extending Safari 2: saft! is a post on The Hickensian

One of my niggles about Safari is that I’ve always felt it’s a little short in features. As mentioned before, Pith Helmet (Advert blocking), Sogudi (Address bar searches) and Safari Enhancer go someway to improve it. I want to use Safari – I love its clean, elegant interface and speed, but sometimes it feels a bit lacking.

I’ve been testing and enjoying the radically more stable Omniweb 5 (beta 3) for a few days now, and enjoying its workspaces feature. This reminded me that Safari is about the only Mac browser that doesn’t let you save a group of tabs. However, Saft v6.5 was released today, and amongst its many new features – the ability to save tab groups. I’d never looked into Saft before, as I’m not that bothered about full screen or kiosk mode (which was its original purpose) so I was surprised to see that its developer was busy adding more functionality.

Even better than tab group saving though, is the option to save a browser window – its tabs, window size and screen position. Previously saved windows are accessed through the File menu, as well as the ability to delete saved windows. Saft also features the same shortcut searches from the address bar as Sogudi, but adds those search engines to the google search bar menu as well. Nice.

Add to this PDF export/back/forward commands in the context menu, a preference to force new windows to open as a tab, type-ahead searching and suddenly Safari starts to feel like a fully-featured browser.

The only possible downside to all this, is that you have to pay $10 (£5.89 in UK money) for all this extra functionality. Some may feel its not worth paying to extend a free browser, especially when Apple might get around to adding these features someday. Its up to you, but personally I felt that it was a pittance for functionality that I would enjoy every day.

I’ve asked for bookmark menu separators in the next version – you never know…

Finallly, a quick mention for Safari Sorter, which will organise your bookmarks alphabetically for you.