Last month senior Chronicle reporter Jennifer Howard wondered on Twitter about the best way to share a link from within the built-in iPad web browser. ProfHacker‘s own Jason Jones responded that an upcoming version of iOS would include a “tweet this link” function. Then I joined the conversation by noting that the free Diigo Browser app already has this feature. And, it turns out, many others that are worth sharing on ProfHacker.
First of all, let’s talk about the sharing. From the share button on the top Diigo Browser toolbar, you can instantly send a link to your Diigo bookmarks (of course), but also to Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Evernote, Instapaper, and Read It Later---in short, to just about any social network you want. Try doing that with the current version of the Safari iPad browser (you can, actually, but it requires Javascript bookmarklets, which are a pain to set up).
In addition to the built-in sharing, there are three other features I particularly like. First, the Diigo Browser app is tab-based, rather than the virtual windows of the Safari browser, in which you have no visual clue what other browser windows are open at any given time. The tabs operate much like they do on the desktop versions of Chrome or Firefox (or Safari for that matter).
Second, the Diigo Browser app includes an offline Reading List. Click the pair of reading glasses in the location bar, and that page will be saved for offline reading. I find this capability especially useful for airplane trips. Before I board, I’ll save a few key links for reading while I’m up in the air. True, you can use Instapaper or Read It Later for the same purpose, but if photographs or the page’s visual layout is essential, then I prefer Diigo’s offline reading mode over the more text-centric formatting of Instapaper.
Finally, the app has an incognito mode. Not that any of us would ever need it, but one might imagine a scenario in which one does not wish the app to remember one’s browsing history.
And of course, the Diigo Browser is tightly integrated with Diigo’s bookmarking and annotation services, which I’ve written about before. My only complaint about the Diigo Browser is that for a small minority of pages with complicated layouts, the load time feels a tad more sluggish than with Safari. Most pages, though, seem to load just as quickly as they do in Safari. And if sharing (or conversely, privacy) on the iPad are priorities to you, then the Diigo Browser is worth checking out.
