Se você ainda tem o hábito de abrir links do X (antigo Twitter) para ler um post isolado, sabe como a experiência costuma ser irritante: ou o site pede login, ou carrega um monte de coisas que você não quer ver, ou simplesmente trava. Foi pensando nisso que Zhenyi Tan, desenvolvedor do site And a Dinosaur, criou o Litterbox.

O Litterbox é uma extensão para Safari (iOS, iPadOS e macOS) que abre links do x.com em um popup, permitindo ler aquele post específico sem sair da página em que você está — e sem precisar visitar o X de fato. A ideia, nas palavras do próprio desenvolvedor, é simples: abrir, dar uma olhada e fechar em seguida.

Alguns detalhes de funcionamento que valem a pena destacar:

• A extensão usa a mesma API que o X utiliza para os embeds oficiais do site, então não depende de gambiarras que podem parar de funcionar a qualquer momento.
• Nenhum cookie seu é enviado quando o popup é aberto — ou seja, o Litterbox não usa sua sessão logada no X para exibir o conteúdo.
• Links que podem ser abertos dessa forma ganham uma pequena marcação ao lado (um pontinho), já que nem todo link do x.com pode ser incorporado dessa maneira — perfis de usuário, por exemplo, ficam de fora.

O Litterbox é gratuito na App Store, sem assinaturas, compras no app, anúncios ou rastreamento, e exige o iOS 18/macOS 15 ou superior.

via Daring Fireball

Hot on the heels of OpenAI’s addition of a cloud-based browser to ChatGPT Work, Anthropic has added an in-app browser to Claude Cowork in its desktop app. What’s interesting about the two browser implementations is that while both ChatGPT Work and Claude Cowork are meant to be used for general knowledge work, Claude Cowork’s browser is something of a hybrid that mixes aspects of OpenAI’s Codex built-in browser with its ChatGPT Work cloud-based browser.

First of all, I do not yet have access to Claude’s in-app browser, so the following is based solely on Anthropic’s announcement and other documentation. Still, the differences are worth understanding since the tools are aimed at different workflows.

Like Codex’s in-app browser, Claude Cowork’s in-app browser is built into the desktop app itself. That ties Claude’s browser to the instance of its app running on your Mac. Turn your Mac off or close the Claude app, and the browser becomes unavailable. Leave the Claude app running, and you’ll be able to control the browser session remotely through the Claude mobile app or the web.

From there, however, the browsers diverge. As you’d expect, the Codex implementation is developer-oriented, with tools to build, inspect, and annotate web pages along with access to a terminal, repos, and diffs. In contrast, Claude Cowork’s in-app browser opens automatically as needed for general-purpose web tasks instead of development tasks.

Also, while both ChatGPT Work’s and Claude Cowork’s browser implementations benefit from being isolated from your other day-to-day browser use outside those apps, their handling of login credentials is a little different. As I wrote in greater detail yesterday, ChatGPT separates the login process from the model’s activity and evaluates the login page for things like phishing schemes. Claude Cowork’s in-app browser offers two ways to log in: manually, or by importing cookies from logged-in sessions in another browser. Currently, Claude supports cookie imports on the Mac from Chrome, Edge, and Firefox, but not Safari. In addition to the security benefits that come with a browser that runs isolated from your everyday browser, Claude also requests permission before acting on a site for the first time, blocks high-risk sites, checks actions against the your requests, and uses the same prompt injection protections as its Chrome extension.

My first-run experience with ChatGPT Work’s cloud browser was a mixed bag but showed promise. Although I haven’t tried Claude Cowork’s browser yet, I’m glad to see Anthropic moving in the same direction as OpenAI here. Isolating agent browsing by bringing the browser into Claude and ChatGPT doesn’t solve every security issue, but it’s a good starting point. I expect we’ll see both Anthropic and OpenAI iterate quickly on this theme in the coming months.

Yesterday, OpenAI introduced a new ChatGPT Work feature designed to let it navigate websites that require a login without revealing your credentials to the model.

Like a lot of people, I spend far too much time clicking around websites that require a login, looking at analytics and other data, checking whether new sponsors have been booked for our podcasts, and more. It’s a tedious but necessary part of my week that slows me down and takes me away from writing and other creative work. ChatGPT’s new Work feature is designed to handle that sort of work for you.

The feature works by signing into websites using a virtual, cloud-based computer. That separates the browsing session from any browsing session on your local computer, walling the agent’s computer use off from your open tabs, cookies, browsing history, passwords, and other data. Because the login and browsing happen in the cloud, that also means work can continue whether you close the ChatGPT app or power down your computer.

According to OpenAI, an additional review model checks the sign-in request and credential destination for signs of phishing or deception. ChatGPT Work then pauses while the user signs in. Credentials entered through its secure sign-in form go directly to the cloud browser and are not visible to the model. After the user authenticates, ChatGPT resumes its work.

OpenAI also explains that its cloud-based browser doesn’t store your username and password. Instead, it saves cookies that allow you to return to a previously authenticated session. If you don’t want to remain logged in, ChatGPT’s cloud browser settings allow you to clear browser data for individual websites or all sites.

Similar to other features in ChatGPT and Codex, users have choices when it comes to which sites ChatGPT Work can access. “Always ask” is the default, requiring the agent to check with the user before using a website, but the permission level can also be set to “Auto approve” after ChatGPT checks a site for relevancy and risk or “Always allow,” which OpenAI discourages. Individual websites can also be allowed or blocked. These settings control website access, but consequential actions require separate confirmation.

I gave ChatGPT’s browser use a try and the results were mixed. I wasn’t able to get the feature to work at all using ChatGPT Work in Safari on my Mac. Some websites had security measures in place that prevented me from logging in. Other times, the cloud browser asked me to take over manually, but I was unable to do so because the UI was frozen or login panels didn’t appear.

I had better luck using my iPhone. On one site with a simple username and password system, a login sheet appeared. I entered my credentials, was logged in, and the agent navigated the site to answer my queries. On Apple’s affiliate link dashboard website, I had to take over the browser interaction manually to satisfy a CAPTCHA, which worked after several challenges. Once logged in, the agent pulled and analyzed the data I requested. Also, after I’d signed in to both of those sites on my iPhone, I remained logged in to ChatGPT’s cloud browser, which meant I could also use them from my Mac.

In its current form, the idea of having ChatGPT Work browse signed-in websites on your behalf is better than its implementation. If you can get logged in, having an agent collect and analyze things like analytics data is fantastic. However, getting past the initial login screen is still too frustrating. That said, I’ll be keeping a close eye on the feature, which is available on eligible plans depending on rollout and workspace settings, for future use collecting and analyzing data that would otherwise require a lot of clicking around.

Learn how to automatically group open Safari tabs in relevant topics to streamline multi-tab browsing in iOS 27, iPadOS 27, and macOS 27.