The Firefox Tutorial

-- finished toolbar config --

II - Themes

A theme is a small file that dictates how Firefox looks, buttons, scrollbars, etc, can all be altered fairly easily and many variations are available at any time. Much like the customization of the toolbars a theme can have a dramatic effect on how you interact with a Firefox and I strong suggest giving it a shot if you are dissatisfied with the way Firefox looks.

In order to get more themes:

1.     Go to "tools" in the menu select "themes,"

2.     Click on the link at the bottom right that says "get more themes". Guess what happens?

--Click the selected area to "get more themes" --

The site that Mozilla uses to catalog themes and extensions, this is a trusted site, and you can be confident that all themes or extensions that are on this site have gone through at least some testing in order to ensure their compatibility and safety.

Once at Update.mozilla.org one can relatively easily navigate through the list of Themes. However, because of a bug in the server software previews are not available for many of the themes at this time. I suggest visiting the theme homepage (listed in their update.mozilla.org entry) or just trying them out if they sound interesting.

--click the selected area to install a theme -- (will be updated to a themes

page... but the idea is the same)

Now you should have a browser that you like to look at, you'll find that as time goes on you might want to change things, move things around, you might decide that you have a better place to put something or that something you thought was important no longer is. regardless this is an important first step to owning your browser (and taking back the web).

Browsing history

The Mozilla Firefox browser has got many useful functions, some of them you might need to use on a regular basis, some are  nice to have  in mind if you need them. In this article I will go through a few of them. Hopefully this will make you enjoy Firefox even more. Browsing history (Ctrl + H) This can be a very nifty function for anyone. By pressing "Ctrl + H" you will get this window:

As you see in the highlighted area you know got a window where you can go through the browser history, if you need to find an old URL maybe? The browsing history option gives you a variety of options. As you see the history is pided into different days, and you can go in and check each one of them.

As shown in the screenshot above, you can also in the "Find" field type in a search string and the browser will search the browser history for sites containing those keywords, below you can see I typed in "Mozilla", and the browser automatically generated a list over sites I've visited containing the word "Mozilla".

To the right of the search string field, you got a drop down menu where you can sort the sites as you wish, press it and check it out. :) "Ctrl+ H" is one of the nicest functions in Firefox. There are more, to be continued..

An introduction to Mozilla Firefox Download manager Going to Tools and clicking on "Downloads" will give you something looking like this:

This is the Mozilla Firefox download manager, this feature mainly consists of two functions, you can view current downloads, and finished downloads. If you look at the screenshot above,  the first thing I noticed was the pleasant user interface, good job Mozilla.

The highlighted area shows where files are stored by default, and clicking on the folder icon or name will open the folder in your favorite file explorer.

The Clean up button will let you clean the list of finished downloads on your download manager list.

In the screenshot above you see a download in action. As you see the download manager tells you how far it has come, what speed it's downloading at and how much time remains before the download completes. You've also get the choice to cancel or pause the download, very nifty if you're on a slow connection.

The open link will open the downloaded file in the default application, if there aren't any applications defined for that file, Firefox will ask you how it should be opened.

Page setup, print preview and printing

I'm sure many of you print documents straight from the browser. Mozilla Firefox allows you to edit the printing options as well, as an ordinary text editor would do. The Firefox application is truly a multi-functional browser. :)

First of all, from the drop down menu in the top left corner of the browser, you can choose "File". Go File > Page setup...and you will get these two options:

:

In "Format & Options" you can choose orientation, portrait or landscape. You can scale or make it auto-adjust. If you want the background printed out (usually that's not necessary) just check the box which says "Print background (colors & images)".

In "Margins & Header/Footer" you can adjust margins, as well as choose what you want or don't want in the headers and footers, really it's only your imagination which is the limit. :)

Now, as you see you have many of the same options as a regular text editor program as for example Open Office, Word and such. I can't tell you what your settings should be, that's your choice. :) For the next function, go to File > Print Preview...an you will get the following options:

If you look at the top tool bar, you got all your options at one place. :) You can really access most functions from Print Preview, and lay the finishing touch on your printout. Enjoy.

Bookmarks

Bookmarks and the bookmark function is something most of you who browse on a daily basis will use. In this article I will explain a bit more about the options you get in Firefox regarding bookmarks. I'm sure with a bit more knowledge on how Mozilla Firefox works, and how to use bookmarks optimally, your experience and satisfaction with the browser will increase.

If you look at the screenshot above, I have highlighted the button for your bookmarks, press it once with your mouse button and you will get a extended menu:

• Add to bookmarks (option)
  Choosing this action will add your current page (tab window) to your bookmarks. If you choose this option you will get the following window (as shown below), note you got a few options. You can give the bookmark a name in "Name" field. You can also choose where the Mozilla Firefox browser should store the bookmark (which folder), really it's up to you. If you check the box which says "Bookmark all tabs in a folder", the browser will create a new folder under bookmarks, which includes all the open tabs windows. If your unsure about tabs windows check out this article. I suggest you spend a few minutes navigating and try to learn where things are.

To remove a page from bookmarks, simply press "Bookmarks" on the top of your browser and locate the page you want to delete, right click and press "delete".

Manage Bookmarks Dialog Box

Yes, a new window. I won't elaborate to much, this will get out of hand. ;) The bookmarks manager can be used to manage the properties (name, where it's pointing to) for each bookmark, as well as organize the bookmarks into folders and separate sections. I suggest you use some time and get to know the choices you have. Nothing you do can really hurt the program, so go on explore a bit.

• Bookmark toolbar folder (a folder)
  Here you can find some of the Mozilla sites, you can also add pages to this folder if you want to.

• Firefox & Mozilla Information (a folder)
  By default there are placed some Firefox help sites under this folder, you can also add your own sites here if you wish to do so.
• Quick Searches (a folder)
  Lists a few search sites, you can edit this option as well.
• Imported IE favorites (a folder)
  If you used IE as a default browser previously, you will find your bookmarks from IE under this folder, quite handy.
• "Your bookmarks" (URL's)
  At the very bottom of"Bookmarks" menu, you will find your bookmarks added by you after Firefox installation, note you can move the bookmarks to folders if you wish to do so.
  How to create a Live Bookmark

 

 

Subscribing to an RSS web feed is as simple as creating a so called Live Bookmark. And to make life even easier Firefox can auto detect some feeds, and provide a shortcut for subscribing.

 

Subscribing to an RSS feed (pre 1.5)

When you visit a site and you see the orange icon in the bottom right part of the Mozilla Firefox browser window (the status bar), or if you are using version 1.5 or newer, in the right most part of the address bar.

Subscribing to an RSS feed (1.5 and later)

You can add the feed(s) by clicking the orange icon and subscribing to one. If there is more then one RSS feed, Firefox shows a list from which you can pick one.

Multiple RSS feeds (1.5 and later)

The Add Bookmark (Add Live Bookmark for 1.5 and newer) dialog appears and you can add the Live Bookmark.

Adding a Live Bookmark

I prefer to add the Live bookmarks to the Bookmarks Toolbar Folder, normally shown under the navigation toolbar, so I can have a quick peek at recent events with just one mouse click.

Live Bookmarks added to the Toolbar Folder

Backing Up Bookmarks

Need to move your bookmarks to another pc? Maybe you got a new computer, or your wiping your HD (which has to be done at some point in life), whatever the reason Firefox makes it easy to save your bookmarks to a single file so you can move them around.

Most of what you will want to do with bookmarks will be done in the Bookmarks Manager. This can be accessed from Bookmarks > Manage Bookmarks.

Select File > Export, and select a place to save the file. That's it for the backup!

Now you'll be wanting to know how to import those bookmarks from that file again of course. This is still done from the Bookmarks Manager, so go to it, click File > Import. Now select From File, and click Next (There may be options there to import bookmarks from other browsers which can be handy too!). Now select the file that you exported your bookmarks to and open it. Your done!

Although Firefox's Bookmarks Manager is an improvement from IE's and makes the export/import process a breeze, there is one shortcoming that I hope they improve upon in an upcoming release; you can't select certain bookmarks or folders of bookmarks to export, you have to take the whole list.

 

Manually subscribing to an RSS feed

If a site has an RSS feed, but the orange icon doesn't show up, you can add the feed manually. Select "New Live Bookmark..." in the Bookmarks Manager and enter the URL and other information of the feed.

How to get the orange icon on your site

If your site makes a feed available, but the orange icon doesn't show up in the status bar, add the following lines to the head part (not the body) of your HTML pages:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml"    

title="John Bookmark RSS" href="/index.rss">

Add a link element as given above for each RSS feed available on your site. If you need an example, just view the source of this web page.

Other options

In the past I used Awasu, which I didn't like because it uses Internet Explorer, and Aggreg8, a Firefox extension. But Live Bookmarks does exactly what I want, using the right browser and just showing the headlines.

Navigation

Oft over looked navigation has come a long way since the Internet Explorer days. There are many features to take advantage of, and lots of times they are either taken for granted or forgotten. I've tried to compile some of the basics, and more advanced methods of navigation.

Tabs

Tabs are probably the single most used navigation after the basics (forward, backward, url bar etc) one day they will be considered basic as well, but as it stands many new users don't have the foggiest about these little devils.

As an example of how to use tabs I tend to demonstrate the following (this takes a little imagination. bear with me.)

Lets say that you are writing a terribly important paper on Firefox, and as a result want to include some information about the Mozilla foundation. To do this you:

1. Head to google and do a search for "Mozilla Foundation".
2. See that there are too many choices.
3. Hold down the control key and click the first 7 or so.
4. Notice how your entire search is now neatly organized into tabs.

As a general reference the following are the ways in which one can make and manipulate tabs.

• Ctrl - left click: open link in a new tab
• middle click: open link in a new tab
• Ctrl - T: open a new tab
• Ctrl - W: close current tab
• Ctrl - tab: switch between tabs (forward)
• Ctrl - shift - tab: switch between tabs (backward)

You will find these commands to be useful when browsing, even if they don't feel natural at first I encourage you to practice every once in a while, I think you'll come to understand why they exist.

 

Pop Up Blocking

First lets notice that Firefox has a terrific pop-up blocker built in and already customized for your use, which is how all modern web browsers should come these days.

When you first block a popup in Firefox it will bring down a small bar bellow your toolbars like shown.

-- that bar is telling you Firefox has blocked a popup :) --

If you never want to see the bar again, left click it, and tell it "Don't show this message when popup's are blocked." If you ever need to allow a pop-up it's as easy as clicking "the information button" at the bottom right hand section of the screen. and select "allow pop-ups from"

-- click the little guy in the corner to allow popup's --

 

Ad Blocking

Note: If you are going to use Firefox for viewing the Web pages that you develop, the AdBlock may interfere with any Flash buttons that you place in your pages.

Much like pop-up blocking Firefox has the amazing ability to actually block ads within web pages. There are two ways of doing this, through the use of the Adblock extension, or by editing a user file, I will be covering how both methods.

Blocking Ads Through UserContent.css

To begin I suggest installing the extension "Chrom-Edit". From there we'll head to the "Tips and Tricks" page at the help site for fire fox. Here you'll find a large list of little tweaks that can be done to make Firefox act in certain ways, everything from changing menu appearances to making Firefox block ads. We'll skip all these for now and head straight to the ad blocking page.

Once at the ad blocking page you'll find what is called a script; it runs a set of commands that can be passed to the browser, in this case it passes a list of things to ignore from web pages (namely... ads).

1. Open up Chrom-edit: from the menu bar select tools => "Edit User Files".
2. Select the "user Content" tab (top)
3. Paste the ad blocking script into the text area
4. Click the save button (bottom)
5. Restart Firefox, if every thing has gone correctly you are now blocking ads!

Other user file tweaks I suggest are are:

Disable blinking and scrolling text...this may look fancy to the newcomer, but for knighthood into Geekdom they are nothing short of annoying...why would anyone want such? Change the cursor shapes depending on what a link will do (open a new window, open javascript)

 

Blocking Ads Using the Adblock Extension

Unfortunately, one cannot switch to a different channel while surfing the Web, but you can just turn them off. Blocking ads with Adblock is about as easy as it gets, so it's generally the method people use, and with a good set of filters it's very effective at blocking ads, and not blocking content that you want to see.

1. Head over to the Adblock Page Here is AdBlock Plus!
2. Install the Extension
3. Restart Firefox, not your computer, just shut down Firefox and then re-open it.
4. Download this .txt file.
5. Open the Adblock extension Preferences
6. from the menu: Tools -> Adblock -> Preferences
7. Click the text that says "Adblock Options" --> import Filters
8. Point Adblock to the .txt file I had you download
9. Restart Firefox

 

Realize that these filters aren't perfect, who is?, but they are good. If you run into ads that aren't being blocked you can add them to the filters through the right click context menu.

1.  Right click image menu: Adblock image

This can be refined if you are crafty by editing the image location and replacing what you see as a probable location for all the ads with *. This acts as a wild card. This way you can block hole folders of images.

 

Quick Links

This is one of those Firefox features that does seem very... well, jaw dropping, but is one that consistently has impressed people, and is one that I probably make this most extensive use of.

The basic idea is that using certain keywords (set by the user) you can use the URL bar to access some bookmarks. While this isn't particularly useful for just doing bookmarks, it is useful you creating what are called "quick searches". Firefox comes with a number of these already built in. So lets try a few out before we move on.

Try typing "wp Mozilla" (without the parenthesis) in the URL bar.

You'll notice that this takes you to the Wikipedia article on Mozilla, isn't that neat!

The same is true for typing "Dict -search term-" or "Google -search term-". (dictionary.com and google.com respectively)

Now, what's nice is that these searches are relatively easy to make yourself and can be used just about anyplace that has a search field, and thus become an easy way to quickly navigate the Internet.

 

Make Your Own

To begin learning how to make your own, lets start by editing the Google quick search so that you can access it with a simple "g" command, which I find much less cumbersome than typing out google every time.

Simply select Bookmarks from the menu bar => manage bookmarks.

From here you will see a nicely ordered version of your bookmarks. open up the Quick Search folder, inside will be "Google" quick search, a "Dictionary" quick search and an "I'm feeling lucky" quick search.

1. Right click Google quick search => Properties.

2. Edit the keyword field from "Google" to "g".

3. Select okay.

-- Exchange "g" for "google" --

This same process can be followed in the Dictionary.com quick search changing "dict" for "d".

For making your own quick searches:

1. Go to the site you want to quick search, and search for something that will be easily recognized (I use a bunch of capital Z's for example "ZZZ").

2.  Bookmark that page, and put it in the quick search folder - this isn't necessary but a helpful organizational tool. now head to the bookmark manager (like we did for editing the Google quick search)

3. Right-click - edit properties.

4. Fill in an appropriate keyword.

5. In the URL field find the "Z's", they should be there standing out like a sore thumb (look hard). Remove all the Z's and in their exact place put "%s". (see highlighted section above)

This is the Firefox "put x here" command. That is, those two symbols together tell Firefox that it should replace them with user input.

For most search sites (not all, and some are tricky like imdb.com but I won't go into that here) the URL contains the search parameter in a specific spot every time, by adding the %s you've given Firefox the power to add anything you put into the URL bar into it's place, and thus "quick search".

 

Live Bookmarks

RSS (really simple syndication) makes it easy to keep up on news and blogs. If you read the news, or visit a friends blog chances are that you've bumped into RSS and haven't even known it. You'll notice that in the latest versions of Firefox (1.0PR and higher) that when you visit a site that has an RSS feed

-- click the selected area to open up the live bookmark dialog --

To add an RSS feed simply click that icon, select one of the "subscription" options. (usually I choose the RSS, and 2.0 if available). Add the bookmark to one of your folders (bookmarks by default). now if you go look at the bookmarks menu item, you'll see that there is folder that corresponds to the RSS feed you just added. This folder will be automatically updated when you open Firefox, and will have within it all the different "articles" that the site is sending out.

 

Single Window Mode

This is the much request feature that has spawned a plethora of extensions from Tabbed Browser Preferences to Tabbed Browsing Extension. Many times it's Opera users that are seeks a method of tab management more similar to their native browser, other times it's just people that like tabs.

So, what does it do? Single Window Mode routes all links that would open new windows to new tabs, keeping all browsing (without holding the control key or middle clicking) in a single window.

By default this preferences are hidden because the feature had some bugs and wasn't tested very well before 1.0. However I haven't ever had or heard of any issues with it, and it's nice to have that functionality native to the browser.

In order to activate single window mode in Firefox:

1. Open the url "about:config" (trust me)

-- about:config --

2.  Search for browser.tabs.showSingleWindowModePrefs

3. Double click that entry to change it to "true"

4. Restart Firefox

5. Open the options dialog (tools --> options/edit --> preferences)

6. Go to Advanced --> Tabbed Browsing

7. Check the entry "force new links that open a new window to open in:"

-- new preferences --

8.  Restart Firefox

Note: the preferences found in about:config can be used for a number of other very useful settings, I encourage you to explore.

 

Save Pages Using Names You'll Actually Remember 

Do you ever save web pages with Firefox? I do. I find that it's much more convenient to save a copy of a page than to print it off and add to an ever growing junk pile. Paper and ink cartridges or toner costs money, but with 100GB or 200GB (or larger!) hard drives, it's much more economical to just save them.

Personally, I save a copy of every thing I sell or buy on eBay. It's an easy way to keep a record of all my transactions. However, Firefox just uses the file name of the page you're viewing to save it - "eBayISAPI.dll.htm" won't make any sense when you see this file months from now. What I'm about to show you is the easiest way to use the title of a page as the file name when saving, so you can easily see what it is at a glance, and desktop searches can find it too!

We're not going to need a fancy extension - just a bookmarklet. What's a bookmarklet? Simply put, a bookmarklet is just a little bit of JavaScript inside a regular bookmark. Don't worry, you won't need to know how to make one yourself - we'll cover making your own bookmarklet's in a future article.

Figure 1: Enabling the Bookmarks Toolbar

The first step is to make sure that your Bookmarks Toolbar is enabled. To do that, just go the "View > Bookmarks Toolbar" menu option and make sure it's checked. (See Figure 1)

We've made this special bookmarklet for you. Pretty much what it does is show you the title of the page you're viewing, so you can easily copy and paste it when you save the page. Drag the link below onto the bookmarks toolbar and you should be set.

Figure 2: Your New Bookmarklet on the Bookmarks Toolbar

Figure 2 shows what the toolbar should look like when you finish.

That completes the installation. Simple right?

Now to put it to use:

Figure 3: The Page Name Window

1. Click on the "Page Title" bookmark and a box will come up with the page's title in it. (See Figure 3)

2. Copy the title, then click "OK" to close the box.

3. Go to "File > Save Page As".

4. Finally, paste the title into the file name box.

It still requires some effort, but for us lazy's its better than figuring out what to type for the file name. Maybe someone will make it even easier and create an extension to do this without the bookmarklet and all the clicking.

Downloading Freezes Firefox

If Firefox freezes up for a few seconds every time you try to download a file, it's probably caused by an excess of old completed downloads left in the downloads manager. There is a short and simple solution to this problem.

You can usually fix this problem by opening the Downloads window(Tools > Downloads -or- hold Ctrl and press J), and clicking the Clean Up button. This will clear that long list of old downloads.

Once you've done this you shouldn't have that pesky freezing problem anymore.

While I'm talking about the download manager, I should recommend the Download Manager Tweak extension, which puts a cleaner look on the downloads window, and adds a few handy buttons, like Open Folder, to open the containing folder for a download.

 

Can't Live Without SessionSaver 

SessionSaver is a Firefox extension that saves the state of your browser whenever you close it, it crashes, your computer crashes, or even if the power goes out! Everything is saved including all the tabs you had open, web site sessions, text in forms, and even the scroll position on each page!

It's only been about 6 months on my new computer, and before that I was so far behind; a 333 MHZ, 160 MB RAM, eMachine. That thing was built for the past, and when the applications of the present actually worked, it would often crash if I put too much stress on it. Well I often have 3-5 very important tabs open at once, and then maybe a few leisure tabs, and it was a pain to reopen them all if my computer crashed. Once SessionSaver didn't keep my computer from crashing, but it did spare me the annoyance of crashes, and since then has been great on a not-so-buggy computer, because I always come back to the web pages I'm reading or working on.

Of course, you don't have to have an old computer for SessionSaver to be useful. Even if your computer doesn't crash often, you can close your browser to let someone else use the computer, and then come back to the same pages you had open before. It's such a simple thing that I'm having a hard time trying to come up with more to say to try to convince you, but there's nothing more to say; it's a great extension that can make your life a lot easier. But you won't know if it's for you unless you try it. Multiple Home Pages 

This is a great feature. Since Firefox has the ability to have more than one web-page open in the same window (through tabs), it's just common sense that you should be able to have more than one web-page open by default, when you open your browser. I find it handy because when I come online I check up on 3-8 different website's, and I can have the ones I visit most frequently open automatically.

I'll stop babbling and show you the two ways to do this. The first is the hardest, but will show you how to do it manually. Go to Tools > Options. On the General tab you'll find Home Page is the first option.

Notice that in the image there are a few URL's in the text box. You may list as many as you want, all you need to do is separate each one with a | (usually located just above your "Return" or "Enter" key), like they are in the image.

Now a much easier way to do this is to open all of the pages you want as home pages in different tabs, go to Options and click the "Use Current Pages" button. You also have the choice of selecting one of your bookmarks for your home page, or just using a blank page

 

Open My Files in a New Tab!!!

After you first install Firefox, and you go to open an HTML file from your hard drive, Firefox shows the file in whatever tab you last used, possibly navigating away from a web page that you're viewing. This can be quite annoying sometimes. Want to change it? Read on.

By the way, this one's pretty simple, so I don't think we need a screen shot. Bug me at ethan@firefoxtutor.com if you want help.

Click the menu Tools > Options. Click the Advanced tab. Find the part that says Tabbed Browsing and it should list an option labled Open links from other applications in:. Now, you have three options.

"a new window"
"a new tab in the most recent window"
"the most recent tab/window"

If you prefer the files you open to be opened in a new window, select the first option. If you want the files you open to be opened in a new tab, in the last window you used, select the second option (If you have no windows open, a new one will be opened for the file). The default is the third one, which opens the file in the last tab you used.

So there you have it! A simple solution to a pesky peeve. (Use of alliteration was unintentional!)

 

Removing Cookies

1a) Removing Cookies from Internet Explorer 6:

• Click Tools menu, Internet Options...
• On the tab titled General, click Delete Cookies...
• Confirm OK
• It should take a few moments to erase all the .txt cookie files from your hard drive.

1b) Preventing All Future Cookies in Internet Explorer 6:

• Click Tools menu, Internet Options...
• On the tab titled Privacy, click Advanced ...
• Check mark the Override Automatic Cookie Handling checkbox
• Check both of the Block option buttons
• Confirm OK, and OK to complete.
• From this point on, no more cookies will be allowed to track your browsing information in IE6.

2a) Removing Cookies from Firefox 1.5:

• Click Tools menu, Options...
• On the tab titled Cookies, click View Cookies...
• Click Remove Cookies or Remove All Cookies
• Confirm OK
• It should take a few moments to erase all the .txt cookie files from your hard drive.

2b) Preventing All Future Cookies in Firefox 1.5:

• Click Tools menu, Options...
• On the tab titled Cookies, click View Cookies...
• Disable the checkbox Allow sites to set Cookies
• Confirm OK
• From this point on, no more cookies will be allowed to track your browsing information in Firefox.

Understanding URL's: How Internet URL Addresses Work

Part 1) Eleven Years of URL's, and Already There Are Billions.

In 1995, Tim Berners-Lee, the father of the World Wide Web, implemented a standard of "URIs" (Uniform Resource Identifiers), sometimes called Universal Resource Identifiers. The name later changed to "URL's" for Uniform Resource Locators.

The intent was to take the idea of telephone numbers, and apply them to addressing millions of web pages and machines.

Today, an estimated 31 billion web pages and Internet transmitters are addressed using URL names.

Here are six examples of the most-common URL appearances:

Example: http://www.whitehouse.gov
Example: https://www.nbnz.co.nz/login.asp
Example: http://forums.about.com/ab-guitar/messages/?msg=6198.1
Example: ftp://ftp.download.com/public
Example: telnet://freenet.ecn.ca
Example: gopher://204.17.0.108

Cryptic? Perhaps, but outside of the strange acronyms, URL's are really no more cryptic than an international long-distance telephone number.

A URL Spelling Lesson

Here are some simplified rules to start your URL habits right:

a. A URL is synonymous with "Internet address". Feel free to interchange those words in conversation, although URL makes you sound more high-tech!
b. A URL never has any spaces in it.
c. A URL, for the most part, is all lower case.
d. A URL is NOT the same as an email address.
e. A URL always starts with a protocol prefix like "http://", but most browsers will type those characters for you. Nerdy point to note: some other common Internet protocols are ftp://, gopher://, telnet://, and irc://.
f. A URL uses forward slashes (/) and dots to separate its parts.
g. A URL is usually in some kind of English, but numbers are also allowed.

Some examples for you:

http://english.pravda.ru/
https://citizensbank.ca/login
ftp://211.14.19.101
telnet://hollis.harvard.edu The Internet's Cloaked Web, Explained

 

Web Pages That Exceed Google and Yahoo

Many untrained users have the mistaken expectation that they can locate anything Internet with Google or Yahoo. These two "Primary" search tools are indeed popular catalogs with amazing databases, but no, they do not index everything on the Internet.

Here are three statistics for you, taken from Google.com, Yahoo.com, Cyberatlas, and MIT:

1) Google, commonly hailed as the best search database today, uses electronic spiders to read and catalog thousands of web pages each day. Google currently indexes 3.3 billion total web pages in its database.

2) Yahoo, a database powered by human editors and collaborative people effort, works much slower than Google robots to catalogue web pages. Yahoo currently indexes 1 million web pages.

3) As of December 2003, there are an estimated 45 billion publically-available pages on the World Wide Web, and another estimated 5 billion in private intranet pages.

The exact numbers are impossible to know, but the scale of these estimates is fair.

Assuming some overlap, then Google and Yahoo collectively catalog about 4 billion web pages and user postings, which is approximately 25% of the public World Wide Web.

That means 75% of the Web's available content is not searchable via Google or Yahoo.

Assignment:

1. What is a cookie?
2. How do you remove a cookie?
3. What is a URL?
4. What is the correct way to spell a URL?
5. What is a Session Saver?
6. What is an RSS feed?
7. What is a Blog?
8. What is an ISP? How do they work?
9. What is spyware?
10. Research, and then test a favorite password for strength. Here, here, or here are just a few locations to check passwork stregth. Or, just get the big list here. If you used the first three sites, did you notice how they differed on their interpretation of passwords? Why should you have strong passwords? Final note, if you are performing any financial transactions then all of your passwords should be strong or very strong. Never compromise your personal security. Be smart.

Firefox

1. Install Firefox and the Google Tool Bar Get the link on the top right of this page
2. Make your home page www.co-bw.com
3. Use the Session Saver
4. Change your skin/theme from the default
5. Add the following Add-ons:
   1. All of the Web tools found on this page
   2. Save Image in Folder
   3. Google Search Toolbar
   4. Fasterfox
   5. Fotofox
   6. MR Tech Local Install
   7. CookieSafe
   8. Google Web Accelerator
   9. Googlepedia
   10. Googlebar Lite
   11. HTML Validator
   12. AI Roboform Toolbar for Firefox... this is a great tool that will work best on your home computer.
   13. Colorful Tabs or something similar
6. Load at least five different themes (these are some suggestions):
   1. Noia 2.o
   2. PimpZilla
   3. Metal Lion
   4. AquaFox
   5. Modern Aluminum
7. Create a custom toolbar:
   1. GOTO: View -> Toolbars -> Customize
   2. Click on: "Add New Toolbar"
   3. When it asks for a name, name it: "Standard"
   4. You will see a new menu bar appear below your navigation bar. Drag the following icons up to the empty bar.
      1. Print
      2. Separator
      3. New Window
      4. New Tab
      5. Bookmarks
      6. History
      7. Downloads
      8. Separator
      9. Copy
      10. Cut
      11. Paste
      12. Separator
      13. Now add some of the extensions/add-ons to your bar

   Just for fun, click on the "New Tab" icon that you added to your tool bar. Notice how much easier it is for you to open new tabs, or new windows if you choose. The advantage is that you can work more efficiently. If you decide that you do not want to use the tool bar, then go to View and click on Standard so that it no longer has a check mark.

Opera

This is optional, but Opera is an exceptional browser. I have found it to be more secure than Firefox, faster, and not a memory hog like Firefox.

1. Install Opera
2. Change your skin
3. List and describe all of the "key features" of Opera. Speed dialing, and the wand are a couple of cool tools.
4. How do you adjust Multimedia in Opera. Turn your sound off.
5. Set up the form with your personal data so that you can use the "wand."
6. Optimize your workspace.
7. How do you Zoom, use Full-screen mode, or Fit-to-width mode?

Finally, you may choose either Firefox or Opera as your browser. With this in mind, select one of them to be your default browser. But, on the Mac OS you have Safari which is a good browser. In the years to come I would suggest that you experiment with different browsers, just make sure that you know how to import and export your 'favorites.'

 

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