Exploring Firefox Extensions

Gary writes "If you haven't made the switch to Mozilla Firefox it may be because you aren't aware of the great benefits Firefox has over IE. Flexbeta has posted a nice HOWTO guide on Firefox extensions; my favorite is the Target Alert extension which displays a small graphic next to links that are not web pages. For example a mailto: link will display a small envelope, a link to a PDF file will display a small Adobe icon, etc."

Comments

Yet more good reasons to switch from IE

[Slashbot Hive-Mind]

FireFox features I can't live without:

1. Middle click to open link in new window/tab
2. Find as you type
3. Themes/Skins/Chromes
4. Customizable toolbars
5. Plugins that allow me to put just about anything on the toolbars
6. Great development tools - javascript console, venkman debugger, live-headers plugin

All that boils down to:

1. Easier to use
2. Easier to customize
3. Broader advanced feature set

Re:Yet more good reasons to switch from IE

[qshapadooy]

about:config

Preference Name: image.animation_mode
Value: once

Re:Yet more good reasons to switch from IE

[Anml4ixoye]

Someone should really change the code of this feature because it doesn't work with javascript links (you get a blank page when you middle-click on this kind of link)

Unfortunately there is no way to know what to change it to so it can be "fixed." Such a wide variety of actions could occur during onClick that it would be very difficult to parse that out and do the right action.

For example, I have used javascript in an href to do the following:

• Open a new window
• Open a new window to a specific width and height
• Change the location of the current page
• Change the source of an image on the page
• Interact with a Flash movie
• Interact with form elements on screen

And even with the location and window opens, sometimes it is done with the simple

javascript:window.open()

and sometimes through a function.

Re:Yet more good reasons to switch from IE

[Linknoid]

Simple and consistent solution: The user middle clicking on any element is doing so because they desire whatever action they clicked on to occur in a new tab. The solution is to make an exact replica of the current page and its state in a new tab, and then act as if the button had been pushed on the replica page instead. Sure, there will be things that don't work right with it, but I think most of the time that will give the correct behavior. Oh, and open in new tab should work with buttons too, not just links.

Re:Yet more good reasons to switch from IE

[Threni]

> Just because something moves to v1.0 does it magically become stable, feature
> rich, simple and user friendly?

No - rather, it won't be released at v1.0 or above until it IS stable and more user friendly.

Tabs

[frankthechicken]

Tabbrowser extensions, to get the tabs reacting the way I want(i.e everything in the same browser window, middle mouse click on the tabbar opens an accidently closed tab).

And for browsing Slashdot, this kind of helps.

my most used extension ever...

[huphtur]

...has to be Web Developer.
A MUST for every webnerd.
It even lets you edit CSS live on the web.

adblock

[seanismdotcom]

adblock is one of the greatest extensions I must say. Adblock along with the following filter block 98% of ads..

[Adblock] /[\W\d][Aa]d(server|s|remote)?[\W\d]/ /[\W\d][Bb]anner(s|id\=)?[\W\d]/ /[\W\d][Ss]ponsors?[\W\d]/ /amazon\.com.*\W(promotions|marketing|merchants|st ores|associates)\W/ /yimg\.com.*\W(a|flash)\W/

The best thing is not that it has extensions

[Gopal.V]

The best thing I like about firefox is not that it has extensions , but that the extensions are done up in Javascript and XUL (most of them are). I can safely install most of these because I just take a peek at the code (*tinfoil hat*) to make sure there are no obvious backdoors in it.

Thankfully most extensions are done up cleanly , so it's easy to understand that there is no "crazy" code or backdoors hidden.

Lastly they run the same (almost) everywhere :)

Here's one benefit...

[proxy2]

Firefox is the ultimate porn browser !

Adblock

[strider44]

As extensions go, nothing beats adblock.

I haven't switched...my reasons are...

[bogaboga]

I haven't switched [from Konqueror], and will not switch anytime soon because I find that: -

1: Mozilla Firefox had terrible fonts on Linux. I know there is the possibility of using one compiled with xft. But where is it? Whenever a new release is announced, the version producing those bad fonts is what I find.

2: I find that it is slower than Konqueror on most sites. My only use of Mozilla Firefox is on Gmail. I wonder why Google will not support Konqueror yet.

3: Firefox keeps some important passwords long after I have logged out of my online baking site. It is not the problem of the site but Firefox. I have confirmed this.

Please note that I am no expert in these matters. I just download stuff and use it as such.

Cb..

Re:I haven't switched...my reasons are...

[The Grassy Knoll]

>my online baking site

Doh! (nut)

.

Re:I haven't switched...my reasons are...

[Nimey]

Mozilla Firefox had terrible fonts on Linux. I know there is the possibility of using one compiled with xft. But where is it? Whenever a new release is announced, the version producing those bad fonts is what I find.

You'll want the version that's built with GTK2, here.

Wikalong

[phUnBalanced]

A little blatant self promotion. (I apologize)

I've written up a little extension called Wikalong.

Basically, it puts a wiki in your sidebar, that is indexed off the current page you are viewing. The wiki is online so anyone using the plugin, that visits a page you make notes on will see your notes, and vice versa.

It doesn't work perfectly yet, but I'm hoping to attract some smarter people than I to help get it straightened out.

More details on the site I linked above.

Builti-in features vs Extensions

[cloudless.net]

I am quite interested in how the Mozilla team decide what goes into the browser, and what should be left as an extension. Many built-in features of Firefox can actually made made as an extension instead, which could make the browser more lightweight and start up faster. Yes it would require the user to download more extensions, and I think it could be solved by providing extension packs with several useful extensions put into one easy-to-install package.

Wanted Extension:

[tratten]

'Apply new extension without Firefox restart'-Extension

Some useful links

[t7]

Texturizer.net has a nice collection of extensions you may not find on mozilla's dev site.

Some extensions I'm currently using:
Flat Bookmark Editing
Add Bookmark Here
CuteMenus
Paste and Go
Gmail Notifier(Still works)

Free iPods? Sure. freeipods.com

Nuke Anything

[Anonymous Coward]

Nuke Anything is a favorite of mine. Right click an image, table, or even a frame, select "Remove this object" and it's zapped from the page layout. Quite useful for removing images or overly large margins.

Flashblock

[Artichoke]

Flashblock replaces Macromedia Flash animations with a button you have to click to download and run the animation. Most uses of Flash are abominations to me; I like to choose when to consume it.

Gripe wrt Macromedia: a couple of days back I installed the latest and greatest Flash player from Macromedia on my WinXP box and it uninstalled Flashblock for me.

Better yet: it also prevents subsequent (re-)installation of Flashblock.

Solution: download Flaskblock.xpi, unzip it, mod so that it installs under a nom de guerre, rezip and install.

Anybody at Macromedia, if you're listening: STOP BEING NAUGHTY.

Re:Flashblock

[fishdan]

Yea, I must agree -- macromedia employs the same tactics as most spyware companies to install stuff without your permission, and with the same excuses. I've stopped allowing Flash on our 300 workstation computers here, and I've banned Flash from the sites we host until I can see Macromedia showing higher level of ethical programming -- namely, I should not need an extension to selectively disable flash.

I talked to a Flash evangelist about this, and he essentially told me " our real business is showing you ads that you cannot avoid. "

Ssshhhhhhh. (Have you tried AdBlock?)

[ubiquitin]

Pssssst. What really revolutionized my browsing and will make it very hard for me to switch away from FireFox is AdBlock. Right-click on any image, flash animation, or iframe, and you can permanently add it to a block list. (Sshhhhh Don't tell anyone, but I don't see ads on slashdot, CNN, NYTimes, or any of my favorite periodicals any more.) If there was a way to keep a centralized list of blocked sites or an easy way to import and export the lists, then you'd have a real-time distributed content-blocking system.

My extensions

[Sunspire]

Here's some extensions I like that I haven't seen mentioned yet:

Magpie. Those who've used FlashGet with IE will love this little thing. It'll snatch all the files pointed to by links from a page according to some pattern, for example *jpg, and save them to disk or open them up as tabs. Great for collecting "nature pictures".

Firefox's bookmark dialog's "Create in" feature pisses me off. It never, ever, has the folders you need in it's puny little drop down. OpenBook removes it and replaces it with the full bookmarks folder tree.

You can reorder tabs with MiniT using simple drag and drop on the tab bar. I think this should maybe be added to Firefox itself, it's pretty basic functionality.

Re:Why people cling to IE

[wagemonkey]

I introduced my step-daughter's girl friend to Firefox when she was complaining about all the pop-ups in IE, but after about 5 minutes she switched back to IE. The only reason: In IE you can copy an image to the clip buffer and paste it into Photoshop or some other graphic program (she was grabbing pictures to make her Livejournal icons), but in Firefox (and Mozilla) you have to save the image and then open it in Photoshop as an extra step. Evidently managing all those little files was more effort to her than dismissing all the popups.

Here is an extension to let her do that too.

Macromedia goes onto the NEVER AGAIN list

[obtuse]

Uninstalling user-installed software? That's unforgivable. Too bad. I used to think Flash was annoying. I guess it's not just flash that sucks, but all of Macromedia.

Here's a rule of thumb: How much can you afford to annoy your customers? That's exactly how much flash you want to inflict on visitors to your site.

What proportion of people sit through a flash movie, versus the number who click "skip intro?" I've asked that question a lot, and never gotten an answer. Web developers aren't tracking it. They aren't about to point out that an expensive feature only drives customers away. Nobody is actually looking at those statistics. These irritating time wasters are just put up without any concern for whether they are an asset or a liability.

Only a few people are so dumb that they are impressed with an online movie that they didn't choose to watch. "Ooh! Looky! Stuff on the screen is MOVING!" Maybe those people are the ideal targets for marketing.

BugMeNot

[Takkuri]

I'm surprised no one's mentioned BugMeNot yet. It connects to a database of usernames and passwords, allowing you to log in as the public BugMeNot account.

This is especially useful for a one-time posting on a site, or to read members-only newspapers and things like IGN Insider.

Re:MOD DOWN PARENT - RACIST TROLL

[Mant]

Getting way off topic here but...

You never, ever use a racial slur, even just to repeat the words of others.

You may never, but the rest of the world is generally aware of something called "context". If the poster was using it as an insult, it would be bad. They weren't though.

Tell me, do you get offended when one black person calls another "nigger" not as an insult? Or even themselves? Or if someone repeated such a conversation to you? It is quite common for minority groups to take insulting terms and reclaim them.

The poster could have used asterisks or put N-word, but it was horrible to use the word itself!

Surely it is the concept of slavery and discrimination that is horrible, not the word in a context of a non-insult? If someone wrote "n****r", from context your brain is just going to subsitiute "nigger" anyway. Asteriks and euphamisms are pointless, either you completely obscure what you are trying to say, so why say it, or everyone know what you are saying, so why hide it?

If you are really that easily offended (and not just trolling as I suspect) then I suggest you avoid Slashdot, and webforums in general, and definately stay clear of usenet.

Re:Ssshhhhhhh. (Have you tried AdBlock?)

[OneFix]

Try the filters listed here. They block most ads for most people and very little else. The only one I've found a problem with is IMP...it has a "redirect.php" script that it runs on login which triggers one of the filters. I think there should be an adblock exclution list. It's actually interesting how popular adblock has remained even though there hasn't been a major update since at least Firefox 0.7...

I would think someone would have designed a new extention with more bells and whistles.