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Firefox
Web Browser

Introduction <top>

Fast, customizable, available on many platforms (Mac, Windows, Linux) - simply the best all-purpose web browser there is out there.

Download from www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox.

Firefox 4, released 2011-03-022

• What's New - www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/4.0/whatsnew/
• Features: www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/features/
• Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox_4

Add-ons (Feature) <top>

Aside Firefox being fast and conforming to standards, it's a very much customizable browser and you can easily add more functionality, and tweak existing.

The possibility to use add-ons is one of the most powerful features (in our minds) and for a long time, Firefox was the only web browser (or at least among the very few) that had this capability.

Browse the huge library at https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/.

Note that even if most addons are available via this, and from inside Firefox via Tools > Add-ons menu, not all addons are there - some are only available via developers own site, or other software-download sites.

• CustomizeGoogle - CustomizeGoogle is a Firefox extension that enhance Google search results by adding extra information (like links to Yahoo, Ask.com, MSN etc) and removing unwanted information (like ads and spam). All features are optional and easily configured. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/743; home page: www.customizegoogle.com/ (mentioned in CNET Insider Secrets: Hack Google with Firefox extensions, 2008-08-20)
• GooglePreview - Inserts preview images (thumbnails) and popularity ranks of web sites into the Google and Yahoo search results pages. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/189. (mentioned in CNET Insider Secrets: Hack Google with Firefox extensions, 2008-08-20)
• McAfee SiteAdvisor - When you search with Google, Yahoo!, or Live Search, SiteAdvisor's safety ratings appear next to search results. www.siteadvisor.com/download/ff.html.
  • WARNING: Currently available version per 2011-03-26 of SiteAdvisor is NOT compatible with FF 4. And also creates a havoc with any open web pages... It creates a lot of behind-the-scene error dialogs that to be accessed and confirmed requires minimizing all main browser windows. (A real mess for someone like with J&P who often has 10-20 browser windows open...) (Mac OS X 10.6, FF 4.0, latest available Site Advisor - downloaded today March 26.)
    http://www.google.com/search?q=mcafee%20site%20advisor%20firefox%204
• More security-related: Browse all in Mozilla's Privacy & Security addons-category. Note: this is NOT comprehensive and some add-ons may exist in other places (such as McAfee SiteAdvisor)

Update History (latest first):

• Oct'11: Added Ghostery, added a more clear 'Must-Haves' section. (2011-10-01)
• Mar'11: 2011-03-26 Updated information on selected add-ons when finally moving to first public release of Firefox 4.0 (released 2011-03-22). Also first added this section.

More for developers - check out Chrome and Firefox and add-ons, oh my ... (opens in a new window). A good intro to the power of Firefox add-ons for developers. NOTE! It's a little bit outdated in regard to latest and greatest actually available add-ons. Recommend browsing for comparable. We at J&P are for instance using Firebug, Live HTTP Headers, and Web Developer.

Must-Haves

• FastestFox - More below.
• Ghostery - for privacy, disable tracking of your visits on sites
• NoScript - control what sites that may or may not execute JavaScript (Ok, this add-on can be a bit intrusive...)

Hacking Compatibility Version Information...

If an add-on states it's not compatible with your current version of browser, all hope may not have to be lost. You don't neccessarily have to wait for the developer to upgrade the add-on but you can give it a try by yourself.

The hack is to modify the maxVersion setting in the install.rdf file for the add-on(s) in question. Example:

...
 	<em:minVersion>3.0</em:minVersion>
 	<em:maxVersion>3.6.4</em:maxVersion>
...

...
 	<em:minVersion>3.0</em:minVersion>
 	<em:maxVersion>4.0.*</em:maxVersion>
...

Disclaimer:

• This is a hack and the add-on absolutely may still not work in never browser. Especially if it's a more advanced add-on, involving for instance development, and/or functionality that is closely tied to browser internals. (Yes, it can be hard to know.)
• It shouldn't be dangerous to at least try and see if it works.
• But - any tweaks like this could be a security risk. The add-on code and the (newer) browser code has not officially (by developer) been properly tested!

Procedure:

1. Find directory for the add-on to hack.
2. Edit install.rdf file
3. Restart Firefox browser (there are some add-ons that claim reloading add-ons w/o restart (e.g. Addon Developer Helper and Extension Developer) but I've not been able to get any to work reliably)
4. Try and see if the add-on now actually works. Disclaimer above.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

Addon Developer Helper

• Not available for Firefox 4.0b6
• https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/45322/

Adds a small button in the Status bar at the bottom of browser window:

Extension Developer

• Extension: 7434
• Developer's page: http://ted.mielczarek.org/code/mozilla/extensiondev/

Installs a menu:

And adds toolbar buttons (Javascript Shell to RegExp Evaluator in figure below):

FastestFox (formerly SmarterFox) (Add-on)

Added 2009-10-28. An absolute MUST-HAVE! As example, check out my own view of all the slides mentioned below - plus more pages - as one single page.

From http://download.cnet.com/8301-2007_4-10316869-12.html?tag=mncol;txt, accessed 2009-10-28:

August 24, 2009 6:32 PM PDT SmarterFox packs a productivity wallop by Jessica Dolcourt * Font size * Print * E-mail * Share * 5 comments * Yahoo! Buzz

SmarterFox's many browser tricks--screenshots

I've been using the SmarterFox Firefox add-on (Windows | Mac) for awhile now. It's by far one of the most varied productivity add-ons for Firefox that I've seen. Its clever tricks to speed up searching, browsing, downloading, and even copy and paste are good news for just about anyone whose job description contains the word "Web."

I've put together a SmarterFox slideshow to walk you through the substantial features. Without giving away too much, SmarterFox facilitates faster search through multiple channels, including the Firefox Awesome Bar, the context menu, and Wikipedia enhancements. It also helps launch Web sites faster, and has a novel way of dealing with pagination for sites with multipage articles, and for shopping sites displaying pages of results. Check out the gallery to see exactly how these features work.

http://smarterfox.com/share/

PDFs, PDF Add-Ons/Plug-ins

Firefox (including 4th major generation, released 2011-03-22) does not natively handled PDFs. I.e. it does not show PDFs inside web browser window but downloads document to local file system for open by other application.

• Search add-ons on 'PDF' (sort latest first) https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search/?q=pdf&sort=newest (opens in new tab/win)
• support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Opening PDF files within Firefox
• support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Using the Adobe Reader plugin with Firefox
• Options window - Applications panel - support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Options%20window%20-%20Applications%20panel
• Mac OS X
• PDF Browser Plugin (Mac OS X) http://www.schubert-it.com/pluginpdf/
• http://www.google.com/search?q=pdf+reader+plugin+mac+os+x
• PDF Plugin for Firefox on Mac OS X
• Current per 2011-03-31: v1.1.3, Feb 2, 2011: NOT compatible with FF 4
• https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/pdf-plugin-for-firefox-on-mac-/
• web site: http://code.google.com/p/firefox-mac-pdf/

Profiles (New 2011)

Profiles (new Nov 2011)

• Start in Safe mode: hold down Option key (Mac) during start
• Profiles | How to | Firefox Help - support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Profiles
• Managing profiles | How to | Firefox Help
  

  /Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox-bin -p
  

• ~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/, then /Profiles/. Your

Customization

• about:config
• user.js
• userCrome.css

General resources:

• mozillazine.org/
• 15 Coolest Firefox Tricks Ever - www.lifehack.org/articles/technology/15-coolest-firefox-tricks-ever.html
• FireFox 3 Secrets - forums.techarena.in/guides-tutorials/994211.htm

TO CHECK OUT:

• ChromEdit - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/17/?id=17
  • more, incl. source: cdn.mozdev.org/chromedit/
• ChromEdit Plus - webdesigns.ms11.net/chromeditp.html

about:config

• kb.mozillazine.org/About:config
• kb.mozillazine.org/About:config_entries

user.js

• www.google.com/search?q=firefox+user.js+tutorial
• www.google.com/search?q=firefox+user.js+examples

userCrome.css

• www.google.com/search?q=userchrome.css
• Customize Firefox with userChrome.css - lifehacker.com/197715/customize-firefox-with-userchromecss
• Best Firefox userchrome.css Tweaks? - lifehacker.com/software/ask-the-readers/best-firefox-userchromecss-tweaks-301520.php

For Developers - JavaScript in Address Bar, Addons

To enable (increasingly limited possibilities, due to strengthening security):

1. Open about:config (link ain't working in FF 7, maybe a security thing... copy text into address bar and press enter)
2. Search for, navigate to: noscript.allowURLBarJS
3. Set value to true (toggle via contextual menu)
4. Close the window.
5. That's it. (Change take effect immediately when value's changed, before window is even closed.)
6. Try: copy the text below into the address bar and press return:
   javascript:alert("hello, world");

• https://www.google.com/search?q=execute+javascript+in+address+bar+how+to+enable
• Javascript command not working from address bar - http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/questions/885558#answer-259571
• Running Javascript in Navigation Bar (URL) - http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/questions/876916
• Disallow javascript: URLs entered into location bar - http://forums.informaction.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=6488&p=27991

Live Bookmarks (Browser Feature)

Info: www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/livebookmarks.html, google it - www.google.com/search?q=live+bookmarks,

One descriptive article is Mozilla Firefox- RSS web feeds and Live Bookmarks - johnbokma.com/firefox/rss-and-live-bookmarks.html (local).

Screen Real Estate

• Own work
• www.ghacks.net/2008/11/19/setup-firefox-to-use-minimal-screen-estate/ (a bit old - from 2008 - but illustrative) (local save)

Toolbars

Toolbars are a basic feature of most - if not all (special builds for very specific purposes could be exceptions) - web browsers but can take up precious screen real estate if not properly managed. Especially when you are a power user or developer and uses many addons (that has toolbars).

An extreme example is the below figure:

• Note: this is not how the authors Firefox web browser normally looks. Only made multiple toolbars visible for exemplification.
• The items within red - QuickToolbars and QuickToolbars Menu - belong to QuickToolbars addon (more below).

Search for more toolbars related addons.

Found but not yet installed and checked-out:

• SQLite Manager - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5817/
• Custom Buttons - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2707/
• Custom Buttons² - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5066/
• Toolbar Thinger - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6545/

Thinger

(2010-10-17

1. Downloaded
2. Added extension .tar
   (http://www.undermyhat.org/blog/2009/09/tip-how-to-unpack-xpi-files/)
3. Doubleclicked to unpack
4. Opened install.rdf
   1. Retrieved name of addon - Thinger@blueprintit.co.uk
   2. Changed MaxVersion
   3. Saved and closed file
5. Renamed directory from #3 to Thinger@blueprintit.co.uk (from 4.1)
6. Moved directory into Firefox'
7. Restarted Firefox

Customize Toolbars, Custom Toolbars

• Create Customized Toolbars
  • http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/How+to+customize+the+toolbar
• Remove Customized Toolbars
  Not the most intuitive way, or well described - actually kind of hard to find.
  The process seems to be removing all buttons from the custom toolbar and then the actual toolbar itself also is removed.
  • Uninstalling toolbars - http://kb.mozillazine.org/Uninstalling_toolbars
  • how to remove customized toolbars in firefox - http://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+remove+customized+toolbars+in+firefox
  • http://www.ehow.com/how_6052149_delete-custom-toolbar-firefox.html
  • I created a customized toolbar and now I want to delete it. How do I do this? - http://support.mozilla.com/ga-IE/questions/751545

Hide/Show Toolbars

Considering other browser than Firefox, check out comgt.com/web/browsers/ and one overview at comgt.com/testcenter/#webbrowsers.

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