
Show HN: A directory of single-page sites and useful apps - sgdesign
http://www.thetoolbox.cc/
======
citricsquid
I would love the ability to create my own toolbox based off of the sites you
link. The basic idea would be I login, select the sites that I use and then
can see them via my account, or link other people via
citricsquid.thetoolbox.cc or something. For now I can load up the page and
scroll through and remember which are useful with relative ease, but if you
get to the point where there are hundreds or thousands of tools listed then
it'll be hard to find the ones I like.

Great work so far, submitted 2 sites.

~~~
sgdesign
Thanks for the suggestion, but that's a little outside the scope of the site.
Plus, I have no clue how I'd even do that with a WordPress install…

But you're right that the site will be hard to browse once there's a lot of
apps, so I'm planning better navigation and filtering features (for example,
sort by most used).

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sgdesign
Really sorry for the downtime… I thought my WordPress install was ready to go,
but for some reason the caching plugin was not activated. So everything came
crashing down under the traffic, and then I was unable to log back in the
admin to enable caching.

I'm now talking with the PHPFog guys to add resources to the server, but it's
taking some time…

The lesson here: never EVER run WordPress without caching. Triple check that's
it's active before you do anything.

~~~
stefanherz

        I thought my WordPress install was ready to go, but for some reason the caching plugin was not activated. 
    

Wordpress glitches just happen, it's ok. Your idea is really neat though,
congrats and thanks for sharing.

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mmahemoff
Not loading for me right now.

The web really needs the equivalent of an app store. Search engines don't do
apps justice. They don't have enough content to index and are often difficult
to crawl anyway, being JS-heavy. Chrome Web Store is a good start, but a place
with reviews and ratings of browser-independent, no-install, interactive
websites would be excellent.

~~~
derefr
I don't know about "no-install"--I for one prefer the Chrome Web Store's
model, because it gives users a definitive point (hitting install) where they
can grant my app extra permissions for things like geolocation and increased
local storage, rather than bothering them with fifty different prompts once
the app is running (and giving them the chance to refuse, even though my app
won't work without those things enabled.) Personally, I'd prefer if other
browsers just adopted the CWS's .crx app format, and every browser allowed app
installation from sources other than its "own" store.

~~~
mmahemoff
That's not trivial for them. Adopting "crx" means they wouldn't have any say
in the evoluion. The point of the web is for a browser to be able to take the
lead with something like CRX and then work with the other browsers to
standardise it.

Anyway, the permissions question is independent of the store mechanism. iOS
apps ask for permissions on demand, Android apps don't.

My main point about no-install is simply that they're regular websites, not
downloadable packaged apps. There's room for both, but right now there's no
good mechanism to find regular websites with apps on them.

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import
Sorry, the site you're trying to access is busy! Error code 502

PHPFog

~~~
sgdesign
Sorry for the downtime, I'm looking into it. It seems I stupidly didn't
activate the caching plugin I'm using :(

~~~
chasingtheflow
feeling a little bad for your server right now ...

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empire29
Thanks for this great site - I hope it gets some traction and grows.

There are so many great sites/services out there that because I've forgotten
about them. Having a simple index of sites like this will keep my memory about
useful sites and help me discover new ones.

I really hope you are able to grow this site - i've added it to my Chrome
bookmark bar!

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ezequiel-garzon
Is Wordpress (along with a professional theme) the fastest route to a site as
visually appealing as this one? In other words, what would other HN readers
have chosen in order to deploy this content?

[1] <http://designerthemes.com/themes/construct/>

~~~
sgdesign
I picked WordPress because I knew I had bigger chances of finding a theme that
already matched the design I wanted. Otherwise if I was coding the whole thing
from scratch I'd probably use <http://locomotivecms.com>

~~~
ezequiel-garzon
Thanks! And keep up your site!

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Alex3917
A couple more:

<http://www.favicon.cc/>

<http://www.stripegenerator.com/>

I don't think I've ever actually used the stripe generator, but there should
definitely be at least one favicon site on there.

~~~
Alex3917
Thought of a few more things to add:

<http://validator.w3.org/>

One of the browser testing tools:
[http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/08/07/a-dozen-cross-
bro...](http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/08/07/a-dozen-cross-browser-
testing-tools/)

<http://www.pythonregex.com/>

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peter_l_downs
Are you taking suggestions? I'd love to see Bookshrink [0] and Who Will I Know
There? [1] on the list :)

[0] <http://bookshrink.com>

[1] <http://wwikt-peterldowns.dotcloud.com>

~~~
sgdesign
Bookshrink is a very interesting concept, but I'm really trying to feature
things that are useful and practical for a majority number of people, not just
"interesting" sites. Thanks for the suggestion though!

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davezatch
Another suggestion:
[http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/graphics/cssgradientbackgr...](http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/graphics/cssgradientbackgroundmaker/default.html)

IE's gradient builder, I find it nicer than the colorzilla one.

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loeschg
Intrigued by Markup.io. I think I'll probably add this to my arsenal.
<http://markup.io/v/0fk6myfx7wk5>

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ew
If you're taking contributions it'd be great if Backup Box [0] was included.

[0] <https://mybackupbox.com>

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talmand
Excellent, bookmarked.

Feature suggestion: a suggestion box for people to request tools they would
like to have but don't seem to exist.

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longneckdeer
Seems not able to load website right now.

~~~
ay
More specifically, for me: Chromium says "This webpage has a redirect loop".

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MaxwellM
This is awesome - a number of tools i've never seen before. I think i'll find
them very handy.

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justinavery
Love it. Especially the companion article about the proecess to set up
thetoolbox.cc

Well done!

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sgdesign
Feel free to suggest missing sites, either here or via the submission form.

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aeeeee
i think you might want a better font for the "I use it" links, they were
difficult to read on my screen (it could also be the contrast between the text
color and button color)

~~~
sgdesign
I just increased the contrast, thanks for the feedback!

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ttttannebaum
notepad.cc absolutely belongs here

