directory - ReadWriteWeb http://www.readwriteweb.com/feeds/tag/directory en Copyright 2012 Richard MacManus readwriteweb@gmail.com Wed, 15 Feb 2012 07:00:00 -0800 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=4.35-en http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Does the Mobile Web Need a Yahoo-Style Directory? taptu_logo_jun09.pngDo you remember the days when Yahoo was a Yellow Pages-like directory of websites? Back in the early days of the Internet, a number of companies created vast, human-edited databases that aimed to catalog all the Web - and some even sold these as printed books. According to mobile search engine Taptu, the mobile Internet is at a similar point today, where a directory is simply the easiest way to discover content. While Taptu's main focus is still on its crawler-based search engine for mobile sites, the company also just launched a Yahoo-like directory of touch-friendly websites.

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taptu_touch_friendly_directory.jpgEarlier this year, AdMob's CEO and founder Omar Hamoui argued that the mobile Web is going through its "Yahoo phase," as it is still possible to find mobile apps using directory-like app stores instead of having to rely on more advanced search engines. While Hamoui was mostly talking about apps, the same could be said about the mobile Web in general. The number of touch-friendly mobile sites is still relatively small when compared the Web as a whole, and services like Taptu's new directory make sense at this point.

Taptu's Directory

To help its users find the best touch-friendly sites for mobile phones, Taptu decided to create a directory. Taptu notes that phones with touchscreens are quickly becoming mass-market devices, but a lot of these devices don't feature app stores. For Taptu, the top five traffic-generating phones include the Samsung Caliber, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and Samsung Finesse.

Thanks to Taptu's focus on touch-friendly sites, the directory turns out to be a fun way to find interesting sites on the go, without the hassle of having to deal with sites that don't work well on small screens. To access Taptu's directory, just head over to the company's mobile site and look for the Categories icon at the top of the page.

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http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/does_the_mobile_web_need_a_yahoo-style_directory.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/does_the_mobile_web_need_a_yahoo-style_directory.php Mobile Fri, 28 May 2010 12:01:08 -0800 Frederic Lardinois
Bmlet: An Online Directory of Bookmarklets Love bookmarklets? You know, those small bits of code that you add to your web browser's Favorites menu? With bookmarklets, you can reduce browser bloat by replacing a number of your add-ons with bookmarklets that perform the same actions, yet without the need for extra software installed. And if your default browser is Google Chrome, bookmarklets are even more essential to getting things done since you can't use extensions at all unless you run a developer build.

If you've been looking for a great resource for finding bookmarklets, you're going to love the new site at bmlet.com, an online directory and search engine just for bookmarklets.

]]> On the bmlet homepage, you'll see the highest rated, newest, and most popular bookmarklets listed and there's a search box provided where you can query to find just the one you need.

If you'd rather browse through the listings, you can do so from the "browse" link at the top of the page, but here your only options are sorting them by date or relevance. That's not all that useful, to be honest. (And how are they determining relevance, we wonder?) An alphabetical listing or listing them by category would be a lot more helpful. In fact, it's almost not worth bothering with the browse option at all.

That's really not a big deal, though, since the search engine works just fine. However, it looks like the site still has room to grow - we noticed that they were missing a few of our favorites. For example, we love the "share in Google Reader" bookmarklet, but a search for Google Reader only delivered two results: view feed source and note to Reader. Oh well. (You can see a list of great bookmarklets we're using here). But on the other hand, a search for Twitter left us with so many options it was hard to even choose a favorite.

If, like us, you notice any missing bookmarklets on the site, you don't have to wait for them to add them to their directory - you can just add them yourself. After creating an account, you can click the add bookmarklet link and fill in the title, description, javascript, source link, and tags for the bookmarklet you want to share. Hit "submit" and you're done.

Be warned though - it's very easy to lose track of time when delving into this resource. Instead of giving it a quick once-over, I found myself lost in there for over half an hour today. But what better way to spend a Friday, right?

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http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/bmlet_an_online_directory_of_bookmarklets.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/bmlet_an_online_directory_of_bookmarklets.php Product Reviews Fri, 29 May 2009 09:56:04 -0800 Sarah Perez