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Command Lines and the Future of Firefox
Barence writes "Mozilla has revealed how it plans to integrate plain text commands directly into future versions of Firefox. Dubbed Taskfox, the move sees Mozilla's Ubiquity project become part of the browser itself, allowing users to type commands directly into the address bar. You can, for example, type 'map cleveland street london' to bring up a Google Map of that location, or 'amazon-search the great gatsby' to find that book on Amazon, without visiting the website directly. 'The basic idea behind Taskfox is simple: take the time-saving ideas behind Ubiquity, and put them into Firefox,' the Taskfox wiki claims. 'That means allowing users to quickly access information and perform tasks that would normally take several steps to complete.'"
You joke, but the interface is all that's new here. You can already do what the summary suggests using bookmark keywords - it is a useful feature, actually. I don't know how well-know it is, but basically you make a bookmark with a keyword for the address bar and a wildcard in the URL.
For example, if you make a bookmark with the keyword 'map' and the address 'http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&q=%s' (note the '%s' wildcard) you can then type 'map cleveland street london' straight into the address bar just as the summary suggests. All that they seem to be suggesting is having it come up in a 'floating' context box like the AwesomeBar rather than actually open in the tab.
You joke, but the interface is all that's new here. You can already do what the summary suggests using bookmark keywords
Not exactly. With Ubquity you get instant feedback during typing, so you don't have to wait for the page to load with all the bells and whistles, you see only the relevant part of it.
So it's quicker and more convenient than keyword bookmarks.
No, it's oh so much more than that.
Watch the video, it explains everything, and looks like a very cool feature with a LOT of potential.
http://labs.mozilla.com/projects/ubiquity/