Mozilla

Removing ‘Remove All’

Chris Ilias 14 Comments

Here’s a question: Using any of Firefox, Thunderbird, SeaMonkey, the Mozilla Suite, or Netscape, have you ever purposely clicked on the ‘Remove All’ button, in the password manager?

Follow up question: Have you ever clicked on it by accident?

Clicking on it by accident, is easy, when it sits right beside ‘Remove’ button. Luckily, the closest I’ve come to that, is removing all cookies, not passwords. The scary part is that there is no “Are you sure” prompt, asking for confirmation. One accidental click, and ‘poof’, data is gone.

I’ve been able to avoid this by removing the ‘Remove All’ button. If you’re using Firefox or Thunderbird, add the following script to your userChrome.css file, to remove the ‘Remove All’ button from the password manager:

#removeAllSignons {display: none !important;}

Customize the Firefox Bookmarks location

Chris Ilias 35 Comments

Don’t like your bookmarks being stored in your profile folder? Want two or more users on the same computer to share a bookmarks file?
Easy.
– close Firefox.
– copy/move your bookmarks.html file (and bookmarks.bak) to the location you prefer to keep it.
– open Firefox.
– enter about:config in the Firefox location bar, right-click on any of the listed preferences, and choose New -> String.
– enter the preference name: browser.bookmarks.file
– for the value, enter the new file path (including the file name) of your bookmarks.html file.

Using this method, not only can you share your bookmarks file with other Firefox users on the same computer (and possibly same network. I’m not sure.), but share the file with SeaMonkey users, or Mozilla Suite users, or Netscape users. If you share with SeaMonkey/Mozilla/Netscape, just remember that live bookmarks will not function.

If you have Netscape Communicator, you can even go as far as pointing it to your Communicator bookmark.htm file.

The \bookmarkbackups\ folder stays in the profile folder. The bookmarks.bak file travels with the bookmarks.html file.

Mozilla newsgroups are now allowing posting through Google Groups

Chris Ilias 1 Comment

When the mozilla.* newsgroups were originally set up, they were fed to Google Groups for archival purposes. Google allowed read-only access, not allowing posting via Google.

Things have changed (purposely). You can now use Google Groups to post to the mozilla.* newsgroups, and those posts will be fed to news.mozilla.org.

Anyone wishing to use Google Groups to post to the mozilla.* newsgroups, PLEASE read these:
http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/
http://www.safalra.com/special/googlegroupsreply/
http://ilias.ca/blog/2005/08/plea-to-google.html

Firefox 1.5.0.2 has NOT been released

Chris Ilias 11 Comments

The authors of the following webpages are incorrect:
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Internet/Browsers/Mozilla-Firefox-Final.shtml
http://www.techspot.com/downloads/19-mozilla-firefox.html
http://www.freewarefiles.com/program_5_51_7277.html
http://www.addict3d.org/index.php?page=downloadfile&ID=1398
http://www.ddlboard.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=491
http://www.softportal.com/freesoftware/2538/mozilla-firefox

When Firefox 1.5.0.2 is released, it will say so on Mozilla.com.

If you see any websites jumping the gun on a Firefox release, please contact the authors of those websites.

Newsgroups automatically updating in Thunderbird

Chris Ilias

People using Mozilla Thunderbird to read newsgroups may like this one.
Notice how when you expand the list of subscribed newsgroups in the folder pane, Thunderbird automatically connects to the server, to update the unread/total messages count on each subscribed newsgroup? Then, when you click on a newsgroup, Thunderbird automatically downloads new messages. Both actions can be disabled.

In Thunderbird, go to Tools -> Options -> Advanced -> General.
Click on Config Editor.
There are two preference settings to look for, in the Config Editor:
news.update_unread_on_expand and news.get_messages_on_select.

To prevent Thunderbird from updating the unread/total messages count, when you expand the list of subscribed newsgroups, search for the preference setting news.update_unread_on_expand, and double-click on it (setting the value to false).
To prevent Thunderbird from automatically downloading new messages when you click on a newsgroup, search for the preference setting news.get_messages_on_select, and double-click on it (setting the value to false).

Outlook and OE address book support in Thunderbird

Chris Ilias 48 Comments

Mozilla Thunderbird and SeaMonkey (and even the Mozilla Suite and Netscape 7) can actually be set up to use your Outlook Express address book, and/or your Outlook Contacts list. It’s just another one of those features that are not in the user interface.

To make Thunderbird use your Outlook Express address book, close Thunderbird, and add the following lines to your prefs.js file:
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OE.description", "Outlook Express");
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OE.dirType", 3);
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OE.uri", "moz-aboutlookdirectory://oe/");

For Outlook Contacts, use these lines:
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.Outlook.description", "Outlook");
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.Outlook.dirType", 3);
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.Outlook.uri", "moz-aboutlookdirectory://op/");

One important note: in order for it to work with Outlook, Outlook must be set as the system default mail client.

Interestingly enough, it appears this feature goes back to Mozilla 1.0.

Is your email address safe from spam on news.mozilla.org?

Chris Ilias 5 Comments

One of the most frequently asked questions regarding the new Mozilla news server is whether or not people will need to munge their posting addresses, to prevent spammers from getting their addresses, like they do on Usenet newsgroups. I’ve never been able to answer that, because I just don’t know. News.mozilla.org is not propagated to Usenet, but is archived on Google; so the question is: How much of that spam is a result being archived on Google, and how much is a result of being propagated to other Usenet servers?

The Good:
I’ve created an email alias specifically for news.mozilla.org, which I only use on news.mozilla.org. If/When I get spam, I can look at the headers, to see if it was sent to my news.mozilla.org address. Currently, 1 month after the server went live, 207 of my news.mozilla.org posts are on Google. I have not received any spam sent to my news.mozilla.org address.

The Bad:
Just recently, it appears one independent news administrator decided to work around the lack of usenet feed, by copying the articles right off news.mozilla.org, and mirroring them on his/her own server. Potentially, he/she could feed the groups to usenet.

The Ugly (profanity ahead):
Any news administrator who decides to do this, is an asshole for doing so. People post messages on news.mozilla.org with the impression that their posting addresses are not going to be propagated to usenet. The Mozilla Foundation consciously decided not to propagate to usenet; and this(these) news admin(s) are completely disrespecting that decision, and being inconsiderate to those using news.mozilla.org. All because one or two people are too spoiled and lazy to set up a second news account in their newsreader (which can easily be done).

February 24, 2006 update: I have just received one spam message sent to my news.mozilla.org address. Probably due to bug 326759