
Show HN: Tablist – a chrome extension to copy and paste lists of open tabs - slymax
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tablist/eagbohciligljbgpbdbflaloangiodhe
======
rsync
I don't understand why a simple export of the list of current tabs open is not
a basic, built-in feature of the browser.

I am not asking for management or storage or export or sharing ... or anything
interesting at all. I should just be able to go to:

chrome://tabs

(or whatever) and see a text list of tab URLs. All browsers should have this
functionality.

~~~
sneak
I don't understand a lot of things about browsers, including why they don't
log/persist caches of the full content of all history (for full text search at
the minimum), why they still send user-agent headers, why they persist all
cookies for all domains by default, et c.

It's making me rather cynical, because I'd like to think that browsers are
user agents, but I think these days they're just advertising company agents
that happen to run on users' computers.

~~~
kranner
For full-text search over all history, History Hound
([https://www.stclairsoft.com/HistoryHound/](https://www.stclairsoft.com/HistoryHound/))
works pretty well if you're on macOS.

[No affiliation, I'm just a user]

------
cm523
Really like OneTab for this same functionality. [https://www.one-
tab.com](https://www.one-tab.com) \- For Firefox and Chrome.

Differences, clicking OneTab's "Share as web page" will give you a link with
the date-time you merged your tabs into the OneTabs list as well as a QR Code.

Saving tabs and also saving memory, when it auto merges them into a single
space.

~~~
brewdad
I really wish OneTab could sync between different computers. I regularly use
three different machines and hate when I can't find a Tab I saved on one of
the machines I'm not currently using.

~~~
cm523
Damn, I guess I've just been used to just finding a solution myself by merging
into the OneTab singlepage, then using an easy to remember url shortener, to
pull it up on another machine. Will try the suggestions posted in replies to
this, hopefully with make things easier.

------
antonycourtney
For what it's worth, since folks are mentioning other extensions, my full-
featured tab manager extension, Tabli
([https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tabli/igeehkedfibb...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tabli/igeehkedfibbnhbfponhjjplpkeomghi))
provides a "Copy Window Summary" action that will copy all open windows and
tabs to the Clipboard as a nicely-formatted Markdown table. Tabli was a "Show
HN" items about 5 years ago and is still actively maintained. Of interest to
HN crowd: MIT licensed, no cloud component, rigorous privacy policy (100% in-
browser), keyboard shortcuts for most functionality. I wrote a Medium piece
with an overview of Tabli a couple of weeks ago:
[https://medium.com/@antonycourtney/taming-tab-hell-with-
tabl...](https://medium.com/@antonycourtney/taming-tab-hell-with-
tabli-83f080e32d17?source=friends_link&sk=d121d5ba0114d9eea9cd29a23e202d37)

------
ypcx
Why do we open new tabs?

1\. We want to do multiple things at once (very rare, very limited, let's say
we have 5 such things, Gmail, Slack, Gitlab, monitoring, etc.)

2\. We want to have websites preloaded and ready to go as soon as we get to
that tab (often)

3\. We want to "bookmark" links temporarily without actually saving them into
our Bookmarks (this goes hand in hand with point 2. but not always)

4\. Observation: large numbers of pre-opened tabs will stay opened for a very
long time until we actually find the time to get to them, consuming memory,
tab bar space, as well as our mental space as we have their tab icons visible.

So I think based on the above, an ideal tab management system would:

\- understand "sessions/groups/trees", e.g. I opened HN and alt+clicked on
links and discussions that interest me as I went through the list

\- gave me an opportunity to transfer such "trees" to another browser window,
session, computer

\- had an option to automatically, or on a command, archive (and later restore
from) these into a tab history, which would retain the hierarchy

\- had other functionality that I cannot foresee at this moment

Additionally, the browser should probably load & pause a background tab once
its opened using alt+click, and only run it once its actually opened by the
user.

Edit: formatting

~~~
nicolewhite
Reminds me of the chrome extension I made for myself that will close all tabs
with the same domain as the active tab. Usually I end up with many reddit tabs
open and I want to close all the tabs I opened except for the home page that
I'm currently on.

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/manage-tabs-by-
dom...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/manage-tabs-by-
domain/jgjhgpeaejjahlbcgijdibooomicdcfi)

------
welder
A simple tip for those with many tabs open: Shift + Select multiple tabs and
drag them into a new window. That feature helps me clean up 100+ open tabs in
Chrome.

~~~
bariswheel
Wow, thank you. These life-changing tips really need to be much more easily
discoverable.

~~~
postsantum
The browser could check your tab patterns and offer tips. For example, if you
have a hundred of tabs but navigating mostly within a limited set of them, a
cartoonish fox would appear in the bottom right corner, asking if you need
assistance

------
pcr910303
If you're one of those who use Safari and finds the idea appealing: Tabs To
Links[0] is a Safari native extension that does something similar.

Pretty polished, and has some goodies like trimming the site's name from the
tab title. It's made by Benjamin Mayo[1]. Very useful.

[0]: [http://tabstolinks.com](http://tabstolinks.com)

[1]: [https://bzamayo.com](https://bzamayo.com)

------
renewiltord
Punk-o-matic was the first time I encountered the idea of a string-
serializable program state and my mind was blown. I think more applications
would benefit from being able to turn things into a text state, especially
ones with a lot of configuration.

Imagine hitting a button and having AWS drop everything it does into a
Terraform file or CloudFormation file or something. Or maybe you go through
the UI selecting options and at the end you hit "Export to TF" and you get a
TF thing selecting the options you had. That would be cool!

I've heard that Azure has something like this but I haven't tried it myself.

------
dbg31415
I use CopyTabTitleUrl -- I like that I can key bind it, and customize the
output that gets pasted.

I press Option + C, and the output looks like this:

* CopyTabTitleUrl – Get this Extension for Firefox (en-US) || [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/copytabtitleu...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/copytabtitleurl/)

Works in Firefox and Chrome.

* CopyTabTitleUrl - Chrome Web Store || [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copytabtitleurl/lm...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copytabtitleurl/lmgbdjfoaihhgdphombpgjpaohjfeapp)

It can also grab the format for all open tabs. Here it's grabbing the title +
URL, complete with my formatting.

* Netflix || [https://www.netflix.com/..](https://www.netflix.com/..).

* Hacker News || [https://news.ycombinator.com/](https://news.ycombinator.com/)

* Amazon.com: Online Shopping for Electronics, Apparel, Computers, Books, DVDs & more || [https://www.amazon.com/](https://www.amazon.com/)

------
dutzi_
I have [https://clusterwm.com/](https://clusterwm.com/) set up to open once I
hit Cmd+Shift+L.

It opens a new tab with a list of open tabs and a (focused) search field you
can use to filter that list. Really useful when you have a ton of open tabs
and looking for one in particular.

~~~
basch
GoTo Tab is similar but it opens as a dialog menu not a new tab.
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/goto-
tab/hjfkaobgk...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/goto-
tab/hjfkaobgkmaeomgdhmhhipdbjdhhjkoi?hl=en)

~~~
bogomipz
Interesting. Would this also supersede the need to use extensions that attempt
to put tabs to sleep to manage memory usage? When I was using Chrome it was
always the memory usage by many tabs that caused me problems.

------
gunn
I use and can recommend the chrome extension from
[https://sessionbuddy.com/](https://sessionbuddy.com/)

Even if you don't use it actively, it periodically saves the state of your
windows and tabs (all locally), so you can restore sessions from months and
years ago.

~~~
O_H_E
SessionBuddy is amazing. It is the only thing I am missing from chrome.

Although it is not open-source, it has customizable exports in a variety of
text formats . Too tired to write more, but if you use chrome check it out.

------
bitxbitxbitcoin
Just curious - what is the amount of tabs that everyone else has open right
now in their browser?

I currently have 29... Trying to figure out on which side I'm an outlier. I
know (thanks to the favicon) what each tab is and when I'll use it next, but
am I just wasting ram on my computer and in meatspace?

~~~
Ankaios
Usually probably about 1000 tabs, spread over 100 to 200 windows on 10–20
virtual desktops. (I also block Javascript by default, so Firefox still runs
alright.)

~~~
bberrry
How do you manage the windows? Opening other windows is how I've lost open
tabs before, so now I keep a single Firefox window.

~~~
Ankaios
I tend to give each major thing I'm working on its own virtual desktop, which
has a bunch of open browser and other windows. Each of the browser windows
tends to have its own theme, too. (E.g. documentation for a particular
framework, articles from a particular journal, a news topic, etc.) That makes
it relatively easy for me to keep a handle on things. If I feel like I can't
find things on a virtual desktop any more, that's my hint to clean things up a
bit.

My biggest source of grief is session management between restarts. Firefox
thankfully remembers the windows and tabs, but it doesn't reopen windows on
the same virtual desktops they were on when it closed, at least under GNOME
defaults. (Nor do the other programs.) That makes me do a lot of manual
rearranging whenever it restarts, which is a pain. Other than that, it usually
works well.

------
garritfra
The goal was to get rid of tabs, not to let them grow exponentially! :c

~~~
niamsidri
How about this :) [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/exploding-
tab...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/exploding-tabs/)

------
cloudking
Serious question, people who have hundreds or thousands of tabs at a time,
why? Personally I've never found the need to have so many tabs open.

~~~
errnoh
I think my tabs mostly belong to one of two categories:

* Research about a subject (that I didn't close when I continued to the next one)

* "Oh that's interesting, I'll read it later"

I do remember that 10+ years ago I used to have a nice collection of
bookmarks, each with relevant tags. Then one day I had to switch browsers due
to performance issues, the new browser didn't support tags from the previous
one so lost everything. Ended up just keeping tabs open after that and every
now and then I just go through them until 500 or so remain.

For the "read it later" scenario I'm aware that there are a lot of services
that try to solve that problem, none that I've tried just seem to fit my
workflow.

~~~
weaksauce
I'm very similar to you... i even made a webext to help me find tabs quickly
as i will tend to open a window do something and then open up a few tabs in
that window and eventually minimize the window to dock. if you have a hundred
tabs open across many windows you come into a situation of where did that tab
go? now it's just cmd-shift-e and visually scroll through the list of open
tabs and then click on the link to bring it front and center.

might be useful to you:

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tabist/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tabist/)

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tabist/hdjegjggiog...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tabist/hdjegjggiogfkaldbfphfdkpggjemaha)

and open source too if someone feels like contributing:

[https://github.com/fiveNinePlusR/tabist](https://github.com/fiveNinePlusR/tabist)

~~~
BugWatch
Thank you for your extension; I'm a user and it really helps me find the tab
in my Firefox "window-forest".

I'm a heavy Tree Style Tab user, though, and tree-state isn't reflected in
your addon. Would you consider implementing the support (and maybe easy JSON
export of the generated list)?

In any case, thanks for your efforts.

~~~
weaksauce
you're welcome... not sure if tree style tabs has an api i can use to get that
information. i actually have a dump of tabs to json in an unreleased version i
used for backup and restore but it's not live yet.

------
shacrw
I personally use the Copy as Markdown extension[1]. gives option to export all
tabs/ selected tabs and option to export link/text/URL

[1] [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copy-as-
markdown/f...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/copy-as-
markdown/fkeaekngjflipcockcnpobkpbbfbhmdn?hl=en)

------
milkey_mouse
Huh, I made something almost exactly like this a few months ago. I couldn't be
bothered to get a Chrome developer account and pay the fee so I had to put
Chrome in developer mode every time I used it.

[https://github.com/milkey-mouse/tab-list](https://github.com/milkey-
mouse/tab-list)

------
vbo
This is pretty cool.

On a related note, Chrome makes it easy to "move" your open tabs from one
device to another via history / tabs from other devices / open all, which is
very helpful if you tend to open a ton of links in new tabs to read later, but
need to switch devices.

~~~
beerandt
I've never gotten this feature to work properly (granted I gave up trying over
a year ago, and I am a tab hoarder)- if I switch devices looking for a
specific tab, it's almost never there. There might be older and/or newer tabs,
but rarely the one I actually need.

The only consistent way I've (sort of) gotten tabs from chrome on Android to
anything else is plugging into a laptop and using the developer console list
of URLs.

------
nausher81
Thanks this is really handy for me. In the past, I had to export tabs via the
"Cluster - Window Manager" Extension and then finagle the CSV into an HTML
file before I stuck in my Google Drive.

Also, do you know if there is a version of this for Firefox?

~~~
slymax
Tablist is now also available for Firefox: [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tablist/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tablist/)

------
winkeltripel
I've been intending to write something like this for a while. It's perfect!

------
jdally987
No one's mentioned Workona? How does that extension get like no recognition

On that note though, how the heck is anyone supposed to sort through the
infinite amount of "TabWhatever" extensions.

------
modzu
author of tablist for firefox here!

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tab-
list/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tab-list/)

------
nausher81
This is awesome. Do you know, if there's something similar for Firefox?

~~~
slymax
Tablist is now also available for Firefox: [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tablist/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-
US/firefox/addon/tablist/)

------
chaudhary27
I use OneTab for this.

