Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): Brief, an in-browser RSS reader for Firefox, adds a clean Google Reader-type feed reading interface to your browser, and makes Firefox's default "Live Bookmarks" system far more useful. The stand-out feature for GReader users is the starring system that lets you tag posts for later viewing, but I also like the "X" boxes put on each post—instead of marking a post "read" and scrolling past it, you can actually remove it from your view. It's a lot like Sage, but with a more robust set of features and customisation. Brief is a free download and works wherever Firefox 2 and 3 beta do.

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): Firefox extension YouTube Comment Snob filters comments on YouTube videos that don't meet your snobbish standards. It does so using a combination of criteria, like a user-defined threshold of spelling errors (using Firefox's spell-checker), excessive punctuation, and excessive capitalisation. You can enable or disable any of the filter options if you don't mind capital letters, for example, and you can view any hidden comment by simply clicking Show. It's a pretty saucy little extension, but now it's hard not to want a full-on Internet Comment Snob.

Read More »

Windows/Mac (Firefox and IE7): PicLens, the Firefox and Internet Explorer 7 plug-in that lets you flip through photo sets in full-screen splendour, just added YouTube support to its latest version. That means searching and parsing through YouTube videos in the same elegant interface as with photos, making it far easier to spot just the clip you're looking for, and playing the videos, full-screen or reduced size, from inside PicLens. The latest version is available for Firefox 2 and 3 Beta 5 on Windows and Mac, as well as Internet Explorer 7 on Windows, and is a free download. (Original PicLens post).

Read More »

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): Firefox extension Next Tab adds an option to the right-click context menu to open a link in a new tab directly next to the current tab. If you're the sort who's still got 10 tabs open on a light day, you know how quickly your reading can get disorganised. Next Tab helps keep those tabs in context and next to the tabs from whence they were launched. Next Tab is free, works wherever Firefox does.

Read More »

All platforms with Firefox: If you're constantly typing "Thanks for writing" at the end of all your web email messages, the Paste Email Firefox extension can insert it—and any other repetitive text phrases—with the click of the context menu. Based on the same concept as our home-built Texter and Mac-only TextExpander, Paste Email saves you repetitive typing by offering a selection of pre-entered phrases (like your email address, a link to your web site FAQ, a signature). Unlike global text replacement applications, Paste Email is browser-specific; it also only does single lines instead of text boxes.

Read More »

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): If you're sick of clicking through to subsequent pages of online articles, Firefox extension Repagination adds an option to your context menu to pull all of the pages onto one. After installing the extension, just right-click a page's Next link (or the 2 link, for example) and select to view all pages or a limited number. Repagination will load the pages you tell it to inline at the end of the current page so you don't have to reload at every turn. I tested it on Lifehacker, this barefoot walking article, and Google, and it worked flawlessly with all of them. The only downside is that it loads the entire subsequent page and not just the text, but it's better than the annoyance of multi-page articles. Repagination is free, works wherever the 'fox runs.

Read More »

Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): Create a selective backup of preference settings for your favourite Firefox extensions with OPIE, a free add-on for Firefox 2. Once you've got the Ordered Preference Import/Export extension installed, head to it in the "Tools" menu and you can choose which extensions and preferences you'd like to save and export to a .prefs file, making it easy to auto-configure all the add-ons when moving to new systems or re-installing the Fox. Not a bad extension to have around when Firefox 3 becomes official, but if you're looking to bundle up the extensions themselves, try the Firefoex Extension Backup Extension. OPIE is a free download, works wherever Firefox 2 does (Original FEBE/CLEO post).

Read More »

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): The Auto Context Firefox extension automatically shows your right-click context menu as soon as you select text on a web page, taking a step out of your workflow if the right-click menu is your go-to toolbox. Once installed, Auto Context also provides extensive options for tweaking your right-click menu to your heart's content. Since I can only think of two reasons you'd select text with your mouse—either you want to copy it or you want to perform a right-click action on the text—I'd heartily recommend that you either install this extension or the previously mentioned AutoCopy extension, which automatically places selected text to your clipboard. Auto Context is a free download, works wherever Firefox does.

Read More »

All platforms running Firefox: The Multiple Tab Handler extension adds a truckload of tab-related features to your right-click menu in Firefox. Select multiple tabs and refresh them, copy the URLs as HTML links or just a list, or move them into a new window with the Multiple Tab Handler. On a single tab, you can close all the tabs to the left or right, or close similar tabs (though it's not clear what makes a tab "similar"—perhaps pages on the same web site.) While Firefox's built-in tab group management is already pretty good, this extension really blows things out when you're working with a bunch of tabs often. The Multiple Tab Handler extension is a free download and runs wherever Firefox does.

Read More »

We previously told you about LinkBunch, a Firefox extension which lets you consolidate groups of links to send to friends via Twitter or IM. They've just added a handy feature for getting links out of LinkBunch - by copying them to the clipboard.

This is a nice way around the problem of having long links snipped short to be displayed in LinkBunch. It meant that you couldn't select the links and copy them.

Now when you click "Copy Bunch to Clipboard" it will copy all the links in the bunch to the clipboard in plain text format.

New feature: "Copy Bunch to Clipboard" [LinkBunch Official Blog]