Use The Scroll Wheel To Zip Through Your Browser History

I also do the RIGHT click (and hold) scroll-wheel thing to get a context sensitive history list you can scroll through. Not sure if it's a Firefox thing or if it's because of some extension or other I have.

da5id_nz

@Jeebu: Get the Tab Mix Plus addon. There's an option to change control+tab to "navigate tabs in the most recently used order". I think it's actually the default setting when you install Tab Mix.

wunch

Um... Am I crazy, or does Shift + Scroll Wheel do absolutely nothing? The scroll wheel by itself will scroll the list of tabs when there are too many to fit in the tab bar, but that's not the "Browser History" by any stretch of the imagination.

GershamCrow

@BangBang: Er... doesn't ctrl+page up/down switch between tabs???

I discovered this by accident while in google reader, and I thought it was incomplete support for scrolling through my subscriptions... Strangely never occurred to me to try it out on other tabs too...

I like using Ctrl+Page Up and Ctrl+Page Down for that. Works just as good as in Excel

BangBang

@Feasoron: Tab Wheel Scroll maybe?

paintbox

all you need to do is press F1, and RTFM.

mozilla does actualy have a complete list of all the keyboard and mouse shortcuts.

do i get a lifehacker article devoted to me telling people theres a help page ?

novex

History? Back button? I think it's been years since I clicked a link without holding down the Ctrl key.

seiun

Safari already has this feature but nice none the less.

@moloko:

what a waste! heh. would be cool if it scrolled through open tabs..

cutcopypaste

Cool tip, bro! :thumbs up:

I discovered this while trying to zoom in with ctrl+scroll. It was annoying at the time but it looks like a good feature otherwise. Although why all the important function keys are right next to each other escapes me, it's just asking for people to press shift instead of control or alt instead of windows or whatever.

PercivalDarnsies

It takes some deft fingers, but Ctrl+Shift+Tab scrolls trough the tabs backwards. (Same with Alt+Shift+Tab for programs)

HadleyTelemachus

Does this work on linux? I can't get it to do this here. :-/

SinsapaImbicile

@Nirav Aga: i don't mean double clicking but clicking right next to the border of the last tab.

Nirav Aga

i don't know if anyone has noticed it but u can open a new tab in ff 3.5 by clicking on the blank space next to the last tab...

Nirav Aga

You can also right-click on the back button to get a context-menu of previous (and future, if you've already jumped back) pages in your history.

WillisAntilochus

@Gyroscope352: Really nice addon. Firefox's crew should make it a default feature.

Andrivious

@SenorDunda:

Yeah, between that and the Tab Mix Plus use of the right and left clicks (with the other button held down) to navigate through the tabs, i don't have to take my hands off the mouse but to type.

redfalconf35

I map my back button on my mouse to BACKSPACE. It still works in browsers to go back and is very handy in editing/coding. I use it like you would use delete in file editing.

JT555

Here's my question: I'm looking for a shortcut that will scroll through previous tabs in the order in which they were selected, not in adjacent order, which is what control + tab does. Control + 9 is OK, it takes you to your previous tab, but if you hit it again, nothing happens. At the very least, you should be able to toggle between two tabs with it.

Point being that when you've got a lot of tabs open, control + tab doesn't work all that well; you might have to hit the tab 10 times just to get back to what you were looking at 3 seconds ago.

Jeebu

This also works for me in IE8. Another option is the Alt+left/right arrow keys.

TeagueRhesus

Works in IE8 as well

puntai

it's ALT+Mousewheel on OS X BTW. SHIFT+Mousewheel doesn't do anything.

moloko

Is there a way to swap it around so shift+scroll down is forward etc... i dont know why but it seems backwards for me

madjack1987

Very nice find... I like it

vijayd

Funny, i just found this feature by accident about 4 hours ago..

dman0586

must be an a@Feasoron: must be an add-on you're running. my ff has very few add-ons installed.

You can also just point the mouse at the tabs and scroll for the same effect, unless that is from one of the add-ons I am running.

Feasoron

I already have macros on my Logitech G15 keyboard assigned to back/forward/close tab which are very efficient.

My big tip is to assign Ctrl-Tab and Ctrl-Shift-Tab to the "wheel tilt" action on your mouse (I use the Logitech Revolution). It makes switching between tabs very quick and easy. I find it hard to live without it when I have a different mouse!

I use the advanced features of the FF addon FireGestures which lets me scroll through the history by holding down the right mouse button and scrolling up. Scrolling down also scrolls through my open tabs.
I find it to be quite convenient since my fingers never have to leave the mouse.

SenorDunda

Who is reader Raghav?
He seems like a candidate for a lifehacker intern....

@Gyroscope352: Not to discount this tip, of course...anything that lets me use the scroll wheel for stuff gets a thumbs up in my book.

OR, you could download the History Submenus add-on. It basically makes the Firefox History drop-down menu like in Safari (or...*sigh*...IE), in that you can actually access you history from it (what a concept). AND it organizes them by day, which, I don't know about you, but it makes my life a heck of a lot easier.