Mozilla Firefox is one of the best internet browsers ever made (in my opinion). I like Google Chrome and Internet Explorer 8 too. For me Google Chrome is the fastest browser and stable — I am happy using Google Chrome for Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Webmaster Tools, and other Google products. And Internet Explorer 7 and 8? Hmm… for me they are the slowest, buggy and crashy, but I still need them to test some website layouts since there are a bunch of end users still using this browser. So I have to use it for testing purposes.
Mozilla Firefox performance may not be as good as Google Chrome — I’m using Firefox 3.5.3 and Chrome 3.0. Especially after you use it for a while, Firefox becomes slower and slower since the history database gets larger and larger. Then you need to clean it up after some time; as the effect you will lose your history and auto-suggestion. So you need to choose between performance or convenience. I choose performance 🙂
But why did I say Firefox is the best browser? It is because of Firefox addons — there are thousands of addons in the Firefox addons bank. They provide a very good system for users and developers to use or make addons. And from my experience of using Firefox for some time, these are the most useful Firefox addons:
1. Firebug
Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.
2. Greasemonkey
Allows you to customize the way a webpage displays using small bits of JavaScript. …
3. MeasureIt
Draw out a ruler to get the pixel width and height of any elements on a webpage.
4. Stumbleupon
StumbleUpon discovers web sites based on your interests, learns what you like and brings you more.
5. Delicious
Delicious Bookmarks is the official Firefox add-on for Delicious, the world’s leading social bookmarking service (formerly del.icio.us). It integrates your bookmarks and tags with Firefox and keeps them in sync for easy, convenient access.
6. Google Toolbar
Take the power of Google with you anywhere on the web.
7. Google Gears
Google Gears for Windows as an XPI installer, with AMO update functionality. Works with Mozilla Firefox, Portable Edition, as well as user accounts without administrator privileges.
8. Abduction!
Adds a right-click option to take screenshots of an entire web page or just part of a web page to save as an image.
9. Video DownloadHelper
The easy way to download and convert web videos from hundreds of YouTube-like sites. This works also for audio and picture galleries.
10. NoDofollow
Just a simple extension to highlight links in a page according to nofollow/dofollow status.
11. DownThemAll
The first and only download manager/accelerator built inside Firefox!
12. FireFTP
FireFTP is a free, secure, cross-platform FTP client for Mozilla Firefox which provides easy and intuitive access to FTP servers.
There are still some possibly good addons I missed, but I am using all those addons for quite some time. And I install exactly the same ones on every computer I have. If this post inspired you or you have another addon to share, please leave me a comment. Thanks.