Tech Support > Computers & Technology > Software & Applications > Why FireFox is the best browser
Why FireFox is the best browser
Posted by futureworlds on September 28th, 2004


The major reason why I use FireFox (besides security & speed) is all of the features that can be
added by installing extensions. My top 15 (out of the 40+ I have installed) are:

1) Weatherfox - displays the weather (current & forecast) for most cities in the world in your
status bar or toolbar

2) Adblock - filters ads from webpages

3) Always Remember Password - allows FireFox to remember passwords for sites that tell your
browser not to remember them (eg. Yahoo, internet banking)

4) DownloadWith - allows you to download files using other software such as Download Express,
GetRight or Fresh Download

5) Down Them All - downloads all of the links in a page (you can also specify the ones you want)

6) FoxyTunes - allows you to control media players such as WinAmp or Foobar via controls on the
statusbar of your FireFox window

7) GetFileSize - shows you the size of a file when you right click on it's URL & choose
properties

8) Linkification - converts text links into clickable ones

9) QuickNote - adds a post-it notes type of feature

10) SpellBound - a spell checker for text boxes such as when posting to a forum

11) StatusBar Clock - displays date & time in status bar

12) SwitchProxy - allows you to switch between multiple proxy configurations easily without
having to change your browser/internet settings. The home page also has a link to a site which
lists proxies open to the public

13) Tabbrowser Extensions - improves tabbed browsing with features such as being able to save
tab sessions

14) User Agent Switcher - allows you to change the user agent FireFox sends to a site (i.e. make
a site think that you are using Internet Explorer, Opera or Netscape)

15) Location Navigator - a useful add-on that allows you to browse up & down through the numeric
portion of a location e.g. www.test.com/01.htm -> www.test.com/02.htm .

The 2 main sites for FireFox extensions are: https://update.mozilla.org/extensions/ (official) &
http://www.extensionsmirror.nl/index.php?showforum=2 (a lot more). When downloading from the
extension mirror, if it says for v0.9, see if there has been one put together for 0.10 (these
often have something like "pass" in the filename) - they are the ones to download.

Posted by Blue Dragonfly on September 28th, 2004


At the top of my list is the Google toolbar extension for Firefox,
which is even better than the toolbar made by Google for I.E.

Posted by Fuzzy Logic on September 28th, 2004


futureworlds <nobody@mail.futureworlds.it> wrote in
news:440d0bed32b1fe657c23e3ce41c6ed8e@mail.futurew orlds.it:

First let me say the abuse of the term 'best' is a pet peeve for me.
What's 'best' for you may be totally useless to me and vice versa.

I could care less.

I use Avant and it has this feature.

Remembering passwords to bank account is a security risk. I have my
browser set to NEVER remember passwords.

My browser downloads files just find without a 3rd party application.

This might come in handy some day.

It's a browser not a media centre!

Of questionable use.

Of minor use.

Yech!

It's a browser not a word processor.

I already have that in my system tray.

Of no use to me as I don't use proxies.

My browser does this as well.

I have never had a need for this.

Not sure where I would use that.

FWIW I use Avant.

Posted by Bruce the Shark on September 28th, 2004


Fuzzy Logic wrote:

Nit-pick: "Couldn't care less" is the actual correct phrase. This is
a pet hate of mine, along with "loose" when "lose" is meant to be used.

So does Firefox, but it allows other apps to handle it if desired, if
you don't like the built-in functionality.

Word processing is a feature of a web forum.



Posted by Buzzy on September 29th, 2004


futureworlds wrote:
.......... and from another angle:

http://www.buzzys.net/firefox.html

Cheers,
Buzzy

--
--- Buzzy's Stall Wall ---
www.buzzys.net
Warning: This site contains MY
version of freeware! All are welcome!

Posted by Richard Steven Hack on September 29th, 2004


On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 06:36:25 +1000, "Bruce the Shark"
<okokjmwd@nebwq.com> wrote:

Well, actually, although you are technically correct, one can argue
that the phrase "could care less" is in fact re-inforcing the disdain
by implying that one COULD care less but in fact one really doesn't.
You are IOW deliberately using "bad" grammar to make the point.
It may have started out as bad grammar but it's slang now.


--
Richard Steven Hack
"Whatever does not kill me makes me stronger" -
and YOU have not killed me!

Posted by Chakolate on September 29th, 2004


Richard Steven Hack <richardstevenhack@sbcglobal.net> wrote in
news:l7rkl0hhse9ja3dml4jhqk2ho1ecdhbqur@4ax.com:

That makes absolutely no sense to me. If you couldn't care less, that
means that you care as little as possible, i.e., not at all. If you could
care less, it means you do care some.

Chakolate

--
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do
and always a clever thing to say.
--Will Durant

Posted by Aaron on September 29th, 2004


t


futureworlds wrote:
I have 53 currently. And even between the both of us we haven't
exhausted the 300+ extensions available on extension mirror. Granted
many are broken , overlap in function the remaining extensions still
cover a very wide scope, covering almost every functionality you can
think of.


If only the thunderbird extensions were as numerous.


Nice one, I don't often notice this, but it does its work quietly.


One of my faves. I don't use download managers, but I use download
status-bar, which shows files being downloaded at the bottom of the page.

Another one if it works well, you won't even notice. It's amazing the
number of people who still post urls in web-pages and don't convert them
to hot-links.


I use this too.


I use Proxomitron to switch or rotate proxies. But I use prefbuttons to
add a dropdown menu to switch between no proxy, manual proxy and autoproxy.

Prefbar together with Toolbar enhancements, gives me the ability to add
buttons, to turn on or off Java,javascript, cookies,popups, images,
quick access to options ,downloads etc practically everything.


Yes, also as tab groups, ability to load/unload tab groups, undocloe
tabs etc etc etc

I use this. The latest versions allow you to spoof even more headers,
but I find this more cool in theory than useful.

I find it more useful to move up the directory, eg from
www.test.com/home/index.html to www.test.com/ , I use diggler for that.











Posted by Aaron on September 29th, 2004


.. eht fo It's quite interesting that for most part your top ones are not
mine.

Here are mine

1) Advanced highlighter button - highlight terms typed into the search bar.


2) All-in-One gestures - I'm not one of those ultra power users who can
remember dozens of mouse gestures, but I do use some.

Basically,

i)close tab
ii)unclose tab - very handy if you accidently close a tab
iii) translate a webpage with googletranslation (do a "L" for language)
iv)open new tab


3) Bugmenot - automatically fills in with the password and username of
any site that demands that you register (for free) to access it site.
Great time saver.



4) Conquery/Context Search - Highlight some text, right click and choose
which search engine (from the list defined in the search bar) to search
the highlighted term with. If you just want a google search, drag the
text with the extension Super DragandGo.

Conquery can do everything that Context Search can do and then some.
Instead of sending the highlighted text to the search form, you can send
the url of the page you are on or the base domain etc.

This is mainly useful for searches you do that involve urls.

For example, you can do a xhtml validation of a page with a click, or
translate that page, and most useful of all, check out how the page
looked like in the past with webarchive/waybackmachine! I'm sure there
are many other uses.

Together with the powerful find as you type and keyword searches (and
the corresponding extension that works with it smartsearch), firefox
provides multiple search systems and multiple ways to access them.



5) Cookiebutton/Cookieculler - The former adds a toolbar button that
allows you to set permissions of the site you are on with a single
click. The latter lists the cookies you have currently, giving you the
option to protect them ,clear them, etc. Together they replace the
cookie manager functionality of Mozilla suite.



6) EMbuttons - A must have for extension crazy people. Adds a toolbar
button to allow quick access to the extension manager, extension manager
also opens in a tab and you can arrange your extensions alphabetically.
Infolister also helps lists and exports extensions you have onto a
website or a text file.



7) IEview- With one click, open the site you are currently on (or the
link you right clicked on) with another browser. It says IEview, but you
can associate it with any browser or IEshell.



8) Keyconfig - Want to open new tabs with cltr-N ? No problem. You can
bind keys to whatever function you want.



9) Menueditor - Too many extensions will cluster up your context menu,
use this to rearrange the order of the entries and/or hide the rest.




10)Pastequote/bbcode/pastehappy/makelink - Makes posting in web forums
easy. Adds a context menu option to paste text copied into the clipboard
with tags around it. The bigger extension, BBcode adds
more tags. Makelink is useful for setting up links for formatting on web
forums or on your webpage.




11) Tinyurl Creator - adds a toolbar button that instantly sends the url
you are on to tinyurl, gets the url, copies it into clipboard. Works
seemlessly. very configurable.




12) X - cleans up cache, forms, cookies etc with a single click of a
toolbar button.


Others I'm trialling are autofill, Permit cookies (adds a hotkey to
permit cookies on current site), Image zoom, OpenBook (when adding
bookmarking, bookmark tree is automatically expanded), policy manager
(adds IE style zones for setting permissions for different sites) and
searchstatus (adds google pagerank bars in the status bar).


There are others that I occasionally use but usually keep disabled
because they duplicate the functions I already have e.g Translate,
Translate page, Translate panel (allows translation of the page via
toolbar&context menu, menubar and sidebar respectively)or

Spoofbar&Verfyurl for antispoofing.


















Posted by Bruce the Shark on September 29th, 2004


Richard Steven Hack wrote:

Not deliberate, it's just poor English skills. Don't give them credit.



Posted by Chaos Master on September 30th, 2004


Aaron puts out:


My 2 "can't live without" extensions:

- Adblock
- Web Developer (to switch down stuff on broken sites)

I still would like that Tab Browser Extensions worked with 1.0PR!

[]s
--
Chaos Master®, posting from Brazil.
"People told me I can't dress like a fairy.
I say, I'm in a rock band and I can do what the hell I want!"
-- Amy Lee

The Evanescen(t/ce) HP: http://marreka.no-ip.com

Posted by Atomhrt on September 30th, 2004


Chaos Master wrote:
For me, there are two extensions that worked better than TBE and work
with 1.0PR:

Focus Last Selected Tab 0.8.1
MiniT


Posted by Jim Byrd on September 30th, 2004


Hi CM - Tab Browser Extensions, v. 1.11.204082801, here
http://white.sakura.ne.jp/~piro/xul/...nsions.html.en works find for me
in 1.0PR. Download here
http://white.sakura.ne.jp/~piro/xul/...ml.en#download and save
the .xpi, then open it from File|Open File to install, then close and reopen
FF.

--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP



In news:MPG.1bc57304f4f7103b989769@news.individual.ne t,
Chaos Master <spammers.fuck@spam.com.INVALID> typed:

Posted by Aaron on September 30th, 2004


f dnatomhrt wrote:
These 2 are nice, but you need one more extension to enable "one window
mode" ?

You can choose from

Window-Q
TBP
Single window
Petite TBE

and of course TBE!





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