Let me begin this note with a simple question: how long do you spend your time on a web browser every day?

I asked some of my friends the very same question, and while the answers varies, but nobody said "I never use web browser!" And I'm quite sure that you will have similar answer.

Based on this information from Review24, around 55.73% of the traffic was mobile while about 41.46% was desktop usage at the beginning of 2021. Still from the same source, considering that there are 4.38 billion internet users worldwide, about 1.8 billion of the traffic was coming from desktop, and that was an enormous number! Just by looking at those numbers, building a browser extension seems to be an interesting thing to do.

So, what is a browser extension?

A browser extension is a small software module for customizing a web browser. This small software will add new features to your browser and helps you personalize your browsing experience. You can also think this extension as a plugin or an add-on for your browser.

The background story

During our busy day, we often forget to give ourselves a short moment to relax and cool down to appreciate our efforts to get the job done. Furthermore, with the growing popularity of remote working where the line between work & home often blurred, this could lead to the increased levels of stress and mental health decline.

This short moment of relaxation could be anything from taking a short walk, drinking a glass of fresh water, sending a text message to our loved one, or just by opening a new tab to find some beautiful images without the need to type anything in the address bar.

The option to open a new tab seems to be the easiest way for you to do. That's why I build this Winterly Tab. On a side note, I also want to help you to decrease your level of stress.

Introducing ❄️ Winterly Tab ❄️

Winterly Tab is a free and open source browser extension to replace your new-tab page with beautiful & minimalist winter-themed background images.

Thanks to Unsplash for providing the images, the background in Winterly Tab will automatically change every 5 minutes, or you can manually change if you want by clicking the Change Background button at the bottom right.

Under the hood, Winterly Tab is built using ReactJS and TailwindCSS. And since it is open source, you can also fork the repository and modify the code to match your own need (maybe you want to change the main theme to autumn 🍂, spring 🌱, or summer 🏖?). Or better yet, you can also contribute to this project! 🎉

Winterly Tab is registered as an open source project for 🎃 Hacktoberfest 🎃, so you can contribute to win t-shirt and other swags. But don't do it just for the rewards, you can do more than that 🙂.

You can check the code here in my Github repository.

Screenshots 📷

Here are some screenshots if you are using ❄️ Winterly Tab ❄️

Get noticed by Microsoft 👏

The stars aligned. In the first week of the first release, Winterly Tab is getting a special attention from Microsoft. It was Varadu Sridharan, the Principal Program Manager at Microsoft who works in Microsoft Edge team. He personally asked me to release the extension for Microsoft Edge.

With the help of Varadu and his team (thanks Disha and Nagachaitanya!), Winterly Tab passed the review in just few hours after I submitted it and you are now able to be download it from Microsoft Edge Add-ons website.

Download ❄️ Winterly Tab ❄️

At the moment I'm writing this note, Winterly Tab is only available in Microsoft Edge Add-ons website, and while for Google Chrome, it's still in pending review phase. For the Firefox and Safari, I have not submit it yet to their extension store, but I'm going to submit it soon. Just keep an eye to ❄️ Winterly Tab ❄️ series in this blog to check more updates from me.

Links updated at Oct 6, 2021

Have a nice snowy day! And may you coffee always hot ☕️

Wrapping up 🛍

To summarize this whole note, here are the important points:

• Winterly Tab is build to help you to decrease the level of stress by showing you beautiful winter-themed image.
• Winterly Tab is open source and you can contribute to it. It is also registered in Hacktoberfest event this year.
• Winterly Tab get noticed by Microsoft in the first week of release, which is a good thing (at least for me).
• Currently, the download is available from Microsoft Edge Add-ons website.

Have nice snowy day! May your coffee always hot ☕️