The popular Firefox extension that enables users to take advantage of Google Android’s ChromeToPhone feature has renamed itself.
The extension formerly know as SendToPhone, will now be known as FoxToPhone.
After months of development, the community build extension, Send To Phone has been re-branded Fox To Phone. The developers have worked closely with the Google sponsored Chrome To Phone project, to build an extension that is 100% compatible with ChromeToPhone app available from today from the Android Market.
ChromeToPhone is a service for Google Chrome that takes the current page being viewed on a desktop and sends it to the users paired Android device. It was first demoed at he the Google I/O confrence in San Fransisco in May 2010, as part of the presentation announcing Android 2.2 (a.k.a. Froyo). The service comes in two parts, firstly an extension for Google Chrome to send the link, and secondly an app for the Android device to open the link once received. FoxToPhone works with the same Android app and enables users to use the service with Firefox, just like they can with Chrome. As over 30% of users worldwide user Firefox, it has been downloaded over 35,000 times and has proven very popular with users who favor the Android & Firefox combination.
FoxToPhone takes advantage of the Mozilla platform’s API’s to deliver additional features:
- Send current page with address bar button
- Right-click on any link/image/page to send it.
- Highlight any text and right click to send to the clipboard in your phone
- Automatically send market://, sms://, tel:// links to the Android device where the launch the relevant app
The open source project started in May after of two developers, one Spanish and the other Irish, joined two competing implementations of ChromeToPhone for the Mozilla platform. With further enhancements currently under development, ChromeToPhone and FoxToPhone are set to a must have feature for smartphone users.
FoxToPhone is available for Firefox 3.0+ on all platforms (including GNU/Linux, BSD, Solaris, Mac and Windows) from https://www.addons.mozilla.org or https://www.foxtophone.com
ChromeToPhone for Android is available from the Android Market
Joe
16/08/2010 at 14:20
App/extension sound great, but how could the setup be secure? What prevents someone sending malware to the phone?
paddy
16/08/2010 at 16:33
Firstly this extension does not have access to your
account details ever.
FoxToPhone implements the same security architect that ChromeToPhone does. This forbids cross domain requests through the use of additional headers, hence preventing malicious sites pushing malware/spam to your phone.
The extension works
by sending the link to Google, and Google
and the browser take care of the security
of the transaction.
We have worked with Google to guarantee
that the authorizations takes place in an
open & secure way.
Our code is open source so feel free to
review it to understand how it works and
ease any fears you may have.
switch
16/08/2010 at 15:33
does the extension have access to my Google account, or am I signing “into Google”?
paddy
16/08/2010 at 16:23
The extension does not have access to your account details ever. The extension works by sending the link to Google, and Google and the browser take care of the security of the transaction.
We have worked with Google to guarantee that the authorizations takes place in an open & secure way.
Our code is open source so feel free to review it to understand how it works and ease any fears you may have.
Zizzy
16/08/2010 at 18:18
I’ve tried it. I like it. Is there a place (on my phone or elsewhere) where I can see a list of items sent to my phone. When I cleared the status list on my phone, there was an item I hadn’t opened yet, and now I can’t find it to open it.
paddy
16/08/2010 at 23:35
This request relates to the Android app. Any feature of it are in the hands of Google developers. A request for this feature has already been logged at https://www.code.google.com/p/chrometophone
RMFlagg
16/08/2010 at 22:03
Any chance of implementing Phone to Fox?
alfonso
17/08/2010 at 09:51
That’s requested at https://www.code.google.com/p/chrometophone/issues/detail?id=7
When it’s added we will include it in the Firefox extension.
Paul Morris
18/10/2010 at 16:20
Great tool!
However, here’s a problem:
I have some notes written in Windows Notepad.
I select all and copy to clipboard.
I then use ‘Fox to Phone’ to send the clipboard to my android phone.
When the clipboard arrives at my phone, all the [Carriage Returns] have been replaced with [Spaces] and thus the structure of the text has been lost.
I hope this can be resolved, but thanks anyway for ‘one-upping’ Google with the send clipboard feature – Why didn’t they think of that
naughtypaws
24/10/2011 at 16:09
I also have issues with not being passed properly.
Might be an issue with windows to unix translation as well.
Shawn Gillespie
10/11/2010 at 06:33
The app doesn’t exist on the marketplace. I’ve tried the code numerous times and it says the item does not exist. A search of the marketplace shows nothing
paddy
25/11/2010 at 17:06
The ChromeToPhone app is only available in markets of native English speaking countries. See the ChromeToPhone project for more details https://www.code.google.com/p/chrometophone
xutao
27/03/2011 at 11:46
can anyboay tell how to push a sms link,thank you very much
alfonso
28/03/2011 at 17:45
You can’t create a link to generate a SMS with body, only the number. FoxToPhone doesn’t have any special priviledge so you can use only the link types supported by the Android system.