Firefox 2 Tweaks: More tweaks
Posted by Percy Cabello on October 22nd, 2006 • Tags:
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Security 

In Firefox 2, support for SSL version 2, a security protocol is deactivated by default due to its weakness and now only SSL 3 is supported. If you encounter some all dated web site that requires SSL 2 you can enable it:

  1. Enter about:config in the location bar
  2. Set security.enable_ssl2 to true

Open Search Results in Tabs

To make Firefox to display search results in a new tab automatically:

  1. Enter about:config in the location bar
  2. Set browser.search.openintab to true (you have to manually add it if it's not present) 

Spell Checking 

By default spell checking is disabled in single line text boxes. To make it automatically spell check these:

  1. Enter about:config in the location bar
  2. Set layout.spellcheckDefault to 2

The Looks

To remove the go button now merged with the location bar

  1. Enter about:config in the location bar.
  2. Set browser.urlbar.hideGoButton to  true

To remove the search button, you will need to edit the userChrome.css file. Add these lines:

.search-go-button-stack {display: none !important; }
#searchbar { margin-right: 1em !important; }

To hide the list all tabs button, you will need to edit the userChrome.css file. Add these lines

.tabs-alltabs-stack {  display: none !important;} 

If you just don't like the updated Winstripe theme in Firefox 2, you can restore the previous look installing Winestripe. Get it at Mozilla Addons.

Or you may want to try David Naylor's remix, which is a more saturated (vivid) version of Firefox 2 theme.

Live Titles

By default, Live titles are refreshed every 30 minutes. To specify a different refresh interval:

  1. Enter about:config in the location bar.
  2. Set browser.bookmarks.microsummary.updateInterval to the desired number of minutes
Comments
Ciaran said on October 23, 2006, 11:14 am:

I just posted this to the previous post, but just so you’re aware, I’ll repost it here since the error’s here too…

For hiding the “all tab” button, you shouldn’t use .tabs-alltabs-button as that will still show the button, it just won’t have anything on it and it’ll still be clickable. Use this instead:

.tabs-alltabs-stack { display: none !important; }

That will hide the whole thing and make it like Firefox 1.5.

Percy Cabello said on October 23, 2006, 11:30 am:

Thanks for the correction. I just updated the article.

[...] Firefox 2 Tweaks: More tweaks [...]

misterhaan said on October 24, 2006, 5:50 pm:

thanks, this got a lot of firefox 2.0 to work like what i’m used to in 1.5 for me! just a couple things i’m stuck on:

getting rid of the search go button has only removed the magnifying glass icon and made it not clickable for me — the button area is still there.

also, is there a way to set the size of the search box? i used to do this up through 1.5, but now it doesn’t seem to do anything:
#search-container, #searchbar {width: 200px !important;}
i move the search box up to the menubar to give more room to the address bar, and with 2.0 it started taking up all the available space up there. i think i just need to tell it not to take up all the available space, but i don’t know how to do that.

Ryan said on October 24, 2006, 8:21 pm:

To remove the go button now merged with the location bar

1. Enter about:config in the location bar.
2. Set browser.urlbar.hideGoButton to true

I set browser.urlbar.hideGoButton to true and it’s still there. :-/

Also… this didn’t work for me either:

To remove the search button, you will need to edit the userChrome.css file. Add these lines:

.search-go-button { display: none !important;}

#searchbar {
margin-right: 1em !important;
}

Removing the “all tabs button” with the CSS in userChrome.css did work though.

Ryan said on October 24, 2006, 8:23 pm:

Oh, to clarify about removing the search button. It removed the magnifying glass icon, but the space was still there. I tried messing around with the size of the search box, but couldn’t get it to go away.

Aaron’s Soapbox » links for 2006-10-25 said on October 25, 2006, 2:20 am:

[...] mozilla links – Mozilla news, tips and more. » Firefox 2 Tweaks: More tweaks Firefox 2.0 tweaks. (tags: firefox tweak customization) [...]

Seb said on October 25, 2006, 8:04 am:

To really remove the search button, use
.search-go-button-stack { display: none !important; }
#searchbar { margin-right: 1em !important; }

(search-go-button-stack instead of search-go-button!)

Percy Cabello said on October 25, 2006, 8:12 am:

Seb thanks for the tip, it works! I’ll update the article now.

dbcooper said on October 25, 2006, 10:33 am:

To restore the next/previous buttons etc to the quick search bar, that pops up at the bottom of the browser, add the following to your userChrome.css file:

#FindToolbar > *
{
display: -moz-box;
}

dbcooper said on October 25, 2006, 11:04 am:

Firefox 2.0 (annoyingly) removes the next/previous buttons etc from the quick search bar, that pops up at the bottom of the browser.

They can be restored by adding the following to your userChrome.css file:

#FindToolbar > *
{
display: -moz-box;
}

IMO, the UI has really taken a step backwards by being overly simplified.

timdream said on October 25, 2006, 12:01 pm:

Hey, a zh-TW technical blogger pointed out that we should not teach end-users to bypass security design. Instead, you should ask end-users informing webmasters to upgrade their servers.

[...] be By Percy Cabello |              | Print This Post For some strange reason, in Firefox 2 the find Next and Previous buttons have been removed from theQuick Search bar (which is activated by /, ' or just start typing) and reserved fo rthe Find Bar only (Ctrl + F). I find this behavior annoying but lucky me and us all dbcooper dropped this tip in a comment to a previous post to restore the buttons. [...]

Justin said on October 26, 2006, 7:54 am:

I tried setting security.enable_ssl2 to true but I still get an error message when I go a site that uses SSL2.

Nogz Blogz 3.4 » More Firefox 2.0 Hacks said on October 26, 2006, 3:47 pm:

[...] This time courtesy of Mozilla Links… Spell Checking [...]

dwjngs said on October 27, 2006, 12:07 am:

Where do I find the userChrome.css file? I found a couple named userChrome-example.css, but not the former. Thanks.

three said on October 28, 2006, 6:44 am:

Just rename the “userChrome-example.css” file as “userChrome.css” and then add the new rules to the bottom of it. :)

Source: http://www.mozilla.org/support/firefox/edit#css

dwjngs said on October 30, 2006, 1:41 am:

Thanks for the quick response. I went ahead and renamed the file, adding the rules to the bottom, but nothing’s changed. I still have the search and all tabs buttons. Anyone have success with this?

dwjngs said on October 30, 2006, 4:42 pm:

Solved. I’d edited the programs file rather than the user file.

carl said on October 31, 2006, 5:06 am:

i am using ssl web proxy and using LAN proxy and i am annoyed of \’Proxy Authentication\’ popup which i have always to log my network login id and passy.. how i can stop this? thanks in advance..

Jan said on November 8, 2006, 7:15 am:

does anyone know how to change the latency time for the quick search toolbar? basically I’d like it to stay visible a bit longer…

[...] Tweaking the Quick Find bar By Percy Cabello |              | | Jan, asked in the comments how to change the Quick Find bar latency, that is, the time the bar remains visible after you stop typing. Specially after restoring the bar buttons (Next, Previous, Highlight) it makes sense to add some more time to be able to comformtably grab the mouse and press the appropriate buttons. [...]

Jan said on November 8, 2006, 10:54 am:

wow you are fast! Thanks…

Rob_B said on November 12, 2006, 9:20 am:

I just cant get

.tabs-alltabs-stack { display: none !important;}

to work, i’ve edited the filename, added the line to the bottom, restarted but it still has the ‘all tabs’ box? Tried editing the line, copying the file etc etc! Any suggestions?

New Browser: Mozilla Firefox 2.0 at Sniper’s vision said on November 16, 2006, 6:22 pm:

[...] Firefox 2 brings a lot of usability enhancements that some old time users may found intrusive. While you get used to this changes you may want to try some customizations to better suite your taste. [...]

jazzyb88 said on January 5, 2007, 8:59 am:

To adjust the size of the search toolbar and align it to the right/left/centre (as was possible with Firefox v1.5), do the following:

Edit the userChrome.css file to include

#search-container, #searchbar {
max-width: 150px !important;
width: 150px !important;
}

Then add 'flexible space' by customising the toolbar within firefox. It should then align itself correctly depending where you put the 'flexible' space.

You can adjust the max-width and width parameters within the userChrome.css file to your liking, just make sure the values are the same.

funiishu said on January 10, 2007, 3:34 pm:

There is one extension/add-on that solve all the annoyance!!

Find Toolbar Tweaks

Cheers!

usefulvideo said on February 10, 2007, 1:25 pm:

I didn’t know the default refresh rate for live titles is 30 minutes. Thanks for the tip!

I’m looking forward to seeing live graphic titles, AKA “graphical microsummaries” in Firefox 3 (http://wiki.mozilla.org/GraphicalMicrosummaries). Imagine a live graphic, like a bar graph or a pie chart. That would really be great. The problem with live titles is that they are so hard to explain. To help explain live titles to new users (and show them how to add them to Firefox), I created a short video tutorial here: http://usefulvideo.blogspot.com/2007/02/little-known-firefox-feature-live.html

squarti said on March 6, 2007, 1:01 pm:

Can you change what shortcut Quickfind uses? For some reason in Gmail Chat it kept popping up whenever I tried to use an apostrophe. Closing the window and reopening it seemed to fix this, but it seems like it would just be easier to switch the shortcut key in case this happens again.

[...] Source:Mozilla Links [...]

karlo said on March 23, 2007, 7:45 am:

is there anyway to remove the shiny features of tab?

john said on April 1, 2007, 12:02 pm:

Hello, in FF2.0, I do not have an address bar, only a long search bar. So I cannot type urls directly but must go through Google (or another search engine). I have not been able to find a customization that returns the address bar.

I have exec’d View –> Toolbars –> Navigation –> Reset — still no URL bar.

I have no interest in sending my URLs through a search provider.

Can you help, thanks.

dave said on April 8, 2007, 9:19 pm:

john:

under “view,” try turning on your navigation toolbar.

Uutisblogi - Mozilla.fi said on June 28, 2007, 6:20 pm:

[...] muutamia vinkkejä, jolla voi trimmata 2.0:n toimintatapaa. Valitut vinkit on kerätty Mozilla links -blogin laajemmasta [...]

Daniel Tome said on June 16, 2008, 7:22 pm:

The quick find and the regular find have 2 different styles. If you press ctrl +f you get the button. if you press / or ‘ you get the quick find input only.