How I built a Chrome extension with zero permissions that recommends personalized gifts
I run outreach for a small personalized-gift store — photo blankets, custom mugs, ornaments, that sort of thing. The store has 1,920 products. Shoppers kept telling us the same thing: they knew who the gift was for, but they froze when they had to pick from hundreds of options. So I built a tiny browser extension that asks three questions and narrows it down to three gifts. The whole thing runs…
A small personalized-gift store owner built a Chrome extension that recommends personalized gifts without requiring any permissions. This extension, called Epic Gift Finder, asks users just three simple questions about their gift recipient, the occasion, and the budget. The extension doesn't need any permissions because it runs solely on the user's browser, displaying a popup with personalized gift recommendations.
The store owner, who owns Epic Personalized Gifts, emphasizes the importance of not asking for unnecessary permissions, as it can be a trust issue and isn't required for this simple tool. The extension consists of four files: the manifest, the popup page, its stylesheet, and one JavaScript file with around 200 lines of code. The extension uses a small scoring table to match the user's answers with suitable product categories and displays the top three suggestions as cards, each with a brief explanation of why that gift is appropriate.
The links to the store's category pages are manually verified before shipping, ensuring that the extension remains trustworthy and functional. After testing the extension thoroughly, the owner made sure every outbound link worked correctly before releasing it on the Chrome Web Store. The extension is currently free and available without any sign-up or tracking, making it easy for shoppers to find a suitable gift.
Written by urgent.news from Dev.to's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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