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Abhishek Verma
Abhishek Verma

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🧪 From Frustration to Flow: I Built a 1-Click Unsecured Browser Launcher for Developers

Tired of Chrome blocking your localhost? You're not alone. Here's how I built a simple Mac utility to save time and frustration.

🚨 The Problem: Chrome Makes Local Dev Harder Than It Should Be

If you’re a developer working on web apps, especially during the UAT or testing phase, this scenario will feel painfully familiar:

  • You run your app on http://localhost
  • Chrome or Brave blocks it due to security policies
  • You scramble for flags like --disable-web-security, or worse…
  • You open terminal, copy-paste some arcane command from StackOverflow, and pray it works

💡 It’s a hassle—especially when you have to do it multiple times a day across different test scenarios.

💡 The Solution: command-browser

To scratch my own itch, I built command-browser, a pseudo app for macOS that opens an unsecured Chrome or Brave window with a double-click.

No terminals.
No flags.
No Google search history saying “chrome allow insecure localhost”.

Just click → test → done.

🔧 How It Works

The concept is intentionally simple:

  • I wrote .command files that launch Chrome/Brave with the right flags:

    • --disable-web-security
    • --user-data-dir

  • Then wrapped them using Platypus into lightweight macOS apps

  • So now, clicking the app icon does the work for you

That’s it. It lives on your desktop like a native utility. And yes, you can run both Chrome and Brave versions independently.

✨ Features

  • ✅ 1-Click unsecured Chrome or Brave browser
  • ✅ No terminal commands – fully GUI-based
  • ✅ Super lightweight – no daemon, no background processes
  • ✅ Perfect for frontend/backend testing of local/insecure APIs
  • ✅ Fully open-source and customizable

⏱ Why This Matters

As developers, we talk a lot about productivity.
But we ignore the 30 seconds here and 1 minute there we lose to friction — especially for tasks we repeat daily.

I built command-browser to cut that friction. And honestly?
It’s been a quiet little superpower in my dev workflow.

📦 Get Started in 2 Minutes

🔗 GitHub Repo

Just clone it, give executable permissions to the .command file, or use the prebuilt .app versions — and you’re good to go.

🙌 Let’s Improve It Together

This project is open source, intentionally minimal, and built for the community.
Got ideas for:

  • Security sandboxing?
  • Electron wrapper?
  • Auto-detection of browser paths?

💬 Drop a PR or an issue — I’m all ears.

👨‍💻 TL;DR

If you’re a developer who’s tired of Chrome/Brave blocking your local testing flow, command-browser is for you.
Save time, avoid terminal fatigue, and ship faster.

👉 Check it out on GitHub
⭐ Star it if you find it helpful
💬 Comment if you have feedback
🔁 Share it with that teammate who still types the flag every time

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