Firefox 1.0 Tips and Tricks

[Skyzyx]

I thought that I'd post this in order to help all of the people who've been flocking away from IE in favor of Firefox. I've found a couple of nifty things recently, and I just wanted to offer this info to all Firefox 1.0 users.

Stop webmasters from killing your right-click menu
1) Go to your Tools menu, and choose Options
2) In the new Options panel, choose Web Features on the left
3) The bottom checkbox is for enabling/disabling JavaScript. Next to that is an Advanced button. Click it.
4) Uncheck the option for Disable or Replace Context Menus

Stop webmasters from resizing your windows
1) Go to your Tools menu, and choose Options
2) In the new Options panel, choose Web Features on the left
3) The bottom checkbox is for enabling/disabling JavaScript. Next to that is an Advanced button. Click it.
4) Uncheck the option for Move or Resize Existing Windows

Block Flash sites from opening popups
1) In your address bar, type about:config
2) Right-click in the window and choose New » Integer
3) When it asks for the preference name, type privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins
4) For the value, choose either 0 (no blocking), 1 (treat like any other popup window), or 2 (block completely)
5) Restart Firefox

Block in-page ads
1) Download the AdBlock (https://update.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?application=firefox&id=10) extension for Firefox and install it.
2) Read these instructions (http://www.geocities.com/pierceive/adblock/-instructions.txt)
3) Load the latest dated definitions from this archive (http://www.geocities.com/pierceive/adblock/). You can also Google around to see if better definition lists are around.

I'm sure that this list will continue to grow. PM me if you'd like to see something cool added that I've missed here.

[WA]

Thanks Skyzyx, this thread could turn out to be very useful. Depending on the kind of responses, I might make it a sticky for a little while.

[mindlessLemming]

How about adding links to the optimised FF builds that you linked on your blog? Ooops, you've already posted them in another thread... Perhaps add it to this instead?:)

[Skyzyx]

I've also put together a user.js file that can automatically adjust some hidden settings for you when you save the file inside your profile folder.

Here's the user.js file I'm currently using:

user_pref("browser.cache.memory.capacity", 16384);
user_pref("browser.tabs.loadInBackground", false);
user_pref("browser.urlbar.autoFill", true);
user_pref("browser.xul.error_pages.enabled", true);
user_pref("config.trim_on_minimize", false);
user_pref("dom.event.contextmenu.enabled", false);
user_pref("network.http.max-connections", 256);
user_pref("network.http.max-connections-per-server", 192);
user_pref("network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-proxy", 128);
user_pref("network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server", 64);
user_pref("network.http.pipelining", true);
user_pref("network.http.pipelining.maxrequests", 30);
user_pref("network.http.request.max-start-delay", 0);
user_pref("nglayout.initialpaint.delay", 0);
user_pref("privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins", 2);

Here's a breakdown of what everything does (roughly):

user_pref("browser.cache.memory.capacity", 16384);
Makes Firefox only use 16 MB of memory, rather than the default 52 MB. This seems to improve performance on older machines with less RAM. It doesn't hurt newer machines with more RAM either.

user_pref("browser.tabs.loadInBackground", false);
Changes the default setting and makes new tabs open in the foreground, rather than the background.

user_pref("browser.urlbar.autoFill", true);
Enables the autofill feature in the Firefox address bar.

user_pref("browser.xul.error_pages.enabled", true);
Rather than getting an alert box when Firefox has a problem connecting, or whatever, this sends you to a slightly more detailed alert page, like in Internet Explorer.

user_pref("config.trim_on_minimize", false);
Normally, when you minimize Firefox, it will release some of it's memory for other apps to use. To improve Firefox performance on less-fortunate machines, this setting allows Firefox to keep it's memory and allow better responsiveness coming out of a minimized state.

user_pref("dom.event.contextmenu.enabled", false);
Stops websites from blocking your right-click contextual menu.

user_pref("network.http.max-connections", 256);
user_pref("network.http.max-connections-per-server", 192);
user_pref("network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-proxy", 128);
user_pref("network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server", 64);
user_pref("network.http.pipelining", true);
user_pref("network.http.pipelining.maxrequests", 30);
All of these help to significantly improve Firefox's throughput, allowing you to squeeze more from your internet connection. Coupling this with an Optimized Build (http://www.codingforums.com/showpost.php?p=247322&postcount=1) will make Firefox fly!

user_pref("network.http.request.max-start-delay", 0);
user_pref("nglayout.initialpaint.delay", 0);
These will speed up rendering by allowing Firefox to begin drawing to the screen as soon as the first bits of data are received, rather then waiting a pre-defined period of time. Broadband users notice the greatest difference with faster connections being done instantly (more like 0.001 seconds).

user_pref("privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins", 2);
Improves Firefox's popup blocker by also blocking popups created by Flash files, or any plugin for that matter.

To find your profile folder:

Mac OS X:
/Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/default.xxx/
In the address above, replace <username> with your Mac OS X username. Also, the xxx in default.xxx is a random three-letter extension.

Windows 2000/XP/2003:
c:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\default.xxx\
In the address above, replace <username> with your Windows username. Application Data is a hidden folder, so you can either type it in manually, or enable the viewing of hidden folders. Lastly, the xxx in default.xxx is a random three-letter extension.

Windows NT 4.0:
c:\WINNT\Profiles\<username>\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\default.xxx\
In the address above, replace <username> with your Windows username. Application Data is a hidden folder, so you can either type it in manually, or enable the viewing of hidden folders. Lastly, the xxx in default.xxx is a random three-letter extension.

Windows 98/Me:
c:\Windows\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\default.xxx\
In the address above, Application Data is a hidden folder, so you can either type it in manually, or enable the viewing of hidden folders. Lastly, the xxx in default.xxx is a random three-letter extension.

Linux and Unix systems
~/.mozilla/firefox
If you're using Linux, then I'm assuming that you know where your Linux profile directory is... because I don't. =)

Hope this helps!

[Spookster]

You can also get to and modify all of those preferences and more by typing about:config into the address bar.

And for linux the path and filename of your preferences file is

.mozilla/firefox/XXXXXXX.default/prefs.js