Ready or not, here it comes. And it is Firefox 3.0.1. Mozilla has been issuing automatic updates for Firefox for ages. If you're running Firefox 3, you were probably prompted to install version 3.0.1 a few weeks ago. But if you've been running an older version of Firefox, you might still be at version 2.0.0.16. Now Mozilla plans to push out an update to all Firefox 2 users that will prompt them to update to version 3.0.1.
The update could come as soon as next week. Firefox 3 offers a number of advantages over Firefox 2. First, and probably most importantly, it's the most up to date version of the browser when it comes to security features. But it also has improved JavaScript support, faster page load speeds, and improved performance with web applications like Gmail, Google Docs, and Zoho Office. Firefox 3 also has a completely redesigned location bar that makes it much easier to find pages you've recently or frequently visited.
Firefox 2 users don't have to update. If you're happy with your existing browser experience, you can either postpone the update or decline it.
I've never been particularly put out by needing to click the "Next" button on a blog. Sure, there are always exceptions, like when I find sites that archive oddly or only have a few posts per page. And don't get me started on the "Next" buttons and surprise ads (do I want two free iPod Nanos? Only if I can beat the advertiser about the head and neck with them).
LifeHacker introduced me to the AutoPager add-on for Firefox. The idea behind AutoPager is a good one. It takes a web page with continuous content (such as a blog) and allows you to scroll through it all as if it were one page . So that you're not waiting for years for your page to appear, AutoPager allows you to choose the number of pages displayed at a time. It also has a few pre-configured web pages in its clutches, like Digg and Twitter.
The good news is that AutoPager can be set to scroll through just about any site with a next button. The bad news is, it's not really apparent how to do this. I was pointed to the Site Wizard, which worked just as well as many wizards I've encountered -- not at all. I couldn't select the "Next" link, and it kept aborting (and it's too early in the morning where I am to be doing that).
I know little about XPath (the underlying AutoPager mechanism) or how it works, but I did still get AutoPager to give me several pages of Download Squad at once. Truth be told, I'm still not sure what it was I did. I clicked the AutoPager icon on my toolbar, and got a sidebar that popped up in the browser and seemed to autodetect both the "Next" link and the content I wanted to see. I clicked the green checkmark on the sidebar (did I need to? no clue), and we were finally in business.
AutoPager is great for getting your eyes on a lot of information quickly. Once it's configured to the sites you want to see in this manner, it's really handy. But for the first few sites you configure, make sure to take frequent breaks for deep, cleansing breaths.
Thinking about switching from Firefox or Internet Explorer to the Opera web browser, but can't imagine life without the StumbleUpon toolbar? StumbleUpon has yet to release an official toolbar or plugin for Opera. And while there is certainly a way to rank web pages and discover new pages without a toolbar, it's rather inelegant.
Opera Stumbler is a third party plugin that gives you all the same features you'd expect from the toolbar, sans the toolbar. There are several different ways to use Opera Stumbler. You can install the menu button, which adds a StumbleUpon menu to Opera.
If you'd rather have toolbar buttons, you can install a series of buttons for common tasks like giving a page a thumbs up or thumbs down. These buttons can be dragged and dropped onto any Opera toolbar. You can also add a Stumble option to your Opera Speed Dial bookmarks.
If you didn't notice from reading my last massive time waster, I love classic gaming. I'm also a Firefox user, and always on the hunt for good addons like the rest of you. Thank god for FireNES, an awesome addon for Firefox that gives you ready access to a massive repository of NES games.
After you install it, customize your toolbar and add the FireNES button to give yourself one-click access to the sidebar. The full ROMs list is massive, The toplist contains the 100-or-so most played titles, and you can add any game to your list of favorites with a simple right click.
Best of all, you don't have to hunt down ROMs on horibly cluttered, scam-laden websites. Awesome.
The only possible downside to all this: habla usted español? The developer's page is Spanish only - not a big deal, the install link is easy to find and you can always run it through your favorite translation app.
Since switching to Firefox, there's one Internet Explorer function I've been wanting to duplicate: copying my browsing history when opening a new tab or window. Developer Twanno has created an extension that adds that missing functionality, and another that I find particularly useful.
The Duplicate Tab extension does exactly that, creating a second instance of your selected tab in a new one (or in its own window). It can also perform two other useful functions. First, it will "detach," a tab - close it in your current window and open a new window with the same URL and your browsing history.
Second, you can use it to merge different windows - combining their tabs and history in a single window.
Tab Clicking Options gives you the ability to control your tabs through different mouse click actions. It's compatible with other tab extensions, so I've set mine up to duplicate a tab when I double-click on it. A host of action are supported, including reloading, bookmarking, closing, and even switching to IE view (if you have the extension installed).
These are two great, small extensions for Firefox users looking for more control over their tabs and windows.
Ever wish you could remove an annoying logo, ad, or other element from a web page. Not just hide it up for now, but never ever have to look at it again? Then you might want to check out the Remove it Permanently extension for Firefox. It lets you remove any element from any web page. Well, sort of.
First thing you need to do is install the extension. That's a bit trickier than you'd think, because the latest version isn't yet compatible with Firefox 3.01. Fortunately, you can force it to work by preventing your browser from checking for extension compatibility.
Once the plugin is up and running, you can right click on any portion of any web page and either remove that section permanently, or click the RIP advanced button for additional options. Keep in mind that if you remove an element, it will only be gone from a single URL. For example, if you remove the Download Squad logo from our main page, it will still show up on article pages, search pages, and so on.
It's also worth nothing that your browser still downloads the files. You just won't see them. So Remove it Permanently won't reduce your bandwidth use, it will just make obnoxious web sites like MySpace slightly more bearable to read.
No, let me try that again. Firefox is one of those applications that's so hard to write about, because there may be little tricks and shortcuts I've been using for some time, and someone will discover one and say, "Hey, that rocks! Why didn't anyone tell me?" Then light dawns over my marblehead that it is a useful trick, and I should have pointed it out.
So Sean Privitera kindly reminded me that searching Google on Firefox is easier than it appears. Ever been reading something on the web and you have no freakin' idea what the word or phrase means? Select the word in question (if you really want to try it out, select this word: geoduck. It's not a Pokemon), right click, and wonder of wonders, there is an option there to search Google for the selected word.
See a nifty bit of formatting on a website, and you're wondering how it was done? Select that formatting, images and all, and right click. Then click "View Selected Source" and a window will pop up in Firefox showing you (brace yourselves!) the HTML formatting of the parts in question.
I've learned to love my right mouse button. Seriously, developers hide all the interesting stuff there. Of course, the right mouse button in Firefox will allow you to open a link in a new tab or window. But it can also calm some fears about what you might be opening (and how it behaves). Right clicking while hovering over a link can tell you if it opens in a new tab, what the URL is, and allow you to send or copy link location.
It is the little tricks like these that make a browser really useful, and more than just a vehicle for surfing the web. But like geoducks, sometimes you need to do a little digging to find them.
Design inspiration can come from a lot of different places. If you find yours from digital sources on the web, Palette Grabber for Firefox might be incredibly useful to you.
Install it, and Palette Grabber sits in the left corner of your status bar waiting to leap into action. A single click (right or left) exports a selective palette based on your current page in Firefox. Palette selection is very intelligent, producing accurate swatch sets for each of the websites I sampled.
Palette Grabber supports several file formats, including Photoshop, Flash, Fireworks, PaintShop Pro, the GIMP, and Mac OS X Color Picker. Minimalists and power users can elect to save a tabbed text listing of RGB values.
For a 25k download, Palette Grabber is definitely worth adding to your Firefox install if you do any digital design work.
A few months back, Download Squad's Danny Mendez wrote about Yahoo!'s acquisition of popular Safari InputManager Inquisitor. At the time, Danny was worried that Yahoo's purchase would make the tool unusable with other search engines, but those fears were unfounded, and Inquisitor continues to work well with either Google OR Yahoo.
Inquisitor is cool because it adds Spotlight-like functionality to the default Safari search box (it's kind of like the Awesome Bar for Firefox 3), along with easy access to other search results from places like Flickr or IMDB or Wikipedia. The design is also utterly kick-ass.
In the new release, users who choose to use Yahoo! search engine will see much, much faster results, thanks to integration with Yahoo's new BOSS platform. Like, instantaneously fast. Like, fast enough to make me consider changing my default search engine fast.
Inquisitor now supports eight languages in addition to English: Japanese, Korean, Traditional Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, and German.
The interface has also become more streamlined and looks really, really great.
Inquisitor is free and available for Mac's running OS X 10.4 and up.
Sure, Firefox 3.01 is still fresh off the presses, but some if you've been looking forward to getting your hands on the even newer and more improved Firefox 3.1, it looks like you have to wait a little longer. Mozilla had planned to release Firefox 3.1 on August 19th, but has pushed that date back to September 9th.
Firefox 3.1 will feature a handful of updates including Javascript enhancements and bulk tagging features. And those updates just weren't going to be ready by the 19th.
But if you're itching to try out something new from Mozilla, you might want to check out Fennec Milestone 6. Fennec is the codename for the upcoming mobile version of Firefox. It's designed for mobile phones similar devices. Right now, it runs on the Nokia N810 internet tablet, but Windows Mobile support is coming soon. Milestone 6 adds support for tabs, tel: and mailto:. This is still pre-alpha software, but if you've got a Nokia internet tablet lying around, I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you're comfortable with running bleeding edge software.
If bookmark menus aren't enough for you, All Customized Links offers yet another tweak to speed your Firefox browsing.
A word of warning to privacy fanatics: you must register an account to use this, and your links are remotely hosted (there is no TOS that I could find). While not posting privacy terms isn't cool, your links following you wherever you install this addon is.
Adding new links is a breeze through the preferences menu. Enter a name, url, and choose where you want to open it: current tab, new background or foreground tab or window,
An interesting preview option is included, though it's not so much a preview as it is loading the whole page with it's opacity turned down. I was expecting maybe a pop-out thumbnail of a site, not the exact same thing I'd see if I clicked it's entry. You may want to turn previews off in your preferences, it's just not that useful.
All Customized Links' menu also features a quick option to add the current URL, which will save you a bit of typing over just entering everything from scratch by yourself.
This isn't the kind of addon that's going to revolutionize your browsing experience, but it's a nice option for those looking for additional bookmarking options.
While surfing with Firefox's status bar hidden gives you a little more viewing area, it can cause you grief sometimes. For example, when you think you're about to download a file directly and instead have three pop-up windows shoved in your face.
I was glad to find Linkalert, a handy little Firefox extension that gives you visual feedback about links you hover over. While it's not going to blow you away with advanced functionality the way some addons do, it's a decent way to keep yourself informed about the links you might click.
Park your pointer on a link, and Linkalert will display an icon indicating what the destination contains. It supports office files, email links, rss, zip, pdf, Javascript, new windows, and more. The new window and Javascript alerts alone can keep you out of a lot of trouble.
It'll also present you with a lock when linking to a secure site, and will open the lock icon when you're about to click out of it. Useful!
I'm not a big Opera fan, but I have to say I'm pretty impressed with Operator - a portable version with built-in Tor (hence the semi-clever name) anonymous browsing.
Download the 7mb zip and extract it to your flash drive, and you've got an excellent way to keep your surfing on public and work computers safe and private. I was surprised with the speed at which pages loaded, having used TorPark to cure my insomnia back in the day. Part of the boost comes from integrating Polipo, a tiny caching web proxy that Operator bundles with the browser.
Our home page loaded in about 22 seconds, a little over twice as long as it took Firefox. Not bad, considering the added security and privacy.
As the author warns on the Operator home page, only HTTP and HTTPS are anonymized by Tor, so avoid Javascripts and Opera's IRC functions to play it safe. For road warriors - and the truly paranoid - Operator is well worth a test drive.
Vyew My PC is a flash-based instant desktop sharing product with a lot of fun features.
Basically, go to the Vyew My PC web page and click start sharing my desktop. You will be given a unique, unguessable URL. You can then share that URL with anyone you'd like to share your desktop with. There are some features you need an account to use, but the basics are usable by anyone.
You can upload files to be shown on the Vyew My PC desktop, use the whiteboard features, chat and with registration, use audio/video features. You cannot however, view anything outside the Vyew My PC desktop area. So, if you want to switch to a new window and show a web page you are viewing, it's not going to show up unless you take screenshots and present those.
It moves smoothly and all the features seem to work. Now, I didn't go in and have a full-fledged sales presentation to a CEO or anything but I did show a powerpoint to two of my friends who logged in from two seperate locations.
My main concern was about security. Showing a powerpoint to my friends is quite a bit different than important company information. So, this is what I found out; the packet data for your session is not encrypted but the URLs seem to be unique enough that someone wouldn't just stumble into your meeting without being invited. SSL encryption is not offered publicly but could be a possibility for some clients.
If you happen to buy or sell on eBay frequently, the Lauge custom browser is an interesting tool you'll want to check out.
Lauge sports a ton of functionality that makes using eBay less bothersome. The search tab provides a handy tree view of all eBay categories and makes navigation around the site a snap; favorite your go-to categories to access them quickly later. It also includes a simple keyword search and seller search with results filtering options.
Once you've selected a category to browse, Lauge activates the gallery view which provides a thumbnailed view of all eBay gallery items. It's a great visual tool for separating the wheat from the chaff in a hurry. Item listings can be sorted in the same ways as on eBay's site, and you can fully customize which columns you'd like displayed in the results pane. Some options, like item condition (which would be truly useful) don't yet display, though that may have more to do with sellers not specifying it in the first place.
Lauge also handles tabbed browsing, making it easy to switch back and forth between items or categories. On the downside, the panes aren't resizable which can make the item view a bit cramped. Clicking the orange "eject" button will open a full screen view that remedies the situation and lets you view the item in detail as you would on eBay.
Lauge supports English and German, and requires the MSXML 4 download.
Ready or not, here it comes. And it is Firefox 3.0.1. Mozilla has been issuing automatic updates for Firefox for ages. If you're running Firefox 3, you were probably prompted to install version 3.0.1 a few weeks ago. But if you've been running an older version of Firefox, you might still be at version 2.0.0.16. Now Mozilla plans to push out an update to all Firefox 2 users that will prompt them to update to version 3.0.1.
Firefox is like a box of chocolates--
A few months back, Download Squad's 
