RSSMozilla and Google add the personal touch to add-on hunting
By Angela Gunn | Published June 10, 2009, 5:29 PM
Widgets and add-ons have been a huge success for computing in general and open standards in particular -- so much so that it can frankly be hard to wade through one's options. (Have you ever clicked clear through the Vista gallery?) Both Mozilla and, more fancifully, Google have a new tactic for addressing the problem.
Mozilla on Wednesday announced Add-On Collections, which allow users to showcase the apps they like best. You can even add comments about why you've chosen what you have.
Collections are for sharing -- on the Firefox add-on site, on one's blog, or via e-mail. Doing so sets up a subscription to whatever you've added, and subsequent updated to Other people who discover a Collection they like can can mark it as a Favorite. The higher a Collection is ranked, the more prominent it will be on the site.
(Like to see a farm-fresh collection of the add-ons that make Betanews tick? We built one for you.)
Meanwhile, would your iGoogle home page be better if someone else were running it? Martha Stewart, maybe, or The Donald or Kevin Rose? (It would either be more orderly, more gilded, or more geeky.) Google is now showcasing celebrity iGoogle customizations in, naturally an iGoogle Showcase. Thirty celebrities so far have offered up their iGoogle widget picks for your amusement; you can cannibalize their picks as you will, or save an entire collection as a tab on your own iGoogle page.
Some of the picks don't ring entirely true -- Queen Rania of Jordan seems like a charming and family-oriented person, yes, but I'm not sure I believe she's constantly on the hunt for new recipes for the royal family. But one does believe that the CEO of Zappo's would obsessively watch the real-time map mashup that shows who's buying shoes from the beloved retail site, and one is amused to see how many of Napster founder Shawn Fanning's picks are text-only.
Betanews seriously doesn't have Adblock Plus on their list, are they crazy?
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|I understand your enthusiasm, Borg3814, but you do realize Betanews is ad-supported, right? :-) Seriously, I like what NoScript does to ads that overstep their place, but I've come to accept advertising as one of those things on which getting my paycheck is contingent. As long as they behave appropriately and don't mess up the display of the stuff I actually came to see (eg., those annoying "floating" ads so beloved of certain other tech publications), I'm cool.
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|I'm from the camp, I'd pay a reasonable fee to have a site without the ads. But that isn't the model of most internet sites. You're very right I can see why you wouldn't have Adblock on your list.
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|In alph. order the add-ons I /use/:
Ad Muncher (not free)
Bazzacuda Image Saver
Bookmarks Duplicate Detector
DownThemAll!
Flashblock
Save Image In Folder
Snap Links (EladKarako Mod)
Url Fixer
I really should use:
NoScript
Firebug
and something like Delicious Bookmarks.
ColorfulTabs looks like fun.
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|Funny you mention URL Fixer; I have that jotted down as something I wanted to look into. (A friend mentioned it a couple of days ago but I've been busy.) You like it, then?
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|Try Nuke Anything Enhanced and see how you like how it (temporarily) removes annoying elements.
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|Mlle Gunn:
Take www.firemountanigems.ocm . Url Fixer
will only correct the ".ocm" so it isn't as good
as http://guide.opendns.com/?url=firemountan...
but is quicker.
(UF does not look at clicks but does look at
ctrl v and typing)
;p
Anyway, I hate birthday shopping. I wonder which
she'd like best.
www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H203290TL
www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H202306GF
www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H202193GF
www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H201024JU
Hmm, tough choice.
/;p
(Actually, not. She "collects" elephants and that'un
is IIRC in a lucky pose.)
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|MC:
I want the flashing siren at
http://drudgereport.com/siren.gif
gone forever, not just for a while.
So, for me, Nuke Anything Enhanced
_is_ not useful.
However when I was getting set in my
ways and didn't have a program with
block and allow lists I could edit? Dude,
like, thing? The cat's meow, right?
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|Try the extension Remove It Permanently.
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|morriscox:
>Try the extension Remove It Permanently.
Since the mostly sleeping me's that try to
be helpful hate suggesting pay stuff I'll have
to play with that one. Thank you.
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