Description from extension meta
GNU Terry Pratchett. Show user when 'Clacks-Overhead' appears in HTTP headers.
Image from store
Description from store
NOTE: See paragraph 1 at the bottom of this description regarding required permissions.
To quote the twitter account of the great man himself:
"AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER."
Terry took Death's arm and followed him through the doors and on to the black desert under the endless night.
See here: http://www.gnuterrypratchett.com/
Github: https://github.com/newfolder0/chrome-clacks
Contributors:
-Peter Bell (original author)
-Charlie Wheeler-Robinson (bug hunting, refactoring, improving in early versions)
-Jimmy Nyström (code)
-Melanie Wilberforce (icons)
-Rob Grundy (who made the Firefox extension) for sending me the clacks icons used in the animation
-Backspindle Games for producing the clacks icons in the animation
-Sap1ens, jwakely, and Amy Atha-Nicholls (generously offering new icons)
-yousuf811 on Github (squashing bugs)
-Jarek Glowacki for some CSS help
-See GitHub issues and pull requests for others
A big thank you to all of the lovely people who sent new icons (listed above)!
The Chrome Developer Dashboard sucks and doesn't notify me of feedback - I try to keep an eye on it but if I don't reply, email me ([email protected]). I take no responsibility for any impact on browser performance as a result of this extension, though I believe it should be negligible. I use this extension myself and am completely open to suggestions or improvements.
I don't know anything about licences so I'm including one offered by Github just in case because it seems pretty reasonable. This is a simple extension and a tribute to Terry so I'm not really worried what you do with it.
Note 1: There are people complaining about the permissions required. That's fair enough, I would be too. The latest updates need 'webNavigation' permissions for reading the HTML meta tags (a feature which a lot of people were asking for). That is what requires access to web page content. The original permissions required by older versions were for webRequest, which is necessary for the basic HTTP header interception. As far as I know, there isn't a better way of doing it. If you are still concerned I suggest downloading it directly from Github (link above) so you know exactly what you are getting, you just won't get automatic updates. I wish there was a way to transparently publish directly from the public version on Github but as far as I know, the only way is to upload zip files myself. There is no way I can guarantee I haven't changed anything in between.
Latest reviews
- (2020-06-25) Caroline E.: love this, thank you. a man is not dead while his name is still spoken.
- (2020-03-12) Katarzyna Jędrzejek: It's been 5 years today. I've never stopped using this extension and it still brightens my day when I'm able to spot incoming clacks signal. GNU Terry Pratchett
- (2019-05-22) Shonaigh Douglas: It used to be cool, seeing the little icon light up on some websites. Sadly, it no longer seems to work - it doesn't appear in the address bar anymore and the control icon is always lit up. I know there are a lot of Discworld fans, but not that many!
- (2019-03-07) Jan Goyvaerts: Is it working properly ? I've got the lantern burning for all sites I visit now.
- (2019-01-09) Daniel Colburn Smith: Sadly this has stopped working.
- (2018-12-27) RC aka FoO: In the most current version of Chrome ever site, except (humorously) the chrome web store, shows as sending the clacks header. This appears to be broken in Chrome 71. <3
- (2018-07-25) Marko Koivuniemi: Excellent tribute to excellent writer. Terry Pratchett deserves this.
- (2018-06-12) Ghoul Cubes: "It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it’s called Life"
- (2018-03-26) Dave Gumble: shows you aint dead.
- (2017-11-25) K Kreutzer: It's always a moment of joy when my clacks lights up on a page I never expected it to. #GNUTerryPratchett
- (2017-01-04) Jenni Warren: I ATE'NT DEAD
- (2016-12-10) Paul J: A man is not dead while his name is still spoken
- (2016-10-13) FM S: absolute must have... really! Thanks for everything Terry.
- (2016-09-19) Amanda Maree Grant: never forgotten
- (2016-07-19) Michael Koorey: An excellent tribute to an amazing author.
- (2016-06-09) Chris Stephens: Perfect!
- (2016-05-13) Najwa Laylah: The only browser extension that can make me cry.
- (2016-03-02) Angie Chick: I love seeing this pop up on sites that I wouldn't have expected to find it. He may be gone from us, but his name will live on forever !
- (2016-02-08) Guy Gascoigne-Piggford: a perfect tribute
- (2015-07-16) Vicky Loebel: Very touching. Thanks for supporting this tribute to a great author.
- (2015-07-12) Jutta: Works perfectly. Tho now I get sad whenever I check my blog :(
- (2015-07-01) Joel Auterson: Thank you.
- (2015-05-31) Christopher Dobson: Very Fitting
- (2015-05-12) Tom McEnroe: Thank you for illuminating a fitting tribute to a fine human being
- (2015-04-01) Kay Schneider: Works fine:)
Latest issues
- (2019-09-20, v:1.7) Alfonso Molina: Icon always lit
The icon is on in every website except chrome web store, it seems. To add to what others have said, when clicking on the icon I can see a different message when the website has the X-Clacks-Overhead header. It appears a little Clack, instead of the menu. So the detection is working, but the icon is not been updated or something. - (2019-02-21, v:1.7) James Dewes: Is there a Git repo for this? - I am sure people would help fix it
A lot of people are reporting this as broken. If it is possible to fix it, it may be a good community project. It looks like for a while it was not possible to get this info on https, but should now be doable via https://developer.chrome.com/extensions/webRequest - (2019-01-09, v:1.7) Iain Crawford: Always on
The Clacks Overhead icon is now lit on all websites. - (2018-12-11, v:1.7) Charles Brailovsky: Lantern always lit
I'm pretty sure my extension isn't working. Maybe Pratchett's just gotten suddenly more popular in the last few months, I dunno. But my lantern is literally ALWAYS lit. I just used a "take me to a random website" tool to visit over a dozen different random websites, and the lantern lit up at literally every single one. It's also lighting up for YouTube, Facebook, and Google, which I'm pretty sure don't have the code. Having the lantern constantly lit takes away the entire point of the extension. How do I fix this? - (2018-12-04, v:1.7) John Wood: Icon always "on"
Hi, Just got a small issue that started a few days ago (that I noticed). The icons seems to "on" for every site I visit. Windows 10 (1703), all updates Chrome 70.0.3538.110 (Official Build) (64-bit) Tried Microsoft, BBC, Yahoo - sites that I suspect wont have the Clack-Overhead header. Even a site I KNOW doesn't have it is showing up. - (2017-11-05, v:1.7) Evan G: address bar
doesn't show up in the address bar anymore? - (2017-05-01, v:1.7) Tom Paine: Uses 250+ MB RAM with 5 tabs open
Twice as much in use as Adblock - (2016-12-11, v:1.7) Arjo Hooimeijer: Seems to not work on HTTPS?
It seems that over HTTPS, plugin is not able to detect the X-Clacks-Overhead: GNU Terry Pratchett header? - (2016-09-13, v:1.7) Chris Alman: False positives on Dailymail site
I don;t know why but it says that X-Clacks-Overhead is in the header of some Dailymail pages, but when I look it is'nt there here is an example page from today ( apologies for you having to go to the Dailymail.....it's a guilty pleasure for me ) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3786972/Plane-lands-belly-skids-MILE-runway-Indonesian-airport-landing-gear-fail-come-down.html - (2016-06-03, v:1.7) Jutta: doesn't work anymore
When I installed it quite some time ago it worked perfectly. But as I was just sitting down to blog about it I noticed it's gone. I didn't change anything about my websites. Was a solution to this ever found?