Just Read Chrome extension takes away website distractions

Sometimes you just really want to read that long article you’ve been putting off for a while. But you can’t help but get distracted by links, ads, or anything else happening on your site of choice. The Just Read Chrome extension wants to rein in this tendency. It helps take out ads, comments, and other elements of a website that might distract you while you try to read. Just Read even comes with a dark mode or a customizable theme to have it look the way you want it to. There are themes from other people that you can use, too. If you just really want to read, this Chrome extension just might be the lifesaver you need.

Source: Lifehacker

Tip on how to stop websites on Chrome from displaying its incessant notification prompt

Chrome notifications seem like a good idea until a lot sites started to support them and now you’ll get the pop-up notification every single time you open a new site that supports it. You can block these individually but that would be a time-consuming task. To completely shut this feature off, you just need to head to this link and flip the toggle from “Ask before sending” to “Blocked.” For those on Android, you just need to head to Settings in Chrome and head to Advanced and then locate Site Settings. From there tap on Notifications and you’ll see the toggle “Ask before sending” and flip that again to “Blocked.”

Source: Android Police

Google to roll out the ability to permanently mute websites soon

Around August last year, Google was testing out ways to mute websites that autoplay videos. Now, it looks like the feature is almost ready for primetime. Google will reportedly roll this feature out in the upcoming update. Soon you can just right-click on the tab that autoplays videos and select the option that’ll let you mute the entire site for good. Chrome already has a “mute” option but this was only a temporary fix.

On top of this, Chrome 64 for Windows adds HDR support for Windows users. You will, however, need to upgrade your system to Falls Creator Update already and have an HDR-compatible monitor and graphics card. The newest version of Chrome also protects Mac and Windows users from Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities. Google Chrome is disabling the SharedArrayBuffer feature to mitigate against attacks.

Source: The Verge

Microsoft removes Google Chrome installer from Windows Store for violating Microsoft Store policies

In order to combat the appearance of fake Chrome browsers on the Microsoft Store, Google just published a Google Chrome Installer app on the app store that basically redirected users to a download link to install the browser. Microsoft is having none of this and has taken down the app saying it violates their app store’s policies. According to a Microsoft spokesperson, they want apps to “provide unique and distinct value” and Google is welcome to do so as long as they “build a Microsoft Store browser app compliant with our Microsoft Store policies.”

This might be something Google won’t be interested in as The Verge points out. One of the big reasons is most likely related to restrictions on Windows 10 S that requires apps to use HTML and JavaScript engines that are provided by Windows 10. Google already has its own Blink rendering engine called Blink and it’s highly doubtful they’ll create a special app just to adhere to Microsoft’s Store policies. Google also can’t package its current desktop app into a Centennial Windows Store app either as Microsoft wants these apps to use Edge rendering engine. So, for now and possibly what you’ve already been doing, if you want Chrome on your Windows machine, you’ll need to launch that right from Edge browser first.