FirefoxNotify Puts Download Notices In Ubuntu’s Pop-Ups
Linux only: The smoked glass, Mac-like notification alerts are one of Ubuntu 9.04’s best features, but they’re not yet compatible with every program, including Firefox. An experimental extension can fix that, moving download notifications into Jaunty Jackalope’s pop-ups.
That’s all FirefoxNotify does, really, but for Ubuntu users looking to give their desktop a more seamless look and feel, it’s a nice fix. The add-on itself is only 9K or so, and while it’s technically unofficial and not thoroughly tested by Mozilla’s team, it seems to work just fine for its single purpose. Until our tipster pointed it out, I was pretty happy to stick with Lifehacker favourite Download Statusbar, but this might just tempt me to switch. If you’re a Mac user looking for the same kind of Growl download notices, try the previously mentioned Growl Notifications add-on.
FirefoxNotify is a free download, works with Firefox on Ubuntu Linux 9.04 (or earlier, if you’ve enabled notifications). Thanks Leo! FirefoxNotify [Mozilla Add-Ons]
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Comments (AU Comments | US Comments)
Me and my windows install are jealous.
object
To get the full effect, in about:config set
browser.download.manager.showAlertOnComplete
to false
Wow, that's a cool tip! Thanks. :)
I'm busy getting plug-ins for all my Ubuntu apps to get rid of all those different-looking notifications.
Schendje
I only installed this yesterday and now you have it. Very odd. Its not too bad, Ubuntu is starting to look polished.. If only we didnt have to hunt around for everything and it came pre-installed. Maybe one day
hyperhead
Thread-jack!
Does anyone know of a way to get mplayer to use Jaunty's notifier? It'd be nice if it could send the name of the current song it's playing to the notifier.
One of the big disadvantages of the notification is that it is very difficult to do anything with them. For example once a download completes I can't click on the new notification to open the download folder. It looks pretty, but other than that not very functional.
I also discovered recently emesene 1.0 users can also install the crazy emesene fork to enable jaunty notifications
[apt.emesene.org]
Tony Hartfield
I used to use Snarl's equivalent to this, it's not a replacement for statusbar as much as a "you can minimize your browser now :)" thing.
I can't wait to try this - after I feel like restarting FF.
@endolith: What are you talking about? I suspend, hibernate, copy and paste, and use my fully functional video card all the time - no extra work needed.
Some systems might have these problems (though I think the copy and paste thing is a bit dubious), but you will have that with any OS.
@object:
Don't be. This is just lipstick on a pig. In a few years maybe Ubuntu will be good enough for general consumption, but it still has a long ways to go. While they're spending their time making snazzy things like Compiz and these notifications, video cards are still broken, suspend/hibernate still don't work, COPY AND PASTE still doesn't work, etc.
etc.
etc.
@abhiroop: Agreed. Ironically, this was explicitly specified by Mark when he described them in the first place.
"The key proposals we are making are that:
* There should be no actions on notifications."
[www.markshuttleworth.com]
I downloaded this a couple of days ago; I really enjoy it! Now if only I could get the same effect in Songbird to work...
Doesn't there seem to be a bit of a delay though, between the download and the notification?
Firefox in gnome sucks.
nortexoid
@hyperhead: I'd rather not have my default install completely bloated with crap I'll never use, and have to uninstall. The "hunting" procedure is generally quite fast. Find package in manager, install. (Or find .deb, or repository entries.)
nortexoid