The Secrets of Firefox about:config

jcatcw writes "While Firefox is very customizable, many of its settings aren't in the Options. Each setting is named and stored as a string, integer, or Boolean in a file called prefs.js and accessed via about:config from the nav bar. Computerworld provides instructions on 20 tweaks for speeding up page loads, making tabs behave, reducing memory drain, and generally making the interface act the way you want it to. Customization also comes through the must-have FF extensions (but be sure to skip these)."

Comments

While it's nice..

[microbee]

Do not tune stuff that is hidden unless you know what you are doing.

Re:While it's nice..

[hahafaha]

So if these options really make pages load faster, offer less memory drain, and even feed the dog, why aren't they a part of the settings to begin with?

Basically, because, although they may give more speed, they have drawbacks as well. Your question is like asking, ``If people can overclock their processors to so much faster, why isn't it overclocked by default?''

Hacking Firefox

[Dominare]

Gah. Why is it that these people insist on calling anything not found on the main options page "hacking"? As for the above questions - usually the reason things like that are 'hidden' is to stop people fiddling with them. A good example is the old 'coolbits' entry in the registry for nVidia cards - the overclocking functionality was there, but you had to do something non-standard to enable it. That way, the company's ass is covered if you melt your card; you can't pretend you enabled the options accidentally. Since Firefox is free and nobody is paying tech-support, I'm not sure why these things aren't available - but the fact of the matter is, anyone messing around with fundamental parameters should _not_ be the kind of person who lets random articles on the internet tell them what to change.