Beyond the Browser

… OK~ 是這樣的，首先，要先感謝”你人真好”先生提供我諸多有關我在使用 MAC OS X 時所遇到的疑難雜症的解決方法，以及給了我許多寶貴的建議以及軟體支援，讓我深深體驗到國衛院真的是個臥虎藏龍之地，以及同仁之間的友善與熱情。有了這麼強力的高手當後盾，前幾天我終於可以放心的重新安裝我的美洲豹 (Leopard) 囉！ ^___^

之所以寫這篇文章，是因為在整頓好我的作業系統、應用程式、備份資料以及其他基本設定後，特別對於我個人常用的瀏覽器 (Firefox) 下了一番功夫。也就是… 小弟特別去安裝了一些好用的外掛元件 (Add-Ons) ，以提昇小弟在這浩瀚無垠的網海上衝浪時的效率與效果。所以囉！本文主要是想將小弟目前常用的、好用的 Firefox Add-Ons 做個簡單的介紹，以與各位大大分享與交流一些 Firefox 相關的使用經驗。 ^___^

嗯~ 對了！插播一則重大的新聞。

好滴！接下來將一一來簡介我的 Firefox Add-Ons 清冊囉！

1. PicLens ：

PicLens transforms your browser into a full-screen, 3D experience for photos and videos across the web. Media comes to life via a cinematic presentation that goes beyond the confines of the traditional browser window. Available for Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari.

2. Cooliris Previews ：

Cooliris Previews lets you preview links and rich-media without clicking or leaving your current page, so you can browse faster than ever. Available for Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari.

3. Delicious Bookmarks ：

Delicious Bookmarks is the official Firefox add-on for del.icio.us, the world’s leading social bookmarking service. It integrates your del.icio.us bookmarks and tags with Firefox and keeps them in sync for easy, convenient access.

4. Diigo Toolbar ：

Power tools to substantially enhance your experience
for online browsing and interactions, and for information gathering and sharing…

5. Google Desktop Search ：

Google Desktop can index several different types of data, including email, web browsing history from Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox, office documents in the OpenDocument and Microsoft Office formats, instant messenger transcripts from AOL, Google, MSN, Skype, Tencent QQ, and several multimedia file types. Additional file types can be indexed through the use of plug-ins. Google Desktop allows the user to control which types of data are indexed by the program.After the initial indexing is completed and performing searches, results can also be returned in an Internet browser on the Google Desktop Home Page much like the results for Google Web searches.

6. Google Gears ：

Gears, formerly Google Gears, is beta software offered by Google to enable offline access to services that normally only are available online. It installs a database engine, based on SQLite, on the client system to cache the data locally. Gears-enabled pages use data from this local cache rather than from the online service. Using Gears, a web application may periodically synchronize the data in the local cache with the online service. If a network connection is not available, the synchronization is deferred until a network connection is established. Thus Gears enables web applications to work even though access to the network service is not present.

7. Google Notebook ：

Google Notebook is a free service offered by Google that provides a simple way to save and organize clips of information when conducting research online. This personal browser tool permits a user to write notes, and to clip text, images, and links from pages during browsing. These are saved to an online “notebook” with sharing and collaboration features.

8. Google Toolbar for Firefox ：

Keep the power of Google search close at hand. Google Toolbar puts a search box in your browser, making it easier than ever to find anything you want on the Web. Additional options include a pop-up blocker and form-filler.

9. GoogleEnhancer ：

Enhances your Google search results by adding numbers, keyword highlighting and icons.

10. Googlepedia ：

Shows you a relevant Wikipedia article along with your search results. Clicking links in the article will trigger new Google searches, making it a very useful research tool…

11. GooglePreview ：

Inserts preview images (thumbnails) of web sites into the Google and Yahoo search results pages. The GooglePreview thumbnail system currently consists of 7 dedicated servers and generates 5 TB of traffic per month.

12. Surf Canyon – Search Engine Assistant ：

This extension enables you to uncover relevant information buried in the search results, that you otherwise might never have found, without having to modify your search behavior. Simply go to your favorite search engine and enter your query as you always would. By then clicking results that appeal to you, the technology automatically calculates the “instantaneous” relevancies of the entire result set in order to dig out what you need.

13. Web Developer ：

Web Developer screenshot The Web Developer extension adds a menu and a toolbar to the browser with various web developer tools. It is designed for Firefox, Flock and Seamonkey, and will run on any platform that these browsers support including Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

[註] 另外，還有一個 Firefox Add-Ons 想要推薦：IE Tab ：IE Tab – an extension from Taiwan, features: Embedding Internet Explorer in tabs of Mozilla/Firefox… (可惜這個 Add-Ons 不支援 MAC 的作業系統。囧)