Tips to Create Custom Google Chrome Web App Shortcuts

Have you ever felt tired while searching for your favorite website on Google and then getting its URL from the search results? Do you think that you should get a quick shortcut that can take you to the desired website just by clicking on it once? If yes, then you must try accessing the Chrome packaged apps offered by Google, which offer an easy and uninterrupted access to the websites. These web apps are nothing but the specially designed shortcuts to web pages that enable a user to visit a particular website in a fast and convenient way. If Google hasn’t offered a shortcut for your desired websites, then there is no need to worry as you can now make your own custom web apps that function exactly like the Chrome packaged apps.

 In order to ensure that Google doesn’t provide the desired web app, visit the Chrome Web Store and look for the all the shortcuts that have been made available. Once, you’ve scanned the Chrome Web Store, it’s the time to create your own Chrome web app, which will later appear in the Chrome app launcher on various operating systems.

In this article, you’ll read about the tips that can help you to create your custom web app in a few simple steps:

Tips to create custom web app

Step1. Create a new folder on your PC for your web app and create a new text file named manifest.json in that folder.

Step2. Now, open the manifest.json file in any text editor and copy and paste the following text into it:

    {

    “manifest_version”: 2,

    “name”: “Website Name“,

    “description”: “Description of website“,

    “version”: “1.0″,

    “icons”: {

    “128″: “128.png”

    },

    “app”: {

    “urls”: [

    "http://example.com/"

    ],

    “launch”: {

    “web_url”: “http://example.com/”

    }

    },

    “permissions”: [

    "unlimitedStorage",

    "notifications"

    ]

    }

Step3. Change the text in bold by replacing them with the desired website’s name, description, and URLs.

Step4. Next, download a 128×128 PNG image file, which will be used as the website’s logo. In case you don’t have an image, then either download one, crop or resize any existing image, or create one in image editing software.

Step5. Once you have the image with you, save it with the name 128.png in the folder that you’ve created in Step1.

Step6. Go to the Chrome’s extensions page by typing ‘chrome://extensions/’ in the URL address bar and enable the ‘Developer mode’ checkbox. Now, click on the ‘Load unpacked extension’ button and wait for the browser to respond.

Step7. Browse to the folder that you’ve created on your PC and click on the ‘OK’ button to allow the Chrome to install the web app, which you have just created.

Step8. Once the app is installed, it can be easily launched from the new tab page. Chrome will ask you to customize the way in which it will open, here you can either choose the right-click method or command it to launch using the Chrome app launcher.

Step9. (Optional) Users can also click on the ‘Pack extension’ button to completely pack the newly created extension as a single installable .crx file, which can be later used by other PC users.

Tips to create a shortcut using the Bookmark method

Step1. Users can add custom shortcuts to your new tab page by simply dragging a bookmark from the ‘Bookmarks’ bar.

Step2. Once Chrome understands that what exactly you wish to do, then it will drop a large icon of the desired website on the new tab page. The icon will be too large and ugly and it will function just like a standard bookmark app, without allowing a user to change its name or appearance.

The above mentioned steps will help you to create custom Google chrome web app shortcuts. Apart from these, you can also bookmark your favorite websites and keep them handy for later use. Most of the users want Google to extend its drag-and-drop functionality in order to make the bookmarking function easier and quicker to respond. The company should allow renaming these custom shortcuts and assigning better icons to make bookmark function to be used often rather than creating a custom app for every website.

Brooke M. Perry is an ardent technician associated with Qresolve online computer support with wide experience of fixing issues with PCs, laptops, tablets and smartphone. With a strong track record of devising effective ways of online tech support and system security, she has so far helped thousands of users across the globe.