Tag Archives | Tabbed Browsing

Easily E-mail and Save Your Open Tabs

Dec/11 in Add-ons Reviews

Need an easier way to share a list of links you may have opened up in tabs via Firefox?  Send Tab URLs is an add-on for Firefox that will allow you to send a list of browser tab URLs to e-mail, web mail, or the clipboard.

Send Tab URLs

If you do a lot of sharing of links, this add-on can come in really handy.  Here are some of the other features Send Tab URLs has to offer:

Send Tab URLs Features:

  • Works with most e-mail applications (some limitations apply to Windows users; see Known Issues below for details). Gmail is also supported.
  • Up to 30 browser tabs can be listed; there is no limit if sending the URL list to the clipboard
  • Select the style of the URL list in the email: numbered, bulleted, or plain list
  • Optional toolbar button available for the browser toolbar

You can check out more about the extension over at the official web site, and download it from the Firefox Add-ons site.

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A Chat with the Man Who Makes Your Tabs Colorful

Sep/12 in Interviews

colorful-tabs

Not often do the people behind the absolutely awesome Firefox add-ons, tools and the browser itself get much time in the spotlight.  I recently had the chance to talk with the ColorfulTabs extension author, Shivanand Sharma, to get his views on his creation and a number of other development related questions.

What first inspired you to create the ColorfulTabs add-on for Firefox?

Before I begin I’d like to congratulate you and commend you for the great and popular blog and content you have created. A ‘hello’ to all your visitors and fans of Firefox.

Back in the old days when Firefox caught my attention, there was a page with a walk-through on how to use userchrome.css to style your toolbars and buttons. The article was created by Flexer and I was so fascinated that I spent hours coloring and styling every aspect of the browser. One day the idea just struck – what if every tab was a different color? At least the tab boundaries will be more distinguishable. It was a small idea that gave birth to ColorfulTabs. Initially ColorfulTabs just used 32 fixed colors to color each tab in a cycle (after the 32nd tab color cycle just restarted).

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Badges for Favicons

Sep/01 in Add-ons Reviews, Tabbed Browsing

Think of that wasted space in your tab bar.  You know, where the favicon for the web site your visiting rests.  Isn’t there enough room there to fit in a little more information about the web site you are visiting?

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The new Firefox add-on Badges on Favicon takes advantage of that idea very well.  It allows you to put a rounded badge over the tab favicon of some pages.  Where does this come in handy?  Well what if you could see in your tab the number of unread Gmail messages you had?  Or how about if it told you how many new posts were in Google Reader?

Nuggets of Information for Your Tabs

The extension uses little scripts, called badgets. The badgets define both the appearance of the badge (color, position, size of the text, etc.) and how to get the data from the current page. The extension comes with three sample badgets that work with Gmail, iGoogle Reader Gadget and Zenbe. But you can install your own badgets and even create your own for your preferred site.

This add-on was also a runner up in the Extend Firefox 3 contest.  It is still listed as “experimental” so you might need to visit BugMeNot for a user name and password (or sign up on Mozilla.org) to use before trying to download.

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Add Tab Clicking Options

Aug/18 in Add-ons Reviews, Tabbed Browsing

Need a few more options for your Firefox tabs?  Twanno’s Tab Clicking Options extension for Firefox should do the trick.  With the Tab Clicking Options extension it is possible to set various actions to different clicking events on the tab bar or a tab in the Firefox browser.

duplicatetab The events you can assign an action to are:

  • Double clicking
  • Clicking with middle mouse button
  • Left clicking with control-key (or meta-key on Mac) pressed
  • Left clicking with alt-key pressed
  • Left clicking with shift-key pressed

    • And the actions which you can choose from are:

  • Open a new tab
  • Reload the tab
  • Reload all tabs
  • Close tab
  • Close other tabs
  • Close all tabs
  • Duplicate Tab
  • Duplicate Tab in New Window
  • Undo Close Tab (only in Firefox 2.0 beta or with extensions)
  • Bookmark Tab
  • Bookmark All Tabs (not in Firefox 1.0)
  • No Action

    • This is no doubt that Tab Clicking Options makes it easier to work with your tabs in a number of different ways.  Also, because I know somebody will bring it up – Tab Mix Plus will also do a lot of these same things too. So if you want an alternative – there you go.  (via Download Squad)

    Bonus: Via Twanno’s Firefox extensions page you can also pick up his Duplicate Tab add-on for the browser.  It allows you to clone a tab along with its history.
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Save Your Lost Tabs

Aug/05 in Add-ons Reviews, Tabbed Browsing

save-that-lost-tab What was that tab you closed about three tabs back again? Could it have been the fourth tab back, before you got your coffee? If you find yourself using the Ctrl + Shift + T keyboard combination to bring up lost tabs a lot, there is a better way to get the job done.  The Undo Closed Tabs Button add-on for Firefox gives you a few ways to save your lost tabs.

This extension allows you to undo closed tabs via a toolbar and/or tab bar button or the right-click context menu. Also it comes with a much easier keyboard combination of its own to remember, Ctrl + Shift + Z.   You must add the toolbar button by going to View -> Toolbars -> Customize, then drag and drop the icon where you want it on the toolbar.

Save your lost tabs, and save yourself a lot of wear and tear on your Ctrl and Shift keys while you are at it.  Your keyboard will thank you!

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Add Bookmarks Here 2

Jul/30 in Add-ons Reviews, Bookmark Help

Add Your Bookmark Here! Where exactly would you like to put that bookmark?  If you’re in a hurry, and currently in the folder you need to bookmark a link in – you can pickup the Add Bookmark Here 2 add-on for Firefox to get the job done.

This extension adds a new menu item when you right-click any of your bookmark folders to allow you to bookmark your current web site you are viewing into that folder.  Here are a few more features to get excited about.

  • Expand all fields of bookmark popup panel.
  • Allow customize the position of “Add Bookmark Here” & “Open All Tabs”
  • Allow to add bookmarks from the top of Bookmark Menu.
  • Allow to insert a bookmark by using right-click on a bookmark.
  • Auto remember last selected folder when you bookmark a page
  • New option: Don’t show the Edit Dialog when I add a bookmark.
  • New option: Click the Bookmark Star once to show the Edit Dialog.

This is a small change that really does make bookmarking just a little easier.  You can pick up Add Bookmark Here 2 on the Firefox Add-ons web site.

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Move Tabs to the Sidebar

Jul/15 in Tabbed Browsing

thumbnails-in-sidebar The Tab Sidebar add-on for Firefox does a simple change, but after I can promise you you’ll get a whole new perspective for the way Firefox works.  It acts more like a replacement for the tab bar and includes an always visible thumbnail preview of all the tabs you may have loaded up.

Here are some of the other Tab Sidebar features:

  • Provides navigation options for each tab including history, stop and reload
  • Allows you to move tabs around with drag and drop
  • You can drop links, local files and bookmarks anywhere you like
  • Displays the security status of tabs
  • Automatically refreshes the tab preview whenever the page changes

To activate the extension, just go to View and then Tab Sidebar to see it.  On the down side, some have complained that CPU usage goes way up when using this addition.  On the good side though, hey – you get pretty thumbnails for all of your tabs!  In the “what would I like to see” I would like to see if work flawlessly with the scroll wheel on your mouse. 

There is a lot of promise and a lot to already love, so give Tab Sidebar a download either via the Firefox Add-ons site or the official web page for the extension.

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Weave 0.2 Ready to Sync You Up!

Jul/01 in Firefox News, Usability

weave-logo

Along with a fresh design, Mozilla Labs has also release Weave Prototype 0.2.  What is Weave, you say?  It is Mozilla’s answer to the problem of keeping all your bookmarks, history, passwords and more in sync across multiple computers.

So what is new in this 0.2 version of Weave?

  • Intelligent scheduler for synchronization to improve performance.
  • Expanded set of supported browser settings and metadata, including:  Bookmarks, Browsing History, Cookies, Saved Passwords, Saved Form Data, and Tabs.
  • Support for retrying failed network operations.
  • New server format performs better when there are frequent changes (e.g., for history sync).
  • Significant reworking of the startup experience, including a new Setup Wizard that performs account creation in chrome and allows for customization of settings.
  • Improved error detection and handling.
  • Notification dialog added to the status bar for displaying error, status and asynchronous events with or without required actions, e.g. authentication errors, notification of shares, etc.

Might be worth mentioning that they are still saying this version is for testing purposes only, so if Firefox later on kicks you in the head, points its browsing finger and laughs while your down, you were warned.

Ready to test it out?  Then download Weave 0.2 here!

Here recently, I just switched from Google Browser Sync to Foxmarks.  Once Weave gets all the kinks out though, I’ll probably be switching again because I really like the idea of having everything accessible no matter which PC I might be at.  Check out the Weave 0.2 Release Notes for more information.

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Add Flags to Firefox Tabs

May/06 in Add-ons Reviews, Tabbed Browsing

firefox-flag-tab We have colored them, moved them, shrunk them – so why not add little colored flags to your tabs?  The FlagTab add-on for Firefox gives a little more control when it comes to organizing your open tabs in Firefox.  For each tab open you can add a different colored flag, or give several the same colored flag.  The organizational options here are endless.

This extension for Firefox would come particularly handy when it comes to working on a project, where you need to keep track of which tabs are with which set of sites.  For example, if I was writing something about Firefox, I might flag the Mozilla sites I was getting information from green and the non-Mozilla sites red.  That way I can quickly see the difference between the two.

So if you are in need of another way to organize your open tabs – FlagTab might just do the job.

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Open Links in the Next Tab Over

Apr/30 in Add-ons Reviews, Tabbed Browsing

Open in the Next Tab Over... The Next Tab add-on for Firefox solves an issues I deal with everyday. We have all run into the situation where we are opening up a link and we have many tabs open already. Now to see that new link would you rather scroll sideways all the way to the end of the list of have it open up beside your current tab? Most people would say, “Hey Mitch, open that link up beside of course!”.

According to the developer, Next Tab is…

An add-on that improves the tabbed browsing. Naturally, we want all related tabs grouped together. So when you are a opening a new tab, you might want to open it right next to the current tab. This is a small, light weight extension that does the same. Usage: When you right click on a link, you will get an option to “open the link next to current tab” in the context menu. Click on it and the tab will be opened right next to the current tab.

So for those of use who spend our time browsing back and forth through multiple tabs, there is now an easier way to open the next link in a tab right next to your first one.

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