CheckPlaces is an experimental addon, so you have to tick a checkbox and install it. However, it worked flawlessly for me on Firefox 3, so the experimental status should not really be a worry.

Check Places gives you options to check for offline bookmarks, duplicates or both. To avoid the addon hanging up for a long time when checking for offline pages, you can set a timeout – the duration depending on your network speed and latency. The default, 60 seconds, should be large enough for all.

If you have bookmarked duplicates intentionally, you can tell Check Places to exclude folders while checking. Alternatively, you can check only the specified folders.

Download Check Places Firefox extension

An original article by TechZilo

Check Places Firefox addon checks offline and duplicate bookmarks

Related reading:

• View offline webpages with Resurrect Pages addon
• Search and remove duplicate files with Duplicate File Searcher
• Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)
• Remove non-deletable super cookies with Better Privacy Firefox addon

I was not aware of super cookies until I came across BetterPrivacy, but a quick Google search does turn up a Wikipedia page on local shared objects (emphasis added by me):

Flash Players use a sandbox security model. Adobe Flash Player does not seek the user’s permission to store LSO files on the hard disk. LSO’s contain cookie-like data stored by individual web sites or domains. Any kind of text data can be stored, some of which may be cause for privacy concerns. Indeed, as with cookies, online banks, merchants or advertisers may use LSOs for tracking purposes.

More than security concerns, it is the tracking element that would worry any internet user. Flash cookies are placed in system folders, thus protected from deletion.

BetterPrivacy removes LSOs on every browser exit. Much like Flashblock and Adblock, BetterPrivacy is an install-forget addon – you do not have to do more than configure it initially.

Get BetterPrivacy Firefox addon

An original article by TechZilo

Remove non-deletable super cookies with Better Privacy Firefox addon

Related reading:

• Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)
• Prevent accidental closing of Firefox tabs with Permatabs addon
• Hide webpage titles in Firefox with Page Title Eraser addon
• Check Places Firefox addon checks offline and duplicate bookmarks

Firefox 3.5 has two known issues – memory consumption and excrutiatingly long startup time. Excess memory usage has been a problem for long, but version 3.5 also introduced a long startup time (some users have reported waiting minutes for Firefox to start up). This post provides some tips on speeding up the Firefox boot time.

The longer startup time is the result of a bug, or more accurately, a lack of foresight, in the implementation of a security feature. Firefox 3.5 requires randomness for security purposes, and on Windows, it gets this by scanning temporary folders. This is a disk-intensive process, and on computers with lots of temporary files and folders, it causes delays in startup.

Fix Firefox startup delay

The next dot release (like 3.5.1 or whatever) will likely include a patch to address this startup delay probelm, but until then, the solution is to clear temporary files and folders generated by Internet Explorer.

To do it the quick way, open Control Panel, then go to Internet Options. Under Browsing History, press Delete button, ensure that all options are checked and hit Delete.

If you would like, you can manually clear the files by following the instructions below.

In Windows XP

Empty the following folders in Windows XP:

C:\Documents and Settings\*user*\Local Settings\History
C:\Documents and Settings\*user*\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files
C:\Documents And Settings\*user*\Local Settings\Temp
C:\Documents And Settings\*user*\Recent

where *user* is your username.

In Windows Vista and Windows 7

Clear these folders if you use Windows 7 or Vista:

%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\History
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent
%TEMP%

where %USERPROFILE% is your username.

An original article by TechZilo

How to speed up / fix Firefox 3.5 startup slowness

Related reading:

• Speed Dial adds Opera-style speed dial to Firefox
• Napster founder Shawn Fanning’s startup Rupture bought by EA
• Metamaterials could speed up internet
• How to speed up Send to menu in Windows XP

In many cases, the extensions and themes do not break, but simply need to be marked compatible with the specific version of Firefox. In such cases, you can use the simple about:config hack below to disable the extension compatibility check and use older addons without any problems.

Note that this presents the risk of crashes and problems, so make sure you either know that your favorite extensions and themes are compatible with Firefox, or you have proper backups of your data/settings/bookmarks/addons.

Hack to use older addons in Firefox 3.5

Here are the steps to disable extension compatibility check to use incompatible Firefox themes and addons:

Enter about:config in the address bar to bring up the about:config page.

Right-click anywhere, point to New and then to Boolean.

Enter the key extensions.checkCompatibility and hit OK.

Choose the value as false.

If you type the first few letters of extensions.checkCompatibility in the filter field, you can find the value set as false.

You have to restart Firefox for the hack to be in effect.

I found that the above hack worked in letting Firefox use the GrApple theme – which is still ages ahead of the default Firefox theme.

An original article by TechZilo

Run old extensions in Firefox 3.5

Related reading:

• Best themes and extensions to spruce up Firefox for Christmas
• Install extensions in Google Chrome
• Download Firefox 3 to help Mozilla Firefox set a world record
• How to speed up / fix Firefox 3.5 startup slowness

Page Title Eraser adds a context menu item and also under menu items, each of which includes a “Hide title” menu item. Clicking on it hides/shows tab and window titles. This has to be done for each tab. There are also toolbar button (which you can drag and drop from within the customize window) and shortcut (ctrl+alt+shift+H).

Get Page Title Eraser addon

An original article by TechZilo

Hide webpage titles in Firefox with Page Title Eraser addon

Related reading:

• Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)
• Prevent accidental closing of Firefox tabs with Permatabs addon
• Remove non-deletable super cookies with Better Privacy Firefox addon
• Check Places Firefox addon checks offline and duplicate bookmarks

Tweetpkr, a Twitter bookmarklet that brings Twitter to your browser sidebar, is a viable alternative if you do not like to install another Firefox extension, or use another browser.

Configuration options include refresh interval, choice of URL shortener, theme and choice of secure connections to Twitter.

Download TwitKit Firefox addon

An original article by TechZilo

TwitKit extension brings Twitter to your Firefox sidebar

Related reading:

• TwitBin – bring Twitter to your Firefox sidebar
• Tweetpkr: Twitter in your sidebar, in a bookmarklet
• BlogRovr Firefox extension: See what other bloggers are saying
• Group Firefox tabs with Tabgroups extension

Reload Firefox tabs

Reload Every is a Firefox addon that does just that: reload tabs according to timing of your choice. You can set Reload every to refresh pages at intervals of 5 seconds to 15 minutes or a custom time. Reload Every can refresh all or chosen tabs in Firefox.

It is a lightweight extension, with not even a configuration pane (all you need to do is click and hold the refresh button to get the drop down menu). It works for all versions of Firefox, from the antiquated version 1.5 to the latest (3.0.7 as of writing).

Get Reload Every Firefox addon

An original article by TechZilo

Refresh Firefox tabs automatically with Reload Every extension

Related reading:

• Group Firefox tabs with Tabgroups extension
• Stack Firefox tabs verticaly with Vertigo extension
• Prevent accidental closing of Firefox tabs with Permatabs addon
• BlogRovr Firefox extension: See what other bloggers are saying

Most web users would have written a comment or long search query and hit return only to realize that the data wasn’t sent, and Firefox is unable to recover the data. Bloggers who write posts in WordPress may also have lost long blog posts due to auto-save not working and hitting Back button on Firefox not working.

Lazarus auto-saves text you enter into a form. When you need to recover data, go to the page you entered the text into, and right-click within a text area. Hover over “recover form” and get back your text.

For those of you who ask whether Firefox’s own text recovery is not sufficient, I can only say that Lazarus improves the chances of recovering data. Firefox still is not very reliable in recovering form data – before using Lazarus, I copy-pasted any long paragraph I wrote, into an open “scratch” text file before submitting the data.

Download Lazarus Firefox addon

An original article by TechZilo

How to recover lost form / field data in Firefox

Related reading:

• Recover accidentally deleted Textmate bundles
• Install Reliance Net Connect Data Card on Windows Vista x64
• Download Firefox 3 to help Mozilla Firefox set a world record
• Run old extensions in Firefox 3.5

SkipScreen quickens the download process by taking out the annoyances (ie. ads and countdowns). This can be particularly useful if you download from these sites often. Also see Happy Checker Firefox extension to check for Rapidshare happy hours.

Get Skipscreen addon

If you do not use Firefox and/or do not like to install yet another extension, use this list of premium Rapidshare link generators to start downloads at full speeds immediately.

If you’re not particularly geeky, this screencast from Skipscreen should help you:

An original article by TechZilo

Start Rapidshare downloads immediately with SkipScreen

Related reading:

• Automate RapidShare downloads with Raptor
• Use Rapidshare as a premium user for free
• Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)
• Ares Tube converts and downloads videos directly to your iPod

Happy Hours checker Firefox addon

Happy Checker has an icon at the bottom right of Firefox, clicking on which will bring up a popup with options to check for Happy Hours. If Happy Hours is detected, Happy Checker brings up a message box like below:

What is Rapidshare Happy Hours

Rapidshare Happy Hours is the hours designated by Rapidshare during which file downloads become easier. You do not need to enter difficult image verification or wait for the download. Only a small fraction of the bandwidth used is counted towards your daily limit. You can also use download managers.
Using Raptor, a download manager for Rapidshare is also a good idea.

Get Rapidshare Happy Hours addon

An original article by TechZilo

Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)

Related reading:

• Prevent accidental closing of Firefox tabs with Permatabs addon
• Remove non-deletable super cookies with Better Privacy Firefox addon
• Hide webpage titles in Firefox with Page Title Eraser addon
• Check Places Firefox addon checks offline and duplicate bookmarks

Instead of using torrent search sites, why not use a toolbar to quicken your searches? Torrent Finder is a Firefox addon that can search torrents from over 180 torrent sites, including the popular ones like Mininova, ISOhunt, Demonoid, Torrent Spy, Pirate Bay etc.

Torrent Finder Toolbar for Firefox

Torrent Finder Toolbar options

Features of Torrent Finder

You can configure Torrent Finder to find torrents from single or multiple torrent search engines. Results can be opened in Torrent Finder search tabs, small windows or in Firefox tabs themselves. Pagination is included (previous and next buttons) to toggle between tabs.

Extra tools to find torrents by keywords (keyword highlighter), to toggle between search engines by category (select toggle), and to easily find the search engine you need (toggle by first letter) have been included too. An incredible number of users (~330,000) have installed the add-on as of today.

Get Torrent Finder Firefox extension

An original article by TechZilo

Search torrents within Firefox with Torrent Finder

Related reading:

• Search torrents with ScrapeTorrent
• Search torrents, mp3s, videos and ebooks easily with Filewin
• How to use Advanced Search to get only Firefox 3-compatible addons
• InquisitorX search results plugin comes to Firefox and IE

Resurrect Pages uses multiple sources for finding cached pages – Live Search, Google, Internet Archive, Yahoo etc. This translates to a greater chance of finding the cached page. The addon inserts “Resurrect this link” to your right-click menu upon clicking a link. Clicking on it will show you a popup where you can choose the source to use.

Install Resurrect Pages Firefox addon

On a side note, I wish the addon would ping all sources and see which of them have the page cached.

An original article by TechZilo

View offline webpages with Resurrect Pages addon

Related reading:

• Check Places Firefox addon checks offline and duplicate bookmarks
• How to prevent Stumble Upon from bookmarking your liked pages
• Whos.Amung.Us: Know which pages are visited on your site
• Find Rapidshare Happy Hours (Firefox addon)

Reading a dozen comics by visiting the websites can be cumbersome. Daily Dilbert, a Firefox addon, is here to help.

Daily Dilbert is a Firefox extension that shows you several online popular comic strips every day. Daily Dilbert shows several popular comics like Dilbert, Garfield, XKCD, Peanuts, Andy Capp, Getfuzzy, Pearls, PHDComics, Opus etc. Some of these comics are available in multiple languages too.

The extension adds an icon to Firefox status bar. Clicking on it brings a popup with the cartoons. Clicking on the comic either subscribes you to RSS or takes you the comic’s website.

Install Daily Dilbert Firefox addon

An original article by TechZilo

Read Dilbert, Garfield comics in Firefox

Related reading:

• Create cartoons (web comics) with Toonlet
• What topics would you like to read more posts on?
• Download Firefox 3 to help Mozilla Firefox set a world record
• Run old extensions in Firefox 3.5

Firefox has themes for most occasions (Halloween seems popular), including Christmas. Here are two themes for Christmas – TinselTown and XMas theme. Tinseltown is my personal favorite, with transparent tabs, colorful icons and wavy backgrounds.

Please consider bookmarking this article on Delicious or stumbling it to let more Firefox users know of these Firefox Christmas themes.

TinselTown theme

Download Tinseltown

XMas Firefox theme

Download XMas theme

Winter Holiday Toolbar

Winter Holiday Christmas Toolbar and Theme has a sidebar with constantly updating holiday music/videos. The theme reflects changes in time of the day – at noon, you will see sunny snow scene.
Download Winter Holiday toolbar+theme

Ellie from Ultimate Geek Girl has also written a quick guide on setting up Firefox with background images of your choice.

An original article by TechZilo

Best themes and extensions to spruce up Firefox for Christmas

Related reading:

• Run old extensions in Firefox 3.5
• 5 beautiful Mac OS X-style Firefox themes
• Install extensions in Google Chrome
• Google Chrome: Tips, themes and hacks

You can configure how often it should check Google Reader for unread feeds. You can also exclude feeds from the notification (useful if you have organized feeds into different labels in terms of priority). Notifications can be in the form of a popup, or a small counter in Firefox status bar. Clicking on the icon shows you unread feeds.

Install Google Reader Watcher

An original article by TechZilo

Google Reader Watcher alerts you for new feed items

Related reading:

• Google Reader adds control on shared items
• Beautify Google Reader with OS X Style for Google Reader Userstyle
• Get Mac OS X-style system alerts with Growl for Windows
• Facebook adds filtering to news items