Firefox is fun again

(tags browser, Firefox)

Well, I don't mean Firefox 3.1 beta. I still use Google Chrome as my main browser nowadays. Actually what I did with Firefox is declare Add-On Bankruptcy.

All these months of Google Chroming without "Tree Style Tab" and "Adblock Plus" haven't been as horrendous as I thought. And I didn't really miss the stuff from "Better Gmail" or "Stylish". I don't even use the "Sqlite Browser" or "Web Developer" stuff, geez. So, I deleted stuff. So instead of 40+ Add-Ons, now I have 20. And now Firefox feels like it can boot up pretty fast like.

Also the Delicious plug-in moved to the Sqlite database implementation in Firefox 3, so perhaps there's a speed gain there.

But still I use Google Chrome. Hopefully Firefox 3.1 will come out soon and I can enjoy "tear-off tabs", Firefox style.

I'm in yer browser, rubying (Furigana Injector)

(tags browser, Japanese, Firefox)

I only bumped into this today, but it seems useful for language learning. There is a Firefox extension that automatically adds the furigana readings (pronounciation) for kanji on a web page. It's called Furigana Injector. Here's a sample from picture-heavy, kanji poor Moeyo Akiba Blog, regarding the "Moekore Plus No. 3 Miku Hatsune" PVC figure sample preview for 2008-08 (my trans. from 「ボークス「モエコレPLUS No.3 初音ミク」PVCサンプルレビュー」).

In this sample, all of the conversions are correct. I did notice some incorrect conversions on some other pages, though.

The conversions are added on the fly, and you can manually add them through right-clicking. You can dial the non-conversion level to your level of competency. I have mine initially set to ignore the "980 most common" kanji. Yeah, manga and figure blogs aren't really good Japanese practice, I know. Perhaps this will help when slogging through Yahoo News or Wikipedia, ugh.

This extension works with the XHTML Ruby Support extension, which I've been using without much practical benefits.

I never did understand why furigana was also called ruby. I better read up on the ruby explanation at Wikipedia Japanese. Oh, the name comes from the 19th century England-created font. Okay.

Count my Firefox 3

(tags browser, Firefox)

Today is Mozilla Firefox 3 Download Day 2008. They want to get a million downloads before the day is over, but the last time I checked, they had over 7 million downloads already. I helped contribute about 5 downloads by reinstalling Firefox on every Windows machine I had. So I gave myself a certificate:

I was running Firefox 3 betas for a long time and RC2 for the last week. I haven't had the need to use FF 2.x, so I decided to just get rid of everything and reinstall FF3 everywhere. What I mean by FF3 is actually two installs, the official one and the Portable Apps version.

By the last count, it seems as though I am dependent on about 50 extensions, which is a rough estimate since some of them are not yet working with FF3. Still, FF3 has some acceptable UI speed even after all that weight.

Dual Browsers, Duel Browsers: Opera

(tags browser, Firefox, Opera, failure, resolved)

I totally depend on Firefox now. I haven't used Sleipnir in a long time, thanks to Tree Style Tab. However FF 2.x becomes pretty slow when I bog it down with 20+ extensions and 50+ tabs. I wanted another FF to run on my second screen (dual monitor).

I couldn't figure it out, so I tried out Opera. I like how its fast and "g search" works in the address bar just like FF. But it lacks the convenience of FF and plus Alt-Enter in the address bar doesn't work the way I want. It is stable and consistent though.

I saw FF 3.x beta was getting more beta releases out. There was number 4 and now number 5, just a day or two ago. I try them out using the Portable Apps version. I want to run FF 2.x and 3.x beta simultaneously but that was the original problem. I got smart with "Run Multiple Firefoxes? (solved)".

It won't be long now before I give Opera the boot and the uninstall. I hardly knew yeh.

Firefox just got better: Tree Style Tab

(tags browser, Firefox, customize)

For years I have been using Sleipnir just for the hierarchical tabs, but now Firefox has this functionality in multiple different ways. Earlier this month I started using Tab Kit, but it was just a disorganized mess because it was trying to handle both the tree-view and the normal tab list, with nonsensical grouping options and no manual rearranging. But then I found Tree Style Tab (ツリー型タブ), which is pretty much what I want. Hierarchical, manual tab group rearranging, fast. Now I will be opening Sleipnir less and Firefox more. Coupled with the del.icio.usBookmarks extension, the Session Manager extension and FEBE user setting/extension backup extension, I finally will enjoy Firefox more.