Vacuum Database to Speedup Firefox
Posted by watashii | Filed under Software
Firefox performance can be improved by defragmenting the internal SQLite database. This can be done by running a vacuum command within Firefox, as explained in Mozilla Links. The process are as follows:
1) Open Tools > Error Console (or Press Ctrl + Shift + J)
2) In the Code text box, paste the following (in one single line)
Components.classes["@mozilla.org/browser/nav-history-service;1"].
getService(Components.interfaces.nsPIPlacesDatabase).
DBConnection.executeSimpleSQL("VACUUM"); Note: Make sure the double-quotes are normal quotes and not slanted quotes
3) Press Evaluate. Firefox will freeze for a few seconds while the database is being defragmented.
A handier add-on extension is also available to perform this action.
Tags: firefox, performance, vacuum
Firefox Disable Flashing Cursor
Posted by watashii | Filed under Software, Web
Something annoying just sprung up, a flashing cursor appears whenever I click on any part of a webpage.
The solution? Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: blinking, cursor, firefox
Viewing Firefox Cache Files
Posted by watashii | Filed under Software
The browser cache stores all the web pages and images downloaded on to the computer to allow faster access and reduce the downloading bandwidth when revisiting a website.
Type “about:cache” on your Firefox address bar to view the cached files. There are 3 types of cache for allocating the files…
Tags: about:cache, cache, disk cache, firefox, memory cache, offline cache, performance
Add Search Engines to Firefox
Posted by watashii | Filed under Software
Most Firefox users should know about the search engine lists, which makes life easier by searching directly on Firefox instead of going to the search homepage. But what if you want to add more?
To add new search engines: Click the search icon > Click “Manage Search Engines” > Click “Get more search engines…”
This will bring up the Firefox search tool addon page for commonly used search engines.
A more comprehensive list is available at mycroft.mozdev.org which I noticed its missing on the Firefox addon site, so here it is for convenience. These are FF2+ and IE7+ compatible.
Tags: addons, firefox, search engine
Firefox 3.0 Upgraded
Posted by watashii | Filed under Software
Just upgraded my Firefox from FF2.0 to FF3.0 today. Here are my initial findings:
1) Browsing feels more snappier than FF2.0, definitely has improved memory handling. Especially websites with flash content.
2) The most noticeable new feature was the ‘Awesome Bar’, which provides suggestions when entering the URL. It takes time to get used to it, since it acts like a search box of your favorites/rss feeds rather than the most typed URL. See here for tweaks of this. Or revert back to FF2.0’s ‘Old Bar’ with this extension.
3) One minor issue, it doesn’t migrate my FF2.0 setting for “Keep history for the past x days”. Lets hope all my other settings were migrated!
4) My URL bar doesn’t color yellow on HTTPS secure site.
Tags: awesome bar, firefox, firefox3, url color, userchrome
