• On mySimon: Pea Coats Are Another Wardrobe Staple
July 31, 2008 2:47 PM PDT

PicLens adds YouTube, Amazon

by Seth Rosenblatt

The fun browser add-on PicLens has incorporated YouTube and Amazon.com into the short but hopefully soon-to-grow list of supported Web sites. Compatible with Firefox on Windows and Mac, Internet Explorer, and Safari, PicLens recreates your surfing experience with a futuristic graphical display.

PicLens now supports searches on YouTube and Amazon.com.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

As Rafe talked about in February, PicLens highlights the image content of a site and allows you to whip back and forth using mouse gestures instead of conventional static browsing. If you're familiar with how it works with an image site like Flickr, the YouTube interface is identical. The PicLens plug-in will install a grid button on your Toolbar, which you click to activate the PicLens full-screen interface. Click a thumbnail to start playing a video, while the search box lives in the upper right of your screen. As video starts playing, standard YouTube controls appear at the bottom of the video. One potential drawback is that if the quality of the video is low, then the not-quite-full-screen playback will probably appear pixelated.

On Amazon, the experience is slightly different. The main Amazon.com page doesn't support the PicLens button, but if you click on the button anyway it will open up the PicLens UI. From there, change the Web site search to Amazon, type in your search term, and images of whatever item you searched for will zoom past. The Amazon interface responded slower than other, more heavily-image based Web sites like Picasa.

PicLens currently supports YouTube, Flickr, Picasa, Facebook, MySpace, Fotobucket, deviantART, Google Images, Yahoo Images, and about a half-dozen others. The slideshow mode makes PicLens more accessible for users who are worried about the vertiginous effects of the add-on. There's also a plug-in for WordPress users to add the feature to their site, and instructions for any webmaster to add PicLens support to their self-hosted pages.

Originally posted at The Download Blog
Seth peers into the deep, dark corners of software so that you don't have to. He has yet to suffer a single nightmare about OS/2. You can follow him on Twitter.
Recent posts from Webware
Review redux: Flixster movie app for BlackBerry
Popular iPhone movie app flops on BlackBerry
Opera Mobile 10 beta browser: First Look video
Google trying not to cross 'the creepy line'
Integrated retweet on its way to Twitter
Mozilla's e-mail group looks toward the cloud
Facebook: We're going after scammy ads, too
Alterna-browsers Firefox, Chrome get quick fixes
Add a Comment (Log in or register) (7 Comments)
  • prev
  • 1
  • next
by eclipse7500 July 31, 2008 4:58 PM PDT
Sorry but this is news from around a month ago, why is it posted now?
Reply to this comment
by blogdork August 2, 2008 1:58 PM PDT
eclipse is right, this review was here before and was plagued with negative comments about it. Is CNET watching our backs here?
Reply to this comment
by Lapinou August 5, 2008 11:43 PM PDT
it is an excellent plugin, if you want to publish your own photos on a web site and visible with piclens, you can use http://www.photoonweb.com which added the support for Piclens
Reply to this comment
by cse_riyadh August 6, 2008 1:51 AM PDT
ddfs
Reply to this comment
by kevinlakin August 6, 2008 4:23 AM PDT
I have been raving about Piclens to all my friends for months and months, i even e-mailed the peeps at PicLens to tell them what a brilliant job they were doing, this a fantastic bit of kit,
and its free.
Reply to this comment
by khalid120/9l August 12, 2008 4:49 AM PDT
Reply to this comment
by talat777 August 18, 2008 9:44 PM PDT
have a nice day.
Reply to this comment
(7 Comments)
  • prev
  • 1
  • next
advertisement

About Webware

Say No to boxed software! The future of applications is online delivery and access. Software is passé. Webware is the new way to get things done.

Add this feed to your online news reader

Webware topics

FAQ: Buying the right Windows 7 upgrade

Readers still have lots of questions on just which version of the software they need to buy in order to upgrade their PC. CNET News tries to offer some answers.

N.Y. lawsuit details Intel's 'largesse' toward Dell

Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's federal antitrust case filed Wednesday alleges a longstanding symbiotic relationship between Intel and Dell.

Inside CNET News

Scroll Left Scroll Right