from ImproveFirefox.com
To utilize separate profiles:/path/to/firefox -P "another profile name" -no-remote
To create separate profiles:
/path/to/firefox2 -profilemanager -no-remote
Firefox
Archived Posts from this Category
A friend of mine, Bill, found out that his password had been mailed to him in plaintext from his ’shiny, new 401k’ and he wrote about the disconcerting experience of a financial services company being careless with security. Having worked in a financial services company, I can only say that the troubles he encountered are not that bad… you should have seen some of the sausage in the factory I worked in.
That said, Bill violated a crucial rule of security and he needs to learn it as much as the Schwab folks need to learn their own lessons:
Never, never, never depend on someone else to provide your security.
Bill “used one of his common passwords”… and you shouldn’t have any of those. A common password is a common vulnerability, especially because you can’t know how companies will protect your passwords or your data — as he unfortunately learned. To avoid this, you can use a desktop application (such as the free Password Safe, originating from Bruce Schneier’s Counterpane Labs) or a browser plug-in (such as Password Hasher or Secure Login or any of the other 48 listed on the addons site) or the Mac’s built-in Keychain app so you can generate random passwords and never, never reuse them. Personally, I’ve been using Password Safe for years.
He also offers great tips for websites to make their applications more secure, like not asking for really constant, common, data like mother’s maiden name. The other option is to not answer with an expected response. Mother’s maiden name? Istanbul. Honeymoon location? Jones. And so on…
Never trust someone else’s security.
Technorati Tags: security, password, firefox
Firefox is now 2, and I have a new tweak list – actually, it’s mostly the same ones but I don’t trust other sites to still exist after I lost a few…
And remember, you can get to these through about:config really easily…
- // Disable image animation
user_pref(”image.animation_mode”, “none”); - // Enable frame resizability
user_pref(”layout.frames.force_resizability”, true); - // Prevent popups to hide the urlbar
user_pref(”dom.disable_window_open_feature.location”, true); - // Prevent popups to hide the menubar
user_pref(”dom.disable_window_open_feature.menubar”, true); - // Enable pipelining to increase the speed of (broadband) connection (10 on the second line can be any number)
user_pref(”network.http.pipelining”, true);
user_pref(”network.http.pipelining.maxrequests”, 8);
user_pref(”network.http.proxy.pipelining”, true); - user_pref(”network.http.max-connections-per-server”, 16);
- user_pref(”browser.search.openintab”, true);
- user_pref(”accessibility.typeaheadfind”, true);
Disable only certain annoying JavaScript tricks:
Tools ->
Options -> Content -> Enable JavaScript -> Advanced ->
uncheck (according to your taste) Allow scripts to “Move or resize
existing windows”, “Raise or lower windows”, “Disable or replace
context menus”, “Hide the status bar” and “Change status bar text”
set keyword.URL to prevent I’m Feeling Lucky
Technorati Tags: firefox, configuration, tweaks
Multiple versions of Firefox – easily
look at dojo.com for the info… I especially like the change-the-icon tweak
An interesting interview with one of the creators of Firefox, Blake Ross. My favorite part about Firefox is that it is driving Microsoft to clean up their act, even when they claimed it was impossible. Refreshing to see David poking Goliath and getting a reaction, though I still have doubts about the ultimate outcome of the fight…
Technorati Tags: firefox, microsoft, internet+explorer
Well, I haven’t updated my recommendations since version 1.0.4 and technology marches on. Here’s a new guide that pretty much is what I use as well, so I’m referencing it for self-preservation…
will langford dot com » Firefox Guide
Finally found out how to run Firefox with multiple versions at once… thanks to a FAQ on DSLReports.
C:\>cd C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox>set MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox>firefox.exe -p
-or-
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox>firefox.exe -Profile “C:\Path\to\profile”
It’s also shown on Mozilla’s dev site, but without the helpful steps…
And you can force the profile manager to show up (to keep your profiles separate for each version with a tip from galfi.com – To do this, add ” -profilemanager” to the end of [your] shortcuts in the Target field
So I’ve upgraded to 1.0.6 and now there’s a problem with conflicting extensions. I finally found out that the crashes I was seeing were related to Live HTTP Headers and SessionSaver conflicting so that I couldn’t upload files. However, I was using both on earlier versions and it didn’t seem to conflict.
So now we see the Eclipse problem – an application based on plugins can’t efficiently test interactions between them, and clearly the sandboxing is incomplete in FF. In addition, who can take responsibility for the fix – the core team, the SessionSaver people, the Live HTTP Headers, or does it take a village to fix this bug?
I love Firefox, but this is driving me nuts. I use both extensions regularly and want to keep them active since it is a pain to restart the browser every time I want them – so now I’m reduced to using IE to upload files! Talk about counterproductive…
And sadly I’m not in practice enough to be able to suss out the issue myself. Sigh.
OK, organized as best as possible by my current usage:
Active and I couldn’t live without them:
SessionSaver .2 0.2.1.027 – “SessionSaver will auto-track and restore your browser exactly as you left it — every startup, every time. Not even a crash can faze it…” – this is my #1 extension and absolutely essential. Never browse without it. On a fresh install, this is my first download. Get it now.
Adblock 0.5.2.039 – does what it says. Pretty cool.
Download Manager Tweak 0.6.3 – makes it easier to control your downloads.
Add Bookmark Here 0.5.2 – Makes filing bookmarks easier.
FLST 0.7 – Brings focus to the last selected tab when closing the active tab.
Active and used every day:
ScrapBook 0.13.7
Duplicate Tab 0.5.1
PrefBar 2.3.1
lori (Life-of-request info) 0.1.0.20050201
CTC 0.3 – Close Tab Context (menu) puts an option in the context menu to close the active tab. Very handy.
LastTab 1.0.5 – modifies Ctrl-Tab to switch to recently selected tabs, rather than always go from left-to-right.
Active and used occasionally (but still important):
Copy Plain Text 0.2.1
undoclosetab 20041125.3
Web Developer 0.8
Live HTTP Headers 0.10
SubmitToTab 0.2.1
Nice-to-have:
Copy Plain Text 0.2.1
ReloadEvery 0.5
DictionarySearch 0.7
Configuration Mania 1.05.2004110501
Rot13 Encoder/Decoder 0.1
Calculator 0.7
ieview 0.84 – launches current page (or link) in IE
Launchy 3.9.0 – Launches the page (or source) in various places, including IE. Like ieview on steroids.
FirefoxView 0.31.1 – the reverse of IEView… adds a context item in IE to view the page in Firefox
Checky 2.5 – Checks the HTML/CSS against various validators
Ext2File 0.2.8 – Exports an extension list to a file (so I could make this post!)
Open Source in Tab 0.1
Played with and then haven’t used:
Plain Text Links 0.2
Linky 2.3.0
Tried to use but haven’t figured out yet:
Magpie 3.1.2
BugMeNot 0.6.1
Not used yet but sounded cool:
Keyconfig – assignable hotkeys for your favorite stuff
DOM Inspector 1.0
LoremIpsum Content Generator 0.4.1
Sage 1.3.1
Nuke Anything 0.2
jsLib 0.1.245
Minesweeper 0.8
View Cookies 1.2
Mozilla Calendar 0.8.3+
Calendar Help 0.1
Feedview 0.9
RequestPoison 0.5
EditCSS 0.2.3
Drag And Drop Upload 1.0
Download Sort 2.5.0
Leech 1.5.0+
webcache 0.1
Googlebar
Privacy Fox 0.3.7 – View short privacy policies for sites
Policy Manager 1.3.2004081801 – allows you to set Javascript (maybe others?) policies for specific sites, like the Zones stuff in IE.
Right Encoding 0.1 – Lets you see a page’s encoding (language and character set) and manipulate the selection. Should be useful if you’re debugging a page that appears odd in other character sets?
SwiftTabs 0.2.1 – move to next or previous tab via keystroke. I just haven’t learned the keystrokes yet…
Didn’t really work out (but not their fault):
spooFX 0.3
SpoofStick 1.05
Just plain didn’t work like I wanted:
Research Buddy 1.01
Slogger 0.5.11
Hated it!
RadialContext (and I can’t get it uninstalled!)
I don’t know…
PrefButtons 0.3.2 – I may be using these buttons but I’m not sure… too many extensions!
# DISABLED EXTENSIONS: (5)
Bandwidth Tester 0.4 – out of version sync
miniT (drag+indicator) 0.4 – out of version sync
Toolbar Enhancements 0.16.2 – out of version sync
Tab X 0.5 – Messed with my tabs closing, and I couldn’t have that
ForecastFox 0.5.9 – Would make my browser lock at 100%, usually when I was offline. Might have been something about being disconnected, but on a portable machine that was catastrophic because SessionSaver is still only 85-92%.
Retro Find 1.1 – makes the Find toolbar go away and gives you a dialog box instead. I didn’t like it.
(I’ll be adding more links and descriptions but don’t want to make people wait… if you don’t see it here, look on the Extensions Mirror or Mozilla Addons)
