GoGo

Searching for Links When in a Company

When I was interning at Société Générale, I discovered an internal tool called GO. The idea is quite simple: a shortcut system for group applications. To find different software, you just had to type go/jira, go/git or go/mail, and you were immediately redirected to the right service. It's not a complicated tool, but after a few weeks, it's impossible to do without.

So I wondered if I could also recode this kind of system?

Why Did It Work for Them?

Their tool worked thanks to a simple but very clever mechanism: internal DNS servers. In companies, DNS (Domain Name System) is often managed by the company. It's what translates domain names into IP addresses.

For example google.com → 142.250.75.14.

In Société Générale's case, they had configured a special shortcut: when someone typed go/jira, the internal DNS understood that the go/ prefix should point to an internal server, which then redirected the user to the right tool (jira.sg, git.sg, etc.). It's simple, fast, and above all: it works across the entire company network!

An Already Existing Behavior (But Hidden)

Little anecdote: Chrome, Edge, and Firefox already have a somewhat similar behavior. When you type a keyword like docs in the address bar, the browser first tries to resolve it as a URL (http://docs/) before doing a Google search. This is the logic I wanted to exploit: intercept this moment, understand what the user is typing (go gmail), and redirect them to the right site.

But for that, I needed a clean, portable, and simple-to-install entry point. And that's where the idea became clear:

Create a Chrome (and Firefox) extension that reproduces this behavior, without a server and without DNS (and yes, it simplifies life anyway with extensions).

GoGo

This is how GoGo was born (I thought the name was funny so it stayed that way) A very simple extension that allows you to create your own shortcuts, directly in a browser. No more need for internal servers or system administrators.

• go gmail → opens Gmail
• go yt → YouTube
• go gh → your GitHub profile

---

Tech & Stack

I wanted a lightweight extension, multi-browser (Chrome and Firefox), and especially without backend. Here are the main technical choices:

• WebExtension API to intercept address bar requests (tabs, webNavigation)

• chrome.storage / browser.storage to store aliases locally

• A small Node.js build script (build.js) to generate both distributions at once:

  node build.js all
  

No TypeScript for now, I'll see if the extension gets bigger if it's worth migrating.

---

How the Extension Works

The extension defines a reserved keyword (go) in the address bar. When the user types go gmail:

1. The browser intercepts the request via the webNavigation API.
2. The extension extracts the gmail part.
3. It searches if a gmail alias is defined in local storage.
4. If yes, it immediately opens the corresponding URL in the current tab.

browser.webNavigation.onBeforeNavigate.addListener((details) => {
  const input = extractAlias(details.url);
  if (aliases[input]) {
    browser.tabs.update(details.tabId, { url: aliases[input] });
  }
});

That's literally it.

---

Privacy

GoGo works entirely offline. Aliases are saved locally, thanks to the chrome.storage.local API (for Chrome) or browser.storage.local (for Firefox).

---

Why This Project

I like to give myself little challenges, and see if I can recode small tools that can be useful daily.

It's also a nod to what I discovered at Société Générale: sometimes, a good company idea just deserves to be adapted for the general public.