FF Extension Guru's Blog

This Blog Has Moved!

2006-09-06T01:29:00.000-07:00

Effective September 6th,
The FF Extension Guru's Blog
has moved to a new home.

Please update your Bookmarks/Favorites

See FF Extension Guru’s Blog New Home for details.

Update: Windows Vista Prices

2006-09-05T13:49:00.000-07:00

On CyberNet Tech News today is the article: Microsoft Officially Announces Vista Pricing. So here are the official US Prices:

Vista Business - $299
Vista Business Upgrade - $199
Vista Enterprise - Not available to retail customers
Vista Home Premium - $239
Vista Home Premium Upgrade - $159
Vista Home Basic - $199
Vista Home Basic Upgrade - $99.95
Vista Ultimate - $399
Vista Ultimate Upgrade - $259

Update

Here is information from Microsoft on the Windows Vistas Editions

Now $100 for the Home Basic Upgrade is not too bad. That is right along the lines of what I paid for my version of XP Home a few years back. However that was the full version, not an upgrade.

Using Firefox 2.0b2 As Default Browser

2006-09-04T17:23:00.000-07:00

Been using Firefox 2.0b2 as my default browser now for the past couple days. So far, very good and I am discovering several little things.

Those of you who use Firefox with Delphi Forums and WhiteMare's WYSIWYG Editor, will be happy to hear that the Copy, Cut and Paste commands are on the context (right-click) menu.
The Inline Spellcheck works (sort of) within Delphi Forums and the Editor. There are a couple places where it is not 'activated', these are in the subject field when starting a new thread or poll and when editing a message. To 'activate' the Inline Spellcheck, simply right-click in the text-box and select 'Spellcheck this field'.
Important: Right-click on misspelled words for suggestions, to ignore or add.
The Session Restore feature can be setup now like that in Session Saver or Tab Mix Plus where it will 'remember' all your open tabs and windows when you close Firefox. To change this setting go to the 'Tools' Menu and select 'Options...'. From there make sure you are in 'Main' and in the section 'Startup', select from the drop-down menu 'Show my windows and tabs from last time'
DO NOT use or force the Download Manager Tweak extension, it will break your options window.

CyberNet Tech News's Ryan has very good guide with several tweaks for Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 (these also apply to Beta 2 as well). All of these involve using about:config to change these settings. To make things simpler I strongly recommend you get the about:config extension.

My Way

2006-09-03T12:23:00.000-07:00

~Something Completely Different~

I have been an avid user of Yahoo! for both e-mail as a web portal for many years now. However, Yahoo! tends to get 'bogged down' at times and there a lot of banners ads that even Firefox's AdBlock Plus can not block. These banners are usually FLASH and even manage to get past the Flash Blocker as well.

My Way is fast, free to use, free of banners, free of pop-ups and has tons more options for content then Yahoo! You can even create a My Way Page (just like the My Yahoo! Page), but with a much greater choice of themes/skins. You can also get your own FREE @myway.com e-mail address. The only downside with the My Way E-Mail is there is currently not a 'notifier' extension available as there is with Yahoo or GMail.

Thunderbird 2.0 Alpha 1

2006-09-02T22:37:00.000-07:00

First, this isn't really new news, the Thunderbird 2.0, Alpha 1 release has been out since July 27th. However, I been so busy testing, playing and but sadly NOT crashing FF 2.0, I've put Thunderbird on hold. Since I made Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 my default browser tonight (more on this soon), I decided to go ahead and get Thunderbird 2.0, Alpha 1 setup on my system. So, what's new with Alpha 1? I wondered that myself so I took a look over at the Rumbling Edge's Notable Bug Fixes and notice there are a few items.

The most notable though is the New Mail Alert Improvements. This has been adapted from Outlook and is one feature I have found lacking in Thunderbird. When activated, a slider will appear from the bottom right corner of the screen. Yes this is similar to before but, includes the senders name, the message subject as well the first couple lines of the e-mail. This is so nice if you are working else where and a new e-mail comes through, you will be able to see who it is from and what it is about without having to toggle over to Thunderbird.

The slider will remain displayed as long as you are hovering within it. Once you move your mouse out of the slider or click the link in the slider to take you into Thunderbird it will disappear. However, if the message is in an 'unread' status, the new mail icon will still appear in the Windows task tray. Simply clicking the icon will bring the slider back up.

Mozilla Japan's New Mascot

2006-09-02T21:00:00.000-07:00

Found this article tonight on the mozilla links blog. Mozilla Japan is presently holding a contest to name their new mascot (pictured below). While the mascot does fit well into the Mozilla as well as Japan's Anime themes, I just think they are going to have a hard time having anyone take this seriously. While you're at the site, check out the user comments and you'll understand where I am coming from...

Something Completely Different: Vista & Office 2007 Prices

2006-09-01T21:43:00.000-07:00

Blogger's Note: This will be the first of my Something Completely Different entires. These entries are not the usual Mozilla, Firefox, Thunderbird, related topic that I usually post in the blog. However chances are they are going to computer/Internet related or may be not.

~Something Completely Different~

Earlier this week information about the prices for Windows Vista and Office 2007 started leaking out. My favorite source for Technology News, CyberNet Tech News first posted this information last Sunday (August 27th) with their article: Windows Vista and Office 2007 Prices. A couple things to keep in mind...first, unlike Windows XP, there four versions of Vista (not counting upgrades) and second those prices are a rough conversion based on the Canadian Prices posted on the Microsoft site.

However, a couple days later, CyberNet via the Longhorn Blogs posted the prices for Windows Vista as they appeared on Amazon.com:

Vista Version	Regular Price	Upgrade Price
Home Basic	$199.00	$ 99.95
Home Premium	$239.95	$159.00
Business	$299.99	$199.95
Ultimate	$399.99	$259.00

Now, I have no idea what the difference is between the versions but still these prices are a bit over-inflated IMHO. Oh and by the way, you will need to have a DVD-ROM or recorder/rewritable drive in order to install Windows Vista.

Now here are the Office 2007 prices as they appear on Amazon.com:

Office Version	Regular Price	Upgrade Price
Office 2007 Home/Student	$149.00	N/A
Office 2007 Small Business	N/A	$279.00
Office 2007	$399.99	$239.00
Office 2007 Pro	$499.99	$329.00
Office 2007 Ultimate (DVD-ROM)	$679.99	$539.00

Again, not sure what the difference is between the versions. But I can make one suggestion, before you shell out $150 to almost $700 for MS Office 2007, take a look at OpenOffice.org. It is Open Source, very much similar to MS Office and best of all....it is FREE!!!

Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 Released

2006-08-31T16:21:00.000-07:00

While mozillaZine has not made an announcement yet, CyberNet Tech News has, Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 is out! A couple interesting changes in Beta 2, the new default theme or visual refresh is in place now. Also noticed a couple minor changes with the tab bar. After opening a certain number of tabs you will get arrows on either end to scroll through your open tabs. However, I much prefer the drop-down tab list (see below) over the arrows. Also, the session restore has been setup now to automatically restore where you left off in the event of a crash as well as when Firefox needs to restart (due to installing/removing an extension or theme).

This release was only 3 weeks later than predicted and the next step will be Release Candidate 1, which is tentatively scheduled for September 19th with the final release of Firefox 2.0 in late October.

UPDATE

mozillaZine announced on September 1st: Mozilla Firefox 2 Beta 2 Milestone Released

Click For Larger Image

Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 MIA?

2006-08-30T19:25:00.000-07:00

Per the Mozilla Developers Calendar, Firefox 2.0, Beta 2 was suppose to be released today after being delayed the last 3 weeks. So far there is no news from Mozilla. However, a quick Google News Search for 'Firefox 2.0 Beta 2' came up with an article from InfromationWeek:

Barring more bugs, Firefox Beta 2 will release Thursday, Mozilla Corp. developers reported after a weekly status meeting held Tuesday.
"[We are] on target to release Thursday, Aug. 31st assuming no stop-ship items [are] discovered," the meeting's online minutes read.

For Mike Schroepfer's sake (see the State of the Firefox) let's hope it does come out on Thursday.

The Mozilla Museum

2006-08-28T21:20:00.000-07:00

If you have a high speed connection and some time to kill, check out the Mozilla Museum, a collection of pictures of Mozilla painted by Vincent van Mozh. There are tons of great Mozilla themed graphic, especially at this page (Warning: high speed connection recommended!) Here a few samples below:

Windows Vista Boot Up Sound

2006-08-28T15:34:00.000-07:00

Over the past few days there been some interesting news and outrage about Windows Vista's Boot Up sound. I first learned of this outrage via CyberNet Tech News, Vista Will Not Let You Disable the Startup Sound:

"Microsoft may not give me the option to disable the startup sound in Windows Vista though. Why would they do such a thing? Robert Scoble had the pleasure of talking with Steve Ball, program manager for the Windows Audio Video Excellence team, who gave a reason for this decision:

"A short, brief, positive confirmation that your machine is now conscious and ready to react. You can turn on your Vista machine, go eat some cereal, while your machine is cold booting and then this gentle sound will come out telling you that you can log in." "

Then today on Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog, Debate over Windows Vista's startup sound:

"For details, see Robert Scoble's notes on his conversation with Steve Ball, Microsoft group program manager for Windows audio and video. According to the post, the purpose of making it unchangeable would be to help create a "spiritual side" to the Windows "branding experience" and to help people calibrate the volume on their computers at startup. Ball told Scoble that a final decision hasn't been made, but he said that's the current plan."

There are several valid comments in regards to Todd Bishop's Article, most have to do with using a Windows PC in a corporate environment. More so having to reboot for software updates or even if the freakin' PC crashes. I never gave this much thought, even though on some days I have to reboot my Windows PC at work several times. The reason being, we don't have speakers on our PC's, if we want to listen to audio, we use head phones.

FF 2.0 Beta 2 Teaser

2006-08-26T21:06:00.000-07:00

According to CyberNet Tech News, Mozilla has released the 2nd Release Candidate (RC) for Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 (quite the release name). As it is stands now and this ~~could~~ likely will change, the official release of Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 is scheduled for Wednesday, August 30th. CyberNet also indicates a possible release date for the final version of Firefox 2.0 on October 24th. However, they don't declare where they got this piece of information as the Mozilla Developer's Calendar only goes up to Firefox 2.0 RC1 on September 19th (and even that is subject to change). More information to come soon.

A Look Back at Dell in 1996

2006-08-25T19:04:00.000-07:00

CyberNet Tech News take a look at Dell's Homepage from 1996. I do love the author's closing thoughts,

Looking back really makes you appreciate the 3GHz machines that we can buy now at the 233MHz prices from back then!

The price/technology difference is incredible. I remember back in 1994 I upgraded my then desktop (the thing literally was the size of a small desk) computer from 1 to 2 MB of video RAM and 4 MB to 8 MB main RAM. The video upgrade wasn't too bad about $25, but the main RAM for those 4 MB cost me $256!!! All this so I could play Sim City 3000 which was about another $50. So, you ask how much RAM can you get today for $256? Doing some quick research I could get 2 GB for around the same price today.

Oh, one final thought in regards to this comment,

However, they don’t seem any faster because the applications are more resource intensive.

I had always thought those older computers were faster. Of course back then Microsquish didn't have an operating environment that ate up half of your computer's resources!

Yahoo's New Anti-Phishing Mechanism

2006-08-24T19:48:00.000-07:00

From CyberNet Tech News. Simple yet effective, in many ways similar to what Bank of America has done for their online site with SiteKey.

Unusual Way To Promote Firefox

2006-08-23T19:50:00.000-07:00

Someone has come up with a clever way to promote Firefox. Just follow the link: http://www.ie7.com/

Update: FF 2.0 Release Schedule (Yet Again)

2006-08-22T18:10:00.000-07:00

FF 2.0 Beta 2 has been delayed yet again, this time to August 30th. No official word as to what is causing the delays although rumor has it, may have something to do with the 'Visual Refresh'. Here the latest release schedule per the Mozilla Developers Calendar:

August 30th - Beta 2 UPDATED
September 19th - Release Candidate 1
TBA - Release Candidate 2
TBA - Release Candidate 3
TBA - FINAL RELEASE

In my State of the Fox entry from last week I pointed out a couple comments from Mike Schroepfer about the FF 2.0 release schedule:

"He says Firefox 2.0 "definitely ship by the end of this year...with beta 2 out sometime in August." Kinda cutting it close on the beta 2 release as we are already up to August 23rd, but another week's delay would put it August 30th. I'm little surprised, but then again not about the 'definitely ship by the end of this year' comment. Granted FF 2.0 has taken a bit longer then expected, granted not as bad as IE 7 or Windows Vista. But still year's end? Last we heard we were looking at then end of September (26th)."

I guessed correctly about the week's delay on Beta 2. However, I wondering now when FF 2.0 is going to ship since now the Mozilla Developers Calendar doesn't have anything past RC1 in late September. This announcement is a bit ironic being Microsoft annoucned today, Windows Vista will ship as scheduled which is either November or January depending if business or consumer edition.

The state of Firefox

2006-08-17T19:43:00.000-07:00

NewsForge recently (August 4th) did an interview with Mozilla Corp.'s Vice President of Engineering, Mike Schroepfer. The bulk of the interview they talk about JavaScript, security as well as better migration for Linux users who got Firefox packaged with their Linux distribution. In regards to JavaScript, Firefox 2.0 will ship with the new and improved JavaScript 1.7, which is the first upgrade in nearly 6 years (sorta like IE).

Further, transitioning to Firefox 2.0 should go much smoother compared to what many of us went through when we went from 1.0.7 to 1.5 last December. Many of us experienced the heart-ache of our favorite extensions becoming broken and desperately waiting for the developers to make them compatible with 1.5. Mike Schroepfer explained, "the 2.0 branch was developed on an API freeze from 1.5, so there should be very little breakage between releases."

Finally, Mike does give us a brief glimpse into the FF 2.0 & 3.0 timeliness. He says Firefox 2.0 "definitely ship by the end of this year...with beta 2 out sometime in August." Kinda cutting it close on the beta 2 release as we are already up to August 23rd, but another week's delay would put it August 30th. I'm little surprised, but then again not about the 'definitely ship by the end of this year' comment. Granted FF 2.0 has taken a bit longer then expected, granted not as bad as IE 7 or Windows Vista. But still year's end? Last we heard we were looking at then end of September (26th).

Mike's comments about Firefox 3.0 are intriguing, "...architectural changes in 3.0 to upgrade the graphics subsystem, and it's likely that 3.0 will include a revamped bookmark system that didn't make the cut for the 2.0 series." 'Revamped bookmark system'? That's a bit wordy Mike, did you mean 'Places'?

FF 1.5.0.7 Coming

2006-08-17T19:01:00.000-07:00

In about two weeks Mozilla will release an update for Firefox. Version 1.5.0.7 is addressing some possible security issues and any known regressions. Now, hopefully this update will go smoother than the 1.5.0.5 update did when Mozilla pulled a 'Microsoft'. In this instance a 'Microsoft' is causing a problem with fixing another problem, which they quickly fixed with the 1.5.0.6 release. At this time there are no planned updates for Thunderbird which will remain at the current 1.5.0.5 version.

More information on the Firefox 1.5.0.7 Planing Page

Update: FF 2.0 Release Schedule (Again)

2006-08-10T19:39:00.000-07:00

Bad news.,there seems to be one pesky bug (and is big one) that won't go away. The burrito-overflow bug (Cannot eat 10 burritos in 2 hours without vomiting) is a pesky one. Okay, so the developers are were just trying to break the tension with a little fun. There is a serious bug though it has to do with the rendering. This however has knocked the current release schedule totally out-of-whack with all the major milestones being pushed back a week. There is some good news though, if everything goes as planned (which thus far it hasn't) FF 2.0 is still scheduled for final release on September 26th. Here is the new (and subject to change) release schedule:

August 23rd, Beta 2
September 8th, Release Candidate 1
September 15th, Release Candidate 2
September 22nd, Release Candidate 3
September 26th, FF 2.0 FINAL RELEASE

Firefox 1.5.0.6 Released

2006-08-02T19:38:00.000-07:00

Shortly after the release of Firefox 1.5.0.5, users discovered one of the new security fixes created a new problem. Bug 346167 was created on July 27th due to the Windows MediaPlayer plugin stopped working on certain sites. This bug fix is the Firefox 1.5.0.6 release.

If your Firefox did not auto-updated to the new version, you can obtain the download by selecting from the Help Menu, 'Check for Updates...' or you can get the update here.

200 Million Downloads

2006-08-02T16:57:00.000-07:00

On Monday, July 31st, the Firefox download counter crossed the 200 million mark. More info can be found at Spread Firefox.

UPDATE: Firefox 2.0 Release Schedule

2006-08-02T15:49:00.000-07:00

The Firefox 2.0 Release Schedule has been updated slightly. The Beta 2 release has been pushed back until August 15th now to give developers time to finish the 'visual refresh' (look) of FF 2.0 release. CyberNet has more information about the Visual Refresh including screen shots.

Trojan Horse Mozilla Firefox Extension

2006-08-01T21:07:00.000-07:00

mozillaZine posted an article/warning on Thursday, July 27th, in regards to a Trojan Horse Mozilla Firefox Extension. The Trojan Horse, dubbed by McAfee as FormSpy and Sophos as Troj/FireSpy-A is installed by a Windows malware known as Downloader-AXM. This piece of malware is used to download and install various Trojan Horses. For Firefox users, it downloads and silently installs (bypasses the installation warning) a modified version of Numbered Links 0.9 extension. While Numbered Links 0.9 is a legitimate extension the Trojan version will capture and send banking info along with passwords entered in Firefox as well as those for ICQ, IMAP, FTP and POP3 to a remote computer.

So, you ask how does this happen and how does this Downloader-AXM get onto a users computer? The process is quite simple and yet avoidable. The Downloader-AXM is an e-mail attachment contained in an e-mail claiming to be an order confirmation from WalMart.com. When users open the attachment, Downloader-AXM is installed and it then scans the computer for software it can exploit. It also known to take advantage of a 3-year old exploit in IE. When running Firefox FormSpy will install the modified Numbered Links 0.9 extension.

To check for infection, simply review your extensions list via Tools Menu and Extensions (note FF 2.0 users select Add-Ons. If it is in the list and you did NOT install this extension prior chances are your computer is infected. Take a look at McAfee virus profile of FormSpy for more information.

A couple things to keep in mind, McAfee has declared FromSpy as a low risk virus. Further the only way FormSpy is going to get on your machine is if you open the e-mail attachment from the bogus WalMart.com e-mail. Most users know better than to open e-mail attachments and further most anti-virus programs scan incoming e-mail attachments.

FF & Thunderbird 1.5.0.5 Released

2006-07-28T19:49:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week Mozilla released version 1.5.0.5 of both Firefox and Thunderbird. If your Firefox and/or Thunderbird did not auto-updated to the new version, you can obtain the download by selecting from the Help Menu, 'Check for Updates...'

FF 1.5.0.5 Release Notes:

Firefox 1.5.0.5 is a security update that is part of our ongoing program to provide a safe Internet experience for our customers. We recommend that all users upgrade to this latest version.

Improvements to product stability
Added changes for Frisian locale (fy-NL)
Several security fixes

Thunderbird 1.5.0.5 Release Notes:

Thunderbird 1.5.0.5 provides stability and security enhancements that are part of our ongoing program to provide a safer email experience for our users. We recommend that all Thunderbird users upgrade to this latest version.

Here's what's new in Thunderbird 1.5.0.5:

Improvements to product stability.
Several security fixes.

The Rumbling Edge has a more detailed list of notable bug fixes.

Firefox 2.0 Release Schedule

2006-07-23T02:03:00.000-07:00

I happen to come across the Mozilla Developer's Calendar which has the preliminary release schedule for Firefox 2.0:

August 23rd, Beta 2 UPDATED
September 8th, Release Candidate 1 UPDATED
September 15th, Release Candidate 2 UPDATED
September 22nd, Release Candidate 3 UPDATED
September 26th, FF 2.0 FINAL RELEASE

All the releases are about a month later than the Historical Schedule dates. Not too bad considering MS may not have Windows Vista ready by the projected January 2007 date. A Seattle-based software developer (not MS or Mozilla) has challenged Bill Gates to a $10,000 bet: He says Windows Vista will not be released as scheduled in January.

FF 2.0 New Feature: Tab Overflow

2006-07-23T01:44:00.000-07:00

While I was searching for news on an updated release schedule for Firefox 2.0, I came across an article over on internetnews.com about a new feature called Tab Overflow. This feature showed up in the Beta 1 release earlier this month. Funny I don't recall seeing anything in the What's New, must fall under the general category of 'Changes to tabbed browsing behavior'.

According to the article, the tests performed by internetnews.com, showed that this feature kicked in after opening 17 tabs while running at the 1024x768 resolution. The Tab Overflow feature will allow you scroll through your open tabs in the tab bar and still see what they are. A long time ago I took a look at the very hefty (weighing in at 266K), Tab Mix Plus extension and one of the options it allowed was a double decked tab bar.

Next time I fire up FF 2.0 Beta 1, I'll have to experiment with this. But I just can't see having 17 tabs opened at once. As it is now, I have 8 opened and for me that is a lot. The feature is suppose to be improved in the Beta 2 release due out August 8th. Which will likely be the next time I do anything with FF 2.0, unless I do some testings for Go Firefox!

Update: Time to Replace Those Old Windows

2006-07-21T15:43:00.000-07:00

As y'all may recall, I finally broke down and installed Windows XP SP2 on my system. Well recently while working on a computer for someone else I ran into a bit..okay more like major problem after I installed SP2 on the computer. I couldn't get on the Internet anymore! 'Group Policy' was blocking access to the Internet because Windows XP thinks their computer is on a home network. Technically it is, but is not. This is the way their ISP configures Windows so both computers in the household can access the Internet at the same time.

Frustrated I removed SP2 from that computer until I could find out a way to remove the 'Group Policy'. I thought I had found such a method so I went ahead and tried to reinstall SP2. May be there was a problem downloading SP2 not sure, but it would not install. I am going to end up doing a full recovery on that computer and opted not to install SP2.

So what happens if you don't install SP2:

You get this annoying message (which can be disabled) from Windows Update telling you no more support (tech support and updates) after October 10th. Well, there are folks out there still running Windows 95 and I ain't going to pay to get Microsoft tech support anyway.
You won't be able to run the Windows Defender which is basically the old MS Anti Spyware and firewall. Since I started using Firefox, the amount of Spyware on my computer dropped to nearly nill. I use a third-party (and free) firewall program. I truly dislike the Windows Firewall, especially the one that comes with SP2.
You won't be able to use Media Player 10. I don't use Media Player. For MP3's I use Nullsoft's WinAmp and for video's Real Player
You won't be able to use IE7. I don't want to use IE7, especially after I went to install the beta version and it advised me to disable my virus protection and firewall and to BACKUP my system. I also wonder what kinda spyware crap will be installed with IE7. It is bad enough that MS Windows Genuine Advantage is behaving like spyware. MS is facing a couple lawsuits regarding this anti-piracy tool.

I have ended up removing SP2 from my system today and then ran all the updates need for SP1. I figure as long as I keep my virus protection up to date and continue using the Firewall I should be fine. Especially since I am using Firefox and Thunderbird instead of Internet Exploiter and Outhouse. Also there are plenty of free anti spyware programs such as Spybot and Lavasoft's Adware.

At the point the only thing Microsoft on my system is Windows itself. I have ditched MS Office for Sun Microsystem's Open Office and Front Page as since been replaced with Nvu which is based off the old Mozilla Composer. Both of these applications, just like Firefox and Thunderbird are free to download, use and since they are open-source make changes as you desire.

Preview: FF 2.0 Beta 1

2006-07-12T20:08:00.000-07:00

Earlier today Mozilla announced the next next milestone for FF 2.0, Beta 1 has been released. There a handful of new features and changes with this release, which I will touch on briefly.

Undo Close Tab. The one feature I always loved about SessionSaver was 'snapback tab'. Accidentally closed the wrong tab, just go into the tools menu, under SessionSaver, Snapback Tab and select the tab you wanted to reopen. FF 2.0 has this feature now and is much simpler to use. Simply right-click anywhere on the tab bar and select 'Undo Close Tab'. Firefox will automatically reopen the last tab you closed (repeat as needed for multiple tabs), putting you back right where you were.

Note: Automatic restoration of browser session still only applies to a crash (or when you click the restart link in the add-ons manager) not if you close the browser.

Warn when opening a lot of tabs at once. This options is so new it is not even in the help yet. To access this option, from Tools Menu, select Options...,click on Tabs and it is the last option on the list. I have not run into (or heard from anyone who has) any troublesome sites which open tons of tabs at once. I've had this happen on IE a site would open windows faster than I could close them. It got to the point Windows had a heart-attack and crashed, not a pretty site! Kudos to the developers for thinking ahead on this one.
Inline Spellchecking. This has been an available feature for a while, but was not working correctly on certain sites such as Blog sites, Delphi Forums, etc. Still going to take some getting use to right-clicking on the misspelled words.
Anti-Phishing. Major improvements have been made to this feature. No longer do you need to buggy Google Toolbar. Here's the info from the FF 2.0 Beta 1 FAQs:
How does the Phishing Protection feature work in Firefox 2 Beta 1?
Phishing Protection is turned on by default in Firefox 2 Beta 1, and works by checking the sites that you browse to against a list of known phishing sites. This list is automatically downloaded and regularly updated within Firefox 2 Beta 1 when the anti-phishing feature is enabled. Since phishing attacks can occur very quickly, there's also an option check the sites you browse to against an online service such as Google for more up-to-date protection. This enhanced capability can be turned on via the Anti-Phishing preferences pane. (Note: final set of anti-phishing service providers TBD.)"

WARNING: This is not a final release of FF 2.0, use at your own risk. But if you do choose to use this create & use a new profile before doing so!More information and the download link can be obtained at The Mozilla Developer News.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer interview with Blake Ross

2006-07-12T13:35:00.000-07:00

On June 30th, Todd Bishop of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer interviewed Mozilla Firefox Co-Founder Blake Ross over lunch at Gnomedex. This is very good interview and covers a lot ground. There are a few questions/answers that I want to expound upon.

Q: The community is at work on Firefox 2.0. Given the success of the first Firefox, is there pressure to make big advances with the second one?

Ross: Some of the feedback we have gotten about the 2.0 release (test version) has been, what's new here? It looks like the 1.0 release because most of the work that has been going on has been to make it more stable, how do we fix the memory problems that people are complaining about, how do we make everyday tasks easier – like spell-checking, for example, in Web forms. Little things that you're not going to notice when you first fire up Firefox 2.0, but you're going to use it for two weeks and say, yeah, this is definitely an overall better experience.

On May 15th in my entry: A New Milestone for FF 2.0, I discussed some of the new features with FF 2.0 after having an opportunity to try out the latest test version. Yes, to the casual user it is going to look very similar to the 1.0.* versions. However, it is more the simple changes such as the new add-ons interface (combines themes & extensions managers into one easy to use interface) that make the difference. By far the best change with FF 2.0 is having the close button on each tab without an extension. Unfortunately, I have not used FF 2.0 that much yet to see if there has been improvements with the memory problems. There is the possibility of a Beta release coming out some time this week and I'll investigate this more then.

Q: I know you're asked frequently about Internet Explorer 7, Microsoft's next browser. How much have you used the test version, and what do you think of it?

Ross: I've used it a little bit. The truth is that it actually looks pretty good. People don't expect me to say that, they expect me to say that it's terrible. They did exactly what we were expecting them to do, which was take a bunch of time and get IE7 up to feature parity with Firefox.

I have not yet had an opportunity to take a look at IE7 and not really sure if I am going to at this point. I don't like the install process telling me to back-up my files, close all programs and then to DISABLE my anti-virus and anti-spyware protection. Makes me a bit leery of this here product.

Q: Microsoft essentially allowed Internet Explorer to go dormant for several years, until Firefox started coming along and chipping away at its market share. What do you think about that, and what does that say about the state of competition?

Ross: That makes me furious, to be completely honest with you. That, more than anything is why we really had to start Firefox in the first place. People think that we started Firefox just to take down Microsoft, just to win some kind of competition. Why would we want to win? There's no money involved for us, there's no IPO for this company, it's a non-profit. Why would we want to do this unless there's a real need?

The truth is I think Microsoft is very directly responsible for spyware and adware and the pop-up ads in general that proliferated across the Web after they abandoned their product. I mean, this is the world's most-used software application ever ... and I just think it's irresponsible for a company to abandon it simply because they can't find a financial incentive to continue development on it.

This is by far the best part of the interview, Ross's answers are right on target. Did some research in Wikipedia about Internet Explorer's Release History:

IE 1.0, August 1995, shipped with Plus! for Windows 95
IE 1.5, January 1996
IE 2.0, November 1995
IE 3.0, August 1996
IE 4.0, September 1997
IE 5.0, March 1999, shipped with Windows 98 SE
IE 5.5, July 2000, shipped with Windows ME
IE 6.0, August 2001, shipped with Windows XP
IE 6.0 SP1, September 2002, shipped with Windows XP SP1
IE 6.0 SP2, August 2004, shipped with Windows XP SP2
IE 7.0 Beta 1, July 2005
IE 7.0 Beta 2, January 2006 (Preview)/April 2006 (final)
IE 7.0 Beta 3, June 2006
IE 7.0, 1st half 2007, shipping with Windows Vista

Looking at this history it easy to understand what Ross meant by "abandoning their product". When (and if) IE 7.0 comes out in 2007 is going to be the first time in nearly 5 1/2 years since there has been a major (not counting the bug/vulnerability fixes) new release of IE. In the mean time AOL/Time Warner's Netscape continued release newer and improved version of Netscape 7.0:

Netscape 7.0 – August 29, 2002 (based on Mozilla 1.0.1)
Netscape 7.01 – December 10, 2002 (based on Mozilla 1.0.2)
Netscape 7.02 – February 18, 2003 (based on Mozilla 1.0.2)
Netscape 7.1 – June 30, 2003 (based on Mozilla 1.4)
Netscape 7.2 – August 17, 2004 (based on Mozilla 1.7)

In May 2005, Netscape released version 8.0 based on Mozilla Firefox and has since released version 8.1 in January 2006. While IE still continues to be the dominate browser worldwide it has been losing ground and remained dormant. From OneStat.com, the most popular browsers in the USA are:

Microsoft IE ~ 79.78%
Mozilla Firefox ~ 15.82%
Apple Safari ~ 3.28%
Opera ~ 0.81%
Netscape ~ 0.20%

Overall, Mozilla Firefox's global usage share has reached 12.93 percent! Not bad for a browser which has only been fully on the market since November 2004! Noticed from the IE time line above, how work on IE 7 starts around the time Firefox is released? Could have been Microsoft realized they were in trouble, users were discovering and liking Firefox. No longer we consumers going to put up with crappy software, especially when obtaining another browser is so much simpler now. Which leads me to the final question I wanted to expound upon:

Q: Is the ultimate potential reach of Firefox limited by Microsoft's distribution of Internet Explorer as an integrated component of Windows?
Ross: Obviously it is to some degree, I can't claim that it's not. But I think that's much less of a problem in 2006 than it was in 1998 when Netscape was fighting this battle. Because there's a pretty huge difference between something shipping in the operating system vs. having to go to Best Buy and buy it, and the world we live in today, where broadband is obviously a pretty key component of a lot of people's Internet experience. It's much easier and it's much more natural today to download and install software. Firefox is what, 6 megabytes on Windows, that's a 1-minute download on broadband. I think that the barrier to entry for us to get people to download Firefox is much lower than it used to be.

People realize now they have a choice in their Internet experience and are no longer just limited to what comes on their computers. Mozilla makes it very simple to get Firefox, no registration, no OS validation, no jumping through half a dozen links, etc.!

There are several more questions in the interview. The complete interview, Q&A with Firefox's Blake Ross: Extended version can be found on Todd Bishop's Microsoft's Blog on The Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Time to Replace Those Old Windows!

2006-07-05T14:48:00.000-07:00

From the Microsoft Windows Site:

End of support for Windows 98 and Windows Me
July 11, 2006 will bring a close to Extended Support for Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, and Windows Me as part of the Microsoft Lifecycle Policy. Microsoft will retire public and technical support, including security updates, by this date.
End of support for Windows XP Service Pack 1
On October 10, 2006, Microsoft will end all public assisted support for Windows XP Service Pack1 (SP1). After this date, Microsoft will no longer provide any incident support options or security updates for this retired service pack under the policies defined by the Microsoft Support Lifecycle policy.
Full Article

I've already discovered the need to upgrade to Windows XP SP2 recently when I had tried to upgrade my Windows Anti Spyware now known as Windows Defender. Also when I attempted to upgrade to Windows Media Player 10, I also received notification I would need to have Windows XP SP2. Even after these notifications, I was hesitant to install Windows XP SP2 after a previous install when it first came out left me unable to connect to the Internet. The Anti-Spyware wasn't that big of a deal since I use other programs and as for media I use either WinAmp or Real Player. I later figured out my connectivity problems were caused by the crappy Windows firewall. I have since installed SP2 and disabled the Windows firewall and am using a third-party (as in n0n-Mirosquish) firewall program.

So you are probably wondering why the Guru finally broke down and upgraded to SP2, when I had such hostility towards that upgrade? One day I was running the usual Windows Updates when I got a popup on my taskbar's system tray informing me after October 10th no more updates. So I was left with a couple options, upgrade and hope I would able to access the Internet or do nothing and hope for the best. I could just see booting up one morning and getting the message:

This version of Windows you are running is obsolete and may no longer be used.
You must upgrade to Service Pack 2 in order to continue using Windows.

After a very long update process I was able to get Windows XP SP2 install along with all the other 'critical updates'. So far so good, I now have the new Windows Defender and I can still get on the Internet. I haven't bothered yet with Media Player 10, at least I don't think I have.

WeatherBug

2006-06-27T22:03:00.000-07:00

Over the past year and half I have been using Firefox I am on my third, make that fourth weather extension. I started out with AccuWeather's Forecastfox later upgraded to the Forecastfox Enhanced which was suppose to work better in the Firefox 1.5.0.* builds plus offer larger and more radar images. Later on tried out 1-Click Weather which uses weather.com (The Weather Channel).

The Forecastfox extensions still had compatibility issues and some international users complained it would not work correctly for their local. Forecastfox also produced a slide-up alert with the current temperature, conditions and/or warnings, even when the browser was minimized. Plus it would constantly reload/update the displayed information which even on a high-speed connection caused Firefox to slow down a bit.

1-Click Weather was nice in that it used information provided by The Weather Channel. However it became very annoying fast whenever there were alerts or warnings. It would produce an ugly pop-box which would become the focus of your browser. Highly annoying when participating in chat or composing a message and suddenly nothing is happening because that window/tab is no longer the current focus of Firefox. To make matters worse, it would re-pop the alerts/warnings constantly.

I had thought about going back to one of the Forecastfox extensions, but thought there has to be something better out there. A search on Firefox Add-on for 'Weather' turned up the WeatherBug extension.

I have to say I am very impressed with this simple extension. It is not affiliate with any particular weather providers site (weather.com or AccuWeather), but instead retrieves information from local and independent WeatherBug stations. These stations are mainly schools and airports. The toolbar icons are very compact (compared to Forecastfox or 1-Click Weather's) and simple.

Click Image For Larger View

With all the icons, simply hovering over them displays more information. The icons (from left to right) WeatherBug Icon (opens WeatherBug Web Site in current tab), current temperature, current forecast, tomorrows forecast, day-after tomorrow's forecast, WeatherBug Options.

The options are very simple:

Current Location
Sever Weather Alerts (on or off) [note: if selected, current temperature will be replaced with ALERT! Click on ALERT! to view and clear the alert]
Units of Measure (English or Metric)
Enable Weather Window (opens and I-Frame window when clicking on any forecast icon)
Display Placement (Toolbar-Menubar, Navigation Toolbar, Bookmark Toolbar, Status Bar or WeatherBug Toolbar)

There are lots of details available on the WeatherBug website when you click on the WeatherBug Icon. These include, current conditions, live camera images, more detailed forecast information and options, featured photos, storm central, World Weather, other WeatherBug stations and much, much more. Since the bulk of the details are on the WeatherBug site it keeps the extension simple and very compact at 37K. Here is how the other three compare:

1-Click Weather -- 611K
Forecastfox -- 413K
Forecastfox Enhanced -- 700K

WeatherBug also offers optional, but free additional software you can download. This allows you to get the current temperature and other information with a click from your system tray on your desktop.

While WeatherBug may not have such elaborate displays as the others, it provides the basics for quick reference. This helps keep the extension small and provides for less clutter on your browser.

Preview: Foxy Tunes 2.0

2006-06-27T21:44:00.000-07:00

The other night I received a comment about my FoxyTunes entry. The developers are coming out with a 'new & improved' version 2.0. You can get more information and download the preview at foxytunes.com .

Click Image For Larger View

Some of the new browser feature include:

Artist search on several sites such as Amazon, All Music Guide, Wikipedia and more
Song search on the iTunes Music Store
Album search on the iTunes Music Store, Amazon, Yahoo!Images and eBay
Several web search options
Quick Searches for Info, Images and Lyrics

FoxyTunes

2006-06-25T19:50:00.000-07:00

There are some extensions that I simply wonder how did I ever get along with out them? FoxyTunes is one of those extensions. Since I am always using WinAmp to listen to my music anytime I am using the computer, not just surfing the web, FoxyTunes makes things so much simpler. With FoxyTunes, you can control (right from the Firefox browser) virtually any music/media player including:

WinAmp
Real Player
iTunes
Windows Media Players
Yahoo!Music Engine
and many more (see the extension page for a complete listing)

Once installed, FoxyTunes adds all the player controls on to the status bar (see picture below). No more having to toggle away from Firefox to control your media player. The extension can also be installed for Thunderbird, but I didn't bother since I use Firefox more than I do Thunderbird.

Click Image For Larger View

From left to right, Artist Name & Song Title, FoxyTunes menu, Previous Track, Play, Pause, Stop, Next Track, on hover displays: Artist Name, Song Title, track elapsed time & total track time, Play File, Show Player, Hide Player and Mute. Not shown: Volume Control.

Themes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly Revisited

2006-06-23T15:42:00.000-07:00

I mentioned in my first post about Themes (Themes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly), how they can cause Firefox to odd things when paired up with certain extensions. A member on Go Firefox! came to us with an unusual problem, their Firefox was 'jumpy' after updating some of their extensions. Now, I have seen this before when I had had the NoScript extension installed. In fact my Firefox would un-maximize itself and do all kinds of odd stuff. Unfortunately, I do not recall what theme I may have been using at that time, but I am somewhat sure it was the standard Firefox theme.

Anyway, back to the Mexican Jumping Beans Firefox issue, us staff were scratching our heads on this one. The user gave us an InfoLister report and none of the usual suspects...err I mean, extensions were listed. However, our forum hostess, WhiteMare suggested changing to the standard Firefox theme to see if that might make a difference. Well, after they switched to the standard theme all was normal again with their Firefox. Now, it is important to understand that the theme was only part of the problem, the user still must have recently installed or updated an extension that did not get along with this particular theme.

Is Anyone Out There?

2006-06-19T21:31:00.000-07:00

This Pearls Before Swine cartoon is the inspiration for this evening's entry. I've gotten some feedback from members on Go Firefox! they have visited my blog. However, I really have no way of tracking visitors unless people leave comments!!! The only comments I have gotten thus far were obliviously done by a robot since they were by the same person, duplicated, minutes a part and not even related to the topic at hand. Because of this I have enabled to word verification feature for leaving comments. You see them all the time on web registrations forms, there is a graphic containing numbers and/or letters that you must enter in order to submit the form. This keeps those pesky spam robots from auto filling & submitting the forms.

So I am asking, if you read my entry's drop a comment (good or bad) just something so I know people are reading the humble Guru's Blog. Thanks!

Themes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

2006-06-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

The other major add-on for Firefox is Themes. From the Firefox Update Themes Page:

"Themes are skins for Firefox. They allow you to change the look and feel of the user interface and personalize it to your tastes. A theme can simply change the colors of Firefox or it can change every piece of its appearance."

There are some creative themes out there some are just simple color or icon changes. Others are well...how do I put it? I guess I'll let the author of one such theme, PimpZilla describe it "It's overdone... It's tacky... It's PimpZilla !!!' See for yourself below...

Click for large view

Some themes are cool to look at and really well done, but sometimes they make changes to the way Firefox behaves that are not just cosmetic. One member on Go Firefox! could not access some of their menus from the menu bar while using a particular theme.

Take for example the Mostly Crystal theme which has been download over 1/2 million times. With that many downloads one would think it must work okay, right? Not exactly, under the FAQs in the developers home page, there are several extensions which don't play well with this theme. Also the Google Toolbar does not function correctly with this theme.

A side note about the Google Toolbar, I have found it to be a bit troublesome and caused my Firefox to freeze up and nearly crash several times.

Another example is iPox Theme, also downloaded over 1/2 million times. But it too is not without issues. I'll give credit to the developer for fully disclosing upfront:

" I have not worked with many extensions except Sage in this theme. I have no idea how other extensions will react to my edits. If you have issues please report them in the form and possible fixes. I can't install and theme every extension. Sorry. "

This is not to say that all themes are going to be troublesome and break your Firefox. There may be (and I am sure are) many good themes out there that work flawlessly. But if you start having troubles with Firefox behaving oddly and/or your extensions don't function as they should, try switching over the 'default' theme to see if it is your newly installed theme giving you the troubles. To do this:

From the Tools Menu select Themes (FF 2.0 select 'Add-Ons, then click 'Themes')
Highlight Firefox (default) and click 'Use Theme'
Close and restart Firefox.

Troubleshooting Add-ons Installation

2006-06-12T20:50:00.000-07:00

For the most part, add-ons (extensions and themes) are trouble free. However, once in a while an add-on will not install, upgrade or uninstall correctly. Or may be you launched a different version of Firefox on the same profile and now your add-ons are disabled because Firefox says they are incompatible.

I will cover the three most common issues with Add-ons Installation:

Software Installation Disabled
Extension(s) not installed after restarting Firefox
Add-on(s) Disabled by Firefox

Software Installation Disabled
This issue mainly occurs when upgrading to a major version of Firefox such as going from 0.* to 1.0.* or 1.0.* to 1.5.0.* versions. For some reason Firefox disabled the installation of themes plug-ins and extensions XPI files. These instructions for re-enabling downloads, are from the Mozilla site:

Firefox 1.0

From the 'Tools' Menu select 'Options..."
Click 'Web Features'
Place a check in the box 'Allow Sites To Install Software'

Firefox 1.5
Starting in Firefox 1.5 the option to allow web sites to install software has been removed from the user interface (UI). The software installation option must be enabled to allow installation of themes, extensions and certain plugins

If you previously disabled this option and then updated to Firefox 1.5, the disabled setting will be carried over. Since the option to enable software installation no longer exists in the UI, you will need to use about:config to reset the "xpinstall.enabled" preference to the default "true" value. Here's step by step how to do this:

Type about:config into the Location Bar and hit enter.
Type xpi to filter and find xpinstall.enabled.
Make sure it's value is true. (double click will toggle).

Extension(s) Not Installed After Restarting Firefox
This issue is becoming less common but use to occur frequently with extensions that did not upgrade correctly. There were some extensions that required you to remove them before installing the new version. Failure to do so resulted in a phantom extension that could not be upgraded or removed.

If after restarting Firefox the extension has not installed go to the Tools Menu and select 'Extensions' (FF 2.0, select 'Add-ons'). If the extension appears in the list with this message '(Name) will be installed (removed/upgrade) when Firefox restarts', then follow these directions:

Close Firefox
Locate your Profile Folder
Delete the following files from your profile folder:

extensions.ini
extensions.cache
extensions.rdf

Restart Firefox.

Firefox will rebuild the extensions list and these files. Your extension should be installed and functioning now.

Add-on(s)Disabled by Firefox
Firefox will automatically disable any extension that is not compatible with build you are running. This will happen if you try to run and older or newer version of Firefox on the same profile. However, even after you return to the correct version of Firefox, it will not automatically re-enable the add-ons for you. This happened to one our Go Firefox! members who posted:

"...I made the mistake of trying out Bon Jovi...That piece of work has now disabled all my extensions on FF 1.5"

To start, it's Bon Echo after the park in Canada, not after the 80's New Jersey rock group. Second and foremost, they should not have been trying out this "piece of work" with the same profile as they were using with Firefox 1.5. This very reason is why I stress the importance of running separate profiles for testing in my Profiles Revisited posting.

But...this same thing happened to the humble Guru. I had installed the newer version on Bon Echo and didn't noticed the box 'Run Bon Echo after installation is completed' was checked. It ran on my FF 1.5 profile and all my extensions became disabled, even after re-running 1.5. I ended up having to go through and reinstall (or upgrade) all my extensions (not an easy task when you have 38 extensions). The good news is you shouldn't have to go through and reinstall all your extensions. In order to restore your add-ons follow these directions:

Close Firefox
Locate your Profile Folder
Delete the following files from your profile folder:

extensions.ini
extensions.cache
extensions.rdf

Restart Firefox.

Firefox will rebuild your extensions and themes list and these files. Your extension should be re-enabled and functioning again.

Note: This post was adapted from FF Extension Guru's post, Add-ons FAQs: Troubleshooting Add-ons Installation from Go Firefox!

Problematic Extensions

2006-06-08T19:34:00.000-07:00

If your Firefox starts acting odd, slows down, hangs, crashes without reason, etc., chances are you could have a problematic extension installed. Sometimes these extensions are fine by themselves, but if paired with another extension could cause troubles. For example, running No Script and FlashBlock together can cause problems. Flash Blocking is included with No Script, so it is redundant to have both installed.

The folks over at mozillaZine and have come up with a list of known Problematic Extensions.
The list goes into details as to the issues caused by the said extension and offers solutions from changing settings to removing the extension and offering a substitute. Also includes references to the said problems.

A New Look

2006-06-08T16:24:00.000-07:00

When I first setup this Blog, I didn't spend much time on the template or adding any customizations. Over the past couple nights I have switched to a 'calmer' template and made some minor changes to the layout. I have also added more links along with listing them under the Links of Interest and Firefox Links.

Installing Spellbound FF 1.5.0.*

2006-06-04T12:27:00.000-07:00

Note: Please see the SpellBound - Spellchecker For Firefox entry for more information about the Spellbound Extensions.

With these builds of Firefox the installation site still automatically detect your version of Firefox, but when you go to install you will get an incompatibility error message. Getting SpellBound to work on this build takes a few extra steps:

If you have already installed SpellBound on FF 1.5.0.1 or newer and have upgrade to the newer FF build, skip to step 8.
You will need to install the Nightly Tester Tools extension (if you already have Nightly Tester Tools skip to Step 5), open a new tab.
Drag into the new tab this link: http://tinyurl.com/q5z2f
Closed and restart Firefox
Install (When the installation box appears, check the box: 'Install using Nightly Tester Tools...'): SpellBound Extension (drag link into new tab)
Select your operating system (Windows, Linux, or Mac OS X) and click the link below to install the spell check libraries When the installation box appears, check the box: 'Install using Nightly Tester Tools...' (drag link into new tab):

Close and restart Firefox
Go to mozdev.org and download your desired dictionaries - Dictionaries for Spellbound

Adapted From: Go Firefox!: Spellbound FAQs

SpellBound - Spellchecker For Firefox

2006-06-04T10:39:00.000-07:00

SpellBound is the one Firefox extension that is a must have for me! SpellBound was developed by Robert Strong who is on the development team for Firefox 2.0 due out late this summer. Now in Firefox 2.0 inline (spell as you type) will be an included feature. But you can have it now with SpellBound.

So, why SpellBound?

It is a Spellchecker for your browser
It works on any site with text area such as web forms, forums (mozillaZine, Delphi Forums), web-based e-mails (Hotmail, G-Mail, Yahoo!Mail), and even Blogs!

There two different versions of Spellbound, Spellbound, the 'classic' version and the Developmental Version.

The 'classic' version is for folks running builds older than Firefox 1.5 (it will work with some effort on Firefox 1,5 and above, see entry Installing Spellbound on FF 1.5.0.*). This version adds a 'Check Spelling...' command to your context (right-click) menu and you can add the optional icon on your toolbar.

The developmental version is design to be used with Firefox 1.5.0.* builds and is a preview of what will be standard in Firefox 2.0. The developmental version is so much easier to install and doesn't have migration (moving to a newer version of FF) issues as does the classic version. The biggest and best feature is the inline or spell as you type feature. Very similar to the inline spell checking you see in MS Office, OpenOffice.org, MS Outlook, Thunderbird, etc. It will place a red underline on any misspelled word. However, instead of right-clicking you need to CTRL+Left-Click to access the SpellBound context menu. From there you can pick from a list of suggestions, add the word to your dictionary or ignore the word.

	SpellBound (Classic)	SpellBound Developmental
Firefox Builds	1.0.* (can work with 1.5.0.* but not recommended)	1.5.0.* or newer ONLY
Inline Spellcheck	NO	YES
Spellcheck Icon & via Context Menu	YES	YES
Migration Issues	Yes, dictionary needs to be reinstalled on each upgrade and other issues with 1.5.0.* builds	No re-installation needed after upgrades

Installation Instructions

SpellBound (classic) Firefox 1.0.* (not 1.5.0.*) - follow the instructions on the SpellBound Installation page.
SpellBound (classic) Firefox 1.5.0.*- see entry Installing Spellbound on FF 1.5.0.*
SpellBound Developmental Firefox 1.5.0.*:

Open a new tab
Drag this link into the new tab: http://exchangecode.com/spellbound/downloads/spellbound-dev_20060108.xpi

After the extensions has installed close and restart Firefox

While in a text-area, right click and select 'Check Spelling..." from the menu.

On the bottom left of the 'Check Spelling' window, select English/United States 'Language:' drop down box

Click 'Close'

Note to MAC users, there appears to be an issue with the SpellBound Dictionaries with the Firefox 1.5.0.* builds. You will not be able to use SpellBound. However, this problem should be resolved with the release of FF 2.0 later this summer.

IE Tab

2006-06-02T21:26:00.000-07:00

Firefox continues to gain popularity and each day more and more sites are becoming Firefox friendly. HOWEVER, there are those sites such as Microsoft Windows Update that refuse to work with Firefox. When you come across a site such as this does it mean you need to open Internet Exploiter...I mean Explorer? Not necessarily, I would say 99% of the sites which are not Firefox friendly can be view within Firefox using the IE Tab Extension.

IE Tab is one of my must have extensions, right up there with Adblock Plus, CoLT, Greasemonkey, Spellbound Developmental (future blog entry) and Foxy Tunes. IE Tab opens Internet Explorer right in a Firefox Tab! This allows you to still view those pesky sites that don't like Firefox. Once the extension is installed some new commands are added. In the context (right-click) menu, when you right-click either on the page or on a link, you will have the options 'Open Link In IE Tab or View Page In IE Tab' From the Tools Menu you will have the new item 'IE Tab Options'

The IE Tab Options allows you to add or remove sites to a list to always be rendered (opened) in the embedded IE Tab. You can either type in the URL or if you navigate to the site you want it will be displayed in the URL box.

I said that it works with 99% of the sites which want IE. The Narada Radio is part of that 1%, it plain out refused to work even in IE Tab. For that I had to have Internet Exploiter open. But for everything else that wants IE, IE Tab will work great for you.

Bon Echo Alpha 3 Milestone

2006-06-02T00:28:00.000-07:00

From mozillaZine, Saturday, May 27th, 2006:

"Yesterday, Bon Echo Alpha 3 was released as scheduled. This latest milestone of the code that will eventually become Mozilla Firefox 2.0 adds new anti-phishing features and includes support for client-side session and persistent storage as specified by the WHATWG. Furthermore, when using Google or Yahoo! in the Search bar, users are presented with their previous searches in addition to search suggestions.
The Mozilla Developer News weblog has an announcement about the release of Bon Echo Alpha 3, which includes download links for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. The Bon Echo Alpha 3 Release Notes also have more information.
The Bon Echo Planning Center has details about future plans, including the Firefox 2 milestone schedule, which has the first feature-complete beta set for release in June."

It appears the anti-phishing feature is going to be part of the Goggle Toolbar. Below is a sample of the warning message you will get if you navigate upon a fake site.

Click Image For Larger View

Thunderbird 1.5.0.4 Released

2006-06-01T21:49:00.000-07:00

What's New in Thunderbird 1.5.0.4
Upgrade From Thunderbird 1.5.0.2

Thunderbird 1.5.0.4 provides stability and security enhancements that are part of our ongoing program to provide a safer email experience for our users. We recommend that all Thunderbird users upgrade to this latest version.

Here's what's new in Thunderbird 1.5.0.4:

Universal Binary Support for Mac OS X which provides native support for Macintosh with Intel Core processors. Thunderbird supports the enhancements to performance introduced by the new MacIntel chipsets.
Improvements to product stability.
Several security fixes.

See complete release notes for more details.

Firefox 1.5.0.4 Released

2006-06-01T20:29:00.000-07:00

In Mozilla's on going commitment to provide a quality and safe product, Firefox 1.5.0.4 was released tonight. See the release notes for full details of FF 1.5.0.4

What's New in Firefox 1.5.0.4

Firefox 1.5.0.4 is a security update that is part of our ongoing program to provide a safe Internet experience for our customers. We recommend that all users upgrade to this latest version.

Improvements to product stability
Several security fixes

Release Date: June 1, 2006.

Profiles Revisited

2006-06-01T13:00:00.000-07:00

Last month I mentioned about my Multiple Profile Disorder but I never really went into the importance of having multiple profiles. Never gave that much thought, until today on Go Firefox!, a member learned & discovered what happens if you try to run the same profile on a developmental version of Firefox. A quick reminder about profiles from the Firefox Help site:

Multiple profiles and profile management is an advanced feature, mainly intended for developers. Unless you are an extension developer or an advanced user, you should probably not be trying to use multiple profiles.

I am what they called an 'advanced user' which means I tend to play and crash the test versions of new Firefox builds. A couple weeks back I was doing a lot of testing with the new Bon Echo release. First thing I did after downloading and installing the release was create a new profile. There are several reasons why I did this, most importantly I did not want to mess up or lose any of my settings for FF 1.5.0.3.

Remember, your profile not only includes all your browser settings and preferences not to mention your bookmarks, but extensions, themes and plug-ins too. Many of the extensions I have installed in FF 1.5.0.3 will not work (at least not yet) in Bon Echo. Firefox has a safeguard in place to prevent an incompatible extension from causing problems, it disables the said extension. If you return to a compatible version of Firefox then it should re-enable the extensions, but sometimes you may end up having to restart in Safe Mode and manually reactivate the extensions.

In my case I have a profile for Firefox 1.5 (or 1.5.0.3) as well as a different profile for Bon Echo. I have setup the program short cuts to include loading with the desired profile. Below are my program short cuts for FF 1.5.0.3 and Bon Echo.

Firefox 1.5.0.3: "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox 1.5.0.3\firefox.exe" -p "1.5.0.3"
Bon Echo: "C:\Program Files\Bon Echo\firefox.exe" -p "bonecho"

Notice the '-p' after the location in the short cut? This tells Firefox to either launch the profile manager or the specified profile. If nothing follows the '-p' then Firefox will launch the profile manager which will allow you to create, delete, select and/or make as default a profile. You can also set this up so each time Firefox is launched the profile manager opens. This is useful for computers with multiple users so each person can have their own profile with their own settings.

For more detailed information on profiles be sure to review the Firefox Help site.

Keeping Your Firefox Updated

2006-05-29T08:54:00.000-07:00

Firefox is ever changing, there are lots of updates to the browser itself and depending on which extensions you use those can have frequent updates as well. Firefox by default wants to install ALL these updates automatically for you. Not a good idea, I prefer to have some control and know what I am installing so if there is a problem I can have something to work with. First thing we will want to do is to disable the automatic installation of Firefox updates. To do this:

From the Tools Menu, select 'Options...'
On top of the Options Window click the 'Advanced' Icon
Click on the 'Update' tab
In the section 'When updates for Firefox are found:", click the button for 'Ask me what I want to do'
Click 'OK"

With this setting, Firefox will prompt you when there is an update for the browser itself and ask you if you want to install it. Now, if you decline the upgrade at first you can get the notification again by going to Help menu, 'Check for Updates...'

Prior to version 1.5, Firefox had its own built-in extension update notifier. With Firefox 1.5, that went away in favor of automatic updates. However with the Update Notifier Extension, it will check (from ever 6 to 24 hours) for new versions of your extensions and themes. Just make sure once you have the extension installed you go into the settings and disable the install options.

The Year Of The Suns? (Part 3)

2006-05-24T22:35:00.000-07:00

What one word could describe The Suns this year? How about 'drama'! They pulled off a win on Monday against The Clippers in Game 7. Tonight, they lead the game...until the 3rd quarter then things started falling apart. Missed shot (especially 3-pointers) after shot by the Suns but the Mavericks kept scoring and took the lead. At one point the Mavericks had a 9 point lead. With minutes left the 'drama' unfolded... a couple 3-pointers including one from Nash, the Suns took the lead only to lose it again with 4.8 seconds remaining. At the last second, or more like 1/2 second Boris Diaw, scores the winning basket to give the Suns a 119 to 118 lead. But wait there's more! As if the Mavericks weren't already shocked that they had lost the game they managed to foul Thomas who tacked on 2 more points with free-throws. Final score 121 to 118. Sun's lead the Western Conference Finals 1-0.

The drama doesn't end here though, Raja Bell strained his left calf late in the 4th and was out for the rest of the game. Unknown if he will be back on Friday. Shawn Marion may have injured his left ankle also in the 4th quarter. But he plans on playing on Friday. Assistant Coach Marc Iavaroni, discovered being on the sidelines doesn't mean you are safe. While trying to save a loose ball in the 3rd quarter, Leandro Barbosa ended up sending the ball into Marc Iavaroni face. Iavaroni shook it off an appeared to be unhurt.

The drama continues on Friday with Game 2 in Dallas. Even if Bell is unable to play, The Suns have demonstrated they can play and still win without him. There are plenty of other players on the team that can fill in and keep the team in gear. Unlike last year with San Antonio, they are not dependent on a couple key players to win a game.

Meanwhile in the Eastern Conference Finals, the Miami Heat currently lead the series against the Detroit Pistons. Game 2 is on Thursday. Early prediction for the finals, but why not The Suns & The Heat?

silicon.com interview with Mitchell Baker

2006-05-24T16:13:00.000-07:00

Mitchell Baker Talks to silicon.com About Mozilla in the Enterprise

silicon.com has an interview with Mitchell Baker, which focuses on the limited success of Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Thunderbird in the enterprise market to date. The Mozilla Corporation President attributes some of the lack of success to a reliance on proprietary technologies within some businesses. She singles out intranets that only work with Microsoft Internet Explorer as a particular problem. However, she claims that the fact that Firefox is open-source does not on its own hold back adoption in large organisations. [complete article]

I have to say this quote describes the issue very well:

"Enterprises have intranets that only work with IE. We can't fix their intranet" -- Mitchell Baker, CEO Mozilla Corporation

I work for a large organization that is very reliant on IE. Everything from our online manual to our scheduling and main systems as well as the intranet are all IE based. I have limited to access to the company's intranet from home, but I am unable to access directly via Firefox. In order to access the intranet I can still use Firefox but have to activate the IE Tab extension. This allows me to run IE in one tab on Firefox.

I know our techs use Firefox as I saw the familiar Firefox logo on one of our techs' desktop. When the main system (IE based) crashed he had remotely accessed his computer from my computer to check some settings. But I doubt it will ever be widely used especially since everything is design to run (or more commonly crash) on IE. The only way I could see thing changing would only be if the company the platform for our system suddenly decided to switch to Firefox, but that is highly unlikely given our organization's reliance on IE.

The article also briefly (a couple sentences) discussed FF 2.0 (set for release 3rd quarter 2006) as well as, Mozilla giving back profits to the community.

The Year Of The Suns? (Part 2)

2006-05-22T20:15:00.000-07:00

The last couple nights have been 'do-or-die' for three of the match-ups in the NBA Conference Semi-Finals. Last night, the Detroit Pistons knocked out the Cleveland Cavilers to advance to the Conference Finals. This series with the Miami Heat will begin Tuesday in Detroit.

Meanwhile on the Western Conference there are two big games tonight, San Antonio Spurs and the Dallas Mavericks as well as the Los Angeles Clippers and our Phoenix Suns. Now recall last year the Suns made it to the conference finals after defeating the Mavericks in six games only to be stopped by the Spurs in five games. I had said prior if we can get past the Clippers, which I really thought was going to a lot easier than it has turned out to be, ideally we would like to matched up with the Mavericks. But since San Antonio is #1 and made a come-back starting in game 5 it looks as if we would have to play the Spurs in the conference finals.

In what could be described as an upset, the Mavericks manage to pull out a win 119 to 111 in overtime. The Spurs are out and the Mavericks move on to play against the winner of tonight's Suns & Clippers game. So far the Suns have managed to hold on to a 4-6 point lead throughout the first quarter, but the key is going to be holding on to that lead for the rest of the game.

R.I.P. Blue Frog

2006-05-17T07:30:00.000-07:00

Blue Frog/Security is no more. For your safety UNINSTALL the extension(s) as well as the application. An alert reader on Go Firefox!, posted me a link to this Wired News Article: Under Attack, Spam Fighter Folds. Also check out: BlueSecurity, BlueFrog & BlueFreaks That Love Them: Blue Security Surrenders... Spammers Win.

Preview: Inline Spellcheck

2006-05-16T14:55:00.000-07:00

Robert Strong created the SpellBound Spellchecker for Firefox and Mozilla Suite (now known as Sea Monkey) extension which enabled users to have a web based spell checker. He also part of the development team for Firefox 2.0. When Firefox 1.5 came out Robert created a 'developmental version' of SpellBound which was an inline or spell as you type of spell checker. The inline spellcheck is suppose to be one of the new features in FF 2.0.

I've had an opportunity to try it out. Right now it is only working for pages that have a text-area fields such as Yahoo!Mail. However it does not work for pages using I-Frames for entering text. This includes the Firefox WYSIWYG Editor for Delphi Forums, the Blogger editor and most other WYSIWYG editors.

FF 2.0 Inline Spellcheck
Click Image For Larger View

The above screen shot was from Yahoo!Mail. Misspelled words are underlined in red. Right-clicking opens the context menu with a list of suggestions or to add the word to the dictionary. This is going to take some getting use to as I have become so accustomed to the CTRL+Left Click used in SpellBound. Heck I have problems in Thunderbird, I keep CTRL+Left Clicking on those misspelled words.

Again it is important to stress at this time FF 2.0 is still being developed and the Bon Echo Alpha 2 release is more testing and development. I am sure at some point like its predecessor this feature will support/check text entered into an I-Frame.

This was the last of the major new features of FF 2.0, I wanted to evaluate. Although, I may take a look at the RSS handling improvements.

Preview: Session Managment

2006-05-16T11:46:00.000-07:00

The next new feature for Firefox 2.0 is Session Management. First thing I noticed is this is NOT quite the same as the session management features available in Tab Mix Plus, Session Manager or SessionSaver. If anything it is more similar to Crash Recovery. So...what's the difference? Well, Session Management like these above mentioned extensions will recover your browser (tabs & windows) session exactly as it was in the event the browser crashes. However, unlike the above (Crash Recovery excluded) it does not recover your browser if you accidentally (or intentionally) close it. That is what I liked about Session Saver, it would save everything exactly as it was when I closed the browser. This is very useful when switching between FF 1.5.0.3 and Bon Echo (since I can't run both a the same time).

At least it will recover your browsing session in the even the browser crashes. I have already tested this by doing a force shut-down of Bon Echo. The browser treated this as a crash and it performed exactly like SessionSaver does in a browser crash. Also there is no 'snap-back tab/window' option as in SessionSaver if you accidentally close a tab or window.

Click Image For Large View
This Session Recovery Pop-Up Box will appear when your restart Firefox after a crash.

So the Session Management feature may not eliminate those above name extensions, but that could change. After all, this is only the Alpha 2 release. I'll have do some digging around mozillaZine and the Bon Echo forums and see what I can find out about the future of this feature.

Well, this just leaves the 'Inline spellcheck' feature to preview.

Preview: New search engine infrastructure and UI

2006-05-16T10:08:00.000-07:00

Continuing my previews of some the new features with FF 2.0, I will now take look at the 'New search engine infrastructure and UI'. Firefox 2.0 will come preloaded with six popular search engines (Google, Yahoo!, Amazon.com, Answers.com, Creative Commons and eBay). You can easily add more and remove search engines. Click the arrow next to the magnifying glass will display all the installed search engines and give you the option to 'Manage Search Engines...'

Click Image For Larger View
New FF 2.0 Search Engine UI

The Manage Search Engine List allows you to re-order your search engines, add more AND remove search engines you don't want. Previously you either needed to hunt for the search engine plug-in and delete it or install an extensions such as Search Engine Ordering to remove unwanted search engines.

Click Image For Larger View
New FF 2.0 Manage Search Engine UI

Still to come:

Session Management
Inline spellcheck

Preview: Add-ons UI

2006-05-16T08:52:00.000-07:00

On my May 1st entry: Excellent Move Mr. Schroepfer!, I listed some of new features for FF 2.0, including Extension/Themes UI (user interface) change. This new feature is part of the Bon Echo Alpha 2 milestone release. No more separate interfaces for extensions and themes. Instead there is a new Add-ons UI where the management of extensions and themes are integrated together into one simplified interface.

Click Image For Larger View
New FF 2.0 Add-Ons UI

Some changes to this interface include listing installed extensions and themes in alphabetical order instead of the order they were installed in. Note: Adblock Filterset.G Updater is out of sequence as it was just added and is not yet 'installed'. In addition, it is now possible to disable extensions without having to restart in safe mode. This is useful for problematic extensions or if you don't want to use an extension but rather not uninstall it. You will still have to manually restart Firefox for the change to take effect. While on the subject of restarting...

Click Image For Larger View
New FF 2.0 Add-Ons UI with Installation Tab

Whenever you install and extension or theme, the installation will appear in a new tab on the Add-Ons window. The 'Installation' tab will show extensions and/or themes that were just installed in this current browser session. A neat little feature is the 'Restart Bon Echo' (when FF 2.0 goes live it will be named 'Restart Firefox') button. When you are done installing click the button and the browser will close and automatically restart.

Some others features I am still checking out include:

New search engine infrastructure and UI
Session Management
Inline spellcheck

A New Milestone for FF 2.0

2006-05-15T20:52:00.000-07:00

On May 13th Bon Echo Alpha 2 was released. Now I am sure you are asking "Oh humble Guru what the heck is Bon Echo?". Bon Echo is the project name for FF 2.0, named after the park in Ontario, Canada. I have yet to play with this release yet but do look forward to doing so tomorrow. Some of the new features in this release include (click links below to see Blog entries):

Links default to opening in new tabs, not new windows
New user interface for Add-Ons (extensions & themes)
Close buttons now appear on every tab, and the close behaviour is slightly different
Inline spell checking in text boxes
Automatic session restoration in the event of a crash
New search (engine) plug-in manager for removing and re-ordering search engines
Complete Listing

Now keep in mind FF 2.0 is not scheduled for final release until late summer or early fall. Further we are only in the Alpha releases at this moment. For those of you not familiar with the release progression:

Alpha 1
Alpha 2
Alpha 3*
Beta 1
Beta 2*
Release Candidate (RC) 1
Release Candidate (RC) 2
Release Candidate (RC) 3*

* If needed

Note: Release Candidates are nearly final releases. All the features have been completed, but there may be some bugs, security or other issues that still need to be fixed. The final Release Candidate becomes the live/production version.

Stay tuned for more details as I test and review this release.

about:config

2006-05-11T09:38:00.000-07:00

As I've mentioned before, Firefox is highly customizable. You can add themes, extensions and plug-ins to add new features to your browser. But there are lots of configuration options that you can change as well. I am not just talking about those that you can get to via the Tools, Options...menu. Firefox has a 'control panel' of sorts, called about:config. To access, simply open a new tab and in the address bar type about:config.

But wait, there is another and 'easier' way to get tot this 'control panel'. It is the AboutConfig extension, once installed you can add a button to your toolbar (right click in a blank area on your toolbar and select 'Customize...", find the about:config icon and drag it on to the toolbar). Now you are asking "Oh humble Guru, if I can just type 'about:config' in the address bar, why do I need this extension?" Lots of reason, no need to open a new tab, nothing to type, but the best reason...it puts your about:config info in a new window.

This is useful when you are reading directions on changing settings in about:config. Instead of having to flip between tabs, you can make your Firefox smaller (than full screen) and be able to the directions and your about:config at the same time.

To change a setting, highlight the preference you want and then double-click. Note on 'boolean' type preferences, double-clicking will change the value from 'false' to 'true' or from 'true' to 'false'. For 'integer' and 'string' type preferences, a popup-box will allow you to enter the settings. Preferences in BOLD have been changed from default (user set). While changes are saved as soon as you double-click on a 'boolean' or click 'ok' on 'integer' and 'string' type preferences, you can restore a preference to its default by right-clicking and select 'reset' from the context menu.

Want to know more about the standard preferences in about:config? Take a look at the mozillaZine Wiki article, about:config entries.

InfoLister

2006-05-09T19:51:00.000-07:00

One of the neat features of Firefox is the ability to customize the browser with Extensions, Themes and Plug-Ins. But sometimes there are problems a theme does something funky to your browser. Or may be an extension goes haywire and gets corrupted. Then there is the site you visit that just doesn't behave or display the way it should (missing plug-in). Finally, lets add into the mix, multiple builds & versions of Firefox. There are so many possibilities of what could be the problem. If you have a lot of extensions (last count for me was 40) installed, it is hassle to list them all.

Whenever anyone posts on Go Firefox! a more advanced problem they are having the first thing I recommend they do is install the InfoLister extension. In a matter of seconds the extensions generates a report with loads of information:

The build/version of Firefox and your OS
Complete list and a total number of extensions (including enabled & disabled)
Listing of all the themes installed and which one is currently in use
Simplified listing (compared to about:plugins) of the all installed plug-ins

With this information it is very easy for me to see if the user is running an outdated extensions, a problematic theme, a troublesome (Yahoo!) or missing plug-in. Below is the results when I run InfoLister on this profile...

Last updated: Wed, 10 May 2006 04:20:21 GMT

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.0.3) Gecko/20060426 Firefox/1.5.0.3

Extensions (enabled: 40, disabled: 0):

Themes (4):

Fireburn 1.5
Firefox (default) 2.0
Nautipolis for Firefox 1.5.0.3 [selected]
Orbit Red 1.5 Beta

Plugins (12):

Adobe Acrobat
Java(TM) 2 Platform Standard Edition 5.0 Update 6
McAfee Clinic
Microsoft® DRM
Mozilla Default Plug-in
PCMan's IE Tab Plug-in for Mozilla/Firefox
QuickTime Plug-in 7.0.3
RealJukebox NS Plugin
RealPlayer Version Plugin
RealPlayer(tm) G2 LiveConnect-Enabled Plug-In (32-bit)
Shockwave Flash
Windows Media Player Plug-in Dynamic Link Library

Maps+

2006-05-07T18:21:00.000-07:00

The Maps+ Extension has quickly become one of my favorites. I use Yahoo!Maps quite frequently as I do many of the Yahoo! tools. Yahoo!Maps is great but when it comes to finding an address listed on a website it is a bit of pain:

Copy the street address for the site
Switch to the Yahoo!Maps tab and paste
Switch back to the other tab and copy the city and state OR zip code.
Switch back to Yahoo!Maps tab and paste
Click get map.

NO MORE! Once this extension is installed all you need to do is highlight the address (including city and state OR zip code) on the web page you are viewing. Right click and select from your context menu, 'View Map Of...' option. An I-Frame Windows (or tooltip) opens on top of the page you are viewing and displays a Yahoo API (beta version of Yahoo!Maps). You can pan by clicking and dragging or zoom in and out. When you are done viewing the map you can either click outside of the tooltip or close it via the X on the top right corner of the window The extension can be further customized via the options from the extension manager (Tools, Extensions, highlight Maps+, Click Options):

Set a default address for driving directions (driving directions feature does not appear to be active at this time)
Set the size (width and height) of the tooltip in pixels from 1 to the maximum allowed by your resolution. If your resolution is set to 1024x768 you can set the tooltip to a maximum size of 1024 (width) x 768 (height).

Below is an example of the map that is generated (note I have the tooltip size set to 400x400). From My Yahoo! Page, I had highlighted the address for East Valley Cinemas, 2140 North Arizona Avenue, Chandler, AZ 85225 and the right-clicked and selected View map of "2140 North Arizona Avenue, Chandler, AZ 85225" The orange outlined balloon shows the location.

This extension works on Firefox builds 1.0 and above including the nightly builds on Bon Echo (future FF 2.0).

PoliticianSearch

2006-05-07T17:19:00.000-07:00

NOTE: This extension works only with FF builds/version 1.5 and above.

While looking around Mozilla Add-ons today I came across and interesting extension called PoliticianSearch. It was built off the DictionarySearch extension (advantages of open-source) and once installed will add an option to your context (right-click) menu to Search Project Vote Smart...

To use, simply highlight the (US) Politician's last name, right-click and select the 'Search Project Vote Smart' option. Once installed you can try it out now by doing a search on our Governor, Janet Napolitano. If you don't have the extension installed yet, click here to open the results in Project Vote Smart.

I could find this useful for news and newspaper sites. Complete information about the politician, only a right-click away!

The Year of the Suns?

2006-05-07T09:44:00.000-07:00

A little something different today. As I mentioned in my bio, I am originally from California, Los Angeles area to be more exact. The plays off between the (Los Angeles) Lakers and (Phoenix) Suns has been tough for me. Granted, The Lakers are not the same team they were from back in the 80's, but then again neither are the Sun's as they were in 1993 (remember Charles Barkley!). June 1993, 'Suns Fever' as they had made it all the way to the finals.

However in 1993, the Chicago Bulls proved to be too much for the Suns. The play offs went well, at least the first game, the Suns won 107 PHX to 102 LA. The the next three games they lost by 1-7 points. Last Tuesday was 'do or die' for the Suns and they made a nice comeback with a 114 to 97 win over the Lakers. Thursday's game a bit of a 'nail bitter' but the Suns managed to stay alive (even without Raja Bell) with a win of 126 PHX to 118 LA in OT.

Saturday night was the game that would decide who would advance to Conference Semi-Finals. The game last night was incredible. Never did Suns lose their lead over the Lakers. By half-time they had a sizable 15 point lead, but that wasn't good enough, by the end of the forth quarter, the Suns had increased their lead by 30+ points!!! Was it a case of over-confidence on the part of the Lakers, how else would explain them losing to the Suns 31 points (121 PHX, 90 LA)?

This is not the first time an Arizona team has made a dramatic comeback to win a series. Flashback to November 4, 2001, AZ Diamondback and NY Yankees. The game had been going slowly, with the Diamondbacks being the first to score in the 6th. Then things made a turn for the worse in the 7th & the 8th as the Yankees not only scored but took the lead. It was almost over but a small shimmer of hope, as the Diamondbacks Grace gets in a run in the bottom of the 9th to the tie the game. Extra innings? Not quite, the Yankees made a critical error moving their infield in as 'Gonzo' batted in the wining run.

So it is on to the Conference Semi-Finals with the first game on Tuesday here in Phoenix against the Los Angeles Clippers. Wait, the Clippers?! How in the world did they get into the Conference Semi-Finals? A better questions, is how did they even get into the Conference Quarterfinals? The Suns and the Clippers have played each other only 4 times and each won half of those games. I don't see the Clippers being that much of a challenge as long as the Suns stay focused and keep playing like they did in Games 5-7.

The good news is, Miami took care of Chicago already so when we make it into the NBA Finals we won't have to deal with them. Based on who's left (Detroit Pistons, Cleveland Cavaliers, Miami Heat, New Jersey Nets) looks like we could face either Miami or Detroit. The bad news, The San Antonio Spurs are still in and unless the Dallas Mavericks can take care of them we will face them in the Conference Finals. This was the case last year with disastrous results (lost games 1-3 & 5). Last year we were able to take care of Dallas in the Conference Semi-Finals so should they happen to eliminate San Antonio they shouldn't prove to be too much of a challenge for us.

But, one big difference this year is the Suns as whole are good and they have shown they can adapt as demonstrated in Game 6 with the unjustified suspension of Raja Bell. Last year they were too dependent on a couple players and when they got hurt the team fell apart. This should be an interesting and exciting next few weeks!

I'm the Blue Security Spammer

2006-05-06T19:17:00.000-07:00

A fellow member on Go Firefox! posted me a link to this article from Wired News today. An anonymous spammer wrote into Wired News claiming to be "one of the spammers behind (the) Blue Security scandal". There is one paragraph of the article that stands out and shows the effect that the Blue Frog is having on their business.

"The point of it is to get Blue Frog software to stop turning its subscribers' computers into zombies that attack our servers," the spammer wrote. "If you want to be removed from our mailing list, please opt out first."

If only it were that simple! Many users who have 'opt-out' via the links (if there is one) in these messages find they suddenly get more Spam, are directed to a non-working or bogus site and worse yet, have to jump through hops just to get their e-mail address removed. Here's a better idea Mister Russian Spammer, stop sending the e-mails to begin with, we never wanted to get them in the first place! Oh wait, that would put you out of business!

The comment on this article by kamikazi150, that is well worth taking the time to read. It may be a little long but this person is very through and to the point.

The Dust Is Beginning to Clear...

2006-05-05T16:32:00.000-07:00

It has been quite a war... PharmaMaster (Russian Spammer) vs The Blue Frog.

First they sent tons of spam messages with misleading information, threatening and extorting us Blue Frog Members to remove ourselves from the registry or get tons more spam.
They repeated this again and again.
Then they really started playing dirty, they sent more spam but disguised it as to look as the messages were from members of Blue Frog. Again, providing misleading information about Blue Security.
To further up the ante, launched a denial of service (DoS) attacks against Blue Security sites.
Another bombardment of Spam from May 4th to May 6th.

The end result? The Blue Frog is still standing (a little wounded but still holding its ground). For more detailed information on the May 1-5 Attacks, please visit the CastleCops Forums.

The main Blue Security and members sites are back up, but the Spam Reporting took some damage along with the Blue Security's Community sections. There are presently unavailable and Blue Security is asking for you to hold off on your spam reporting until they can get there areas fixed.

A Status On The Blue Frog

2006-05-04T20:05:00.000-07:00

Well the good news it seems Blue Frog/Security's website is back up, the bad news...

Blue Security's servers are currently under attack.

Our staff is working around the clock to restore normal operation as soon as possible.

We are extremely happy to see the overwhelming level of support and global presence the Blue Community is showing.

Thank you for your patience!

We'll have to wait to see how this plays out in the next couple days. As for my spam count...getting more recycle and future spam on the Yahoo! account, but 99% of it is being caught and deposited into the bulk folder. My ISP's e-mail accounts have been spam free since this whole incident with Blue Security started earlier this week and YES they are registered. I am not sure though how much spam gets caught-up in my ISP's spam filter, but still usually a half dozen messages will slip through a day. Since Monday, nada!

The Blue Frog Is In Trouble

2006-05-03T21:54:00.000-07:00

As of this evening, Blue Frog/Security's sites are completely inaccessible, more about this in a bit. Now allow me to back up to last night. A couple things happened that I found odd but would have had no idea they were related:

When I went to bluesecurity.com last night it took me to the their blogs site (bluesecurity.blogs.com)
Earlier in the evening I was experimenting with Live Journal when that site started becoming very sluggish and some points inaccessible.

I was thinking the troubles with Live Journal seemed all too similar to those at Blue Frog/Security, but these could not possibly be related...could they? The answer came tonight while searching the web for more news on Blue Security. I came across an article posted on the Q Daily News: The dishonor of Blue Security.

Now, back to item #1, the redirect to the blogs site...The Blue Security blog site is TypePad which is hosted by Six Apart, the same people who host Live Journal (item #2). Seeing the connection between what was thought to be two unrelated events? Now, the question is why would Blue Security do this? Simple, redirect the domain away from their server, which at that time was being bogged down by DoS attacks. So then the DoS attacks were hitting Six Apart's severs which is what caused Live Journal to go down last night. The Q Daily News author came up with an excellent analogy for what Blue Security did:

"You dealing with a water main break in your basement by hooking a big hose up to the leaking joint and redirecting the water into your neighbor’s basement instead." Link

It appears Blue Security is still trying to redirect their domain on to Six Apart's servers however Six Apart has found a way to block the redirect which is why users are now getting an "Unable to connect" (Page Can Not Be Displayed for you Folks using IE) error message instead of "Connection Timed Out"

Now you may be asking, "Oh humble Guru are you going to keep the Blue Frog or send it to that big blue lillypad in the sky?" To be honest I really don't know, I'll have to do more reading.

The Blue Frog Still Alive!

2006-05-03T09:29:00.000-07:00

For a brief time last night I was able to access the blogs portion of Blue Security's site. Here is a portion of their Blog entry for 05/03: The Blue Independence War

"Today is Israel's Independence Day. It's a public holiday in Israel, but all of us in Blue Security are working. But we are glad we're working. We're helping the community fight the Blue Independence War. We fight for our freedom from spammers and cyber criminals. This is our big chance to reclaim the Internet. We must not let it slip from our hands.
Some desperate spammers are doing its worst to harm our community. They'd like us to back off, and agree to get their spam silently. Needless to say, that is not going to happen. We're not here to listen to their vile threats and fraudulent advertisements. We're here to stand up for our right not to be let alone."

Unfortunately, this morning the DoS attacks continue and even the blogs portion of Blue Security's site is inaccessible. Did a little search for some News on Blue Security and came across an article on MacWorld, Spammers turn on antispam vigilantes. Comments below are from Eran Reshef, CEO of Israeli based Blue Security.

"The spam campaign is a sign of Blue Security’s success and an act of frustration by a major spammer based in Russia, Reshef said.

“It’s one of the top spammers. We’re not sure which one at this point, but six of the top ten are complying with (Blue Security), so it’s one of the remaining four,” Reshef said."

Silly of me to think all this spam was originating from within the US. Of course who could forget those Nigerian scam emails, you know ones I am talking about...some high ranking person dies suddenly and tragically leaving behind millions upon millions of dollars.

A quick scan of my Yahoo! Mail box and I noticed haven't seen any of these lately. Wonder if they were one of the six top ten that have chosen to comply? As for the spam in general today, seems to be lighter than yesterday and no 'future spam' thus far.

Even though Blue Security's site is still down, Blue Frog is still reporting the e-mails. You can also obtain the Blue Frog software via download.com, but you will need to wait for the site to come back up before you can register.

FF 1.5.0.3 Released

2006-05-02T15:10:00.000-07:00

In Mozilla's on going commitment to providing a safe and quality product, an updated version of Firefox (1.5.0.3) was released today. FF 1.5.0.3 previously was going to contain more fixes but due to the severity of a Denial of Service (Dos) vulnerability discovered last week this issue was addressed, fixed and put into this release. All the other fixes which were slated for the 1.5.0.3 release have been moved into the upcoming FF 1.5.0.4 release.

More information can be found in the Mozilla Firefox 1.5.0.3 Release Notes. If you have Firefox configured to Automatically Install and Download Updates (default setting) you do not need to do anything but shut-down and restart Firefox when prompted to do so. If you have the Automatic Installation disabled, go to the Help Menu and select, 'Check For Updates...'

For those of you who may be running the older FF 1.0.8, there is no update at this time and unknown if there will be.

Colorful Tabs Just Got More Colorful

2006-05-02T11:17:00.000-07:00

On April 27th, a new version (1.2) of Colorful Tabs extension was released. For those of you who are not familiar with this extension, it assigns each tab in your FF tab bar a different color. Some of the documented changes in this version included making it so that closing a tab did not change the color of the tabs around it. Also no longer is there the limitation of colored tabs after the 32nd tab.

Now this got me thinking, if you have 32 tabs open they have to be so narrow how could you even distinguish the colors? For that matter why would someone have 32+ tabs open?

A fellow member over at Go Firefox! was kind enough to confirm a theory I had about an undocumented change. It appears there is no longer a set color order for the tabs when you open new tabs. Now, when a new tab opens it is random color and there also seems to be more colors now (or least different shades).

Has Blue Frog Croaked?

2006-05-02T08:44:00.000-07:00

Over the past 48 hours there has been a lot of 'rumors' and 'chatter' that just may be Blue Frog croaked and that the Do Not Intrude Registray database has been compromised. Their web site has been inaccessible since May 1st due to various DoS (Denial of Service) attacks. On to top of that, apparently a desperate group of spammers are claiming they sent out this message to ALL the registered users of Blue Frog on May 1st:

Hey,

You are recieving this email because you are a member of BlueSecurity (http://www.bluesecurity.com).

You signed up because you were expecting to recieve a lesser amount of spam, unfortunately, due to the tactics used by BlueSecurity, you will end up recieving this message, or other nonsensical spams 20-40 times more than you would normally.

How do you make it stop?

Simple, in 48 hours, and every 48 hours thereafter, we will run our current list of BlueSecurity subscribers through BlueSecurity’s database, if you arent there.. you wont get this again.

We have devised a method to retrieve your address from their database, so by signing up and remaining a BlueSecurity user not only are you opening yourself up for this, you are also potentially verifying your email address through them to even more spammers, and will end up getting up even more spam as an end-result.

By signing up for bluesecurity, you are doing the exact opposite of what you want, so delete your account, and you will stop recieving this.

Why are we doing this?

Its simple, we dont want to, but BlueSecurity is forcing us. We would much rather not waste our resources and send you these useless mails.

Its simple, we dont want to, but BlueSecurity is forcing us. We would much rather not waste our resources and send you these useless mails, but do not believe for one second that we will stop this tirade of emails if you choose to stay with BlueSecurity.
Just remember one thing when you read this, we didnt do this to you, BlueSecurity did.

If BlueSecurity decides to play fair, we will do the same.

Just remove yourself from BlueSecurity, and make it easier on you.

Gena Elmore

So what does this mean? Nothing! It just more spam and empty threats by a spammer. A few observations:

Looks like a typical spam/phising e-mail, poor grammar, misspelled words and the poor souls are using keyboards that don't have an apostrophe (') key!
Of the four address I have registered with Blue Frog/Security, NONE of them got this message (and others have said they have gotten it on some but not all of their registered addresses).
I have seen a slight increase of spam (more like future spam as the e-mails are dated 05/03-05/10) on my Yahoo! account
My ISP e-mail accounts appear to be getting less spam than it has before
The 'future' spam I am getting appears to be multiple copies or variation of the same spam, another words I am getting recycled spam, nothing new.
How are we suppose to 'remove' ourselves if they have taken down the Blue Security site with DoS attacks?

In the meantime while were waiting for the dust to settle from the DoS attacks on Blue Security's sites, check out this article: Enabling the Complaint Department, for more information about Blue Security.

Blue Frog

2006-05-02T07:22:00.000-07:00

A while back on the Go Firefox! Forum, the humble Guru was asked about Blue Frog Anti Spam extension and software. The extension and software (about 4 MB) are suppose to reduce the amount of Spam you get by making spammers remove all Blue Community members from their mailing lists. The software will automatically run in the background when you access your web e-mail accounts (Yahoo!, G-Mail, Hotmail, etc) and go through your junk/bulk folder and report the spam. For Desktop mail clients (Thunderbird, Outlook, Eudora, etc.) you will need to forward the messages directly to a special address you will be assigned when you sign up.

Once a registered member, you can protect up to 10 e-mail addresses and one domain. Been registered for about a week now and have seen a slight but noticeable reduction in the amount of Spam I have been getting on my Yahoo! account. It actually seemed to be more effective on my ISP e-mail accounts, my Junk Folder in Thunderbird is piratically empty.

Over the next couple weeks I'll keep tabs on my Yahoo! account and see how much more of a reduction of Spam I will get. Speaking of Yahoo! if you are having issues with your Firefox crashing when trying to access Yahoo! Mail and you are running Blue Frog and/or AdBlock Plus there is a bug in the plug-in for Yahoo!Messenger. The workaround is to remove the plug-in by deleting the following file: C:/Program Files/Yahoo!/Shared/npYState.dll (or where your Yahoo! Messenger is installed).

Excellent Move Mr. Schroepfer!

2006-05-01T18:06:00.000-07:00

Note: Some of this content I had posted previously on the Go Firefox! Forum. After some time to think this over and doing some in depth research I have decided to dig into this in more detail on my blog.

On Friday, April 28th, Mozilla announced they would be pulling a major feature from the forthcoming Firefox 2.0 (due out later this year). In the announcement on mozillaZine, there is a link to a news group post by Mike Schroepfer of Mozilla Corporation explains the reasoning for the feature removal.

There are two key points here:

The decision to remove an incomplete or non-functioning from FF 2.0
The justification of Mozilla in keeping the release as FF 2.0 without this feature

The first part of Mr. Schroepfer's comment really stood out...

"Places is a complex and exciting feature which changes the way people use bookmarks, history, and navigate through their private space of the web. Rather than rush it to market - we'd prefer to spend the time it takes to get it right."

First off a bit of rant, I am so tired of software developers trying to 'rush it to market' resulting in a crappy product. The paying end-user become beta-testers. While Firefox is free and being open source (resulting in the end-user being somewhat of a beta-tester), Mozilla still wants to present a quality product to the market, not something half working. You know it is bad when you get new software installed and the first thing you have to do in order to even get it to work is download patches.

Now before I start getting a ton of comments from folks asking the 'Oh humble Guru, what about all the updates to Firefox 1.5, weren't those patches?' True they are patches, but those were fix minor bugs and/or security/exploitation issues, not a patch to major new feature. Further Firefox could run without the said patches (although it is not recommended).

As Mr. Schroepfer said 'Places' is a 'complex and exciting feature' which also means a major change to the look and feel of Firefox. From what I have read in various Blogs from those who work and test the nightly releases the 'Places' feature had a lot of stability issues and they are glad to see it pulled. So to leave this feature in place (no pun intended) ,not fully developed or broken could really be bad news for Firefox. Bad news not only because it does not work correctly but also could cause the whole browser to malfunction. This could leave a bad taste in peoples mouths about the 'Places' feature as well Firefox in general.

Again before I get a ton of comments such as 'Oh humble Guru, but aren't end-users use to broken or incomplete features from other developers such as that big one in Redmond, Washington that also beings with 'M'?" or 'Oh humble Guru, Firefox is a free product, the end-user gets what they pay for!' Again, I stress quality product (less a few minor glitches) which is what the end-users are use to and expect from Mozilla. Besides, IE is free and then there all the problems Microsoft created by Tying IE Changes To Security Patch.

Now, if Mozilla were to go ahead and push forward FF 2.0 with the defective 'Places' feature the negative response (and possible backlash) to FF 2.0 in general could overshadow some of the other and functional features (see below). This could result in end-users rolling back to 1.5.0.* or whatever the most recent builds were, until a more stable 2.0 with a functioning Places (2.0.*) is released. Or worse yet, being so disappointed and/or frustrated end users just remove Firefox from their machines (nothing like shooting yourself in the foot).

The uproar in the Mozilla/Firefox community is not really the removal of 'Places' from FF 2.0, but keeping the 2.0 version number. Mozilla has quite an elaborate numbering scheme and to move up th next whole number (e.g. from 1.5 to 2.0) usually means a major change in the 'engine'. Many people feel 'Places' is that major change and therefore yanking it out of the next big release it shouldn't be numbered as FF 2.0. They would rather have it called FF 1.6. But there are plenty of other smaller yet 'exciting' features coming (see below) to justify the major release designation of FF 2.0. This issue is addressed in Ben Goodger's blog, Inside Firefox.

FF 2.0 New Features:

Visual Refresh (new look and feel)
Safebrowser anti-phising
Inline spellcheck (something that is offered now with the Spellbound Extension)
Session Management (SessionSaver)
RSS handling improvements
Extension/Themes UI change
New search engine infrastructure and UI
New installer
Browser performance metric measurer

Okay, so we may have to wait for FF 2.5 (speculation on version/build number) before we get the new and improved look and feel of Firefox with 'Places'. I don't mind waiting a few more months for a working version, something to look forward to in that upcoming release. Further I really don't care if FF 1.6 or FF 2.0, I am just happy Mozilla is keeping their commitment to a quality product.

Multiple Profile Disorder

2006-05-01T16:39:00.000-07:00

I appear to be suffering from Multiple Profile Disorder! With all the testing I do on Go Firefox! and with different versions of Firefox (1.0.7, 1.0.8, 1.5.0.*, 1.6a1, Bon Echo, etc.). I have way too many profiles and I am not even sure what some of them are and worse yet, what version of Firefox I was using them for!

So Guru, What is a "Profile"?

Simply put a 'profile' on Firefox is your settings or a non-technical term personality. Your profile contains all your Bookmarks (Favorites for you IE folks), Extensions (add-ons, more about these in another time), Themes (kinda similar to skins) as well as all your settings. You can learn all about profiles on the Firefox Help site which has these wonderful words of advice...
"Multiple profiles and profile management is an advanced feature, mainly intended for developers. Unless you are an extension developer or an advanced user, you should probably not be trying to use multiple profiles."
I am not an extension developer, although I have been tempted time to time to develop an extension. I guess that makes me an advanced user! I guess this means I should do some housekeeping in my profile manager. So the moral of this story, follow the advice above or you could end up like me, suffering from Multiple Profile Disorder!

A Blog is Born!

2006-05-01T14:59:00.000-07:00

Well, I have finally jumped on the bandwagon and have created a blog! This blog is going to be primarily (if not entirely) about my experiences with Firefox. What the heck is Firefox you might be asking yourself? Well, it is a free, open-source web browser created by the folks at Mozilla. It is a great alternative to the buggy and security hole ridden IE browser.

I consider myself somewhat (only because I haven't done any development type of stuff) of an advanced user of Firefox. Over the past year and half now, I have done a lot (including crashing) with multiple versions of Firefox. This is a rough draft of topics I might discuss in here:

Firefox Extensions
Using (and Crashing) Firefox
Mozilla/Firefox News
and more!

FF Extension Guru's Blog

This Blog Has Moved!

Update: Windows Vista Prices

Using Firefox 2.0b2 As Default Browser

My Way

Thunderbird 2.0 Alpha 1

Mozilla Japan's New Mascot

Something Completely Different: Vista & Office 2007 Prices

Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 Released

Firefox 2.0 Beta 2 MIA?

The Mozilla Museum

Windows Vista Boot Up Sound

FF 2.0 Beta 2 Teaser

A Look Back at Dell in 1996

Yahoo's New Anti-Phishing Mechanism

Unusual Way To Promote Firefox

Update: FF 2.0 Release Schedule (Yet Again)

The state of Firefox

FF 1.5.0.7 Coming

Update: FF 2.0 Release Schedule (Again)

Firefox 1.5.0.6 Released

200 Million Downloads

UPDATE: Firefox 2.0 Release Schedule

Trojan Horse Mozilla Firefox Extension

FF & Thunderbird 1.5.0.5 Released

Firefox 2.0 Release Schedule

FF 2.0 New Feature: Tab Overflow

Update: Time to Replace Those Old Windows

Preview: FF 2.0 Beta 1

Seattle Post-Intelligencer interview with Blake Ross

Time to Replace Those Old Windows!

WeatherBug

Preview: Foxy Tunes 2.0

FoxyTunes

Themes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly Revisited

Is Anyone Out There?

Themes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Troubleshooting Add-ons Installation

Problematic Extensions

A New Look

Installing Spellbound FF 1.5.0.*

SpellBound - Spellchecker For Firefox

IE Tab

Bon Echo Alpha 3 Milestone

Thunderbird 1.5.0.4 Released

What's New in Thunderbird 1.5.0.4Upgrade From Thunderbird 1.5.0.2

Firefox 1.5.0.4 Released

Profiles Revisited

Keeping Your Firefox Updated

The Year Of The Suns? (Part 3)

silicon.com interview with Mitchell Baker

Mitchell Baker Talks to silicon.com About Mozilla in the Enterprise

The Year Of The Suns? (Part 2)

R.I.P. Blue Frog

Preview: Inline Spellcheck

Preview: Session Managment

Preview: New search engine infrastructure and UI

Preview: Add-ons UI

A New Milestone for FF 2.0

about:config

InfoLister

Extensions (enabled: 40, disabled: 0):

Themes (4):

Plugins (12):

Maps+

PoliticianSearch

The Year of the Suns?

I'm the Blue Security Spammer

The Dust Is Beginning to Clear...

A Status On The Blue Frog

The Blue Frog Is In Trouble

The Blue Frog Still Alive!

FF 1.5.0.3 Released

Colorful Tabs Just Got More Colorful

Has Blue Frog Croaked?

Blue Frog

Excellent Move Mr. Schroepfer!

Multiple Profile Disorder

A Blog is Born!

What's New in Thunderbird 1.5.0.4
Upgrade From Thunderbird 1.5.0.2