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57

What is your most-used web application? Fairly straightforward question. It shouldn't be too hard to guess what will come out on top, but I'm interested to see what else gets high votes.

ONE entry per post and NO duplicates.
The following applications have already been listed.

Use the following search query inquestion:2050 "example name"

Why do you use this one more than anything else and what does it actually do? Should I use it too?

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103 Answers

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up vote 293 down vote accepted

Gmail

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I'm on the internet = Gmail is open – ilhan Jul 10 '10 at 22:05
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I even use it for my office mails, instead of using outlook, I pull all my mails into gmail and keep it open always – JayaprakashReddy Aug 6 '10 at 9:40
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Gmail = Breathing! even open when I'm off to bed. – KMan Oct 6 '10 at 7:17
up vote 212 down vote

Stack Overflow

...of course!

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+... I'd vote this up but I've been on so long that I ran out of votes. Nuff said. – Evan Plaice Jul 8 '10 at 18:48
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I'm surprised this in #3 currently. Hopefully the day will come when the typical WebApps user has no interest in SO. – Eric Wilson Jul 10 '10 at 15:48
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I would say that Stack Overflow was not a WebApp, but rather a web site – DoNotInstall Jul 16 '10 at 21:53
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@Ian I disagree. Stack Overflow provides a rich, user interactive experience; tracks personal state/profile information; and provides a personalized experience. Just because it isn't presented as a make-a-webapp-look-near-identical-to-its-desktop-counterpart format doesn't mean it isn't a webapp. – Evan Plaice Jul 23 '10 at 7:22
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I agree with Evan Plaice. A web site is just a site for providing information, like a company web site. A web application contains advanced functionality where the user can actively change the displayed content. SO indeed provides that. – awe Aug 4 '10 at 8:15
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up vote 208 down vote

Google Reader

Sadly, Google Reader. I waste way too much time reading feeds.

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yeah - me too. It's shocking how much time I waste on Reader. – seanyboy Jul 8 '10 at 9:18
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Time-sink indeed, I always have Gmail open, but I USE Google Reader way more. – Ivo Flipse Jul 8 '10 at 11:04
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up vote 152 down vote

Google

Search is probably number one of mine, to be honest.

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Same here, which raises the question of how do we define web apps? – Liam Jul 8 '10 at 11:08
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@Liam: [sarcasm] Web apps suck away your time and magically refill with new content. [/sarcasm] Google search is much less sticky than, say Facebook. – Jared Updike Jul 16 '10 at 17:11
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up vote 93 down vote

Wikipedia

Aren't all wiki's web-apps?

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Not sure I'd call that a Web App, more a bunch of pages with a CMS attached. The CMS itself IS a web app (maybe), but I don't think wikipedia is. – Bobby Jack Jul 13 '10 at 16:34
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up vote 81 down vote

Localhost

Definitely: http://localhost:8080/ :D

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Ha. Funny. +1 for your 127.0.0.1 sweet 127.0.0.1 – Glycerine Jul 19 '10 at 15:56
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@George Edison On UNIX-y systems, you need elevated (or root) rights to open a port lower than 1024. Therefore, your average local application will often use a port >=1024, and 8080 happens to be http-alt. Also, people won't have to change the port if they already run a web server. – phihag Jan 26 '11 at 12:50
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up vote 78 down vote

Dropbox

is so good for personal syncing between my laptop, desktop and mobile devices. Also great on collaboration projects being able to easily share files between users. Simple and super easy to use.

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I threw away all my usb memory sticks because of Dropbox.. – Lipis Jul 21 '10 at 11:02
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I threw away my personal web server because of Dropbox. It's amazing the number of different ways the public folder can be used (as long as you don't need server side support). – Evan Plaice Jul 23 '10 at 7:27
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up vote 70 down vote

Facebook

...unfortunately...

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Though it would be eclipsed by the Google Mail/Calendar/Docs/Search/Groups/Reader combination. – Nicolas Raoul Jul 8 '10 at 4:34
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Boooo - Ha. I gave up facebook a long time ago now. I thought I'd miss it - but I really don't just cold turkey like. The only limitation is people 'expect' you to have a facebook account. For example when I go to a new contract... "What you mean when you say 'no facebook'?" – Glycerine Jul 19 '10 at 15:52
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@T M: This question is not about your favorite webapp but about the one you use the most. – miloshadzic Jul 21 '10 at 19:36
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up vote 42 down vote

Google Docs

Because you don't have to install any special software for editing and viewing your documents. Multiple users can edit documents in real time also!

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I migrated to using this on a daily basis for work. The built-in scripting features are pretty amazing just search for 'Google Apps Scripting' (not to be confused with Google App Engine). – Evan Plaice Jan 13 '12 at 21:17
up vote 39 down vote

Google Maps

Brilliant feature of google maps is to find a direction from one place to another which details the route , distance , time takes to travel using car,public transport...And almost my favorite in this app is it also gives "Suggested routes".

Hope its been useful by many travellers and path finders :)

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up vote 38 down vote

YouTube

Destroyer of free time and disseminator of memes.

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up vote 37 down vote

GitHub

I'm a coder- I'm either browsing logs on my projects, tweaking and contributing builds to the Homebrew Package Manager or browsing around to see what neat software projects other people are working on.

I daresay even Gmail takes a backseat to GitHub in my case.

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up vote 37 down vote

RegExr

As a programmer, I find myself using RegExr a lot.

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Nice! I'm always thinking "man, if only I could test this RegEx out really quick to see if I have it right..." – Sharpie Jul 19 '10 at 2:06
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+1 Thanks, I didn't knew this. – iSid Jul 26 '10 at 10:07
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up vote 34 down vote

Grooveshark

Grooveshark to listen your favorite music wherever you are.

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up vote 32 down vote

Last.fm

http://last.fm

It's constantly on in my house. I know there are alternatives but it has great range and a fun API.

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I've seen some of the alternatives, but what can I say, I just like last.fm – Wayne Werner Aug 5 '10 at 17:58
up vote 30 down vote

Pandora

It really comes in handy when you're hanging out with friends. Just fire it up on the Android and you've got music. No pesky CDs, music libraries, stereo systems, etc...

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I wish it was available outside of USA, I had enjoyed it. – nimcap Aug 5 '10 at 9:17
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@nimcap: You can use pianobar (github.com/PromyLOPh/pianobar) to listen to Pandora outside the US. – Mark Szymanski Oct 8 '10 at 15:08
up vote 20 down vote

jsFiddle

I use jsFiddle all the time. It's great for prototyping a simple HTML/CSS/JavaScript page and sharing it.

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up vote 19 down vote

Remember the Milk

Remember the Milk - It's awesome. Easy to use, I can email tasks & lists to my RTM account, repeating, everything is better! Used to use todoist, but RTM is WAY better.

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I spent literally entire days looking for the perfect todo-app. I ended up settling on toodledo.com - it's not perfect (though even without the premium features it comes close), but IMHO it's significantly better than RTM. – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft Oct 1 '10 at 2:25
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up vote 14 down vote

Flickr

Share your photos. Watch the world

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up vote 14 down vote

WordPress

  • The most used blogging platform
  • Open source CMS
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up vote 12 down vote

iGoogle

Gives me Gmail, Reader, etc. on one page.

From there I too often click links to Stack Overflow, Server Fault, Super User, Web Apps, Pro Webmaster. Sigh, maybe I should go do work.

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up vote 11 down vote

Google Wave

Google Wave (soon to be removed)

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what do you use wave for? – plod Jul 14 '10 at 13:54
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Communication, task tracking, collaboration, and so forth. – Arlen Beiler Jul 14 '10 at 19:01
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It's very useful for team project. You don't have to worry about not everyone having the right version of a document. – HoLyVieR Jul 23 '10 at 13:49
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up vote 9 down vote

deviantART


Can't tell you how much time I spend on deviantART. I'm not sure if it's a web app, but some parts of it could be.

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protected by Jeff Atwood♦ Oct 6 '10 at 12:16

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