idea - Firefox - standalone, site-specific app instances #34
Description
Why the need?
To make life easier.
Many a times when working with several tabs open, it is pretty inconvinient to locate that particular website's tab you are going to require often. For example, something like Evernote, Whatsapp, Gmail, etc.
Having multiple windows of browser doesn't help either, because every window would be clubbed under the same Firefox icon in taskbar.
[ I would be using Evernote as an example case throughout this explanation, but it could be any other website. ]
What's the solution?
Provide feature to allow creating customized instances of Firefox, with corresponding taskbar icon being the website logo. These apps would have a launcher entry as well (that allows for creating shortcuts!). Here are couple of screenshots describing how an Evernote launcher shortcut would look like:
What I've tried:
As of now, I use the following workaround:
I created a .desktop file (I'm using linux) with Exec command: firefox -P "Evernote" --no-remote https://www.evernote.com/client/web
and placed it in .local/share/applications
A profile is needed to start a new instance, hence created the "Evernote" user profile.
Here are file contents:
[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Exec=firefox -P "Evernote" --no-remote https://www.evernote.com/client/web
Name=Evernote Web
Icon=evernote
Issues and todos:
- Once launched, the instance is, of course, counted as of Firefox, and hence grouped with other Firefox instances and windows in the taskbar. It would be wonderful if it were under Evernote icon, as intended. This issue can probably be resolved by providing support through Firefox itself.
- Provide a way to create them at one click, maybe through context menu option.
- A manager built right into Firefox for managing these launcher entries would be very helpful. This manager should be able to edit and delete launcher entries and associate changeable icon and name, defaults being fetched from website metadata.
- Ability to individually apply extensions to these apps, profiles seems a good option.
My username on Riot: @stellarbeam:mozilla.org