Dangling Conversations

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Hooked on Firefox....

Posted 04 Apr, 2006 at 23:35 by kael in /Technical | Permanent link

I've been contemplating reverting back to Opera as my default web browser. It's not that Firefox is feature poor. It's just that it's bloated. Compared to Opera, it's pretty slow to load and has a big footprint.

Now, featurewise, the extension system has been what's kept me using it. I've got a simple extension that lets me log in to LiveJournal quickly, which helps when LiveJournal's login procedure is being a bit buggy. It's also got a nice little extension that give me fine control over which sites are allowed to use javascript (NoScript). Forecastfox simply puts the weather forecast on my menu bar, so I don't even have to click a link to see what the forecasters are betting on.

Tab browsing is what got me hooked on Opera in the first place. The only reason that I even gave FireFox a chance was because it seemed to let me twiddle a lot more with how tabbed browsing works. The Tab Mix Plus extension did that in spades, and with Firefox 1.5 (possibly before), I can now set up customized address bar search shortcuts (a la 'g' for google searches, I could do 'tq' for thottbot quest searches for World of Warcraft quests.

And yet, it seems like every two or three months, I consider slipping back to Opera. Then something new comes along. Right now it's StumbleUpon's Firefox extension. It seamlessly integrates the lazy web surfing system that StumbleUpon uses with Firefox. It's the lazy man's lazy. Perfect for me!

So, what am I going to do in three months? This looks like the next hook for me: Take the communal rating system of StumbleUpon, and tie it in more closely to your friends particular opinions of things, and you've got what the authour of Outfoxed refers to as "A Third Phase of Internet Search": "Social networks determine subjective quality".

This really appeals to the amateur sociologist in me, on the one hand, and the technologist in me, on the other: an elegant solution to a complex system that leverages the strongest parts of technology and natural social systems. It even seems to have support for "socially aware surfing"!.

Comments (3 comments so far)
Opera was my browser of choice on Windows until the ad banner got too annoying; I switched to Firefox, but then switched platforms entirely shortly thereafter. Safari v2 does pretty much everything I want in a browser, but it's not as widely supported as IE or Firefox -- most GoogleToys, for instance, don't work in Safari during their first couple months of life.

The Outfoxed idea looks neat, but I suspect that there's a threshhold: it's not really useful (or at least, as useful as it should be) until you've gotten a sufficiently large/dense neighbourhood.
Posted 2006/4/4 23:57:44 by Matt
Much like the fax machine. FWIW, Opera is now free & banner free, I believe.
Posted 2006/4/8 17:29:12 by Kael
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Posted 2006/12/13 22:04:56 by 1 loan resource
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