The latest update to Google Chrome on Linux finally brings extension heaven for users unhappy with the way in which “notifying” extensions were layed out.
My two previous posts on Chrome – 15 Must Have Extensions for Google Chrome and Why Google Chrome should be your default browser – both generated lots of positive feedback from users of Chrome.
One thing recurring negative was the ‘dislike’ for the way in which extensions that update you or provide “actions” were displayed along the bottom status bar: –
Windows users are able to hit a keyboard shortcut and ‘hide’ them, Linux users however were stuck with the choice of either having them on show or not having them at all.
Extension-rama!
Thankfully today saw an update to the Chrome dev channel for Linux which provides the option for some extension maker to have their “action buttons” sitting, instead, on your "tool bar". (See top screenshot.) Obviously only extensions that choose to take advantage of this will actually sit there.
How extensions will behave in the toolstrip
This is much more preferable in my opinion – providing you don’t end up with an entire row of icons taking up space!
Currently in the Windows dev build hiding the extensions tool-strip on the bottom results in only seeing those extensions extensions when on a new tab page. It looks gorgeous and i think a lot of people will be keen to install extensions when this finally arrives in Linux.
Download
Links
Dev channel (for 32-bit systems): google-chrome-unstable_current_i386.deb
Dev channel (for 64-bit systems): google-chrome-unstable_current_amd64.deb
Note
Installing Chrome automatically adds Google’s repo to your system for updates. If you don’t want to stay up-to-date with Chrome you can opt out by issuing: –
- sudo touch /etc/default/google-chrome
before installing the .deb.