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Google Toolbar for Firefox Released
fizz writes "Google has released their toolbar, available in 10 languages for the Firefox browser, and available for 3 operating systems (Windows, Mac and Linux). You can download it from the Google Toolbar homepage, and you can read the Google Blog for more information." Reported on recently here on Slashdot.
But I think I speak for everyone on Slashdot when I ask when is Microsoft going to release the MSN Toolbar for Firefox?
Since the article earlier today said they were "about to" release the toolbar.
The only problem I have with it is the doube google search box.
snowulf.com
It works on Linux, even on PPC ones. Finally, google released a product for Linux users.
Does this mean that Google is going to migrate some more of their products from Google Labs http://labs.google.com/ on linux now?
Will this tool bar replace the default Firefox Google homepage? Sponsorship is what it's all about, after all, no? Do you really think that Firefox developers will tolerate such redundancy? My bet is on the discontinuation of the homepage paired with a default Google Toolbar installation.
Does anyone have suggestions for other toolbars that are useful that work in Firefox? I am sure auto-complete is just scratching the surface. ( That's really all I use the google toolbar for anyway...in IE)
Actually, I find the "other Firefox extensions" link almost more interesting. The Google Suggest extension looks pretty darn slick.
I know Google tracks and logs every search query by IP address, but it's these persistent session pieces like the GMail cookies, "Personalized results" etc, that I find scarier. And what's more, a large number of people tend to use their full names as Email IDs (moreso for an attractive email service like GMail, which can be used as a formal email account for most purposes), which gives Google a way to directly map People Names to Google Searches.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
I do not see enough features in the toolbar to let it occupy 25% (ok maybe less) of my browsers tool space.
Google should just CNAME pr.google.com to slashdot.org
When I was first thinking about converting to Firefox I remember that Google's toolbar was the "killer app" that initially kept me from switching over. Then I realized that I could do pretty much everything I could do using Google's IE-only toolbar using Firefox extensions and its built-in capabilities.
For example, for instant Google searches, Firefox allows you to create Keyword Searches in which you can just type in, in my case, "g <search query>" in the URL bar. Or for Wikipedia it is "w <search query>". For word highlighting you can just use Firefox's search functionality. And finally, for AutoFill you can use the AutoFill extension (which ends up being better than Google's anyway IMO).
So basically, Firefox has rendered the Google toolbar pretty useless to me.
Nothing disturbs me more than blind loyalism towards some unrealistic and over-idealistic notion of one's nationality.
Why would I install this toolbar when I have instant search access to google built in to Firefox already?
Obviously the google toolbar offers a few bells and whistles, but I'll never use them. I just want to search.
So, the Google toolbar for IE makes sense, this one not so much.
Am I missing something?
Are those bells and whistles something worth sacrificing half an inch of screen real estate?
Google Search -- integrated
AutoLink -- US use only; most stuff don't work outside US, and even then a limited usefulness
WordTranslator -- limited use; only useful if you must understand e.g. a french site, and even if you do, there are non-toolbar extensions for this
Pop-up blocker -- integrated
AutoFill -- as far as I can see, Firefox' form saving system works well enough here
SpellCheck -- useful!
PageRank -- why should I have a use for it? diagnosing rank issues with my own sites? seems like highly limited use
Highlight search terms -- integrated
Word find -- integrated
An entirely new toolbar for this? Hmm... I can get the spell checking elsewhere without one, and besides that, it seems a bit much.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
...the page you are viewing will be sent to Google if you click on the "Cached Snapshot", "Backward Links" or "Similar Pages" features.
Wow, imagine that, google needing to know which page you're viewing so it can 1) show you a cache of that page, 2) show links to the current page, or 3) show pages related to the one you're viewing.
How on earth could they do this without knowing what page you're viewing?
[by the way the Mac of the time, while far more secure than the windows of the time, certainly had its share of problems. The autostart worm was a particularly nasty one that I was lucky enough never to get bit by. ]
Wow, imagine that, google needing to know which page you're viewing so it can 1) show you a cache of that page, 2) show links to the current page, or 3) show pages related to the one you're viewing.
How on earth could they do this without knowing what page you're viewing?
By sending you the information for every page on the Internet, then allowing you to pick the page you want client-side, of course.
(Note: may not be practical.)