Software: Firefox Text To Link

How many ways can you use text in a Web page as a link?

• Highlight text with your mouse pointer, then drag and drop your selection into the address bar.
• Hit F7, highlight text using the cursor keys, copy the text into the clipboard, paste the text into the address bar.
• Install the Linkification extension. This extension makes all parse-able text in a page into links.
• Install the Plain Text to Link extension. Highlight some text, then use the context menu to open that text as a link.

Software: Firefox form history

It would be a neat idea to view values stored by Firefox's form completion feature. Then I could reuse text that I've previously entered in our local bug database form and make my reports more consistent. In Windows, Firefox saves form information in C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\random.default\formhistory.dat. Unfortunately, that file is encoded in some proprietary XML database format and there is no reader (other than Firefox) for it. All I can do is delete all entries or delete individual entries using Shift-Del. It would be nice to have an editor like the Password or Cookie Manager. Dream on.

Software: Firefox HTML Validator Extension

If you want a quick way to validate your web pages, try the Firefox HTML Validator extension. Install the extension, restart Firefox and you will notice a new icon in the bottom right-hand corner of your window. When your mouse pointer hovers over that icon, Firefox displays a tooltip with the number of errors, if any, in the current page. Select that icon and Firefox will display a View Source dialog with more information about errors in that page. Then, if you select the OK button in that dialog, Firefox displays a new window with the source view of the current page in one pane and two extra panes containing errors and help.

Software: Firefox's Search Bar

You can widen your Firefox Search Bar by editing your userChrome.css file. In Windows, it is C:\Documents and Settings\[username]\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\[random].default\chrome\userChrome.css:

#search-container, #searchbar {
 -moz-box-flex: 600 !important;
}

Also, I found from the French Firefox site, but not in the English on-line help, that the keyboard shortcut for selecting the search bar is Ctrl-K.

Tip: The search bar is more useful than Smart Keywords in the Address field because it remembers previous search patterns while the address field does not.

Misc: Pointless Contractions

Just now, I had to check out a project management module from CVS. What do you think it's called? Something obvious like ProjectManagement? project_management? No … it's called proj_mgmt. What a pointless contraction in this day and age.

Nethack Insta-death - Drowned by giant eel

Here I was, a fully kitted up Peregrinator with lots of intrinsics, water-walking boots, AC -11, wielding Grayswandir, lots of gear and a blindfold, ready to tackle Medusa's Isle. Then an eel grabbed me and I drowned.