Talk about saving your work, I accidentally exited this tab and lost everything at the end :redface:. So, here's round two! I don't know how many of you guys already use Firefox, but if you don't already, you definitely should. Get Firefox! Anyway, I've used Firefox for a number years now, and I've picked up on a few neat little tricks along the way, that some of you might not be aware of. So, here goes: Addons Addons are extensions to Firefox that allow you to do more than the browsers core capabilities. None of them are necessary, but these few should definitely be made a core part of your browser. NoScript NoScript makes what was originally the safest browser to use for your internet expeditions even safer. By blocking scripts, such as Java, JavaScript, and other executables, NoScript takes security to a whole new level. In this way, it can essentially block almost all forms of malware, such as spyware and keyloggers (eh WoW players? I'm a former addict myself :redface:, been clean for a few months now, though!) from infecting your computer. At first it might annoy you, since it blocks basically everything. But, after a day of browsing your favorite sites and creating exceptions, much of the annoyance disappears. Essentially, for every site you want to allow to run a script, you must click a small yellow window that appears at the bottom of your screen and then click allow. It takes all of two seconds, and after the first few days, this nuisance basically vanishes. At this point, I'm so used to it, that unblocking scripts on trusted sights is almost subconscious. Even though NoScript makes browsing the internet much safer, it's not alternative to a good firewall, anti-malware program, and anti-virus program! Adblock Plus Adblock Plus does just what its name promises - blocks ads. This nifty addon, when used in conjunction with a filter pack, blocks almost all ads from appearing on every page. Now, instead of taking up your browsing time downloading those flashy advertisements, they simply do not appear at all. If the addon (with a filter pack), misses one, you can simply right click and manually add it yourself. Adblock saves not only download time for webpages, but also keeps your concentration on the actual content! CookieSafe This addon locks up those baked delights so pesky children don't steal them from you, via a magical teleportation device, linked to Kamino, where the expert cloners are bus... uhh oh, yeah. Not really. This addon is much like NoScript in its functionality, except that it blocks cookies. I know that sounds bad, but I haven't ever encountered a problem with logging in on any site, or storing any information, etc. Cookie Plus allows you to see when your cookies expire, which cookies the site installed, and easily clear all your cookies, or just the cookies for a particular site. Not as useful as the others, but still has some nice uses. Also, I won't go into much detail about these two, but if you run a blog (I'm not sure which bloggers are compatible), ScribeFire may be for you! And, if web design/coding is your thing, try Firebug. The Search Bar The search bar is that small thing next to where you type in website URLs, that, untouched, should be acting as a Google search. By clicking on the big G, or whatever logo is to the left of it, you can easily change what search engine you're using - pretty much common sense. What many people don't know, though, is that you can take almost any search engine, and add it to that toolbar. This becomes somewhat useless if you can master the next big section, but still has occasional uses. I'll demonstrate with my beloved Wikipedia. First, go to Wikipedia (English), or any other language you might speak. Then, click the little arrow that allows you to browse the various search engines. You should see a little thing that allows you to Add Wikipedia (English). Congratulations, you've done it! :eusa_clap Like I said, if you can master this next step, though, that's obsolete. Bookmarks In itself, not a difficult subject. You visit any site, press CTRL+D (or go up to bookmarks and click add), and lo and behold, the site is bookmarked. But, bookmarks have another very useful aspect often ignored by many users: keywords, and all their wonderful facets. Press CTRL+B. This should bring up your bookmarks on the left hand side of your browser. Now, open a new tab and go to the Empty Closets main forum index. From here, copy the URL, "http://emptyclosets.com/forum/" (without quotes) and right click on your bookmarks window. Go to New Bookmark. Here there should be a place for you to enter a name. Type in Empty Closets (or EC, it's not important, just for your reference). Next part asks for the URL, so paste the URL that you just copied. Then, where it says keyword, enter something short that reminds you of Empty Closets. Mine is ec. Description is purely optional. Click OK. Now, every time you want to go to Empty Closets, all you have to type in (in Firefox anyway) as your URL is "ec" (without quotes, of course). Typing your short keyword should bring you to the Empty Closets forum index! :eusa_danc But there's something even better than bookmarks can do for you. Searches! This time I'll use, again, Wikipedia as my example. Go to Wikipedia, and type in a search you know will not return a result (this step is only necesary for Wikipedia, you'll see why in a minute. For other websites, just type in any search term). Try "aslkdfukdjv"! The URL at the top should come up like this: "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Search&search=aslkdfukdjv" Now, change the search term that you entered (for me it was aslkdfukdjv) to %s. So, now your link looks like: "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Search&search=%s" Copy that, and again open up your bookmarks. Now, just like last time, manually create a new bookmark by naming it, copying the above URL into the URL line, and giving it a keyword (like "w"). Save this and watch the magic. From now on, instead of actually going to Wikipedia and typing in your search, or typing your search into the search bar, all you need to do is type "w search" in as your URL, replacing search with whatever you want to search for. So, typing "w toe" (as always, without quotes) yields http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toe. Pretty cool, huh? This works for any major search engine. Just type in a search term and replace the term in the URL with %s. For compilation engines like Dogpile, you'll need to remove all the gibberish after the term, BUT NOT FOR ANY OTHER SEARCH ENGINES. (So, instead of putting "http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/%s/1/-/1/-/-/-/1/-/-/-/1/..." as your URL, just put "http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/search/web/%s".) Here are some of the common ones with the %s already added in: Google: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%s&btnG=Google+Search Google Images: http://images.google.com/images?um=1&tab=wi&hl=en&q=%s Yahoo!: http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%s&ei=UTF-8&fr=moz2 YouTube: http://youtube.com/results?search_query=%s&search= Amazon: http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/10...ias=aps&field-keywords=%s&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Search&search=%s Other Neat Tricks The only other neat trick I know is that it's possible to copy a URL from your Firefox browser to anywhere else, like a forum post, simply by dragging the little picture to the left of the text where you want it to be placed. Kind of helpful for bibliographies. Whew this was long. If anyone has any questions, I'm open to help. Hopefully I taught you something about Firefox. <3 Ryan
