You have arranged a new tab you like, and a friend, a partner or a whole class wants the same one. In Backs you can share a new tab layout as a link: they open it, see a picture of your page, and add a copy to their own Backs.
Backs is the Chrome new tab extension we make. This guide covers making the link, what the person who opens it does, and what travels with it, because one part of a share is public.
What you need
- Chrome on a computer, with Backs installed. There is no phone or tablet version.
- A Space to share. A Space is one saved page: its Backons (the Backs word for widgets), where they sit, and its background.
- An internet connection.
- No account, for you or for the person you send it to.
Share your new tab layout in five steps
Look at the page as a stranger would
Open the Space you want to share. Backs takes a screenshot of it for the link, and the picture shows what is on screen: task titles, the words in a note, bookmark names, a personal photo. Change anything private before you go on.
Open Share a Space
Click Menu, then the button with the gear at the foot of the list on the left. If a sign-in screen appears, press Skip for now. Under Spaces, press the Share… button beside Share a Space. A shorter way, if the Space Backon is on your page: with edit mode off, hover over the Space's name, press the pencil, then press Share.
Check the screenshot
A window titled Share a Space takes the screenshot and shows it. To share a different Space, click it in the row underneath and Backs takes its picture instead. What's included lists the rules. If the picture came out wrong, press Retake screenshot. To change what it shows, close the window, edit the page and open Share again.
Create the link
Press Create link. Only now are the screenshot and the layout uploaded; until then they stay on your computer. The box fills with the address: backs-extension.com/s/ followed by 22 characters.
Send it
The button now reads Copy link: press it and paste the link into a message. The buttons underneath are shortcuts for X, Reddit, LinkedIn and email. A copied link ends with tags recording which button was used; the short form in the box works too.
What your friend sees
The link opens a page on backs-extension.com headed A Space for your new tab, with your screenshot, a line saying that only the layout is imported, and two buttons: Use this Space and Copy link. Search engines are asked not to list it, but anyone with the link can open it. On a phone it asks to be opened in Chrome on a computer.
Press Use this Space
With Backs installed, a Backs tab comes to the front with a window titled Import Space. Without it, the page offers Get Backs for Chrome; after installing, they return to the page and press Continue in Backs.
Choose where it goes
With room to spare, press Add as a new Space under Make it yours. On the free plan with both Spaces taken, pick one under Replace one of your Spaces, or press Get Premium. Replacing deletes that Space's notes, tasks, saved tabs and Backons for good, so Backs asks first: Keep my Space or Replace Space.
Make it their own
The new Space opens, named Shared Space. The Backons sit where yours did, in your colours and shape, over the same photo if it came from Unsplash, and all of them are empty: the task list is called To-Do List and has no tasks, the notepad is blank, text Backons read Your text, and bookmarks have no links. It is an independent copy from here on.
Ideas for a shared Space
- A study group's setup. One person builds the page: a Pomodoro timer, a task list beside it, a note for the week's reading. Everyone else imports it and writes in their own tasks.
- A partner's matching desktop. The same photo, clock and colours on two computers. If your background is a photo you uploaded, send the photo separately: the share carries only its colour.
- A team's start-of-day page. A clock, the weather, a task list and a row of bookmark ribbons. Links do not travel with a share, so each person points the ribbons at the team's pages once.
Questions and answers
- Can the person I share with see my tasks and notes?
- In the picture, yes, if they were on screen when the screenshot was taken. In the copy they add, no: the Backons arrive empty. Check the screenshot before you press Create link.
- Do they need Backs or an account?
- Anyone can look at the page. To add the Space they need Backs in Chrome on a computer. Nobody has to sign in, to make a link or to add one.
- Does sharing cost anything?
- No. Making a link and adding a shared Space are on the free plan. It holds two Spaces, so someone with both in use replaces one to add yours, or moves to Premium for unlimited Spaces.
- Can I stop sharing or delete a link?
- There is no delete button in Backs today. A share is saved without an account attached, so Backs cannot list your links. To have one removed, email hello@backs-extension.com with the link, as our privacy policy describes. Copies people have already added stay with them.
- Will my later changes show up for them?
- No. A link is a snapshot of the moment you pressed Create link, and a copy someone has added is theirs alone. To pass on a newer version, make a new link.
- Does a link expire?
- No, a link has no expiry date. The one limit is on making them: 20 new links an hour from one internet connection.
Photo via Unsplash