Firefox add-on Search Cloudlet for Google and Yahoo

Posted on December 20th, 2008 by Richard Catto 2,069 views

This is a truly innovative add-on for the Firefox web browser, that is causing me to rethink my use of Google Chrome as my browser of choice.

Currently Google Chrome does not support add-ons, but apparently will in the future.

With the Search Cloudlet add-on, when you search with either Google or Yahoo, you will get a tag cloud generated which summarises your search results into a tag cloud. The tag cloud comprises all the keywords relevant to your search term. Clicking a tag, adds it to your search terms and refreshes the search with results which zero in on what you want.

You can also see which sites are represented in the search results.

This add-on was written by a research organisation - The International Software and Productivity Engineering Institute (INTSPEI).

Tags: Firefox, Google, INTSPEI, search, yahoo
Filed under Firefox web browser | No Comments »

Losing Firefox 3 web browser cookies?

Posted on July 22nd, 2008 by Richard Catto 7,195 views

Problem

Whenever you close your Firefox 3 web browser, it manages to lose all your cookies so that the next time you start it up, you have to re-login to all your favourite sites.

This might occur after a forced restart of your Windows Operating System.

Cause

A corrupted cookies.sqlite file

Resolution

Delete the cookies.sqlite file. Close Firefox before attempting to do this.

On Windows, this file may be found here:

C:\Documents and Settings\[Username]\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\[ProfileID]

The next time you open Firefox 3 web browser, your cookies.sqlite file will be re-created and your login cookies will be correctly stored. You can now close your browser and the next time you open it, you will remain logged in to all your favourite sites.

Tags: cookie loss, Firefox 3 web browser
Filed under Firefox web browser | 14 Comments »

Go and FLOCK yourselves!

Posted on October 24th, 2007 by Richard Catto 1,866 views

Flock is groovy. If you don’t know what it is yet, it’s a web browser which integrates with social networking sites.

Under the hood, Flock is just a version of FireFox. You can install FireFox extensions on it, including the FireFox StumbleUpon extension.

The default theme for Flock is super cool grey, with light blue and orange icons. It totally enhances your browsing experience. I think Flock is set to become my web browser of choice now.

Best of all, when you access the linked social networking sites such as flickr and facebook, it does some really groovy things. I clicked on a friend’s facebook profile and Flock alerted me to the fact that a media stream was available. I didn’t know what that meant, but Flock is so user friendly it displays short helpful explanations in a collapsible yellow area at the top of the page.

I followed directions and down came a neat black bar at the top filled with all my friends pics from her photo albums. I could select to see each album individually or just see all the pics in one stream. Clicking on a pic, displayed it in the familiar facebook gallery page.

Flock presents the user with a number of useful options to use the image elsewhere, such as in your blog. You can blog anything you see in Flock, with its built in blog function. Once you’re set up your login info, you’re set to send anything you like directly to your blog.

There’s more! I haven’t told you about the My World page, or the People page, the RSS feeds, the clipboard sidebar that you can drag and drop any content you like into, or the Account sidebar that logs you into all your popular services. Like the old Peter Stuyvesant cigarette adverts used to say, “There’s so much more for you to enjoy!”

If you’re a FireFox user, Flock will seem like a natural fit to you. Call it an upgrade if you like. If you’re an Internet Explorer user, you should try Flock – it will blow you away.

Don’t just stand there, go and FLOCK YOURSELF!

Tags: del.icio.us, facebook, flickr, Flock, ma.gnolia.com, photobucket, rss reader, social network browser, twitter, YouTube
Filed under Flock, web browser | 3 Comments »