Talkings of a Tyrant

Greasemonkey is one of the top Mozilla Firefox extensions for the web. It is the ultimate in customization.

Greasemonkey allows users to customize websites (yes, other people’s websites) to your likings. Don’t like the ads? Get rid of them. Hate the colors? Change them. Redirects wasting your time? Remove them. Simply install a userscript and Greasemonkey gets to work.

However, it isn’t quite that simple. If you’re not a skill javascript programmer (which I’m not), you and I have to rely on other people’s userscripts. Luckily, there is a large directory of user scripts over at, guess what, http://www.userscripts.org/.

Let’s take one example

If you use Gmail (Google Mail for UK users) and you don’t have a mail client on your computer (such as Thunderbird), then you probably get annoyed every time you see a mailto: link that opens up crappy Microsoft Outlook/doesn’t do anything.

However, there is a userscript that will automatically rewrite mailto: links into Gmail links.

First, go to Mailto Compose In GMail’s Userscript.org site.

Then you need to click in the box at the upper right, and click “Install this Script”.

The link should bring you to the direct code. Greasemonkey 0.6.4 is kind enough to pop up with a nice bar at the top instructing to simply click “Install”.

Then you go to any site with a mailto: link. One of my favorite sites is Lifehacker, so we’ll go there.

In the sidebar there should be this contact information.

Where before, “Email” under Gina Trapani’s name led you to “mailto:tips@lifehacker.com”, now with the magic of Greasemonkey, the URL is “https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&tf=0&to=tips@lifehacker.com” Now your browser is truly set for the web!

Analysis

This is but one example of what Greasemonkey can do. It is a very powerful extension, and can give the right users almost complete control over what they view in their browser.

Greasemonkey is one of the ultimate extensions when it comes to customizability power. Seeing as I’m a control freak when it comes to web surfing, this is an excellent extension!

Download Greasemonkey
Greasemonkey Website
Dive Into Greasemonkey, a guide for beginning Greasemonkey programmers.
Download Firefox 1.5

If you don’t know what Reddit is, then check out my review of Reddit. It is an awesome site that allows you to submit and rank links.

Now, they’ve added comments!

However, presumably to curb the vile and flame infested comment system of digg (seriously, don’t read the comments there when you’re in a happy mood, especially about a site you like), they’ve added a reddit-like voting system.

Comments people like and are thoughtful are rated higher, whereas spam, and random hate comments seem to be in the crud levels of ratings.

Regardless of what a surprising number of people say, I think they did the Reddit comments very well. It is functional, yet easy to use.

This is an example of an excellent comment by “afabian.” You can see the rating arrows (I liked it, so I gave it a point), the number of points, etc.

It is indeed remarkably like the normal Reddit system, except you’re judged by what you write, not what you link to. And, yes, the ratings on your comments affect your karma, so don’t write crap.

As you can see here, there are three different modes of commenting, and they are very similar to their normal Reddit counterparts.

“Hot” comments are ones people really seem to like right now, “New” comments are just that, and “Top” comments are the comments of that topic that are ranked the highest.

Within each of these, you can easily switch between “Nested” and “Flat” by clicking in the top-right corner.

“Nested” comments are more-or-less chronological, with the first near the top, and the latest near the bottom. Exceptions are made for when a reply to a specific comment is made, but otherwise…

“Flat” ordered comments are shown regardless of context (by which I mean, you can’t tell what someone is replying to) and sorted from highest rank to lowest.

Conclusions

I’ve wanted reddit to have comments for quite a while, and now it is here. While it isn’t perfect, this is an excellent step for reddit. Reddit has now been opened for debate, with the karma and rating system to keep it from getting out of hand.

Good job reddit. You’ve just found yet another way to keep sucking up my free time on your site!

The one downside with the internet is also its greatest strength: too much information.

I ignore my Bloglines account for 2 days (that’s it!) and I’ve got 950+ new things to read!

The main culprits? Joystiq and Kotaku. Each account for about 200 new posts.

However, 60% of each are about topics I don’t care about. My solution? Subscribe to the individual categories. I’ll try that for a few days and see how it turns out.

Finally, after just over a year, Mozilla Firefox has fully made the transition from 1.0 to 1.5.

Firefox 1.0

Firefox 1.0 was released on November 9, 2004. In the year since, it has been met with broad acclaim, and many awards. There is now a cult following/fan base around the browser (which I’m proud to be a part of). It is almost certainly the most successful open-source software in the world.

Firefox 1.0 is an excellent browser. It’s purpose is to be small, lean, and incredibly extensible, and it meets those goals well. It is a small download, it is quick, and it supports themes and extensions.

Themes and extensions add functionality to Firefox in any number of ways. Much of this blog has been focused on reviewing the extensions I like best. You can either see the reviews from the links on the top left, or from the “extension” category. With extensions, themes, and Firefox’s inherent open-source status, a user has, effectively, complete control over how they view the web.

I think the idea of being in complete control of how I customize my browsing experience is what drew me into Firefox. Being able to choose what I wanted, and what I didn’t want; to block both advertisements and arbitrary toolbar installations; that was fascinatingly entertaining and interesting. Firefox actually made it… well… fun to surf the web.

Before Firefox, there were two main browsers I knew about: Internet Explorer, a horribly bloated and rigid software which I’ve always hated, and Netscape, which was a bloated, but slightly customizable, software which I could stand. I had no clue that Firefox, Mozilla, or Opera existed until after I got into the Firefox craze. (how ironic)

Since discovering Firefox, and thus losing my fear of navigating unknown parts of the web, I’ve learned much about Internet technologies and upcoming memes. Firefox essentially opened up the Internet to me.

As well as an excellent browser, Mozilla Firefox was also a battle of business models. Ever since Linux created the concept of open-source, there has been a war of business practices between open-source zealots and Microsoft. Mozilla Firefox also was to show that open-source could be mainstream. Honestly, I believe that Mozilla proved that open-source did, in fact, have a very good chance against multi-billion dollar corporations with pretty much endless money (*cough* Microsoft).

Several times in Firefox 1.0’s lifespan security flaws were found and publicized. Unfortunately, the mainstream media (curse them!) jumped on this fact to go “Ha! Firefox isn’t that much better!” Like much of what mainstream media does these days, however, those stories omitted crucial facts.

Often they reported on bugs that were already fixed. They overhyped the unfortunate fact that Firefox has had more security flaws revealed in that year than did most other browsers. What the didn’t often tell people, though (bless those that did), was the incredible speed and efficiency that the Firefox team fixed those security bugs.

Mozilla’s ability to fix and and release a fix for security holes within a few weeks (sometimes in a few days) was possibly the biggest triumph against Microsoft. Currently Internet Explorer has incredibly severe security holes that have been public for a few years. Some of those holes, Microsoft has said that they’re never going to fix.

Mozilla Firefox 1.0 set the stage for the next-generation browser battle.

Mozilla Firefox 1.5

The unfortunate frequency of the security holes (which caused them to go through 8 releases of Firefox) also put in the spotlight Firefox’s need for a decent updating system. The new updating system is the highlight of Firefox 1.5

Firefox 1.5 was originally 1.1 However, many more features got added in this release than previously intended, and they decided to rename it to 1.5

Firefox 1.5 comes with several new features. Mostly it is behind-the-sciences tweaking and modifying, but there are a few features that will stand out to users of Firefox 1.0:

1. The updating system has been streamlined. In Firefox 1.0, you had to download the whole 4.7 megabyte package to update versions. Now it comes in the form of patches.
2. Much better caching. Caching is better organized and going backwards and forwards is lightning fast.
3. A “Clear Private Data” feature. This allows you to delete a whole bunch of stuff like history, cache, cookies, etc. quickly and easily.
4. Bunches of other stuff. There is more support for several more web standards (notably Scalable Vector Graphics, or SVG). There are some general, all-around usability tweaks, like useful error pages and a revamped Options Menu. And a whole bunch of other stuff.

Along with Firefox 1.5’s release, Mozilla brought online Mozilla.com, which is the new site for Firefox and Thunderbird. Also, Addons.Mozilla.org got a new theme and is revamped to be much easier to navigate.

From the Ashes…

From the ashes of the previous browser battle between Internet Explorer, the next browser battle between IE, Firefox, and Opera is created.

This is a highly exciting time for technology geeks. Firefox 1.5 is released, web 2.0 is kicking off, and being geek is starting to become mainstream (emphasis on “starting”). The next-generation of everything is showing up. From the next generation of gaming consoles, to a new way in which media is done, everything is changing.

We are moving away from the “survival of the fittest” model to a “competition between collaboration.” Companies are no longer the only competitors. Everyday people are starting to find new and better ways to call upon the general public and use collaboration to create stuff that is far better, more sophisticated, and easier to use than anything a corporation can create. Firefox is only the first example. Firefox threw open the doors.

This is a highly exciting time for Firefox fans. Our beloved browser has grown a year older. It is better, quicker, faster, more user-friendly, and more ready to fight Internet Explorer. Firefox 1.0 drew concern from Microsoft. Firefox 1.5 is going to be Internet Explorer’s biggest threat.

Download Firefox 1.5!

The StumbleUpon extension for Mozilla Firefox is an excellent extension for websurfers who are on the lookout for new sites.

It is a toolbar with (*gasp!*) a bunch of buttons on it! It doesn’t seem all that complex, but you can do a lot with this simple toolbar.

When you hit that tempting button that says “Stumble,” Firefox will automatically be sent to some randomly awesome website on the web. Granted, some of these websites suck. Most of them don’t.

The thing is, whether web sites are good or bad is determined by what people do after they are sent there. Once at the web site (or at any web site you want) you can rate it favorably or not. Simple. The more sites you rate, the more good sites StumbleUpon will bring you to. It learns from you.

Once you get to that site, you can also tag the page. Yes, tag it. Decide what words fit it best and tag it. You can’t bookmark anything directly from StumbleUpon (as far as I can tell), but you can still tag sites.

Or, if tagging and giving a thumbs-up or down isn’t enough for you, you can give a full fledged review of the website.

Granted, there are some inherent security issues from telling StumbleUpon what sites you like to visit. But there are the same issues from searching Google, or using social bookmarking. Face it, it is nearly impossible to be truly anonymous on the web. Might as well get used to it.

While these might seem simple, it is really well done. This is possibly the most Web 2.0 extension out there. Democracy and user-control is almost hardwired into this thing.

The main downside to this extension is the registration process. Registering itself isn’t bad, but doing otherwise simple stuff like changing your password or having two profiles on the same Firefox is annoying.
A word of advice: Do not delete the Firefox profile that you originally created your StumbleUpon account on! If you delete it, or move to a new computer, you will not be able to change your password.

This extension is especially good for those who like to randomly surf the web. With StumbleUpon, you can do it in style! It is difficult to explain, but something about tagging and rating every site you come upon is incredibly appealing. Useful with a “Post to BlinkList/del.icio.us” bookmark on you bookmark toolbar the BlinkList toolbar so you can rate and bookmark what sites you visited.

Download StumbleUpon
StumbleUpon.com
Get Firefox!