Pokki 0.245 Beta

The line between desktop apps and online services has blurred greatly over the years, and things have now reached the stage that fully fledged applications are available for use online. While this is undeniably useful, the fact that services such as Facebook and Gmail require a web browser can also be restrictive. To help overcome this issue, Pokki is a free tool that can be used to turn web apps into desktop apps.

Unlike other comparable tools, this does not involve simply wrapping a web site in a new window, but instead is based on a series of specially designed apps each of which have designed for using a particular online service. Although currently only in beta, there are already dozens of Pokki apps available, which can be used to integrate the likes of Twitter and Facebook into your desktop.

In use, Pokki feels almost like have desktop versions of iOS or Android running on your desktop and the experience of switching between sites, or apps, feels very different to switching between the tabs you would ordinarily be using in your web browser. Depending on the site you are using, you are likely to find that working with a Pokki app is at least as handy, if not more so, than using the standard web site.

It is fair to say that Pokki is not exactly a new idea, but here it is an idea that has been wonderfully executed. The desktop versions of apps are not a case of one-size-fits-all, but instead are individual written apps that have been designed with the features and peculiarities of a particular web service in mind.

An almost perfect bridge between desktop and web apps which integrates the internet more tightly into your desktop.