Meet the Perfect Chrome Productivity Boost – Computerworld

I don’t want to brag, but – well, the new tab in my browser is A lot better than yours.

Okay, that didn’t sound as humble as I expected. But it’s true, okay. A while ago I added a new, unique tool to my Chrome setup, and let’s be honest: it has absolutely transformed the way I go about my workday, and in comparison, any standard browser setup seems like child’s play.

It’s an interesting alternative to the simple sticky notes canvas update I mentioned for Chrome’s new tab page in my Cool Tools morning newsletter. And while This configuration is domain-specific for your desktop, connects to many of the same services you use on your phone—like calendar, tasks, and more—and provides a ton of Other useful superpowers at your fingertips.

Plain and simple, it’s one of the smartest, most effective improvements you’ll make to your work environment all year. And it only takes two minutes.

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Meet Your Chrome Performance Specialist

At the heart of this significant browser improvement is a seemingly simple extension that I recently stumbled upon by chance.

This is called Proudand while I’m using the Chrome version on my computer, it’s also available for Firefox and Edge (and should work in any other Chromium-based browser, too).

Dashy brings a customizable and incredibly versatile productivity dashboard to your browser. It replaces Chrome’s standard, space-wasting New Tab page with a canvas on which you can place a multitude of widgets with all sorts of useful features—including:

Upcoming events and meetings at a glance from Google Calendar or Outlook Calendar
Interactive view of pending tasks from Google Tasks, Microsoft To Do or Todoist
Custom world clock showing current time in any time zone
Current weather forecast for your area
On-demand language translator
Simple Dictaphone
And a smart card manager and search tool

Dashy allows you to set up your own Chrome dashboard with widgets for a variety of useful purposes.

Chrome Productivity: Dash Widgets — Dashy allows you to set up your own Chrome dashboard with widgets for a variety of useful purposes.

JR Raphael, IDG

You can add as many (or as few!) widgets as you want, and resize and position them however you like. Your browser’s new tab page essentially becomes a rich, information-packed dashboard and command center, and you have full control over exactly what information is included and how it’s displayed.

In other words, it is, in a sense, a modernized and significantly improved version of the old iGoogle concept – with even greater usability and potential, both practical and visual.

To that end, Dashy includes an optional and customizable search box that gives you an easy place to search the web, along with your Chrome bookmarks and history. You can also get Google suggestions there, and even use it to perform calculations and other such feats — and if you prefer to use a search service other than Google, that makes that easy, too.

Dashy’s search box can be customized and even configured to use different search engines, not just Google.

Chrome Productivity: Dash Search — Dashy’s search box can be customized and even configured to use different search engines, not just Google.

JR Raphael, IDG

My favorite feature of Dash, though, is the custom web widget option. With just a few seconds of simple setup, you can create your own widget that shows a live preview of any web page you want — like a news or stock site, or maybe your company’s website, so you can easily monitor it at a glance.

I used this option to embed a live view of my Notion calendar connected to Google Calendar. This way, I can always see a clear and convenient overview of the current week and add or edit events on the fly, in any new tab I open.

Dashy’s custom widget option allows you to add an embedded live view of any webpage to your Chrome new tab dashboard.

Chrome Productivity: Dash Panel — Dashy’s custom widget option allows you to add an embedded live view of any webpage to your Chrome new tab dashboard.

JR Raphael, IDG

Dashy has many other interesting options, including a lot of keyboard shortcuts AND mouse-friendly hotspots that you can configure to trigger specific websites or actions when you click on them. It can even integrate with browser- and/or system-level notifications and notify you about them in its interface — visually, and even audibly, if you want — to make sure you never miss anything important.

Most importantly, every configuration created in Dash will be automatically synced and displayed everyone computer you use and log in to, so you never have to worry about losing your canvas or having to start over.

The basic version of Dash is free to use, with the option to purchase the Pro version for $3 per month, which removes some restrictions and provides access to the full set of features.

It’s an incredible productivity boost — and trust me: once you get used to the improved desktop browser experience, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.

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