Wolfram Alpha and Firefox Addons
Browsing with Firefox is mostly about customization - addons allow easy changes to how the browser functions, ranging from photo walls to ad blocking to tablet features. All in all I’ve stuck with a core set of addons over the years, ones I would consider essential to browsing the internet. I’ll be listing those here.
Just before I do, a quick reminded; Wolfram Alpha is having a preview this Friday @ 7:00 PM CDT. I’d recommend checking it out. For those unaware, Wolfram Alpha is a knowledge search engine that can also perform calculations and display relative information. It can display graphs of population, retrieve information like the GDP of France, show molecular information for chemical compounds, etc. Unfortunately there haven’t been any more off-the-wall searches publicized but I’m sure they’ll be brought up this Friday.
Without further ado, the list:
Must-have
- Adblock Plus
- By and large the most important of all my addons, after browsing ad-free its hard to go back. Adblock Plus works extremely well at its core functionality without much tweaking, making it possible to go months without seeing a single banner ad on any websites. In addition it makes it easy to add new entries and use wildcards to make them always work, even once the ads change. Not much more explanation needed, aside from a big thumbs up.
- Greasemonkey
- One of the hardest addons to explain, Greasemonkey lets you install javascript files that then further modify your browser but without the bloat of more addons. I’ll list some scripts at the bottom of the post as I’ve got several installed and examples are the best way to show what this addon does.
- Download Statusbar
- Similar to (and predating) Chrome’s download bar, this prevents popups when starting downloads and instead shows a convenient bar containing all your downloads’ progress, speed, and estimated completion time.
- LastTab
- Falling under the “should be the default” category, at its core LastTab does one thing: it makes Ctrl-Tab move through tabs in order of most recently used instead of left-to-right. A few other features here and there but that’s the gist of it.
- OpenDownload
- Another “should be the default” addon, this makes it so that every download has an “open with OS’s default program” option.
- PDF Download
- Not a necessity if you have something like Foxit Reader but convenient nonetheless. Whenever you browse to a pdf file instead of immediately embedding Adobe Reader this lets you choose to download, view as html, cancel, or embed.
Still a Good Idea
- FaviconizeTab
- Mostly convenient for always-open sites (like gmail or google reader) and an excellent companion for Greasemonkey, it lets you delay closing a tab without taking up so much room.
- Ubiquity
- Like Greasemonkey, Ubiquity lets user-created javascript files enrich the browsing experience. Unlike Greasemonkey, Ubiquity focuses on a Spotlight-style functionality whereby you can call it up instantly whenever you need it. It’s useful for mashups like embedding maps in email messages or translating page content, but the best way to figure it out is to give it a try.
Mostly for Tablets
- FireGestures
- If only for one gesture FireGestures makes tablet browsing a lot better - the link down gesture. With a single right-click swipe from a link to the page below it it will open in a new tab. This one requires some experimentation as documentation is thin but important gestures include DR (close tab), UR (next tab), UL (prev tab), LR (new tab), and RL (undo close tab). All of the gestures are fully customizable too.
- Gesso
- Mainly a fix, it makes the windows TIP properly appear on text fields. It’s still a bit buggy with password fields unfortunately.
- Grab and Drag
- By mimicking Adobe Reader drag-to-scroll, this makes browsing websites on a tablet pc a lot easier.
That’s the core list. Finally, onto Greasemonkey scripts:
- HTTP-to-HTTPS redirector
- Makes sure that you never use google services on an unsecure protocol.
- TinyURL Decoder
- With the advent of twitter this is a requirement, as it automatically replaces shortened links with their full equivalents. I’ve made one main modification to this script, line 112 though that’s probably 2 off: “_node.innerHTML = ‘*’ + finalUrl + ‘ (’ + _node.href + ‘)*’;” - makes it more obvious which links are expanded
- Gmail FavIcon Alerts 3
- Goes nicely with FaviconTab by making the gmail icon show unread message counts.
- GReader FavIcon Alerts
- Shows unread item count in the Google Reader icon.
I think I’ve been posting too many lists recently, though it’s for a very simple reason: to get the software I use out into the world. These packs of addons, utilities, etc. have taken years of experimentation to finalize. I’m just hoping this information helps someone else save time in making browsing easier or fixing computer problems.
