Want iGoogle made for laptop / netbook screens? Use PimpMyiGoogle

Download updated PimpMyiGoogle (May 2011):
Install Pimp My iGoogle – Userscripts.org

View Pimp My iGoogle – Userscripts.org
 
Writing userscripts for most sites feels a bit like a game of cat and mouse.  Everytime Yahoo! or Google or anyone else who has a site that I write scripts for changes their page the following occurs:

1. My existing scripts partially or completely break
2. I go to work on writing an update
3. I get most of the way there and hit a roadblock
4. I need to relearn a bit of the differences between script behavior en Firefox and Chrome
5. Updated script is fixed and posted to userscripts
6. Make a new post on spanishgringo.blogspot.com

I am pretty much at step 6 again.  This time it was PimpMyiGoogle.

Google looks to have completely rewritten its content layout and changed its backend JS functions.  I noticed that on 1 computer in Chrome a few weeks back that the script no longer worked.  However, it kept working fine in Firefox and on my computer at work.  I figured that they might be running a new test.  Well, fast forward to last week and all browsers on all of my computers stopped respecting most of the improvements made by the userscript.

So, this weekend, I dove in and made the fixes.  Basically, the script had to be rewritten from scratch.  I decided to clean up a bit and change the old "show sidebar" button to a new CSS3 button.

ToDo for the script:

• Get min/max buttons to work in Chome (odd Object does not have click method error although the JS inspector shows that their is a valid click event listener).
• Check the module status (expanded/minimized ) to determine which button icon to show.

Any other suggestions for the script? Please let me know.  One idea I want to play with is pulling gTalk out of the sidebar and make it a floating menu.

Pimp My iGoogle – Greasemonkey Script

Update May 2011: Complete rewrite to handle new internal structure of iGoogle.



Update: I ported the script to Chrome:

Pimp My iGoogle - Chrome Version  use the main userscript on userscripts.org

Pimp My iGoogle – Userscripts.org
I am not a big fan of many of the changes to the new iGoogle. I tried it back many months ago when it first was launched. I sent them a lot of feedback. Unfortunately, a lot of that feedback seemed to fall on deaf ears at Google (what a surprise - sarcastic emphasis added).

Anyway, there are 3 main things that Pimp My iGoogle does:

1. Simplify and reduce the space needed by the header - I also unbury the link to Google Reader
2. There is a button to hide/show the annoying left-hand nav bar (they really should allow users to customize the order and styling of those links in the nav bar).
3. Brought back the max/min button to load and unload modules. Google decided to move this funtion from its original home to the options drop down layer...forcing users to make 1 more click to move open and close the modules. This script puts the function back where it belongs (on the header of the module)

Sadly, I have not yet fixed my last main gripe with the new iGoogle.
Individual feed items used to have the same max/min functionality as modules. That was great if I wanted to read a post then and there without really changing the screen. Well, that is gone now and you only get a snippet of each post. That makes each feed module take up too much space by default and it forces users into the expanded mode.
UPDATE: Google has since brought back the old functionality

My suspicion is that these moves are mostly aimed at forcing more people into canvas mode where Google will have more ability to show ads targeted to the active module's content. If they try that, I'll just update Pimp My iGoogle to block d'em ads.