Danny Gorog02 June 2008, 4:00 PM
Yahoo's "Browser Plus" technology will allow you to upload multiple pictures at once through a web browser, and automate other handy tasks that have traditionally been arduous.
You might think Yahoo is being slowly crushed by Google, but it is still churning out some interesting innovations. The most recent one is
BrowserPlus, browser-based software designed to improve your web experience and integrate
it better with your desktop files and apps.
Uploading and downloading files via your browser is one area Yahoo is tackling head-on. In desktop apps there are numerous ways to open a file (open from the desktop, drag and drop into the app, drag and drop across apps, open the file via File > Open, application-specific file browsers like Microsoft Project Gallery or Adobe Bridge and so on), but with a web browser upload, you're typically forced into the tedious process of clicking 'browse' and navigating a folder structure, uploading files one-by-one.
With
BrowserPlus installed, a user could simply drag-and-drop their file onto the browser
window, and the browser would automatically upload their file. This
could work in reverse too. For example, instead of exporting a file
from a web-based productivity suite like Google Docs, a user could just
drag the files out of the window on the desktop.
BrowserPlus will also let people crop, rotate and rescale pictures using an easy on-screen interface as part of the file upload -- done on your local computer, so you don't have to wait for a massive pic to upload, only to make it smaller on the web site you're using.
BrowserPlus supports the ability to update and add new services 'on the fly'
which means users don't need to run installers and restart web browsers
when a page uses
BrowserPlus
services (once the initial BrowserPlus software is installed). Developers, for example can add functionality that lets them
'check for and activate new services with a single function call.'
The concept makes for a powerful
combination, and might just be a catalyst to greater adoption of
web-based platforms.
BrowserPlus
is in 'Sneak Peek' release mode at the moment. Developers can download
service APIs plus example code. Additionally, once
BrowserPlus goes live, it will only be available for sites within the Yahoo! family in the short term.
The software currently supports
Firefox 2 and above, Safari 3, and Internet Explorer 7, and runs on both Mac OS X (10.4 and above), Windows
XP and Vista. Unfortunately,
at the time of this writing I couldn't demo any of the available apps
as they were all offline, but you
should try.