Change the Browser Icons with Favicon Picker 3

Comments · July 18, 2008 at 6:11 am · Bookmark Help

Favicon Picker used to be one of my favorite add-ons for Firefox, mainly because I am a ‘bit of a control freak and I like to be able to customize every single little thing about my browsing experience.  Yes, even down to the favicon image that is saved for my bookmarks.

For those of you unfamiliar with the extension, it adds an interface for replacing bookmark icons.  Just right-click on any bookmark, select “Properties”, then “Browse”. (Folder icons aren’t supported yet). 

Here are some of the other features of Favicon Picker 3:

• It works with popular image formats including jpg, gif, png, bmp, ico and animated gifs!
• Any image size can be used, as well as the standard 1kb 16×16 pixels
• You can grab images from a URL.  Click “Browse” and paste in an address like http://www.cnn.com/favicon.ico or if a page has an image you like, right click on it and select “Copy image location”, and paste that in.

Get to customizing your own bookmark favicons with Favicon Picker 3 today!

Tips to Help You Read This Later

Comments (5) · July 8, 2008 at 8:37 am · Firefox Usability

Too many web sites and not enough time, right?  I’m always finding tons of awesome things on the Web and hardly have time to check ‘em all out myself.  What do you do to manage this virtual to do list (or would it be a to visit list?).  Here are a few techniques that might help.

Create a “Read it Later” Folder

The easiest solution to this problem would be to create a special folder in your bookmark toolbar called, “RIL”.  Then each time you are on a web site you want to save for later, drag the URL from the address bar into the special folder you have created.

Use Your Unsorted Bookmarks

Thanks to Firefox 3, we have yet another simple solution to this age old question.  Want to save that link for later?  Just click on the big star located in the address bar.  This will move it to your unsorted bookmarks inside of your bookmarks manager (hit Ctrl+Shift+B to bring it up).  Then later you can decide to keep ‘em or trash ‘em.

Read It Later : the Extension Solution

The Read It Later extension allows you to save pages of interest to read later. It eliminates cluttering of bookmarks with sites that are merely of a one-time interest.

Bookmarklet Help in Instant Paper

This is the method I use the most right now.  Just sign up at InstantPaper.com and then drag the bookmarklet they provide to your bookmarks toolbar.  Find a link you like?  Hit the bookmarklet with your cursor and it will save it to the list you can read later. 

Then just go to InstantPaper.com/u to see all your unchecked saved links.

How do you save things to read later?  If you have a system that works better than these, please feel free to share!

Google Browser Sync = Back from the Dead

Comments (2) · June 25, 2008 at 11:59 am · Firefox News

Told you last week about Google’s plans to kill off the semi-popular Google Browser Sync extension.  According to Ars Technica, while they were tossing the dirt in the hole - somebody decided to do this:

Google is distributing the Browser Sync source code under the BSD license and is making it available through a Subversion source control repository on the Google Code website.

Good news for those of us who really liked this add-on.  The reason for its popularity is that it didn’t just sync up your bookmarks.  It also would transfer your passwords, history and cookies.

Personally, I am looking forward to giving Weave a shot (Mozilla’s version of the same service) due to the fact that Mozilla would know how to do it best.  Right now from what I have seen, it looks like it is still kind of buggy.

Not much is up on the Google Code page for BrowserSync but will be worth keeping an eye on in the next few weeks and months ahead.

What to Backup Before Moving to Firefox 3

Comments (5) · June 19, 2008 at 11:00 am · Firefox Settings

If you haven’t made the jump yet, there are a few files you may want to make sure you back up before going from Firefox 2 to Firefox 3.  The first would be your password files.  These files are located in your profile folder. 

Backup the Firefox files called:

• signons.txt
• signons2.txt
• key3.db

Copy and past them into the place you want to back them up to, and you are done.  To restore them, make sure you don’t have Firefox running and then go into your current profile folder and copy and move them in.  They should replace the ones in there currently.

Now to backup your Firefox 2 boomarks, dive back into your profile folder and look for a file called “bookmarkbackups”.  Double-click that folder, and there you have some of your saved bookmarks that you thought you had lost waiting for you to restore them.

To restore your bookmarks in Firefox 3, go to Bookmarks and then Organize Bookmarks.  In the Library, click on Import and Backup and click on “Import HTML”.  The on screen wizard should walk you through the rest of the steps.

Think You Lost Your Firefox Bookmarks?

Comments (3) · May 7, 2008 at 4:19 am · Bookmark Help

I have had a few friend and read a few horror stories Online about people who for one reason or another have lost their Firefox bookmarks and had to start all over.  What they were not aware of is that you may not have totally lost your Firefox boomarks at all.  There are backups hidden within your PC that I bet you haven’t even checked yet.

First thing you need to do is find your profile folder for Firefox.  Depending on your operating system this may be in a different location.  If you are unsure, be sure to check out this previous post:  Where is my Firefox Profile Folder?

Once you make it in there you should see a folder named “bookmarkbackups”.  Double-click that folder, and there you have some of your saved boomkarks that you thought you had lost waiting for you to restore them.  To restore your bookmarks, you can launch Firefox, then go to “File” and then “Import”. 

Also if you want to live a little more on the dangerous side (first make sure Firefox isn’t running) you could copy one of the bookmark backups, rename it “bookmarks.html” and place it inside of your profile folder replacing the one that is not right.  As a bonus, if you need more help on how to backup Firefox using other tools - be sure to check out this previous most wanted post from the Firefox Facts archives.

Cover Flow for Bookmarks

Comments (2) · March 13, 2008 at 6:42 am · Bookmark Help

There is no doubt that the cover flow feature on Apple machines reeks of pretty eye candy that I wish I could enjoy.  I don’t have a budget big enough for a Mac or the time to learn how to use it, so I’ll have to stick with the knock-offs for now.  BookmarksPreviews (found via Download Squad) is a new addon to Firefox that wants to copy that fresh cover flow feeling with your bookmarks. 

At the time of writing this they say it works for both Firefox 2 and Firefox 3, but due to their different bookmarking systems some things might be different.  This is a very unique way of getting up close and personal with your bookmarks, and while I don’t see this making it into a future Firefox release - it is nice to see the option out there for those of us who like our eye candy.

Simple Delicious

Comments (2) · September 26, 2007 at 6:30 am · Bookmark Help

Some might complain that the various extensions for Firefox that Delicious puts out there can be a little bloated. I used both their classic and new extensions for a while, and I can’t put myself in that camp but I can see where others might have an argument.

That is where the SimpleDelicious extension comes into play. Its goal is to make managing and browsing your Delicious bookmarks a little more simple. SimpleDelicious provides realtime syncing with your online bookmarks and ease of use right from your browser. You can gain access to your bookmarks from anywhere with this Firefox extension.

So would people rather use this or the Firefox plugin that the Delicious team puts out themselves?