I usually try to keep my Firefox add-ons (extensions) to a minimum few that I truly value and use on a regular basis. If there is one or two that I love but rarely use then I might add it but keep it "disabled" until I find that rare time I need it, which also requires a restart of the browser. By limiting them and not getting gluttonous I can avoid causing Firefox to become far more bloated, sluggish and unstable. One of the reasons other browsers 'appear' to be faster is the lack of add-ons/themes, few if any customizations and the fact that nearly all of them (except Firefox) pre-launch in the background with Windows. Don't believe me? If you have multiple browsers then restart Windows and check your task manager... or better yet check start up services under msconfig.exe
Having said all of that, my top 5 Firefox add-ons are:
1) Ad Block: Does exactly what you think. Often blocks flash and java based video ads as well. More to the point it blocks all the ads flooding a webpage like landmines to accidentally click. Best of all is the speed you will enjoy while using it. I often never realize just how many ads there are on a website until I use another browser.
2) Flash Block: Same principle as above, but for Flash - which is Adobe's memory hog of a internet monopoly (not unlike it's equally piggish and domineering sibling .pdf) I seriously cannot wait for HTML5 to arrive soon enough so we can all put Flash behind us. It prevents all of those animated ads and videos (including on YouTube and MySpace) from auto-launching until you tell it to.
3) Bookmark Autohider: This cool Firefox 3.6 add-on auto-hides your bookmark toolbar. It is also customizable! All you have to do is draw your cursor up to the URL field and then it appears for as long as you have dictated it to. Then it goes away. Too cool. I used to have a userchrome hack to do this, but it never worked perfectly and could not be so easily customized.
4) Coral IE Tab: There are some web pages that just haven't been designed to function outside of Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Now no webpage is off limits and no need to switch browsers... with one exception still - Windows Update (of course). You can, however, also launch said page externally in IE itself with one click as well. It has icons available for the "Tools" menu, the navigation bar, the status bar and the 'right click' context menu.
5) Easy YouTube Video Downloader: If you just absolutely MUST save that video you found on YouTube to keep for posterity, this is your add-on.
Now there are many other add-ons I have tried. Some are no longer necessary when the function was added into Firefox (PDF Tab), some were crap (too many to mention), some are no longer supported or updated for Firefox 3.6 One of my other favourites was Answers... as in Answers.com I don't mean the search engine field plug-in, but an actual extension that enabled you to highlight and click on any word/phrase on any page and use the context menu to look it up on Answers.com - which would provide you with dictionary definitions, a thesaurus, Wikipedia listings, translations, search engine results, conversions... BRILLIANT! Sadly it hasn't been updated for 3.6 The best thing about was I could leave my search engine set for Google AND have the add-on for Answers - both accessible via the same context menu!
Lastly... themes. My favourite theme/skin that I have ever used (and still do) is "Noia 2.0 eXtreme" I used to use the Oulook 2003 Blue Skin and Bartoccelli's Silver Skin, and liked them both before they became out of date and unsupported for Firefox 2.0 and 3.0, respectively. Then I found Noia 2.0 eXtreme which has the silvery greyness of the toolbars and colourful icons that Silver Skin did (plus dynamic)... and most surprising of all is how many additional icons/links I can have on the bookmarks toolbar (or even the main/file/nav toolbar) vs. other themes - including supposed "mini-themes". Yet this one looks as big as any normal theme. Kudos to Kongbeat Kuatrakull! :-)
Having said all of that, my top 5 Firefox add-ons are:
1) Ad Block: Does exactly what you think. Often blocks flash and java based video ads as well. More to the point it blocks all the ads flooding a webpage like landmines to accidentally click. Best of all is the speed you will enjoy while using it. I often never realize just how many ads there are on a website until I use another browser.
2) Flash Block: Same principle as above, but for Flash - which is Adobe's memory hog of a internet monopoly (not unlike it's equally piggish and domineering sibling .pdf) I seriously cannot wait for HTML5 to arrive soon enough so we can all put Flash behind us. It prevents all of those animated ads and videos (including on YouTube and MySpace) from auto-launching until you tell it to.
3) Bookmark Autohider: This cool Firefox 3.6 add-on auto-hides your bookmark toolbar. It is also customizable! All you have to do is draw your cursor up to the URL field and then it appears for as long as you have dictated it to. Then it goes away. Too cool. I used to have a userchrome hack to do this, but it never worked perfectly and could not be so easily customized.
4) Coral IE Tab: There are some web pages that just haven't been designed to function outside of Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Now no webpage is off limits and no need to switch browsers... with one exception still - Windows Update (of course). You can, however, also launch said page externally in IE itself with one click as well. It has icons available for the "Tools" menu, the navigation bar, the status bar and the 'right click' context menu.
5) Easy YouTube Video Downloader: If you just absolutely MUST save that video you found on YouTube to keep for posterity, this is your add-on.
Now there are many other add-ons I have tried. Some are no longer necessary when the function was added into Firefox (PDF Tab), some were crap (too many to mention), some are no longer supported or updated for Firefox 3.6 One of my other favourites was Answers... as in Answers.com I don't mean the search engine field plug-in, but an actual extension that enabled you to highlight and click on any word/phrase on any page and use the context menu to look it up on Answers.com - which would provide you with dictionary definitions, a thesaurus, Wikipedia listings, translations, search engine results, conversions... BRILLIANT! Sadly it hasn't been updated for 3.6 The best thing about was I could leave my search engine set for Google AND have the add-on for Answers - both accessible via the same context menu!
Lastly... themes. My favourite theme/skin that I have ever used (and still do) is "Noia 2.0 eXtreme" I used to use the Oulook 2003 Blue Skin and Bartoccelli's Silver Skin, and liked them both before they became out of date and unsupported for Firefox 2.0 and 3.0, respectively. Then I found Noia 2.0 eXtreme which has the silvery greyness of the toolbars and colourful icons that Silver Skin did (plus dynamic)... and most surprising of all is how many additional icons/links I can have on the bookmarks toolbar (or even the main/file/nav toolbar) vs. other themes - including supposed "mini-themes". Yet this one looks as big as any normal theme. Kudos to Kongbeat Kuatrakull! :-)
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