install Kloudless you’ll be walked through a series of simple steps to set up your accounts. You’ll first be prompted to connect Kloudless to your email account. At the moment it only works with Gmail, but support for Outlook is also available, but you do have to sign up to get an invite for access.

If you’re logged into more than one Gmail/Google Apps account, you’ll be prompted to select the account you want to use.

The good news is that if you want to use Kloudless simultaneously with more than one Gmail/Google Apps account – you can. Just simply go through the setup process individually for each account, by logging into that account and clicking on the Kloudless Beta link at the top-right hand corner of the page.

The permissions you are granting Kloudless when it comes to your email address include viewing your email address, viewing and managing your mail, and knowing who you are on Google. That may seem like a lot of data to entrust Kloudless with, not to mention data that you have saved in your cloud storage accounts, but all of your files are encrypted while being transferred using Kloudless, and the service has an extensive Privacy Policy worth reading.

Once your Gmail account is connected, you can then connect your cloud storage account. Currently, Kloudless supports Dropbox, Google Drive and Box.

At this point, Kloudless is fully set up and can be used. But there is one final step that brings an interesting and much welcomed-feature that isn’t available in Cloudy. Since Kloudless allows you to save attachments directly to your cloud storage, the service also offers automation features. You can create rules for how to handle certain attachments. So for example, if you want to save all of the attachments sent to you by a specific person, you can create a rule to copy all of those attachments to a specific Dropbox folder. Rules include copying or moving attachments, based on who they were sent from, who they were sent to, or even based on keywords, and more.

While the automation feature is really cool, it does have its limits. Unfortunately, you can only create up to 10 rules.

If you’d rather not automate the process of saving attachments to your cloud-based storage accounts, you can still access this feature manually when opening individual attachments. When you open an email with an attachment, you’ll find a new option alongside ‘Download.’ Hitting the ‘Copy/Move’ link will open up a pop-up window which gives you access to folders in whichever cloud storage account you’ve connected to.

 You can then copy or move individual files, one at a time, directly from your email account to your cloud storage account. If for any reason, space is becoming an issue in your Gmail account, this is a great way to quickly free up space in Gmail by moving large attachments. Even better, if you don’t want to keep the attachments at all but want a record of the email itself, you can also delete individual attachments from your Gmail inbox using Kloudless.

Kloudless is a convenient, handy Chrome extension which will be appreciated by anyone who finds themselves spending more time in the cloud than they do on their desktop. While Cloudy was a step in the right direction, Kloudless  completes the equation by providing two-way access to your files saved in the cloud and to attachments in your email account.

What do you think of Kloudless? Let us know in the comments.

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Google Launches Hangouts, A New Cross-Platform IM System for iOS, Android & Web [Updates]

Google I/O has brought a flurry of news from the search giant including the announcement of a new cross-platform messaging service called Hangouts. Integrating with a fresh-looking Google+, the new application for iPhone and Android works seamlessly with the Web version of the messaging app found in Google+ to connect users in real-time.

The platform is billed as a replacement for Google Talk and Voice, allowing one-on-one and group chats via text, along with media messaging and video calling. For the moment the service only works on Apple and Google’s mobile platforms and via a Web browser, either by logging in to Google+ and clicking on Hangouts or by downloading the Chrome extension.

The service is aimed at creating long-standing “conversations that last” according to Google, so chats are always kept up to date across devices, with chat histories stored unless you specify otherwise. That means you’ll have to turn off logging for each and every conversation you want to take off the record, as these logs are always enabled by default.

This launch sees Hangouts detach itself somewhat from Google+, the company’s social layer, though users will still need a Google+ enabled account. The new Hangouts has its own standalone apps and icon, but still relies on Google+ to connect with friends in circles and for use on a desktop PC.

The service joins an already busy marketplace for cross-platform messaging clients, with iOS devices connected for free over iMessage, Facebook chat more useful than ever thanks to “chat heads” and WhatsApp messenger continuing its domination of the SMS-replacements that bridge Android and iOS users.

Download: Google Hangouts for iPhone / Google Hangouts for Android / Google Hangouts for Chrome

Have you used the new service? Do you plan to?

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5 Chrome Extensions To Superpower Twitter

For many of us, Twitter is fine just the way it is. Despite what you may think, I’m not going to say otherwise. Twitter truly is fine just the way it is. The thing is, and much like everything else, it can also be better, and making it better doesn’t necessarily involve using a third-party client.

If you’re the kind of person who prefers to leave things in the browser, certain Chrome Twitter extensions can help you get all sorts of fun and useful Twitter features without having to resort to out-of-the-browser clients. Whether you’re looking to save time when sharing webpages, save brain cells when reading your stream, or retweet the good old way from Twitter’s native interface, there are ways to do so without leaving your browser. Try the Chrome Twitter extensions below to find out!

PowerInbox

PowerInbox is a browser extension available for Chrome, Firefox, Safari and IE, which takes your regular Twitter emails and makes them much more useful by turning them interactive. In fact, PowerInbox does its trick with many additional services besides Twitter, including Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, Spotify, Pinterest, and others.

Focusing on Twitter, PowerInbox makes it so you can actually make use of those pesky email updates you keep getting from Twitter, such as “you have a new follower” or “Bla and BlaBla have tweets for you”. After installing the add-on and signing into your Twitter account, emails from Twitter will start looking something like this:

As you can see, instead of getting a simple alert you can’t do much with, PowerInbox makes it so you can follow users from within the email, send tweets, and in other emails also view your stream, reply, retweet, and favorite tweets.

PowerInbox has an on/off button on top of every supported email, so if you don’t feel like viewing interactive content, you can simply turn it off and turn it back on when you’re ready for more.

Tareem Extender

Tareem Extender takes your good old Twitter interface, and powers it up with some new and useful features. While I couldn’t get every single feature listed to work, the extension still adds a considerable amount of them. Starting with features that actually work, Tareem Extender adds an old retweet button to every tweet, as well as a DM button and a quick translate button to translate tweets from English into dozens of languages.

You can also set the extension to highlight your mentions in the stream, and to show desktop notifications for your Twitter mentions.

So what didn’t work? Tareem Extender claims to include a built-in link shortener, which I couldn’t get to work, as well as a “speak to tweet” feature which was no where to be found. Considering Twitter’s ever changing API and interface, I’m assuming some features just stopped working over time, but where it counts, Tareem Extender provides the means to use Twitter’s native interface to much better results.

Tweet This Page

Most blogs and websites include a tweet button of some kind, but these are located in a different spot on every page, and might even look different from website to website. In addition, most of these buttons are just extensions of the twitter.com webpage, and as such don’t let you use your personal link shortener. Tweet This Page can change that.

Tweet This Page is a simple Chrome Twitter extension that makes it super easy to tweet a link to any page you’re on. Want to share a link on Twitter? Click the new Twitter button on the right side of Chrome’s address bar to create the tweet. You can set Tweet This Page to use your personal bit.ly account and to automatically use selected text as the tweet body, making it possible to click and tweet in seconds.

Silver Bird

Silver Bird is a fully-fledged Twitter client built into a Chrome extension. Behind a colorful bird icon hides a simple interface that nonetheless includes pretty much anything you could wish for in a Twitter client. And what’s more, it’s all completely customizable.

From the icon’s color at any given moment, to the interface’s font and color, to the compose area’s position, Silver Bird is like a mold you can shape as your own. With its built-in pop-up notifications, built-in link shortener, its ability to add images to tweets and its handy suspend option for when you really need to concentrate, you may never need to venture into twitter.com again.

Read a full review of Silver Bird.

Larry Filter for Twitter

Twitter too noisy? Larry Filter can make it a quieter place with the help of some well-placed filters. This handy extension lets you set keywords and hashtags you’re not interested in, and either hide them completely, or increase opacity on tweets that include them.

While this is not the only way to filter tweets, I love Larry Filter for its simplicity, and for its ability to only half hide the culprit tweets. This way, I can make sure I’m not missing anything important, and still have a quieter Twitter feed. It’s like having my cake and eating it too!

For more ways to filter tweets and make Twitter a generally quieter place, check out theseways to filter annoyances on Twitter, and some additional ways to help you swim and not drown in your Twitter stream.

More?

As always, we’d also love to hear some of your recommendations. Are there any Chrome twitter extension you find invaluable? What makes your Twitter life easier? Share your favorites in the comments.

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Cleanr Video – Make YouTube Less Of a Time Sink

Strip down YouTube until only what you want is left – the videos. Cleanr Video is a simple extension for Chrome, Firefox and Safari that removes everything – and I mean everything – from YouTube beyond what you absolutely need. Comments, recommended videos, ads – all gone, and in their place white space. If minimalism sounds good, this is one to check out.

Google loves – and I mean loves – changing the YouTube layout. Over the last couple of years it’s gone from focusing on helping everyone discover the same videos, to helping everyone see the latest videos from their subscriptions, to the current incarnation – showing you videos it thinks you’ll appreciate for reasons mere mortals cannot discern. If you’re sick of the cycle – or just want to avoid the rabbit hole of recommended videos and comments – Cleanr Video can help clean up YouTube for you.

From Minimalist for Everything to services that de-clutter the web for readers, we’ve outlined more than a few ways to make the web a less busy place. Cleanr Video is just one more.

How Cleanr Video Works

So, just how much does Cleanr Video strip down? Rather than tell you, I’ll show you. Here’s how the page for a YouTube video looks normally.

…and here’s how it looks with Cleanr Videos installed:

As you can see, everything but the video itself is stripped away, leaving you with a video to watch and nothing more. When you’re done watching, you’ll simply get to whatever it is you’re supposed to be doing – no clicking related videos and no scrolling through comments. This could help you stay focused.

The home page for YouTube is similarly cleaned up. Instead of seeing this hot mess…

…you’ll see this…

Click the “See More” button to show the videos that usually show up on the YouTube home page – and nothing else. If you’re looking for simplicity, you found it.

One Problem…

If you’re like me, you love your YouTube subscriptions. You found the YouTube homepage useful, until recent changes stopped showing the latest videos from your subscriptions and started showing…something. I’m still not sure what this seemingly random assortment of videos is supposed to be, but I know I’m not a fan. It’s why I’ve been habitually clicking the “My Subscriptions” link every time I open YouTube.

Which brings me to my problem – Cleanr Videos hides the “My Subscriptions” link. At first I was panicking, but then I did what I should have done a long time ago – I added a link to the Subscriptions page on my browser toolbar. The link, in case you didn’t know, is:

http://www.youtube.com/feed/subscriptions

Why YouTube doesn’t offer a setting for making that page the default I’ll never know. Maybe Cleanr Videos should redirect users, though, because I don’t think anyone actually wants to use YouTube’s default homepage.

Download Cleanr Video

Sick of reading about Cleanr Video, and ready to download it? Head to Clea.nr. The process should be simple for Firefox and Safari users. Chrome users, however, have to do some extra work. This video explains how to install the extension:

For those who hate video tutorials – you need to download the .CRX file from Clea.nr. Then, head to the “Extensions” menu in Chrome (hit the settings icon to the right of your extension icons, then Tools > Extensions). Open the folder to which you downloaded the CRX file using your operating system’s file browser, then drag the CRX to the Chrome window where the Extensions menu is open. The extension is now installed.

This used to be a simpler process, but a (relatively) recent update to Chrome made it harder to install extensions not from the Chrome Web Store.

Conclusion

This app not only makes YouTube look great – it can also help you to be productive. YouTube can be a huge time sink. Watching videos online when you’re supposed to be working is bad enough, but a quick video viewing can quickly turn into a spree if you follow a long enough line of “Recommended Videos“. Removing this temptation just might be Cleanr Video’s best feature, but blocking comments isn’t a bad thing either.

Do you have any other cool minimalist browser extensions to share? Please, do so in the comments below. Those of us who haven’t blocked all online comments will be happy to read them.

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No Theater Facebook Image Gallery – Facebook Images Made Simple

Some of us aren’t fans of Facebook’s theater mode when it comes to viewing pictures. It’s not a huge issue – after all, it’s just a matter of personal taste and preference. However, many of you have pointed out time and time again that Facebook (and other similar services) do not provide enough personal customization for their interfaces.

Ideally, I think that we could have a fully-customizable Facebook with personalized layouts and possibly even colors. However, what appears on your Facebook style doesn’t appear the same way for others. I wouldn’t be having any of that MySpace 2.0 crap happening in my Facebook.

That’s never going to happen, though.

Admittedly, it’s a tough issue. Each company that develops social networking products knows that they can’t make everybody happy. Why waste their time by developing specialized features that cater to each and every crowd? People would just find a reason to complain anyway…

However, there’s a small Chrome extension available that reverts Facebook back to its old mode of displaying photos: No Theater Facebook Image Gallery. Simply put, it gets rid of the theater mode and shows the images on their own individual pages – just like the older version of Facebook. It’s nothing special, but it does get the job done. Its creator isn’t very elegant about its origins, either:

Those last three words are the most elegant I have ever seen in a description of an extension. Seriously.

Personal Use

The app doesn’t provide many options for customizability, really. I mean, how could it?

It has one single purpose, and that’s all it’s really good for. I can’t explain it much better than that, but I can say that I have been using it for several months, and my experience has gone relatively well. No slow loading times. No frozen screens. In all honesty, my Facebook experience was just as seamless and fluid as before.

I will say that staying away from theater mode does have its disadvantages. For one, every single image has its own page, so that’s a lot of backtracking if you want to go back to the website you were visiting before Facebook. Minor inconvenience? Yup. However, it’s not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. Granted, theater mode has its advantages as well. The main perk is that you can browse the someone’s album without even having to leave your news feed.

So it all comes down to this: it’s all based on your preference.

If you like theater mode? Don’t get this extension for Chrome. If you don’t like theater mode? Try this extension out. It’s the kind of extension that’s so useful you might even forget that you have it installed. In fact, I did! That’s why I wrote this article so many months after having it…

Conclusion

There’s not much else we can say about No Theater Facebook Image Gallery except, well… that there’s not much else we can say about No Theater Facebook Image Gallery. It made our list of Best Chrome Extensions, and there’s obviously a reason for that.

With that said, there are a a few other Facebook “enhancers” you can check out to make your social networking experience more streamlined. In face, we have an article all about it: 8 Great Chrome Extensions For Facebook You Could Get To Like. For those of you who tend to use Firefox, you may want to take a look at 5.5. Firefox Extensions To Make Facebook Awesome.

You can install No Theater Facebook Image Gallery from the Chrome Web Store.

That’s it, folks. Do you like No Theater Facebook Image Gallery? Do you dislike theater mode for Facebook?  Or maybe you’re one of the ones that actually like it?  Fancy that.

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Local Reader – 6 Excellent RSS Extensions For Chrome

The RSS game is wide open. RSS aggregators are back in the feeding frenzy. But then, the tribe of feed readers was already there…we mostly had time for the king. Google Reader will be dead in a couple of months. Long live the King! Now, it’s time to look at the princelings. We have looked at quite a few interesting Google Reader alternatives. Feedly is perhaps the heir apparent. Then there are the interesting characters like FeedRoller andFeedBooster. Throw in some slicker Google Reader wannabes and you have your crowd.

With these good feed reading tools, why should we look at specialized RSS extensions (for Chrome)? Maybe, just for the one-click accessibility they bring. Browser extensions like the one we feature on our Best Chrome Extensions page fulfill all our basic browsing needs and then some more. Reading the feeds we subscribe to is a pretty basic day-to-day activity, and you can bet there are enough Chrome extensions for that. Like these six.

RSS Subscription Extension (by Google)

The Chrome extension developed by Google auto-detects RSS feeds on a web page. The extension makes up for Chrome’s lack of RSS support. It displays an RSS icon in the Omnibox which you can click to subscribe to the feed. You have the option of two feed readers – Bloglines and My Yahoo, with the third option of adding any online feed reader of your choice to the list. For any other feed reader apart from the two predefined in the dropdown, you will need to copy the URL from the respective feed reader’s website. For Feedly users, the URL would be – http://www.feedly.com/home#subscription/feed/%s

Points of Note:

• It saves you the bother of hunting for RSS feeds.
• Download a forked extension that gives you predefined options for Feedly, NewsBlur, and The Old Reader.

Foxish live RSS

Let’s admit it; there are some things that Firefox does better than Chrome. Handling feed subscriptions is one of them. With Live Bookmarks, you can easily subscribe to and be up to date with your favorite websites. Chrome doesn’t have native RSS handling capabilities, so we look towards the Web Store for replacements. The Foxish live RSS extension replicates Firefox’s functionality by auto-detecting and syncing RSS feeds with bookmark folders at configured intervals. I won’t get into the nitty-gritty here as Justin showed us how to add Firefox-Style RSS feeds with Foxish. The extension sets up folders for individual website under Chrome’s bookmarks, and populates them with the maximum feed items you specify in the Options.

Points of Note:

• Foxish live RSS is customizable. You can set the parent folders, the poll interval, and the maximum feed items to include in the folders.
• Import/export of feeds from other RSS readers using OPML.

Slick RSS

On the face of it, Slick RSS is a simple in-browser feed reader sans any frills. But go under the hood and it gives you quite a few customization options without betraying its simplicity. You can import and export OPML files. Slick RSS has in place some feed display options like the choice between summaries or full-content; viewing embedded videos; and loading links in the background. You can set the maximum items you want to display per feed and set the options which allow you to mark what’s read or unread. I found the refresh speed to be slightly slow, but that could be my connection too.

Points of Note:

• Slick RSS has an option that allows for marking an item to be read later.
• The Slick RSS: Feed Finder extension is an optional install for auto-detecting RSS and atom feeds on web pages.

RSS Feed Reader

RSS Feed Reader is a simple and elegant solution for reading RSS and Atom feeds in the browser. It is designed to give you an overview of your RSS account and track your read and unread counts. It syncs with Google Reader but that’s not going to matter. You can directly add your RSS/Atom feeds through the interface and also import your OPML file. Feed Reader helps you to easily subscribe to feeds from any site by clicking on the browser icon. A range of feed customization options are available – choose how many posts to display or change the title of the feeds. You can rearrange your feeds into distinct folders by dragging and dropping them right from within the browser.

Points of Note:

• Change the theme by choosing between – Dark, Mint or Light.
• Feed update status notifications can be enabled for select feeds.

RSS Social Analyzer

If you are into SEO or are a web developer, then RSS Social Analyzer is a Chrome extension that’s just the right fit for you. It is a smart analytical tool that gives you the social sharing metrics of any website with a RSS feed to its name. After installing the extension, it will auto-detect the RSS feed. With a click, it redirects you to a web tool that’s essentially a social analyzer using Linkscape’s API. Social shares are broken down by networks as you can see in the screenshots.

Points of Note:

• The ten most recent posts are analyzed and presented according to their social shares.
• The extension is a shortcut to the analyzing website, but it speeds up the process and helps to auto-detect RSS feeds.

Revolver RSS

As the name suggests, Revolver RSS takes a single RSS feed of any website and automatically rotates the pages that fall under the particular feed. It is slightly limiting because it works with a single RSS feed. On the other hand it can be useful if you want to set up an unattended display of “revolving” web pages for a single website.

Points of Note:

• Go into the options to set the full RSS feed URL for a website.
• You can set the interval between the pages and the maximum pages to display.

The usual suspects like Feedly missing? Well, they have been comprehensively covered before and I am betting as a RSS junkie, you probably are already on it. If you are starting to miss Google Reader, you can use the Feedly Reader extension to turn Feedly into a Google Reader clone. With the help of these extensions and so many other RSS and Atom tools, it is time to bid adieu to Google Reader with a comforting thought. As we have seen, these browser extensions not only let us read our RSS and Atom feeds but also interact with them in other ways.

Is there any super extension that’s missing from this list? I would also be interested to know about your current choice for a feed reader. Drop in and comment.

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Google Launches Keep For Chrome, Lets You Manage Notes, To-Do Lists, & Photos While Offline [Updates]

Google announced on Thursday the release of its latest product: the Google Keep Chrome app. Google Keep was launched for Web and Android in March, and was described by many as an Evernote competitor. However, Evernote still reigns supreme as the go-to note-taking app.

Google Keep for Chrome allows you to jot down notes, cross off to-do lists, and attach photos to various tasks. Even better, the app works entirely offline, so you can keep going even without an Internet connection. Whenever you do reconnect, the app will automatically sync all of your new information with the app across your multiple devices.

Although the app can be downloaded from the Chrome Web Store, the Google Keep Chrome app is not a Chrome extension at all. In fact, Keep can operate as a standalone app even if Chrome is not running.

In general, Google Keep is a service that lets you keep track of all your notes in one place. The service lets you “save ideas and organize to-dos the moment they happen by creating notes, lists, photos and voice recordings.”

For those of you who need a bit of a refresher, here’s a video that showcases the app:

Visit the Chrome Web Store to install the Chrome version of Google Keep.

Will you make use of the new Google Keep Chrome app? Do you think it’s a worthy competitor to Evernote?

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Missing Google Instant Preview: 3 Chrome Extensions That Show Previews Of Google Search Results

Google is shuttering products with the same speed it is launching them. The latest Google feature that is missing in action is Instant Previews. Instant Previews was a search enhancement launched three years back that gave you a sneak peek into Google search results with tiny thumbnails. The visual page snapshot helped you get a glimpse of what the page was about before you decided to click on the address and go to the page. Let’s now deal with fact that Google Instant Preview has been dropped from Google’s scheme of things.

The reason probably has to do with Google’s continuing efforts to streamline the search experience with its search tools. According to reports, Google Instant Preview had low usage and so it was a prime candidate for the Guillotine. For me personally, the double exit of Instant Previews and Quick View from search results is bit of a downer.

Why Google Instant Preview Was Useful?

Instant Preview or any visual preview has its benefits as a search enhancer.

• The thumbnail gave a clue to the design and quality of a website.
• Some previews displayed text call-out boxes over the preview image to help you see where your query appears on the page.
• For a specific search query, you could quickly compare results and choose a page that best matches what you were looking for.
• It sped up search results because you didn’t need to visit each webpage individually.

Most of these points hold up well if you go for an alternative to Google Instant Preview and use a Chrome extension for the same job.

The Alternatives To Google Instant Preview

Browser extensions have always cushioned the loss when features are missing. We use extensions and add-ons to enhance our search experience, so there’s bound to be something that can stand-in for the departed Google feature.

SearchPreview

SearchPreview has considerable number of users; enough to suggest that Instant Preview had its takers. In fact, the extension was previously known as GooglePreview. SearchPreview adds a small thumbnail before every Google search result. The Chrome extension is unobtrusive; there is also no icon to crowd the toolbar. The thumbnails are uniform in their alignment, and while some may argue that it clutters up the page…I personally feel that for the trade-off with usability, the neatness is preserved. You can also refresh the thumbnail by right-clicking on it and selecting the option of Request Update of Preview Image.

The developers say that SearchPreview could display ads to offset server costs (which are used to cache the thumbnail images). The good thing – you can turn them off from the extension’s Options.

ezLinkPreview

ezLinkPreview is a comprehensive solution if you are looking for a wider field of view on your search results page. Mouse over any link to bring up the ‘ez’ icon. Click the little icon to show the linked page in a separate preview overlay or split screen. You can interact with the overlay window in many ways. The ezLink Preview window can be pinned in place. You can send the previewed webpage to Google Bookmarks, share it on Google+, and even search from the preview window. For all practical purposes, the preview window acts like a separate tab. The Chrome extension also allows you to split the browser window and view a preview of the site in the right frame. ezLink has a full range of options for you to customize.

You can set up a flotilla of customized search engines from the extension’s Options. ezLink also allows you to set up exclusion lists which will disable URL’s from loading in the preview window.

CoolPreviews

CoolPreviews gives you a larger snapshot of a webpage instead of a thumbnail. After installing the Chrome extension, you will see a magnifying glass icon next to each search result. CoolPreviews is customizable with support for features like a hotkey (which I would recommend using). You can cycle between the different modes as the icon shows you the mode you currently are in. As you can see in the screen below, you can tweak the display to your comfort level and also set the time the window will be open for.

For privacy concerns, you can choose to turn off the Allow sending anonymous statisticsoption. Though, the extension says it is for product development purposes and is strictly anonymous.

My experience with CoolPreviews wasn’t completely satisfactory as I found it to be slightly slow to load in the preview window.

Every browser has a third party add-on in place that allows you to preview search results. Firefox has the similarly named but different CoolPreviews; and Opera hasSearchenginePreview which is similar to Chrome’s SearchPreview in function. So, Instant Preview may have been mothballed, but you can call in the stand-ins and expect them to do a good job. Did you use Google’s Instant Preview? Tell us if it was useful for you or just wasted space.

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