Look. Some of us work on a higher plane of existence. Our minds craft incredible harmonies, operating at multiple frequencies, weaving a beautiful song through their threads. At each vibration there hums a different idea, a different concept, or task. It is a universe-spanning song of insatiable curiosity. The more prosaic way of looking at it is we have multiple projects on the go and a lot of windows and tabs open at once. It looks something like this:
My main window has 25 open tabs (this is a low-count: usually I have 50+, and I distinctly remember a 78 once), there are seven browser windows open, and a whole bunch of other things going on.
If this looks familiar to you, you know the best intentions summarised in this image. Some might see chaos and too many projects happening simultaneously, but of course, we know it’s a cosmic dance of possibility and potential, characterised by articles to read, videos to watch, emails to respond to, et cetera et cetera. They’re all things we want to get to, but we must admit, sometimes it can get a bit overwhelming having to flip back and forth between tabs trying to find the one we need for our particular project. More than us though, the entities that struggle with it the most are our computer processors, which shudder and groan under the weight of so much opened and accessed knowledge (aka system processes.)
So, my friends, let me share with you a revelatory discovery that has rocked me and my CPU to our fundamental (quad)core(s).
Just writing it gives me chills of excitement.
OneTab.
OneTab is great. It’s a browser extension that works in all the major ones (Chrome, Firefox, et cetera). It takes all of your open tabs from that window, and condensed them into a single page list of links.
At its simplest, you press this magic button:
And, in an act of technological wonder, all of your tabs from that window will closed and saved in, well, a single tab. In one tab, if you will:
You can re-order these, delete these (one at a time or all), restore these individually or at once, manage multiple windows worth of tabs, save regular ones etc. It truly is awesome.
How do I get OneTab?
It’s super easy. Just head to www.one-tab.com and click on the giant “Add OneTab now” link. It should add OneTab to your browser, whichever one you use.
Once installed, you should be able to access a whole bunch of options from the icon in the top-right corner, or by right-clicking in the browser window.
So get to it, my fellow dreamers and Tabbers, and get your browsers organized!
PS. I know it may seem it, but I’m not actually employed or affiliated with OneTab in any way. I just really like OneTab. OneTab.
PPS. Do you use OneTab? Are you going to give it a try? Are there other lifechanging apps and extensions you recommend? Leave some love in the comments. x
* maybe
[…] slide deck by Amanda Sampol My path to PhD, and disability in the university by Annmaree Watharow OneTab will change your life* by Phill […]
Has anyone considered the simplicity of just dealing with the tabs already open before opening more? Do what you need with the few tabs that you can actually remember… and move on. 😉
Great article. I use One Tab for perfunctory tab management. If I need something more precise, such as a series of tabs around a particular theme or project, I use Session Buddy, which more easily allows naming of a suite of tabs for reopening later. Like One Tab, it’s free. https://sessionbuddy.com/ This means that One Tab is my generic tab manager (i.e. saving memory), while Session Buddy is a little more like a bookmark manager for me. Though you could use One Tab for that purpose too. Both are great.
Thanks for the tip! Is this published under Betts & Pieces?
Thank you for sharing this, it is so simple and useful.
Phill… this is amazing! Thanks for sharing it, it is already revolutionising my Chrome!
Viva la OneTab!
Hilarious article, Phill. You have inspired me to download OneTab, and it has changed my life in an instant! Thank you.
Yes Louise! May your browsing be clean and efficient.