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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.'"
So, basically, a bunch of officially-included bookmark shortcuts.
... for Mozilla to keep their filthy commands out of the address bar. They could easily add that to the search plugin bar without any problems. I had enough trouble last night when I was trying to troubleshoot a neighbor's internet connection issues and Firefox would repeatedly send the perfectly valid address (http://192.168.1.1) I was inputting off to a google search, which of course would return a blank page, since the ultimate trouble was the cable modem, not the router nor the connection to the router.
There needs to be a gigantic "FUCK YOU, LEAVE ME ALONE, LET ME SURF THE WEB AS THE FLYING SPAGHETTI WEASEL INTENDED" button in the settings.
Screenshot from article
The idea is interesting, but wouldn't this be better served as an add-on? That would keep Firefox true to it's add-on roots, IMO.
over the past 20 years I've been amazed at how the IT world first started scorning command lines (IE the rise of Mac, Windows and GUIs in general) only to come back to them (IE Mac OS X / spotlight / Quicksilver, Windows / launchy, smart address bars, and the increasing amount of people who started using Linux with Ubuntu and are nwo flocking to the command line).
This just proves what i'd known all along: command lines are more efficient, and although the learning curve might be a bit steeper, they just kick ass for things you have to do repeatedly. You of course learn the commands and then whiz by all those people whose motor skills barely allow them to use the mouse, yet they insist in their clickety-clickety ways.
Many operations are easier with a GUI but getting rid of the command line altogether (mac OS 1.x-9.x, I'm looking at you) is/was never a good idea.
Because new == bad
We know.
No, seriously, at least give it a chance to be useful. Your prejudgment seems unwarranted, unfounded, and unnecessary. I know I'll at least try it out before either ignoring it or destroying it.
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
Users can already do that with the search text field. Example1. Example2. This new feature doesn't appear to bring any new value to the user over what is already provided.
I'd really like to see Mozilla spend one release where they stop working on new features and focus solely on fixing bugs. The results of such an effort would be more valuable to the end user.
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If I wanted bloat I would use IE.
When Firefox was created, it was a spinoff of the Mozilla project for people who wanted 'just a browser' with extensions to fill in the rest.
Part of me wonders if it's time to do that again: spin something new off of the Firefox project for people who want 'just a browser' with extensions to fill in the rest. Firefox has done a lot of good, just like Mozilla before it, but it seems to me like it's starting to suffer from the same bloat-over-standards problem that made the original project necessary in the first place.
Maybe this is a cyclic thing; I don't know. Perhaps it's just plain going to be necessary to do this every few years: when a Mozilla browser gets too large, a lean child project emerges, eventually takes over, bloats up, and another lean child project emerges, and so the cycle continues.
Ahh yes I know there's a plug-in that'll give you the same features as IE8's InPrivate, but what I'd rather do is just block anything that matches some keywords or domains (like "pr0n" or "*.pr0n.com") from showing up in my awesome bar/history.
Those things are right in your face when you use a browser, but if I can filter out certain things deep in a configuration setting or my registry, that'd be gold. Mainly, I want to be able to "show" someone a website without having to hammer out a URL really fast.
[rant]WRT other accounts, I've got plenty of computers that other people could (and do) use for general web browsing/what have you, but I've gotten sick of explaining to people who simply can't fathom how profiles personalize computers for their users that I don't want other people using mine and logging out of websites like myspace or facebook or igoogle and so on... It's like getting in your car and finding all the seats and mirrors moved around, but apparently I'm the only person I know who gets royally pissed off by that kind of stuff. [/rant]
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.
Why not just BUNDLE SOME FUCKING PLUGINS, rather than ignoring the whole plugin-based architecture you've set up?
If you could do it just fine as a plugin, bundle the thing instead of removing the feature of not having it
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All