Mozilla's home-brewed JavaScript engine for its Firefox browsers, TraceMonkey, has impressed us before, but in the raw benchmark game, it's starting to fall behind its competitors. To up its game, Firefox's developers are building a new engine, dubbed JägerMonkey. Ars Technica writes that the new compiler uses some open-source WebKit code to get the job done, including parts of Apple's just-in-time compiler. Promising news—though it's worth noting that, at the moment, Opera seems to hold the crown on JavaScript execution. [David Mandelin, Ars Technica]

Firefox: If you want to compact your user interface in Firefox and turn your address box into a destination for not just URLs but searches too, Foobar combines the address box and search box into one.

If you often find yourself typing in a search command into the address box when you actually meant to use the little search box off to the side, Foobar is a handy addition to your Firefox arsenal. Install the extension and your address bar becomes a little more spartan, the address box and search box are now one.

URLs typed into the box take you to the site, but anything outside a recognized address like HTTP, FTP, or ABOUT: becomes a search in the selected search engine. In the above screenshot my entry of site:lifehacker.com Firefox will pull up the Google search results for Firefox on Lifehacker.com.

Note: Sharp-eyed readers noticed Foobar is similar to previously mentioned Omnibar—minus the handy shortcut building features in Ombinar. If you want your interface condensing with more kick, you'll want to check it out.

Have a handy Firefox extension—interface-altering or otherwise—to share? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Firefox: KeeFox brings tight integration between the cross-platform, open-source password manager KeePass and Firefox, providing automatic logins, form filling, and more.

On Tuesday Kevin sang the praises of LastPass for password management, but a lot of readers are still in love with KeePass and aren't ready to trust their passwords with a third-party service, no matter how secure. Unfortunately, despite some solid plug-ins, KeePass's browser integration isn't close to as tight as LastPass's. That's where KeeFox comes in.

This extension is still a little rough around the edges (it's relatively young), but if you're a die-hard KeePass user and Firefox is your browser of choice, it's worth a little effort getting it set up. Once you do, the extension does automatic form filling, logs into sites instantly, offers one-click saving for adding new passwords to KeePass, and more.

The KeeFox extension is a free download, currently Windows only. If you use KeePass, this extension seems like a must have.

Firefox/Chrome: Sure it's nice and all that we get Gmail for free, but those ads to the right of open messages aren't really all that helpful. Free browser add-on Rapportive replaces Gmail ads with contact info about the sender.

Beyond installing it, there's nothing to using Rapportive. You have to give it access to a minimum of information to get started (looks like your name and email address, via your Google account). Then whenever you open an email, it cross-references the email of the sender with various social networking sites, then fills the ad space with whatever information it finds.

As ReadWriteWeb points out, some users may be wary to trust a third-party add-on with their inbox, but your Gmail credentials don't end up with Rapportive, and they don't have any access to your password. My take: If you can get over the tin-foil hat concerns, it's an extremely cool extension worth trying out.

Firefox: Sure it's fun to hunt for deals online, but it's even better to be alerted when an item you want is at its lowest price. Ookong is an Amazon.com price comparison tool you can use to track price histories.

You can use Ookong as a stand-alone web site, but it's not as convenient as using the Firefox extension. Once you install the Firefox extension every item on Amazon will have a "Follow" button, as seen in the screenshot above. When browsing you can click the follow button to add the item—as we did with the game Dominion—and it's added to your watch list. You can click on the item in your watch list to see the price history, seen below:

You can tweak the Ookong options to specify when you want price drop alerts. You can specify a dollar amount, a percentage, and how many times you'll be alerted to the price drop before Ookong stops notifying you. If you frequently shop at Amazon, Ookong is invaluable for keeping an eye on prices. If you keep a wish list at Amazon the first thing you should do after installing Ookong is to go and "follow" all your wish list items to keep an eye on falling prices.

Ookong can be used as a stand-alone web-based tool or integrated into Firefox. Have a tool for finding the best price online, Amazon-related or otherwise? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Windows/Mac/Linux: Mozilla's second Developer Preview of Firefox 4.0's framework and back-end highlights a feature we'd heard was coming: separate processes for plug-ins. That means if (when) Flash or another plug-in crashes, there's a good chance your browser won't go with it.

This second alpha of Firefox 3.7—which is, confusingly, what will actually be released as 4.0—adds some performance improvements and HTML5 efficiencies, but the main new thing is the "out-of-process" plug-ins. Contained, stand-alone processes for each tab and add-on are likely in Firefox's future, but starting off with the most likely crash candidates is a good start.

Photo by Christopher Blizzard.

Those interested in kicking the tires really hard on Flash crashes and reporting back to Mozilla should give it a go, as should anyone developing extensions or testing site compatibility. Everybody else looking to test it should try a more contained method.

This Firefox developer preview is a free download, available for Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.

Whenever we talk passwords, we always preach the same thing: Use strong, difficult-to-remember passwords, and different passwords for every site. Easy to say, extremely difficult to do through sheer willpower. I've tried many password-remembering systems, and this is what I've stuck with.

To paraphrase photographer Chase Jarvis, the best password manager is the one you have with you. Of all the password management utilities out there, I consider LastPass the most elegant compromise between convenience and security, and if you're not using it already, I recommend you start. It's mostly free, plugs into nearly any browser or smartphone, is KeePass compatible, and just works.

Why LastPass?

Why not just use KeePass for all my passwords and be done with it? It's secure, open-source, extensible, and geeks like Gina have sworn by it as a password solution. Oh, and many readers love it, too. If I only used Firefox, KeeFox would provide a pretty good browser integration, and I could use Dropbox as a universal KeePass syncer.

I like KeePass. KeePass is friendly and locks down pretty tight. But when it comes to filling in web passwords, I want the path of least resistance—and I want to convert my friends and family into more secure practices, too. LastPass offers a few advantages over KeePass:

• Universal: KeePass has a nice collection of extensions and plug-ins, but they're all over the place when it comes to support, updating, and platforms. LastPass offers extensions for Firefox, Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Safari on Windows, Mac, and Linux. There are a few gaps (Opera, mainly), but they're covered in large part by free auto-filling bookmarklets (covered below) and desktop, portable USB apps, and mobile software, offered to LastPass' premium subscribers.
• Simple: LastPass has a multitude of options, settings, tools, and other knobs to twiddle, just like KeePass. If all you want, though, is a better kind of universal password manager that remembers your log-ins, simply install the browser extension, log into LastPass, and let it do its thing. It automatically prompts you to save passwords and form data—though you can turn that off—and fills out username/password fields, with an easy switch to another login name.
• Secure, yet dummy-proof: My one fear with systems like KeePass, where I'm keeping my own database and, potentially, safe-keeping my own encryption key file, is that I'll do something stupid and delete that file, or forget that ultra-secure master password. Sure, sure—you're a superhero of forethought and memory, and would never do such a thing. Me, I've had too many brushes with Dropbox sync screw-ups (my ow fault for tinkering, usually) and memory gaps to leave it up to myself to serve as my own knight to protect the Holy Grail. LastPass uses a single master password to log into your account, sure, and if you lose that, you have to jump through quite a few hoops to get it back. But it is, technically, recoverable.

The short version of LastPass' safety and privacy setup, and its technology is that the only thing stored on LastPass' servers is a heavily encrypted bundle of your passwords and the sites they belong to—a form of host-proof hosting. They don't have the encryption key to your passwords (only you do), and the encryption and decrypting all takes place on your own computer, where a backup copy of LastPass' records is always kept. If LastPass became evil, or got hacked, the nefarious doers would have to buy one of Google's server farms to break into its users' passwords. And the service strongly encourages using strong, secure, randomized passwords with web sites, and it ends the use of insecure password storing by browsers.

Switching to LastPass is easier than you'd think too, mostly because LastPass lets you import passwords from KeePass and many, many more password management apps and sites. Heck, if you only want to use LastPass for your web passwords and still keep your more intense security concerns in KeePass, go ahead. You can actually store non-web passwords and data in LastPass, but we'll get to that in a bit.

Intrigued? Even just a little interested? Here's how LastPass can make your web browsing, or maybe the browsing of a friend with really weak passwords, more convenient and secure. Go ahead and create an account if you'd like, but LastPass actually recommends creating that account from a browser extension or software download.

Browser Extensions

The primary means of getting your username and passwords into your web sites. They're all slightly different, but work basically the same: you click an icon, log into LastPass with your One True Password—making sure not to set your extension to remember that password—and then just go about your browsing. When you hit sites that ask for a username and password that you already know, LastPass will drop down a tiny little toolbar and ask if you want to save them. If you need a new username and password, you can have LastPass generate a random, highly secure couple, save them, and never worry about remembering them again.

Here's LastPass' (somewhat clinical) explanation of how their extensions work, demonstrated on Firefox:

One-Time Passwords

If you're in a foreign land or on a sketchy Wi-Fi connection, the last thing you want to do is pass your universal LastPass password over the insecure airwaves. Luckily LastPass has a brilliant solution: Set up your account with some one-time passwords, then use them whenever you're somewhere not entirely locked down. As soon as you log in, that password becomes invalid, and, as mentioned before, your passwords don't fly over the open air in any case.

Bookmarklets

As we've previously shown, when you're on a system where you can't install your LastPass extension, or if you only like to occasionally fill in a form or login/password field, you can use LastPass bookmarklets to get at your stashed-away passwords. They work on nearly any browser with decent JavaScript capabilities on most any platform.

Secure Notes

Let's say you're looking for a universal password, PIN, and other security data database, like KeePass and its ilk. If you find LastPass convenient, you can store any data as a Secure Note, and it gets the same kind of password-protected, blindly encrypted treatment as your passwords. Helpful for those "virtual keyboard" passcodes that banks often use, telephone PIN numbers, and other non-simple security schemes.

Smartphone Apps, Portable Apps, and a Mobile Site

Small screens, tiny keys, and microscopic text fields are a reality of many smartphones. Even if your phone handles password input well, it's hard to find a password syncing solution that meshes well with every browser and system (Mac users have 1Password, but that's a very Mac-universe app). LastPass has dedicated apps, with free 14-day previews, for iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian, and Palm WebOS (phew). They generally offer both simple password retrieval databases and in-app browsers for jumping right into a site.

If your phone isn't covered by an app, or you don't want to pay the $14/year for a premium subscription, you can hit the LastPass mobile site to get at your security goods. If you're the type to keep a USB thumb drive handy at all times, you can grab a Firefox Portable extension, or "LastPass Pocket," from the downloads page and launch either one right off your drive.

One of the most powerful features in Firefox is also one too few people know about: the ability to create and use more than one profile at the same time. Here's how to streamline and reap the benefits of multiple browsing profiles.

Instead of installing every single extension for every task into the same Firefox profile, why not separate them into separate profiles, organized by task? Think of Firefox like an Operating System for the web, and each profile as a separate application—one profile is used for basic web browsing, another for writing, another for web development, and so on.

Most of the writers at Lifehacker HQ use different profiles for writing, researching, and personal browsing on a daily basis. It keeps your Firefox instances running smoother, and each profile is streamlined for accomplishing the kind of things you want to accomplish with that profile.

Setting Up Separate Firefox Profiles

Creating a new profile is a lot easier than you might think, but there's no default menu item that allows you to open the profile manager easily. If you install the ProfileSwitcher extension in the "Switching Profiles the Easy Way" section below, you can use it to create new profiles via a menu item; if you want to go that route, skip down to that section; either way, here's how to do it without the extension:

You'll need to pop open a command prompt, switch to the Firefox directory (cd %programfiles%\Mozilla Firefox\ should work), and then launch Firefox with a command line switch:

firefox -profilemanager -no-remote

If you don't like using the command prompt, you can simply create a shortcut to Firefox.exe (or copy your current one), and then add the arguments to the end of the Target line.

The first argument clearly indicates that you want the profile manager, but the second –no-remote argument means that you want to open a separate copy of Firefox at the same time as having the first one open. This is the magic switch that will allow you to run more than one profile at the same time, and it also allows you to open the profile manager without closing your current browser window.

Once you've created a new profile, you can make a separate Firefox shortcut, and modify the Target line to include a few extra arguments, making it look something like this:

firefox.exe –P profilename –no-remote

Switching Profiles the Easy Way

If you'd rather not mess with command line arguments and new shortcuts, you can switch between profiles or launch the profile manager the easy way with the previously mentioned ProfileSwitcher extension.

Once you've installed the extension, you can simply use the File menu to access the new profile switching options and access the profile manager directly from there. Once you've chosen one of the other profiles, you'll be prompted on whether you want to switch to that profile or keep the current profile open and open the second profile at the same time.

Sync Your Profile Passwords and Bookmarks

The biggest problem with maintaining multiple profiles is utilizing the same passwords, bookmarks, and settings across the various profiles, and previously mentioned Weave can do just that. Once you've setup Weave in each profile, you can sync your bookmarks, passwords, history, preferences, and even your open tabs if you felt like it. Weave isn't the only game in town, though, as you can use Xmarks to sync your bookmarks and passwords across other browsers as well, but it comes with additional "discovery" services that you might want to turn off.

Create Profiles for Specific Tasks

Now that we've learned how to create profiles, switch between them, and sync your passwords across them all, it's time to actually start creating useful profiles to separate out your tasks. Here's a few suggested ideas for the profiles I use on a regular basis, but you aren't limited to these ideas—you can more or less come up with a specialized profile for any task.

The Writing Profile
If you're doing writing on the web, you've no doubt realized that it's far too easy to get distracted by your other tabs, click on your bookmarks, or just type something into the search box. What I've done to keep myself focused on writing is create a separate profile specifically for writing, with almost all of the chrome elements removed to maximize the viewing area for writing and prevent myself from being distracted.

The Web Development Profile
If you spend any percentage of your time doing web design or development, Firebug is the single must-have extension that you cannot live without. It's not just that it lets you debug Javascript, but it allows you to edit the page HTML and CSS on the fly, and even has extensions like YSlow and Page Speed to help keep your web site nice and speedy. Since you really wouldn't want to have the hefty Firebug extension running all the time, it's best to create a new profile specifically for web development.

The Social Media Profile
Let's face it, social media can be a massive time suck, especially when you're browsing around finding random stuff using StumbleUpon-so what I do is create a separate profile for random browsing and social media. This helps keep me from clicking that Stumble button while I'm supposed to be working, but also helps me separate my time. Your social media needs may differ, but the point is to keep them separate from your primary profile to keep yourself focused on a single task.

The Extension Testing Profile
Rather than install every new extension and bloat up your primary Firefox profile, why not create a separate profile specifically for testing new extensions? This way you can make certain that you've fully vetted an extension before unleashing it on your main web browsing experience. Here at Lifehacker HQ, we make extensive use of test profiles when we're checking out extensions to recommend.

Secure Banking Profile
Why expose yourself by using your primary profile to access your banking sites? What I do is setup a clean banking profile with every plugin disabled, the NoScript and Adblock Plus extension to remove any danger of malware, and only my banking sites are allowed to use Javascript. I even go so far as to remove the search box to make sure I'm not using this profile for any quick Google lookups, and I create bookmarks for each of my banking sites, and make sure to never click a banking link in an email, since that's a quick way to get yourself scammed online.

The How-To Geek has been using multiple Firefox profiles for years. His geeky articles can be found daily here on Lifehacker, How-To Geek, and Twitter.

Firefox: If you hate having to search through your folders every time you change the type of file or directory you're saving to—and we certainly do!—Save File To helps you make custom context menus for file saving bliss.

The problem arises with the way Firefox retains the previous folder you've used to save something. That's great for when you're saving a bunch of the same thing in a row—who would want to navigate from the default directory every time you opened up the save as dialogue?—but if you're frequently saving a variety of files you want a faster way to move between directories.

Save File To is a Firefox add-on that enables editing of the right-click "Save As" context menu. Immediately after installation it adds in your Desktop and My Documents folders as available entries—and you can navigate down through those folders—but you can also specify custom folders and reorganize the menu. It's easy to add in a folder for a specific project you're working on or create custom links to save to your wallpaper collection, music collection, or any other system you want to set up. Although we used an image as our example in the screenshot above you can customize all the Save As menus in Firefox including how you save pages, links, images, and other files.

Visit the link below to install Save File To into Firefox or check out the via link to see a step-by-step tutorial at How-To Geek on setting up Save File To. Save File To is free and works wherever Firefox does. Have a favorite add-on for customizing the menus in Firefox or a similar tool for another browser? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Firefox/Chrome: If you love using your keyboard and shun your mouse, you'll definitely want to try gleeBox, an awesome add-on that lets you effortlessly browse the web without your mouse. Check out the video inside to see it in action.

Click on the picture above for a closer look.

Browsing the web without a mouse isn't easy. Without any add-ons at all you're stuck furiously punching the tab key to move through all the available links on the page. Other add-ons help you to navigate without your mouse but often not very intuitively.

Gleebox offers a highly customizable and intuitive way to navigate web pages via keyboard. At its most basic gleeBox allows you to hit the G key, and every link on the page is highlighted and you can navigate to it by typing part or all of the link name into gleeBox. Check out the videos below to see it in action.

After you've watched the intro video above to get a feel for how gleeBox works, this video showcases the newest features and customizations:

GleeBox is so neat we of course had to try it out immediately on Lifehacker.com and then make a custom script to browse Lifehacker with ease. The following screenshot shows the options menu of gleeBox with the entry you'll want to make to enable "ESP mode" on Lifehacker. ESP mode allows you to narrow the range of links on a page so that only the important links are selected.

For your cut and paste convenience this is the value from the screenshot above: div.content>h1:not(div.menubar-bg). That entry will highlight all the articles in the main column on Lifehacker, but will not highlight the main title bar or top stories. If you don't mind the big Lifehacker logo being highlighted in exchanged for the top stories being highlighted too, you can trim the entry down to just div.content>h1 to highlight all stories.

Definitely check out the manual for more gleeBox tips and tricks, and before you slog through creating a new ESP mode entry for a favorite web site, make sure to check out the gleeBox TipJar where users submit new commands and ESP modes they've created.

GleeBox is available as an extension for Firefox and Google Chrome.

Have a tip or trick for mouseless computer use, web browser-related or otherwise? Let's hear about it in the comments. Thanks JBu92!

Ever seen a picture online that you're kicking yourself for not saving, especially now that it's been removed? There's a good chance it may still be saved on your computer; all you need to do is familiarize yourself with your browser's cache.

Front page photo by Jeffrey Beall.

We've covered resurrecting images from your browser cache once before, highlighting how to recover images in Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari, but the browser landscape has changed a little since then. Luckily, recovering images from Firefox hasn't really changed, and popular alternatives like Chrome and Opera all have similar recovery methods. In Firefox, it works the same as last time we posted it:

1. Type about:cache in the address bar.
2. Under "Disk Cache Device," copy the folder path to where Firefox stores your cache entries.
3. Navigate to that folder in Windows Explorer or Finder. The files there will have strange names and no extension, so it can take some time, but you just have to open each one to see if it's the photo in question.

It's not quite as easy to find your cache folder in Chrome, but it's still there. On Windows, assuming you're using the Default profile (which you are if you haven't made any other profiles in Chrome), just press Win+R, paste %userprofile%\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache in the Run box, and hit Enter. In OS X, you can find it at /Users/adam/Library/Caches/ (replace 'adam' with your username). Basically the method is the same for any browser—all you have to do is find your browser-of-choice's cache folder, then go digging. (If you're an Internet Explore or Safari user, take a look at our original post on the topic for detailed instructions.)

As a bonus tip, reader zaghy2zy writes in detailing how to access removed Facebook photos that may still exist on Facebook's servers. (This method is a little different, because zaghy2zy is actually using his cache to find the web URL of the missing files; he then relies on the fact that Facebook's servers can be slow to delete images after they've been removed. If this quicker method doesn't work, the method's above might.)

Did your friend recently delete a picture on Facebook? Maybe something you really liked but she didn't? OR maybe something really embarrassing that you weren't able to see?

Well, if your friend deleted it within the past 7 days and it was viewed by you or another friend, chances are you should be able to see it, still. And It's still on Facebook's servers.

What you can do is open your browser's cache and look for it there. If you have Google Chrome, you can go to about:cache and search for it there. Of course there are a zillion files in there; you can narrow it down by using find. Facebook's pictures usually end in _n.jpg, so search for those and go through them manually. Once you find it, you can copy the link and open it in your browser. TADA! You can now see that "deleted" picture.

Of course, those pictures aren't there forever. But you still have time to pass it around or use it as blackmail (not that you actually will, right?).

So yeah, you can probably do that at other sites, so go try it yourself. I only have specific instructions for Google Chrome because it's the only browser I've tried the method on. Methods for other browsers would probably be very different but it shouldn't be that hard to do.

Put Google Buzz in your Firefox sidebar for easy access.

#tips #googlebuzz #firefox

Rob Rogers

Firefox: Maybe you've seen your favorite extensions fall behind when new Firefox releases roll out, but you haven't known what to do about it. A new-ish Mozilla add-on not only enables technically incompatible extensions for testing, but makes reporting actual incompatibilities easy.

Some of your favorite extensions might have authors that view them mainly as side projects, and can't always test and release new versions with every Firefox alpha, beta, and final release. Some of their extensions, though, may work just fine with a newer Firefox, but they just haven't updated their code to affirm that. Mozilla's Add-On Compatibility Reporter lets you, the extension fan, enable and test out extensions on any version of Firefox, then report if they're working fine or need some work.

It's a smart thing for Mozilla to make it easier for non-programmers to help with testing and reporting of extension compatibility. Your reports go to Mozilla, not the extension author, so you don't have to worry about embarrassing yourself in front of those clever types (trust me, it's a real concern). And for users who feel like they're lost at sea without their favorite Firefox tweaker, there's a way to verify that it really works, or actually doesn't, without having to hack your browser to make extensions compatible.

Add-On Compatibility Reporter is a free download, and technically works with Firefox versions through 3.7 alpha 1—though I couldn't install it from Mozilla's site while using the 3.7 alpha 1. Tell us if this extension has helped you test and report your own oft-neglected favorites in the comments.

Firefox only: Clicking through multiple product images while shopping on Amazon is really a chore. PictureFox, a handy Firefox add-on, opens all the images in a single gallery so you can stop making with the clicky-clicky all the time.

If you don't shop at Amazon often, then you may not realize what a pain—literally—slogging through products with tons of images can be. Nothing makes your repetitive-stress injured mousing finger ache more quickly than clicking on dozens of images to compare the features of a purchase you're trying to make.

PictureFox installs quickly and follows you every time you visit Amazon's website. Just click on the arrow the add-on displays along side a product's main image, and all its associated images—including user photos—all pop open in a single gallery page. The add-on also overrides Amazon's native "Zoom Viewer" feature and opens up images up to 14 megapixels in high resolution so you can see details before you buy.

To manage PictureFox, just choose Add-ons from Firefox's Tools menu. Then select what options you want to enable: Use image-flow gallery, show customer pictures, and allow multiple gallery instances. You can also uninstall the add-on from here, if it's not working out for you.

If you want a full package of Amazon-centric tweaks for Firefox, then be sure to check out Gina's Better Amazon Firefox extension. It shortens Amazon URLs, enlarges product images, and more.

Got a trick for surfing the vast digital aisles of Amazon? Dreaming of a perfect add-on that will make shopping there easier? Talk about it in the comments.

Firefox is the most extensible web browser around but you don't even need to install any add-ons to take advantage of the numerous shortcuts that make tabbed browsing even better.

Over at MakeUseOf, the software and technology-centered blog, they've put together a guide to being more productive with Firefox tabs, among the great add-ons they suggest like previously covered New Tab King, Tab Navigator, and Tab Preview, they also highlight some great built-in shortcuts—seen in the chart above.

Using the shortcuts expands the versatility of tabs without a single bit of memory bloat to your Firefox installation. You'll definitely want to learn the shortcuts above as well as one they missed—using CTRL+Page Up and CTRL+Page Down to move up and down through your list of tabs.

Have a favorite shortcut in Firefox, tab-related or otherwise? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Firefox: Every new version of Firefox offers enticing new features, but the real question is whether or not your beloved Firefox extensions are ready for the jump. Is It Compatible? puts the compatibility information right in your add-ons window.

There isn't much more to this handy little extension; once you install Is It Compatible? whenever you open the add-ons window in Firefox—as seen above in the screenshot—you'll see not only the extensions you have installed but also the versions of Firefox they are rated for displayed in a minimum-maximum format.

If you only have one or two critical Firefox extensions you rely on, it probably isn't much of a hassle to visit Mozilla and confirm their compatibility. With more than a few extensions however, Is It Compatible? makes a tedious process as simple as scrolling down your extension list.

Is It Compatible? is a free extension and works wherever Firefox does. Have a favorite tool for keeping Firefox in top shape? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Windows/Mac/Linux: It doesn't look that different, and the version number is certain to change, but Mozilla is offering a "Developer Preview" of the rendering engine inside Firefox 3.7, which will actually become 4.0. If you're down with unstable alphas, it's all yours.

The release is technically a first alpha of the web rendering engine inside the next Firefox release, Gecko 1.9.3, but the browser they're releasing it with compiles as Firefox 3.7 Alpha 1. No tab or interface changes here, but the browser itself incorporates things like native WebGL 3D graphics, advanced CSS capabilities, and other code and compatibility changes detailed at the link below.

It's rough, it's unofficial, and it shouldn't be your primary browser, but if you want the earliest possible look at what's coming in Firefox, go ahead and grab it—or wait for the inevitable portable version to follow.

Firefox: If you've ever started up Firefox after a system crash and had it attempt to restore all the eleventy-billion tabs you had open, you know what a resource drain your tabs really are. BarTap helps alleviate the stress.

BarTap is a Firefox extension that keeps unfocused tabs from sponging up system resources. When BarTap is active you can specify that new tabs and restored tabs will not be loaded until they are actually clicked on, turning the tabs into placeholders for the pages you will be viewing and minimizing the amount of system resources devoted to them. You can specify one action for restored tabs and one for freshly opened tabs if you prefer that newly opened tabs always load immediately.

Tabs that are on your "tap" are grayed out until you click on them. Clicking on them causes the content to load at the time you access them (as opposed to the time they were created). BarTap is a clever way to have a lot of tabs open without them bloating up your memory use. BarTap is free and works wherever Firefox does. Have a favorite extension for enhancing tabbed browsing? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Navigating to the directory where Firefox stores your profile has always been a bit of a pain, but the recent release of Firefox 3.6 makes finding that folder—and from there backing up your bookmarks, extensions, or entire profile—a breeze.

That's because Firefox 3.6 added a helpful new about page for support and troubleshooting. Just type about:support in your Firefox address bar to give it a look. The new page separates a ton of useful troubleshooting information into sections, including Application Basics (name, version, profile directory, installed plug-ins, and build configuration, followed by all of your installed extensions, and then ending with your profile's modified preferences. Mozilla put this all together as a helpful tool for finding important information for users elbow deep in troubleshooting, but as Nirmal over at Life Rocks 2.0 points out, it also serves as a great shortcut for quickly backing up your Firefox profile.

Just click the Open Containing Folder (or Show in Finder in OS X) button to go straight to the profile folder for that Firefox installation. Once you're looking at it, backing up your profile is as simple as copying that folder. Windows users, you can also give previously mentioned MozBackup a look if you'd like help with the backup-and-restore process for everything from Firefox and Thunderbird to Songbird.

The official Mozilla Add-ons Blog has issued a security notice to Firefox users regarding two experimental add-ons that made their way onto the Firefox Add-ons pages containing malware. The extensions in question—Sothink Web Video Downloader and Master Filer (neither of which had we even heard of)—target Windows users and have been removed. Mozilla reassures users:

AMO performs a malware check on all add-ons uploaded to the site, and blocks add-ons that are detected as such. This scanning tool failed to detect the Trojan in Master Filer. Two additional malware detection tools have been added to the validation chain and all add-ons were rescanned, which revealed the additional Trojan in Version 4.0 of Sothink Web Video Downloader. No other instances of malware have been discovered.

[Mozilla Add-ons Blog]

If you're looking for a way to organize all the information you find and research you do online, and you've had enough with bookmarking, copying and pasting, and cobbled-together techniques not cutting it, Zotero is a comprehensive information manager for Firefox.

Zotero is, at its heart, a citation manager. It was designed to facilitate research and to make organizing and including that research in essays and publications pain free. As such, it's an excellent tool for any scholar, researcher, or student to have in their toolbox. Its utility extends well beyond preparing to write a paper, however, as it allows you to grab nearly anything off the web and insert it into the Zotero system. The following video gives a quick overview of some of Zotero's features:

If the overview video caught your interest, read on and check out some of the other great screencasts to see the individual features in action.

Getting Items in Zotero

You can add items in a myriad of ways to Zotero. From within Firefox, just click the Zotero icon in the address bar, on the status bar, or hit CTRL+ALT+Z to activate Zotero. You can add nearly everything on the web from books—Zotero will add in all the information about the book automatically—to highlighted portions of web pages, to full out saving entire web pages for future reference. Unlike bookmarking a web page, Zotero saves the page just like you would save it to your computer. Thus when you go to reference it later on, even if it has moved or been deleted, you still have the images and text archived. In addition to capturing information from the web, you can supplement your Zotero archive by adding files right from your computer like images, HTML documents, PDFs, and more.

Organizing Your Research

Zotero allows you to organize your research into collections. The collections are highly flexible and an item can belong to multiple collections simultaneously. They use the analogy of the playlist—and it's fitting—you can "mix" your research into as many collections as you need. Your Zotero library is the master collection of all your research, and from that research you can pull citations, clippings, PDFs and so on, and create a collection representing your current area of interest or research like "19th Century Medieval Literary Criticism" or "Potential Markets for Growth". Collections are easily modified and even shared.

Word Processor Compatibility and Citations

Although Zotero was built to facilitate researchers using Firefox and working on the web, the system—through the use of plug-ins—allows you to work in your favorite word processor using Zotero. They've made plug-ins for Microsoft Word, OpenOffice, and NeoOffice. If word processor support is a deal breaker for you, make sure to check out their word processor compatibility chart. Check out the Word integration in the video below:

As the video shows, inserting citations and even changing them in-text is easy. You're not just limited to citations in word processors however, you can drag and drop citations right from Zotero into any text box. Zotero comes with a built-in library of common citation formats like AMA, APA, Chicago Style, MLA—over a dozen by default. If that isn't enough you can dip into the style repository and select from hundreds of alternative citations styles. On the rare chance you can't find a citation style—and it would be rare!—you can hop over to the Zotero support forum and put in a request that they add it to the archive.

Syncing Your Research and Files

Nobody wants to lug around a computer or flash drive and risk losing all the research they've done. Zotero has multiple channels for syncing your data to ensure your research is safe. Zotero syncs itself to the servers, if you have it installed on multiple computers you can sync all the instances of Zotero through the Zotero servers, and to further replicate your data you can share it with friends through the Zotero group system so that your joint research is stored across multiple computers.

Zotero is a complex yet easy to manage research tool. Fully intended for academic research, you can use it outside of academia to manage your research on any topic from nearly any source on the web. Our overview here highlights some of the best features of Zotero, but a quick browse through the support section on Zotero's web site will show you even more capabilities and innovative ways people are using Zotero to help wrestle with the enormous amount of information web-based research provides.

If you have experience with Zotero or just have a research tip or trick up your sleeve, let's hear about it in the comments.