Google Chrome Plugins and Themes

It looks as if Chrome Theme Developers have now really come to the forefront since the last week or so as soon extensions were started to get packaged into .crx format. We are seeing more and more nice and simple themes being released by various developers such as the 2 Blue Themes and Dark Skin Theme.

One more release is the Berries Themes Pack, which contains 6 different themes based on berries like gooseberry, strawberry, raspberry and others as you see in the image below. Pretty funny looking, but certainly worth having a look.

Theme Name : Berries Themes Pack

Theme Developer : yamoney

Download : Berries Themes Pack - For Chrome Dev 3.0.190.4+ - V: 1 - Contains .crx files of all the 6 themes

Installation & Support:

To install the theme, just download the above file and extract all the 6 .crx files. Drag and drop the theme file you want to use on your google chrome window and the theme will install itself.

Note: This is only for the Dev Channel Users and not for Stable/Beta Users. If you are not on Dev Channel and still want to use this please refer here on how to change your channel.

For any feature request or for troubleshooting or any other issues and for latest upgrades to the theme please refer to the Berries Theme Support Thread.

A new theme released on ChromePlugins.org, by yet another new member of ours. I hope you guys like this. I have included the default.dll file for Stable/Beta/Dev users and also the .crx format for the Dev users, so all Google Chrome users can use this theme.

Theme : DST

Developer : pcki11

Installation :

Download the file and extract the default.dll located in the folder of the Channel you are on.

For Windows XP Navigate To :

C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\Application\VersionNumber\Themes\

For Windows Vista or Windows 7 Navigate To :

C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\VersionNumber\Themes\

Note: Change UserName to your PC’s user name, and VersionNumber to the highest version number there. Prior to replacing your default.dll files, always make a backup copy of it incase anything goes wrong.

For installing the crx format of the themes you need to be on the Dev Channel. Just click on the download link, wait for a few seconds and the theme would be installed.

Downloads :

Default.dll Files:

DST - Dark Skin Theme - For Chrome 3.0.190.1 - .4+ - V :1
DST - Dark Skin Theme - For Chrome 2.0.172.33 (Stable and Beta Channel) - V: 1

Crx Files:

DST - Dark Skin Theme - For Chrome 3.0.190.4+ Vista/Win7 - v: 0.1
DST - Dark Skin Theme - For Chrome 3.0.190.4+ XP - V: 1

For the updates on this theme and for any support queries please refer to the DST Support Forum Thread. If the above mentioned browser versions are no longer in use then please refer to the support thread for the latest upgrades.

As some of you may know that Google has now laid out some platform which supports themes in .crx format, that is there is no need to change the “default.dll” as was the case earlier.

One Click Theme Installation

With the change in installation of the themes by packaging it into .crx format just like other extensions, it has simplied the whole thing and is definately a move in the right direction. However, the themes will not be available for the Stable or Beta channel users since it does not have extensions support as of now. Below are the 2 themes:

Clouds Theme : A Blue Theme That Looks Like Clouds

Download - Clouds Theme - For Chrome 3.0.190.1+ - V:1.5

Soft Blue Theme : Another Blue Theme

Download: Soft Blue Theme - For Chrome 3.0.190.1+ - V: 1.0

Installation & Support:

To install the themes, just click on the above download link of the theme and an installation confirmation download box would appear, click OK and your theme would be installed.

Note: This is only for the Dev Channel Users and not for Stable/Beta Users. If you are not on Dev Channel and still want to use this please refer here on how to change your channel.

Please refer to the support threads of the Clouds Theme and the Soft Blue Theme in case you want to suggest any improvements or for troubleshooting or for checking the earlier versions of the theme.

Reading the title of the post, you might think that this is “yet another google reader extension for chrome”, but in reality it is much more than that. TPReal, one of the newest members at our forum, released the TPGoogleReader Extension earlier today.

Features of TPGoogleReader :

• Shows the no. of unread items, as all of them do.
• It automatically opens all new items in new background tabs, and marks them as read in Google Reader upon checking the checkbox in the toolstrip. You find new things to read appearing, without even clicking anything! Also, at least for me, reading items in their full version by navigating to the item’s link is much more enjoyable than reading the abbreviated, style-less version directly in Google Reader.
• When working in the normal mode where new items do not get opened automatically, clicking on the items counter opens the first unread item and marks it as read.
• When a website has a feed, an icon appears on the right of the omnibox (page action). Clicking on it opens the feed in Google Reader. Thus without subscribing you can view it in GR.
• When you navigate directly to an RSS or Atom page (like this one: http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/feeds/news.rss) normally Chrome displays a mess. With TPGoogleReader you will get the page displayed in a monospace font with preserved formatting. Refer to the screenshot, clicking on the icon will open the feed in GR.

Using TP’s Google Reader Extension:

Each Chrome window has a toolbar (see the screenshot) with GR icon (click to open GR), a checkbox (when checked, all new item will open automatically in this window) and possibly number of unread items (not visible if checkbox is checked). If there are more windows, only one of them can have the checkbox checked, checking it on one of them will uncheck it in all other. So you can have two windows - one where you have the tabs that you normally use, and second with the checkbox checked. And if you have a free moment, you can switch to the second one to see if something new arrived.

The extension does not need your Google credentials, it just works using your current cookies so you simply need to be logged into GR for this to work. This works just like most of the other GR extensions.

Installation & Support:

Again, this extension is only for the Dev Build of Google Chrome, since extensions are not available for Stable and Beta Channel users it wont work on those builds. In order to get on to the dev channel please refer here. Once you are on the developers build just click on the extension download below it would automatically ask you for confirmation to install.

Download - TPGoogleReader - For Chrome 3.0.189.0+ - v: 0.2

For any suport queries regarding this extension or if you need to suggest improvements for this extension please visit the TPGoogleReader Support Thread. I hope you guys like this new extension, share your thoughts in comments below.

Today the Dev Channel was updated to Version 3.0.189.0, and with this release there have been some breaking changes in the way Google Chrome installs an extension. As per the release in the chromium blog, there have been some changes in the CRX format. These changes would add a signature to the package format and thus would enable the automatic updates of the extensions just like in firefox.

However, since its the dev channel, we expect to loose something as well. With these changes, as soon as your Google Chrome is updated to V 3.0.189.0, all the existing extensions would stop working and would have to be repackaged.

So what to do now?

If you Developed any Extension : You can learn how to repackage it in order to get it working for Chrome 3.0.189.0 by reading the packaging doc. It would give you an extension ID which is going to be your public key, so you will have to change any codes that might be using that.

If You Got Any Extension Installed On Your Browser : In order to make it work again in Chrome 3.0.189.0, you will have to reinstall the extension once the developer of that extension has repackaged it as per the new standards.

Extensions Working on Chrome 3.0.189.0

Since our website has launched and featured a lot of extensions earlier as you can see, many of those are not yet repackaged by their developers. However the following extensions have been repackaged and are working for Google Chrome 3.0.189.0 :

Custom New Tab Extension

Aniweather Extension

Chrome Sticky Notes Extension

Extensible Video Downloader

DblClickDial Extension

Cleeki

Element Hider

Tree View Object Browser

As soon as other developers update their extensions and repackaging them, the download links and extension’s posts would be updated.

With these breaking changes in the extensions platform for the Dev Channel, one can hope that extensions are not too far away from being supported by the Stable and Beta channels as well.

Inbuilt Sticky Notepad

Yesterday, i made a post where people can request what Chrome Extensions they need, and needless to say the post got loads of comments and requests from users pointing to their most wanted extensions and addons. One of the guys asked for a notepad feature in Google Chrome which allows you to write down notes and save it from the browser itself and can be viewed later on directly from the browser.

Today, another of our forum member, Waha, made this extension a reality. It is called Chrome Sticky Notes which adds a little notepad icon on your Google Chrome Toolstrip, clicking on which an inbuilt browser notepad pops up.

Chrome Sticky Notes Features:

• Adds a Inbuilt Sticky Notepad feature to your google chrome
• Option to save your sticky note for future reference
• A separate notepad pop-up window which saves your browser window space
• You can view your saved note even if you restart your browser
• A notepad icon on the bottom toolstrip for easy access
• Well Illustrated Icon - Shows whether there is some text in there or not.

Installation And Support:

Extensions are only supported on the Developers Channel so far. So you need to have the developers version of google chrome installed. Please see our earlier post on how to install an extension on google chrome, however, if you are already on the Dev Channel simply click on the download link below and it would ask you to install the extension straight away.

Download : Chrome Sticky Notes - For Chrome 3.0.189.0+ - V: 1

For support regarding installation of this extension, or any plugin trouble-shooting, please refer to the Chrome Sticky Notes Thread.

This is just the first release of this extension. There are going to be continued improvements and addition of features on it and we would be keeping the post updated with the latest releases. So check out often. Let us know what you think about this extension by posting your thoughts in comments below.

This week has been a bit low for our community. There were no new plugins released by our forum members in last few days. Our website also underwent a change in servers and as a result you might have been seeing some error while accessing it.

I am taking this opportunity, to ask the general users of Google Chrome Browser to list their top 3 most wanted extensions, plugins and addons which they want to see in Google Chrome. We would forward the request to all the plugins developers who frequent our Chrome Forum. I am sure that with the limited support for extensions yet in chrome, developers would still be able to get some of the requests fulfilled.

What i Want Personally :

1. Google Toolbar
2. Ad Blocker (we already got that)
3. DownloadThemAll Extension which is in Firefox

So guys, just put your requests in comments below. I am sure that even the Google Chrome Development Team would be having an eye on this.

First Ever Weather Extension For Chrome

One of our Google Chrome Forum member jackstanley, has developed an interesting add-on or plugin as you may call for Google Chrome called Aniweather (any weather/animated weather). As the name suggests its a weather extension which lets you known the weather information such as the temperature, wind speed, etc in a particular location or city anywhere in the world straight from your browser without opening any website. This is infact the first such weather plugin developed for the Google Chrome Browser.

Features of Aniweather Extension:

• Get weather information in a variety of animations
• Real Time weather condition updates are provided
• 5 days forecast of weather conditions
• Check weather updates for 77,000 locations worldwide
• Switch between locations with one click.
• Ability to set a Default Location.
• Customizable temperature units, location and more..

Installation and Support:

Download - Aniweather Extension - For Chrome 3.0.189.0+ - V: 0.5.5

Download - Aniweather Extension - Older Chrome 3.0 - 3.0.187.1 - V: 0.5.1

To install the plugin just follow the installation Instructions of the Googlepedia Plugin.

For any queries or issues relating to AniWeather please refer to our Aniweather Support Thread. There you can directly contact the developer for any troubleshooting. Feel free to leave your comments about this great extension.

One of our new members, Xeno³, has made a nice futuristic-like theme a while ago. It’s compatible with the latest Chrome Dev version, and it looks kinda cool to my taste ;). If you ever encounter a bug, like the theme or just want to say something about it, don’t hesitate to comment on this post or on the forum post.

Installation Instructions:

Download the file and extract the default.dll located in the folder of the Channel you are on and the Color you want.

For Windows XP Navigate To :

C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\Application\VersionNumber\Themes\

For Windows Vista or Windows 7 Navigate To :

C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application \VersionNumber\Themes\

Note: Change UserName to your PC’s user name, and VersionNumber to the highest version number there. Prior to replacing your default.dll files, always make a backup copy of it incase anything goes wrong.

Downloads:

Download Xeno Theme - -  - - - Includes .dll for the Stable, Beta and Dev Channel.

For Support on the above theme, please post your problem here.