I am excited (<– every 'press release' starts like this, but this isn't a press release) to announce Appmator, a tool that I have developed for you, developers of great web apps to help you get your apps in to the Chrome Web Store in under a minute!
With the recent release of the Google Chrome Webstore (literally 10 minutes ago) developers now have an amazing channel to reach over 100 million users of Chrome.
It is pretty easy to get your existing Web apps in to the store. Now it is even easier using Appmator, simply go to the App, add your URL and press enter. You will then have a Zip file that you can upload directly to the store. You can even modify the output to suit your needs!
It is even in the Chrome Web Store so you can install it now. The great thing is, that this tool was packaged ready for the store using itself! Sweet.
It does some pretty cool stuff, all of which I will cover in JavaScript Tutorials in the next couple of days, here is a sneak peak:
- Use of beautiful Webfonts to enhance the UI
- Uses Modernizer to feature detect – I will probably do some workaround for other browsers soon.
- Uses classList to quickly modify styling and state
- Creates the package (zip file) all on the client side (this is my favorite bit) using the awesome jszip
- Allows users to drag a zip file on to the desktop so that it can easily be uploaded
- Uses ArrayBuffers to initiate a client side download (it is a bit of a hack – but pretty cool)
- Detects favicon support so that you can quickly re-use your existing assets
- Uses flexible box model for layout.
- Mostly works offline (supports appcache) – ok, this is in the next version.
And the best thing is, it is all open and the source code is available on GitHub
All feedback and suggestions are welcome. And if you spot any bugs (and you will) please file a bug
I lead the Chrome Developer Relations team at Google.
We want people to have the best experience possible on the web without having to install a native app or produce content in a walled garden.
Our team tries to make it easier for developers to build on the web by supporting every Chrome release, creating great content to support developers on web.dev, contributing to MDN, helping to improve browser compatibility, and some of the best developer tools like Lighthouse, Workbox, Squoosh to name just a few.
I love to learn about what you are building, and how I can help with Chrome or Web development in general, so if you want to chat with me directly, please feel free to book a consultation.
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