Ok, I thought I'd compile a little list of
Firefox extensions
that are useful for any web developer (and a few that are
good for any user of Firefox.) For those of you who read
my blog, you'll know that I've switched to Firefox as
my primary browser—it's just fantastic. Anyway, here's
a list of the extensions you shouldn't be without.
General Extensions (Stuff For Everyone)
-
Tabbrowser Extensions
This might be the best of the extensions as it makes Firefox and
Mozilla's tab interface work the way it should work out of the
box. First, it adds the ability to re-order the tabs by dragging
and dropping the tabs. Oddly enough, I find myself re-ordering
tabs quite a bit. Next, it will remember all your open tabs
when you close Firefox and will automatically re-open them. I
love this feature, since there are 3 or 4 sites I tend to have
open all the time. Also, if you ever need to reboot while you
have a ton of tabs open, you don't have to worry about trying
to restore all your windows after reboot—just close Firefox
and reboot your PC. The last feature I'm highlighting is you can
configure the extension to open all "new window" links into
a new tab instead. This extension does more than what I've
highlighted, but these are the key features that make it a must
download.
-
Bookmarks Synchronizer
Allows you to synchronize your Firefox bookmarks among
different installations of Firefox. I use it to keep
my laptop and desktop in sync.
-
RSS Reader Panel
This extension adds an RSS Panel to Firefox. Just set up a bookmark
folder containing links and folders to all your favorite RSS
URIs, and hit [ALT]+[R] to bring up the RSS Panel. The panel is
split into two sections. The upper section shows the RSS feeds
and the lower section shows the snippets from the RSS feed. Click
on the headings in the lower section to bring up the actual RSS
entry.
Web Develoer Extensions
-
Web Developer
There's just too many
features to list here. If you're a web
developer, than go download this extension now.
-
IEView
Adds an "View this page in IE" item to the context menu. This
is great for checking how the current page looks in IE or
if you've come across a site that is designed for IE specifically.
-
JavaScript Console Status
This extension displays an icon in the status bar everytime a
JavaScript error occurs. This is great when adding JavaScript
functionality to a page, since Firefox won't otherwise visually
warn you of an error (unless you have the JavaScript console
open.)
-
LiveHTTPHeaders
This extension will allow you to capture a log of all the
HTTP headers in realtime. Great if you need to debug what
information is going back and forth between the browser
and the server.
-
EditCSS
This extension allows you to edit the CSS rules for the open
page in realtime. Useful for fixing design issues, without
having to keep re-saving and re-viewing the original
document.
-
SpiderZilla
An extension for pulling down an entire site—including
images—to a local directory on your PC. This is great
for archiving a site, or for grabbing a client's current
site.
-
User Agent Switcher
This extension adds an option to your "Tools" menu which
allows you to select a custom user agent for Firefox to
report to the server. This is useful if you want to test
the way a site might re-act with a different user agent.
For example, to view a content in Firefox that may only
want to display if the user agent is reporting to be IE.
Many (if not most) of this extension will also work with the
Mozilla browser as well. Hopefully you find this little list
useful. If you have other extensions that no Firefox user
should be without, make sure to post a comment and let me
know!
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