SOLVED: Shell extension which would let you choose which browser opens a hyperlink

[chrisalbright]

I don't *think* this would be very complicated, but I don't have the expertise to do it myself

I would like to right click on a hyperlink and be able to choose which browser opens the url. For example, I prefer Chrome, but there are some things I still need firefox for (firebug for example). Most of the time, I want to use Chrome, but sometimes I'd like to open the link in Firefox. And still other times, I need to use IE (for some very dumb apps that don't speak ff or chrome).

Sort of similar to this idea: http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=8979.0 which didn't seem to get any traction (that I could find) although it seemed popular.

This would be incredibly useful for me and I'm certain for many others. What are your thoughts?

[MilesAhead]

Hmmmmmmmmmm if you were using Firefox it already has an AddOn named Launchy that does what you want.  I took a quick look on Chrome AddOns and I didn't see anything similar but there may be.  Try googling on Chrome Plugins and see if anything is already out there.  Other than that seems like it would need a clipboard monitor and some GUI to show you the browsers installed.  Basically duplicating what Launchy already does but in a Hotkey type of thing.  AutoHotKey for me right now is pretty much limited to one page scripts since it's so hard to find out how to do stuff with the syntax.  Strings a quotes "here" but not THERE and it's way confusing for the neophyte.

[ewemoa]

I've been wanting FARR to be able to handle these sorts of situations as I believe that may make it possible for FARR plugins to be written to customize such handling

[MilesAhead]

The programming should be trivial if the user is willing to configure by browsing(pun intended) to each installed browser to let the program know what's installed.  If the utility has to search and catalog the stuff like Launchy does that would likely be most of the code.  Otherwise you'd just have the URL as command line param and the path to each different browser stored as answer to the hotkey(maybe pop up a list or have it go directly using more than one hotkey modifier or something.)

[MilesAhead]

Hmmmmmm I wonder if this could be something added to Mouser's
BrowserTraySwitch

Like, perhaps set default browser and goto the url in the clipboard or something?

[MilesAhead]

I've been wanting FARR to be able to handle these sorts of situations as I believe that may make it possible for FARR plugins to be written to customize such handling

The only thing I'm thinking is if you right click a link in a browser window to use a different browser, the browser with the link is bound to have a bunch of right click handlers and you wouldn't want to cut them out of the loop.  So it may be better to use a hotkey than a mouse click.  Just thinking out loud. Although there's so many browsers out there it would be tough to know what initiator would be "neutral" in that context.

[ewemoa]

The only thing I'm thinking is if you right click a link in a browser window to use a different browser, the browser with the link is bound to have a bunch of right click handlers and you wouldn't want to cut them out of the loop.

Ah, I wasn't thinking of trying to have FARR handle links clicked in browsers -- one of the contexts I had in mind was within windows of IM applications.

[nite_monkey]

One Idea:
Code an AHK script (or some other language, all I know though is AHK) that will show a list of all your web browsers, and run the selected browser with the url shortcut you ran.
Then you just change the open with for url shortcuts to that AHK script, so that when you double click on the shortcut, it opens the program and adds the shortcut to a variable, and when you select which browser you want to use, it would open the selected url with the browser you picked.

[MilesAhead]

@ewemoa it would be simpler if the link was in plain text and usable as is.  If digging out of a browser then the handler would have to read the page source and find the href=url that matches the underlined link.  Afa the Open With.. you could accomplish similar thing if you used a deskCut and right click and use SendTo menu.  Just add all your browsers to SendTo.

Guess the implementation depends most on the most-used app that would have the initial link.

[MilesAhead]

Looks like this may be subsumed into this utility:
http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=8979.0

[MilesAhead]

I don't know if the OP is still interested in this topic but since I just configured FARR for a similar thing I thought I'd post.  If you watch the Screencast for FARR hotkeys, you can see how to set up a hotkey.  The other part of it would be to set External Tools option to Override default browser.

Granted this only works for one browser.  That's one reason I posted a Coding Snacks request for a "redirector" program so you could select from several.

But this method of calling Opera from another browser has the benefit that it doesn't depend on a plugin for the first browser.  It should work for any starting browser(or any app where you can highlight text.)

For my set up I have 2 hotkeys configured.  One copies selected text to the clipboard, then pastes in into FARR and lets FARR call Opera with the URL.  For the other if you want to launch from a link, you use the browser "copy link location" or equivalent to get the URL into the clipboard, then FARR just pastes the URL from the clipboard and calls Opera.

Just one way of skinning the cat but not as versatile as a general purpose redirector thingy would be.

[Smobu]

Using the opera browser can allow you to open links in other browsers.

Download the Open in IE and FF.ini from this site and follow the instructions
http://my.opera.com/Tamil/homes/Blogs/Open%20in%20IE%20and%20FF.ini
http://my.opera.com/Tamil/blog/open-in-firefox-internet-explorer

It should in be the opera context menu:


I believe that you could also add other browsers as well.

[MilesAhead]

Thanks for the info.  I guess my next project will be some redirector to most used apps.  FF is my default so launch from Opera going the other way is very rare.  But I'm sure the links are good for Opera lovers.

Then again, I have to search AutoIt3 forum.  Maybe somebody made a freebie that does what I want already.

[MilesAhead]

I found another approach.  It's not quite as versatile as optional clipboard use, but it is interesting.  It's a free launcher called Enso.  There's a write-up on Gizmo's site:

http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-program-launcher.htm

What applies here is after you teach Enso some "open" commands then you can highlight text, a file in explorer, or a URL in a browser and hit the hotkey and type "open with command" where command is an open command you taught Enso.  So you can highlight a URL in the address bar and hit the hotkey and type "open with opera" as example, and it will open the URL with Opera.  The really weird thing is it comes configured for you to hold down the caps lock key while you are typing this stuff in.  Bizarre.. but it lets you choose another key such as Left Windows key and also set "sticky" so you can let go of the key.  Hit Esc to cancel.

I think I'll play around with it for awhile.  The main thing I don't like so far is you can't tell it, afaik, to use whatever is in the clipboard.  Only highlighted text, images or a file/folder.  Still you can set up a bunch of different programs only using the one hotkey.

[MilesAhead]

I don't *think* this would be very complicated, but I don't have the expertise to do it myself

I would like to right click on a hyperlink and be able to choose which browser opens the url. For example, I prefer Chrome, but there are some things I still need firefox for (firebug for example). Most of the time, I want to use Chrome, but sometimes I'd like to open the link in Firefox. And still other times, I need to use IE (for some very dumb apps that don't speak ff or chrome).

Sort of similar to this idea: http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=8979.0 which didn't seem to get any traction (that I could find) although it seemed popular.

This would be incredibly useful for me and I'm certain for many others. What are your thoughts?

The utility I wrote(Selector) is almost exactly what you want.
See the announcement for more details:
http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=19717.0


If you want to open a link in another browser, right click the link and use the command that copies the link to the clipboard, such as "copy link location" and press the Selector hotkey, choose the Clipboard Text Radio Button, then double click the browser you added to the ListBox.  You may add individual programs or shortcuts to the list via the Add Button or Drag & Drop them from Explorer.

There may be one more click than using a plugin to launch another browser, but using Selector, instead of having to install a plugin in each browser that you use, just open the Selector popup window and drag & drop shortcuts to all your browsers in one go!


In the other case when you want to open the current page in another browser, just click the address bar to highlight, hit Selector hotkey and double click the browser in the ListBox.  Selected Text Radio Button is enabled by default when the popup window displays.

When you hit the hotkey, Selector gets the Clipboard contents as text and saves it, then it does a Copy to put the selected text in the clipboard and retrieves it.  Then it restores the original text to the clipboard.  The idea is to avoid disrupting editing if you already have text in the clipboard.  Other data types such as images aren't preserved.. only text.

You can also use it just as a quicky launcher.  Select the Text Radio Button and leave the Input line blank to launch with no command line parameters.

[lanux128]

another alternative is featured on lifehacker today: Browser Chooser.

Browser Chooser is a small tool acting as the default browser allowing you to choose what browser to open the link in. It gives you the flexibility to choose what browser to use for any given task. It is developed in VB.Net and geared towards Windows Vista and Windows 7.

[attach=#]

• Source: http://lifehacker.com/5352193/browser-chooser-asks-you-which-browser-to-open-new-links-in

[chrisalbright]

another alternative is featured on lifehacker today: Browser Chooser.

Browser Chooser is a small tool acting as the default browser allowing you to choose what browser to open the link in. It gives you the flexibility to choose what browser to use for any given task. It is developed in VB.Net and geared towards Windows Vista and Windows 7.

(see attachment in previous post)
• Source: http://lifehacker.com/5352193/browser-chooser-asks-you-which-browser-to-open-new-links-in

@lanux128 Thank you! This is exactly what I was hoping to find!