The browser wars are heating up again. Microsoft's touting the improved performance and security of Internet Explorer 8, dozens of new Firefox extensions are released every day, and, according to Apple, Safari 4 will be even faster than its speedy predecessor. Meanwhile, Opera just keeps chugging along at version 9.64, with version 10 beta 3 now available.
Just a few weeks ago, Google announced its plans to create an operating system based on Chrome. Considering that the browser itself is barely a year old, such plans may be premature. Then again, maybe not. But for right now, I'll keep looking for ways to make the Chrome browser more useful.
Last June, I described ways to change Chrome's default settings. Here's a look at ways to revamp the browser's interface and access some of its useful hidden features.
... Read more
I'll save us both some time by getting right to the descriptions of three Firefox add-ons that shave minutes off my workday. Hey, they add up!
Navigate Web pages using only your keyboard.
When it comes to speed, I'll take a keyboard over a mouse any day of the week. A post from April 2008 explains how to create a keyboard-shortcut list you can access quickly. I also wrote about using your keyboard to move and resize windows and shortcuts for Word and Excel.
Now I can park the mouse when I surf. Instead of clicking, I enter the number Rudolf Noe's Mouseless Browsing add-on places next to each link. If I want to put the cursor in the address bar, I enter 0, while pressing 00 puts the cursor in the search field. Each open tab gets a number, each text box on the page gets a number, each drop-down menu gets a number. (I just wish the bookmark toolbar options and the reload, stop, and home buttons did.)
The Mouseless Browsing Firefox add-on assigns a number to each link and option on a Web page so you get there from the keyboard.
(Credit: Rudolf Noe)The program is loaded with options, including the ability to use only the numeric keypad to enter the numbers, so the top-row number keys aren't used to enter shortcuts. You can also require pressing the Enter key before the action occurs or change the delay between entering the numbers and taking the action.
Granted, the numbers can play havoc with a page's layout, but I can't count the number of times I've struggled to get the mouse pointer over just the right tiny link in a sea of tiny links. Being able to enter a number instead of clicking is a joy for this keyboard aficionado. (Warning: the add-on also slows your page-load speeds a bit.)
Finally! Copy Web text without the formatting.
I know how to create a keyboard shortcut that pastes plain text, but I didn't have the ability to copy and paste text from Web pages without the formatting until I downloaded Jeremy Gillick's aptly named Copy Plain Text add-on for Firefox. Just download the extension, restart Firefox, and when you copy text from a page, you'll see a Copy as Plain Text option just under the Edit menu's regular Copy option.
Copy Plain Text lets you do just that from Web pages in Firefox.
(Credit: Jeremy Gillick)You also get the Ctrl-Shift-C keyboard shortcut to copy the text without formatting. You can say what you want about one-trick ponies, but I only wish all software was this straightforward. Of course, Firefox could have this feature built in, but I'm not complaining.
The latest scores are a right-click away.
OK, I admit it. If I'm working late and missing a big game, I visit a sports site to check the scores. Now I save myself time by right-clicking Vinny 2020's SportsFox add-on, choose the sport, and see that yes, the Tigers dropped another one to the Bosox, and even worse, the Red Wings lost their second game of the Stanley Cup finals the the Penguins. (Might as well keep on working.)
Get up-to-the-minute sports scores inside your browser with the SportsFox add-on.
(Credit: Vinny 2020)Now I'm going to enjoy some of the time these add-ons have saved me. Go Wings!
What's even better than getting grocery store coupons online? Getting them from your cell phone. AOL has released a version of its online coupons service, Shortcuts.com, that's now optimized for viewing from the mobile phone.
Cellfire and Shortcuts.com want your Ralph's Club Card number.
(Credit: CNET)Coupons for popular cereal and a jumbo pack of Pull-Ups Training Pants greet you when you navigate to Shortcuts.com from the mobile browser. After you've registered your savings club card with Shortcuts.com, you'll be able to add vouchers like these directly to your account, and redeem them in-store without a paper receipt.
The new mobile focus on Shortcuts.com's service puts some heat on Cellfire (coverage), a native coupons application built for a variety of mobile phones. While Cellfire branches out beyond grocery stores to get you coupons to local and national chain restaurants and other retail shops, Cellfire is also gunning for the supermarket tie-in. On Ralph's supermarket Web site, for instance, Cellfire and Shortcuts.com are neck-and-neck for advertising space.
The competition between mobile coupon purveyors is, of course, wonderful for the consumer, who could link their savings card with both services and possibly double the number of coupons to whittle down a bill. That is, so long as the savings arrive for grocery items you'd actually use, and for stores that are already on your warpath. Shortcuts.com has some coupons I would want to use, but none of its 14 partner markets is within a 60 mile radius of where I shop for food. Here's hoping that the undisclosed grocery store AOL says it will partner with this spring is the one situated just down the street.
If you're a keyboard shortcut junkie in Google Reader, Gmail and Google Docs you might have noticed Google.com, the mother of all Google services, is a bit lacking in the keyboard shortcuts department. There is currently an official Google-sanctioned experimental keyboard shortcuts program you can opt into, although there's the slight chance that the company may one day kill it off. That and it won't remember to give you the shortcut keys the next time you search if you're not signed in to your Google account.
If both of these things are holding you back from keyboard shortcut dominance, worth downloading is Janakan Arulkumarasan's Google Keyboard Shortcuts extension for Firefox. When installed you can simply use your arrow keys to sift through the results, which get highlighted in a lovely pallid yellow. There are two ways to open up the result links: you can either hit enter, which opens the link in a new window, or enter plus control which opens it up in a new tab. The extension trumps Google's own keyboard shortcuts program in this regard.
As with many of the other neat extensions we've blogged about recently, Google Keyboard Shortcuts is experimental, which means you have to be registered with Mozilla's add-ons site to download it.
Once installed the Google Keyboard Shortcuts extension lets you browse through search results using your arrow keys.
(Credit: CNET Networks)
This morning, SMS reminder service Kwiry is adding a new tool to its repertoire called shortcuts. It goes beyond the original implementation of adding keywords and photos to look up later, and turns it into a tool that links up with various Web services you might be using.
The first implementation of that is with Netflix. If you're a subscriber of the DVD-by-mail service, you're now able to simply send an SMS to the service with "Netflix" and the movie title and it will automatically be added to your queue. This is one of those things that's just genius--if you overhear someone talking about a movie you can simply send a quick text message and have it show up on your doorstep. There's no need to log in to Netflix from your phone (which only works on a few handsets) or scribble it down somewhere for later.
Amazon.com users also have their own shortcut that's not nearly as sexy as the one for Netflix, but still useful. Texting "Amazon" with a product name will add it to your wish list. Like the Netflix implementation, this has been set up to let you track it down later just like you would a search query, but with the eventual intent to buy. As part of a promotion, the company will be buying a Kwiry'd item someone's put on their wish list each week for the next few months.
Besides Netflix and Amazon, Kwiry has also added some GTD tasking utilities, including support for writing a to-do list and adding events to your Web calendar using the same shortcode. It will convert things like days of the week into the proper date and time in whatever calendaring tool you're using. Likewise, the to-do list you put together can be edited and rearranged back in Kwiry. I think these two items are going to be used less than the Netflix and Amazon look-up, but it's a sign of other things to come from this search look-up tool.
As I've said before, I think Kwiry is a fun little tool if you don't have the time to fire up your phone's Web browser, or if you're one of the millions of folks with an older handset. The only crux here is that SMS fees continue to go up, and using this a few times a day can really add up unless you've got a good texting plan from your carrier.
Kwiry users can now add Netflix movies to their queue and items from Amazon onto their Amazon wish lists with shortcode messages.
(Credit: Kwiry)
Faster is almost always better, at least when it comes to computers. So what's the fastest way to open a word processor?
You can create a keyboard shortcut to open Notepad, WordPad, Word, or any other word processor on your PC by right-clicking the program's shortcut on the Start menu, choosing Properties > Shortcut > Shortcut key, entering your keystroke combination of choice (be sure not to overwrite one that's already in use), and pressing Enter. I described how to get fast access to all your keyboard shortcuts in a post from last week.
Now press the keystroke combination to open the program, and start typing (or navigate to an existing file you want to open). When you're done working in the file, press Ctrl-S, give the file a name (if it doesn't have one already), choose a location to store it (or accept the program's default storage folder), and press Enter. What could be simpler?
Well, skipping the file-naming and storage location-choosing steps, for one thing. And having access to the notes from any Internet-connected computer, for another.
Web word processors auto-save files
You can create a keyboard shortcut that opens Google Docs or any other Web word processor. Start by opening a new document in the service. Select the URL in the Address bar, and type Ctrl-C to copy it to the clipboard. Now open Windows Explorer to the Desktop or any other folder, right-click anywhere in the folder, choose New > Shortcut, paste the URL of the service into the location field, press Enter, give the shortcut a name, and press Enter again.
Next, right-click the shortcut you just created, click Properties > Shortcut > Shortcut key, type your preferred keystroke combination for opening the service, and press Enter. Now you can open the service ready to create a new file by pressing that keyboard shortcut.
Unfortunately, if you're not already logged in, you'll have to enter your username and password before you can open the blank file. You can avoid the login step by creating the shortcut to the Writer online word processor that mimics the look of old DOS-based text editors running on a green-phosphor display. (The service's bare-bones look is itself modeled after the free Dark Room word processor, which, in turn, is the Windows version of the WriteRoom word processor for Mac OS X.)
Since Writer doesn't require you to log in--or even to create an account--you need not give your files a name. Just stick with the default, and when you want to reopen the file, select it from your list of documents, which appears just below the text window.
Use the Writer online word processor for instant--and universal-access to your notes.
(Credit: John Watson/BigHugeLabs.com)Writer remembers your files by leaving a cookie with the identifying information. If you delete the cookie, you lose access to the files, unless you sign up for a free account. The account has the added benefit of providing access to your files from any Internet-connected PC.
Should you find Writer to your liking, be sure to make a donation to its creator to help keep the great services coming.
Monday: get more use out of Windows' taskbar.
Heat map of dirt underneath a keyboard.
(Credit: Tony Targonski)Inspired by Tony Targonski's wonderful heat map of the dirt distribution in his keyboard, I decided to take all my keys off and give my own keyboard a good cleaning yesterday. (Honestly, everyone should do it once a year, unless you've got some crazy, futuristic, self-cleaning device.)
As I painstakingly scraped off all of the gunk, I learned two things. No. 1: I'm a proud PC gamer. Most of the dirt was concentrated under W, A, S, and D. No. 2: I love my keyboard and I hate my mouse. My keyboard provides endless creative potential, while my mouse helps me click on stupid links. I never clean my mouse.
In order for we keyboard lovers to make the most of our wonderful input devices, we need good launchers, i.e. apps that let us run programs or load Web sites without clicking that silly mouse. ... Read more
(Credit:
CNET Networks)
No, that's not a typo. The software is spelled Pitaschio, and it's not the only odd bit of English you'll find in the freeware utility. Initially developed in Japanese by a programmer known as ARA, Pitaschio was only recently released in English.
Pitaschio lets you tweak Windows XP or Windows 2000 in a variety of different ways to eliminate certain annoying functions, add keyboard or mouse shortcuts, customize your windows, and perform other similar system tricks.
Once you download the tiny 55K software and run it, a small "Pi" icon will appear in your Windows taskbar. To access Pitaschio's features, right-click on the icon to bring up a contextual menu. The features are split up rather randomly, with separate selections for managing your open windows, defining mouse shortcuts, accessing mouse and keyboard statistics, and using the generic "Tools" and "Settings" menus. ... Read more
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