Create a "clean slate" button in Safari

23 February 2013, 09:00

When browsing in Safari it’s not hard to build-up too many tabs so that things get cramped and complex.

Sometimes it’s nice to be able to close all the tabs quickly and effectively. You can do this by selecting any particular tab you want to leave open, then pressing Command+Option (Alt)+W. But here’s a way of creating a bookmark button that will close all open tabs and show a blank page, ready for a new browsing session — essentially wiping the slate clean of browser tabs.

1. Open Safari and click Bookmarks -> Show All Bookmarks.
2. In the list of bookmarks, click the Bookmarks Bar entry at the top left.
3. Click the small plus button at the bottom middle beneath the list of bookmarks. This will create a new folder. Call it something like Clean Slate, or just Clear, and drag it to the top of the bookmarks list. This will put it at the very left of the Bookmarks Toolbar.
4. Select the new folder, and put a check in the box that’s within the column headed Auto-Click.
5. Drag two existing bookmarks to the new folder, while holding down Command. It doesn’t matter which two because you’re creating copies of them, and we’re going to edit their contents anyway.
6. Edit the Address field of the first bookmark to read about:blank. You can edit it by slow double-clicking the address (i.e. click once, wait, then click again).
7. Change its name to read anything you like, such as Clean Slate.
8. Edit the Address field of the second bookmark to read as follows:

javascript:var%20objWindow%20=%20window.open(location.href,%20”_self”);%20objWindow.close();

There’s no need to change its name.

And that’s all that’s needed. Whenever you click the new bookmark called Clean Slate, Safari will be returned to a blank just-opened state. If you click the bookmark by mistake, just click the Back button on the toolbar to restore all your previously open tabs.

Know better?

 
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