Green Any Site: The Blog!

This is where the blog for Green Any Site resided before the world moved on. Go then, there are other worlds than these.

Fix Facebook Chat to Only Show Friends Currently Online

July 20, 2011 | Author: Tal Ater | Filed under: Uncategorized

It used to be easy to see which of your friends were online in facebook. But these days, the facebook chat window is cluttered with the friends facebook thinks you should chat with, ignoring who is online and who isn’t, while somehow managing to include all the people you wouldn’t even call during a zombie outbreak, even if they had a collection of medieval weapons.

Facebook chat is broken

In my spare time, I like to dig through facebook’s code, finding hidden gems and secrets (last year I was the first to expose their video chat plans with Skype). So after hearing everyone complain about how broken facebook chat has become, I decided to challenge myself to fix it.

It turns out there’s an easy fix, and it is buried right in facebook’s own code.

All I had to do was change one line of code in one of facebook’s functions, overriding their default definition, and facebook chat became useful and fun again.

I’ve created an easy to use browser addon which you can run and have it fix the chat for you automatically.

Or for the more techno-geeky crowd, you can try it out by getting the code directly from GitHub, and running it in the browser’s console.

Download facebook chat fix



Nov 2010 28

Is Facebook Preparing to Launch Video Chatting In a Partnership with Skype?

While working on the Green Any Site facebook application, and digging around facebook, I noticed a curious little object in their code which wasn’t there a few days...

Jun 2009 24

Looking for Green Innovation at the Paris Air Show

With the aviation industry reeling from increasing fuel costs, dipping profits and those pesky upcoming environmental regulations, airlines are scrambling to become more efficient, cut costs and increase...

Feb 2009 9

This Silly Tip Can Double the Amount of Plastic You Recycle

Most of us (I hope) recycle all the plastic bottles we use. But do you also recycle the many other small plastic containers you use daily, or do...

Dec 2008 28

30 Days of GAS

A little over a month after GAS has opened to the public, and about 4 weeks after the first real traffic started flowing in, I feel the need...

Dec 2008 4

GAS Blog Launches

This first post marks the launch of the GAS blog. My name is Tal Ater, and I am the founder and developer of Green Any Site. I will...

Green Any Site

With Green Any Site, you can easily donate a portion of any online purchase to the environmental charity of your choice. It’s free, there’s nothing to install, and it takes just a quick click each time you buy something.


Here’s how it works: Web retailers (think Amazon, Buy.com) pay other sites a percentage of each purchase for referrals. When you use GAS, all of that money goes to supporting green causes, instead of ending up in somebody else’s pocket.


Visit http://www.greenanysite.com/ to get started.

Recent Comments

  • shredding San Antonio: As silly as it may seem, but this can actually do some good especially to those who have pets....
  • shredding Houston: Plastic bottles are not the only ones that we can recycle or reuse. We are blessed that recycle...
  • Amaury: Nice site and nice idea :) Good luck !
  • Tal Ater: There are a few problems with plugins like Effortless Good and I ♥ Miro: They only support a limited...
  • Tal Ater: Thanks, don’t forget to take some pictures :) Please share the results of your research with us so...