Your favorite Firefox extensions/tips/hacks?

[Rollyco]

I'm a long-time user of Opera looking to maybe make the switch to Firefox, if I can force it to do what I want. I've used Firefox as a web development tool for years, but my usage has been sporadic and I've never bothered customizing it the way I want. So far I've found Adblock Plus, NoScript, NextPlease, keyconfig, and Tab Mix Plus to be useful extensions, but I'm sure there are a lot more out there I'm missing. And configuring this browser seems to be a black art... [highlight]What do you consider to be the essential Firefox extensions? Do you have any favorite configuration tips?[/highlight]

uzzled:

 

[IdolFun]

Other then ones you got i use these sometimes.

DownThemAll https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/201
All-in-One Sidebar https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1027
Stylish https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2108?src=mostshared

 

[shadeofgray]

From the ones not mentioned I have Download Statusbar, FireBug, IE Tab and Hyperwords.

Be ''careful'' with Stylish. That's the most addictive of them all.

I'm not a heavy-duty web user and these work for me.

 

[isityours]

i dont need a whole bunch of apps etc as im not a techy kind of user but i install these extensions in my firefox

1-click youtube video downloader, downthemall, adblock plus, better privacy, cs lite, download statusbar, downloadhelper, fast dial, fastestfox, imacros for ff, noscript, tabrenamizer, trackmenot, wot and personas (im using summerwood atm)

as far as tips go, cant really help sorry. i just use the standard 'speed-up' hacks.

 

[Rollyco]

Thanks for the suggestions. Download Statusbar and CS Lite are quite useful. DownThemAll seems OK, but since downloaded items don't have an Explorer context menu, I'll probably stick to the default Download manager. All-in-One Sidebar causes my FF to crash, so I put that aside for now.

Keyboard navigation in FireFox really is junk. In Opera, pressing the Esc key from almost anywhere puts the focus back on the webpage, Firefox requires reaching over to the mouse to do that. Another thing that I miss is the ability to modify the left-click or the Enter key with the control or control-shift modifiers. In Opera they open almost anything (bookmarks, locations, links) in a new foreground tab or a new background tab. It's something I can't live without... I might have to write my own extension to get that sort of behaviour back. Or maybe userChrome.js or prefs.js or whatever. I'm not too familiar with all the different ways of customizing FF yet.

 

[eDux]

Here what i do have installed:
- Aardvark 3.0 - Lets you remove parts of the website "on-the-fly" for saving/printing & etc.
- Abduction! 3.0.4 - Saves websites as images
- Adblock Plus 1.1.3 - removes ads from sites
- Add to Search Bar 2.0 - add any search form into your searchbar
- All-in-One Sidebar 0.7.11 - Everything in one sidebar
- Auto Copy 1.0.1 - Automatically copies marked text into clipboard
- BatchDownload 1.2.7 - File Downloader
- Bazzacuda Image Saver Plus 0.30 - Image downloader
- CheckPlaces 2.2.1 - Checks your bookmarks and adds favicos
- ColorZilla 2.0.2 - color picker
- Copy All Urls 0.9.0 - can copy urls from marked text also can open links stored in clipboard as tabs
- Copy Links 0.1.7 - same as above
- Custom Buttons² 3.1.0
- DownloadHelper 4.7.2 - save youtube videos & etc.
- DownThemAll! 1.1.9 - File and image downloader
- DownThemAll! AntiContainer 0.6 - Extension for above, to leech image files from common image hosts
- Flagfox 4.0.3 - shows site's country flag near website address
- FlashGot 1.2.1.18 - Extension to use for file downloaders
- FoxTab 1.3 - Shows all open tabs as images on 1 page
- Greasemonkey 0.8.20100211.5 - Lets you use custom scripts on websites & etc.
- Image Toolbar 0.6.8 - Displays toolbar with options if you hover over images.
- Image Zoom 0.4.4 - Zoom any image with rightclick+mouse wheel
- Japanese-English Dictionary for rikaichan 1.10
- Linky 3.0.0 - Copy/pasty/etc links
- Locationbar² 1.0.5 - more display options for web address bar.
- MeasureIt 0.3.92 - to pixel-measure something on website
- Menu Editor 1.2.6 - lets you hide menu elements of rightclick and other menus in firefox. (recommend)
- MR Tech Toolkit 6.0.4 - lets you fix extensions after they no longer work after FF updates, create extension lists (like this one) & much more (recommended)
- Open in Browser 1.7
- Page Zoom Buttons 1.1.1 - Zoom webpages
- Paste and Go 3 1.0.2 - lets you paste stuff from clipboard with single click into search field & etc (recommended)
- Personas 1.5.2
- Redirect Remover 2.6.2 - removes redirection crap from websites
- RefControl 0.8.13 - lets you send custom referrer to websites.
- Remove It Permanently 1.0.6.7 - lets you clean websites from ads & etc
- Rikaichan 1.09 - japanese dictionary
- Save File to 2.0.1 - Lets you save files to defined directories.
- Screengrab 0.96.3 - Saves websites as images or copies their parts as image into clipboard
- Scrollbar Anywhere 0.12.0 - Scroll with right mouse click (highly recommended)
- Tab Mix Plus 0.3.8.3pre.100403a - Better handling for sessions and tabs
- ThumbsDown 0.15 - Best Image leecher out there (needs Regex know-how)
- Toolbar Buttons 0.6.0.8 - more buttons to choose from for toolbar
- United States English Dictionary 4.0.0 - Highlights grammatical errors and offers corrections
- Yet Another Smooth Scrolling 3.0.13 - smooth scrolling for FF

 

[Rollyco]

Wow, that's quite a list, thanks. I don't know how you can handle it, though... I have a smaller list of relatively popular extensions installed and Firefox suffers from random crashes on a daily basis.

 

[lowleg26]

I have a smaller list of relatively popular extensions installed and Firefox suffers from random crashes on a daily basis.

I'm always a little surprised when someone says they're having frequent crashes in Firefox. uzzled:

I'm fairly light on add ons. I only have adblock plus, noscript, better privacy, and video downloadhelper installed. For me, Firefox tends to crash rarely if at all. Then again, I don't do much other than general surfing. If I was responsible for maintenance and upkeep of a popular website, I may be singing a different tune.

Here what i do have installed

I guess I've been missing out by not trying more add ons. I may have to check some of these out.

 

[eDux]

Hmmm...
My fire firefox is running very stable, i don't even remember when i saw it crash the last time on me and iam at least 4-5 hours a day online.

 

[isityours]

when i first install firefox (esp on a 'settled' OS) it tends to be more temperemental in my experience. it does seeem to settle down though, i cant remember the last time it crashed although i get the occasional 'not responding' message and the white. its a lot better on 7, or more accurately 7 is a lot better (than vista).

 

[guy]

AutoPager automatically fetches and appends "Next" (or "Page 2, 3, 4, ...") links from search results or blogs as you're scrolling, so you don't have to continuously click to load more entries.

Color Management adds ICC profile color management to Firefox to accurately render webpage graphics (photos). Not really necessary if you don't have a top-level monitor, but helpful if you find images consistently oversaturated, etc.

dragdropupload lets you drop a file directly from Windows Explorer (or your Desktop, etc) right onto a file upload field, without having to click Browse and manually navigating to the file location.

OptimizeGoogle does what the name suggests. Tons of options to make using Google easier and more anonymous.

Read It Later saves page links as pseudo (temporary) bookmarks. Useful if you're randomly collecting links for use later, but don't want to clutter your bookmarks.

RefControl lets you forge the referrer HTTP header, useful for certain sites that block hotlinking (eg: to images) and would otherwise redirect you to a 403 page or error image.

 

[isityours]

i think auto-pager (or a function similar to that) is included in the fastestfox extension. i think it sets the common speedup hacks as well so you dont have to do them manually.

 

[Larecjv]

Personally i dont like having alot of plugins, atm i just use "Adblock Plus", "Flagfox" and "NoScript".

1 plugin i found useful when i wanna dl stuff is "SkipScreen", it can bypass the waiting time for various sites.