Webcache Browser is a Chrome Extension which allows you to navigate through the Google Cache without going back to the original site when you click a link.
The Google What ?
Google Cache is normally referred as the copies of the web pages cached by Google. Google crawls the web and takes snapshots of each page as a backup just in case the current page is not available. These pages then become part of Google's cache. These Google cached pages can be extremely useful if a site is temporary down, you can always access these page by visiting Google’s cached version.
To make it simple, when you are on a website which is currently unavailable (for example, you have a 404 error), you may have the chance to access an earlier version cached by Google.
You can check it manually visiting this url http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:<your url without "http://">.
But you may have a 404 error from Google Cache itself.
Secondly, if you are on a Google cached page and you click on whatever link you find on the page, you will quit the cached version and go back to the original site, which may still be unavailable.
With Webcache Browser, you no longer need to worry about these two points. You can click, click, click again, click a thousand times and you will still be redirected to the cached version, except when it is impossible. When the extension finds that you will arrive on a 404 error of Google Cache itself, Webcache Browser lets you where you are but notifies you (in the upper-right corner) that where is no cache available at this moment for this page.
How do I make it works ?
Install it from chrome web store.
You will now have a new extension icon to the right of your address bar.
The default behavior of the extension is to let you browse normally the web until it finds an unvailable page. At this moment it will let you see the cached version. It is the autodetection feature.
If you want to disable the feature, you have to click on the extension's icon and select the checkbox. From this moment CacheBrowser's autodetection is no longer active. You can browse the web without being disturbed with redirection.
The other option lets you enable a constant redirection to the Google's cache. Usefull if you want to see the version of a webpage Google had keep, even if this page is still available. If you are done, you can disable it by the same way : click on the icon and unselect the checkbox.
If you have just the need to see the cached version of the current page without lost some time to enable, reload, dowhateveryouwantonthepage, disable, you also have the possibility to be redirect directly through the item in the context menu.
What's next ?
It is planned to add some others features like :
Autodetection option : If a webpage is not found, Webcache Browser will automatically redirect to the cached version: Done in 1.3.0Internationalization (i18n) : Adapt the extension to various languages: Done in 1.2.0
Copyright
- Icons made by Freepik from flaticon is licensed by CC BY 3.0
- Use of Javascript librairie JQuery under MIT license
- Use of Javascript librairie Notify under MIT license
- Use of "Flat UI - Custom checkboxes" by Geoffrey Crofte
Webcache Browser has been written by Alexandre DAUSSY / Kureb licenced under CC BY 3.0