I recently launched a tool for building a custom UI for one-click/custom shortcut actions like IDs, comments, Observation Fields, and Annotations. I recently added a major new feature to that extension that seemed to deserve its own announcement, since it’s something that many people may want to use even if they don’t use the other features.
The iNat ID page currently supports many more URL search filters in much more complex combinations than you can generate using the filter module on the Identify page. These URL features are documented on this 2-part wiki forum post. but in order to use them, you needed to painstakingly construct a URL yourself. I used to make these once and then store them as bookmarks, but it was annoying enough that I would rarely bother. This tool makes it easy. I’ve implemented nearly every supported URL string. I’d love to have people start using it and give me some feedback on bugs, UI improvements, any URL combinations I’ve missed, etc.
To use it, install, then click your browser’s extension menu and open the options page.
Then click the Open Advanced Filters URL Generator at the top of the page:
If there are questions you have about how things work, turn on the tooltips to get some notes on a few ambiguous cases. Please suggest other useful notes I should add if you encounter cases that don’t work.
Installation instructions:
Open this link ; it should download the extension as a zip file automatically
Unzip that folder
Installing in Chrome:
Open Chrome and go to chrome://extensions/
Enable “Developer mode” in the top right corner
Click “Load unpacked” on the top left
Navigate to and select the unzipped extension folder
The extension should now appear in your list of extensions
Installing in Edge:
Open Edge and go to edge://extensions/
Turn on “Developer mode” using the toggle on the left sidebar
Click “Load unpacked” on the top right Navigate to and select the unzipped extension folder
The extension should now appear in your list of extensions
Installing in Firefox:
Open Firefox and go to about:debugging
Click “This Firefox” on the left sidebar
Click “Load Temporary Add-on” on the right
Navigate to the unzipped extension folder and select the manifest.json file
The extension should now appear in your list of temporary add-ons
NOTE: in Firefox, when you close the browser, the extension is removed (and all your saved buttons will be deleted–export them to be safe!) unless you change that setting:
Open Firefox and type “about:config” in the address bar
Accept the warning about changing advanced settings
Search for “xpinstall.signatures.required” and set it to “false”
Go to “about:addons”
Click the gear icon and select “Install Add-on From File”
Navigate to your extension folder and select the manifest.json file