Tag: Firefox

Sign in to Gmail via Secure Internet Connection

October 12, 2008 by Jason

It is recommend for you to have a secure connection network between your PC and the Gmail server. Let say if you login to Gmail using a public network like wireless or hotspot in Starbucks, someone can tamper or see the sensitive information transferred from your PC to the Gmail server. This is because the network you are using is not secure and is open to everybody.

Non-secure networks make it easier for someone to impersonate you and gain full access to your Google account, including any sensitive data it may contain like bank statements or online log-in credentials.

To check whether you are in a secure connection or not, check that the protocol that being used is https at the address bar. And also, there is a Lock icon at the bottom right corner of your browser (Firefox).

When you have both of them, that’s mean you are in a secure connection. No one can tamper or modify or spying on the data transferred between you and the Gmail server. You are now safe and secure to send emails, at least. Read More»

Google Chrome Steps Inside IE and Firefox Territory

October 03, 2008 by Jason

In just the first months of availability, Google Chrome Beta has made consistent inroads into the territory of Internet Explorer and Firefox. Both Microsoft’s IE and Mozilla’s Firefox started to see their audiences slip a little and ended up losing market share to the new browser from Google. In fact, so did Opera and Netscape with Safari left as the sole browser to gain market share. However, considering that Chrome is based on WebKit open source web browser engine also used by Safari, it is possible that some of Google Browser’s traffic to be in fact interpreted as Mac OS X’s native browser.

Market monitoring firm Net Applications revealed that Google Chrome’s usage share dropped after the initial surge. “Google Chrome usage share has been dropping since its launch, but has stabilized at about .7%,” the outfit stated. This in the context in which Chrome exploded to over 1% of the browser market, more than Opera. Still, at the end of September 2008, Chrome accounted for no less than 0.78% of the browser market, a performance by any standards considering that just a month before, it had 0%. Read More»

Firefox 3.1 Alpha 2 RC Faster than Google Chrome

September 05, 2008 by Jason

Firefox 3.1 codename Shiretoko Alpha 2 Release Candidate is faster than Google Browser (Chrome), according to Brendan Eich, chief architect, Mozilla. The fact of the matter is that the comparison involves only the two browsers’ respective JavaScript rendering engines, namely TraceMonkey for Firefox and V8 for Chrome. In the first tests Eich ran with the two JavaScript engines on SunSpider, Shiretoko Alpha 2 RC managed to come on top of Google Chrome Beta.

“We win by 1.28x and 1.19x, respectively. Maybe we should rename TraceMonkey “V10.” OK, it’s only SunSpider, one popular yet arguably non-representative benchmark suite. We are not about to be braggy. “Don’t be braggy” is our motto here at Mozilla,” Eich stated.

Google Chrome comes with the V8 virtual machine, which is essentially an open source JavaScript engine built at the Google office in Aarhus, Denmark. According to Google, the V8 JavaScript engine has been designed with nothing but performance in mind, especially when it comes down to the way it handles web-based applications. Read More»

12 Reasons to Test Drive Internet Explorer 8

September 01, 2008 by Jason

While rival browser makers Mozilla and Opera have launched the latest iterations of their products, Firefox 3.0 and respectively Opera 9.5, as early as June 2008, Microsoft is still in the development phase of Internet Explorer 8, the successor of IE7. August 27 marked the delivery of IE8 Beta 2, a deadline absurdly safeguarded by Microsoft, with the company only managing to confirm a release by the end of this month, and taking its due time when it came down to making available the bits for the browser second development milestone. Internet Explorer 8 is still far from the finish line, reportedly planned for November 2008, but Beta 2 feels more like a browser version ready for wrap-up than Beta 1.

The reason for this is the fact that, in comparison with the March 2008 release of IE8, the second Beta is packed with features and functionality aimed at the home and business users, on top of what has already been available to IT professionals and web content developers and designers. In this regard, IE8 Beta 1 was more of a skeleton on which Microsoft built Beta 2. Now, although Microsoft is not touting IE8 Beta 2 as a feature-complete version, it is clear that the Redmond company will move further only with the process of fine-tuning the browser got with Release to Web (RTW). Read More»

TOP10 - August 2008 Popular Tips

September 01, 2008 by Jason

1. Speed up your Firefox 3.0.1 - Part1

2. DirectX 9.c and 10.1 Download (August 2008)

3. Speed up your Firefox 3.0.1 - Part2

4. Black Screen of Death for XP SP3 and Vista SP1

5. How to Secure is Your PC?

6. Mozilla Introduces Firefox Snowl

7. How to convert video to Apple’s iPhone

8. DirectX 10.1 Downloads for Vista SP1 and XP SP3

9. Speed Launch for Vista and XP

10. Mixed Vista/XP network to work properly
Read More»

Microsoft Applauds IE8 Beta 2 Performance Boost

August 29, 2008 by Jason

Internet Explorer 8 is not the fastest browser in the universe. This, according to IE Program Manager, Christian Stockwell, working on the performance of the browser. However, this is not to say that the Redmond company has not poured a consistent amount of efforts into boosting the performance of IE7’s successor. In fact, Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2, planned for release by the end of this month, will offer palpable proof of the new horsepower under the browser’s hood.

“When we took a hard look at our goals and considered what we could do to build the best browser, we were presented with a quandary. On the one hand, we could focus very narrowly on scripting performance, trusting that our investment would noticeably improve our users’ browsing experience. Alternatively, we could invest more broadly in realistic scenarios, measuring heavily-used subsystems and investing our optimization effort accordingly. We opted for the latter approach,” Stockwell noted.

Even as early as March 2008, IE GM Dean Hachamovitch indicated that JavaScript performance was up 2.5 times, the Gmail inbox was loading 34% faster, the task of opening a new conversation took 45% less time, while that of opening a thread 25% less. With IE8 Beta 2, Microsoft has tweaked the execution time for the browser, but it has also managed to speed up navigation and user interaction. Read More»

Firefox Extension Boosts Browser Security

August 27, 2008 by Jason

The Carnegie-Mellon University (CMU) made available a Firefox extension developed at their School of Computer Science and College of Engineering that improves security in Firefox by protecting against man-in-the-middle attacks. The extension, named Perspectives, is available only for Firefox 3 and works on Windows, Linux (32-bit) and OS X (Intel), with support for Linux (64-bit) and Open Solaris being in the experimental stage of development.

A man-in-the-middle attack is performed by intercepting the traffic between a user and a resource that he is trying to access. This can be achieved by exploiting several vulnerabilities, like the latest DNS cache poisoning or GMail accounts hacking incidents show.

When accessing a server resource using secure protocols like SSL or SSH, a correct identification of the server is required. This is achieved through digitally signed certificates. Due to the fact that certificates issued by trusted authorities like VeriSign are expensive, it became common practice for small businesses and websites to use self-signed certificates. Read More»

How To Boost Internet Speed

August 23, 2008 by Jason

I’ve just seen your video Optimize Your ISP’s Slow Internet Connection, and I’m kind of an expert on this subject because I have been using dial-up and slow speed connections for all my life and I have only recently updated to a wireless HUAWEI 2G and 3G connection. Anyway, during my time using dial-up I came up with different ways to speed up my connection and here are some of them. By the way, these can also be used for any slow connection speed. I used these techniques when I “upgraded” from dial-up to GPRS via cellular Bluetooth, which was 1KB faster than dial up. Anyway, here we go.

1. Firewalls:
Blocking some programs from connecting to the Internet (like WinAmp player, which automatically tries to check for updates). You’d be surprised how many applications try connecting to the Internet behind your back. I’ve caught my Windows Explorer connecting to the Internet; after looking up the IP thinking it was some Trojan, It turned out to be windows.com. Many people have complained about this, claiming it’s spyware. This is one reason I think Open Source operating systems are much better! Read More»

How to Disable Smart Location Bar in Firefox 3

August 22, 2008 by Jason

After days of tweaking my new Firefox 3.0, I found out that one so-called top new features of Firefox is not so pleasing  Smart Location Bar or the Awesome Bar.

The Smart Location Bar is just too “smart” to an extent that it saves my viewed browsing history without my knowledge! The auto complete feature is fine with me but I would still prefer the old Firefox 2.0 way in handling my addresses. I tried to disable this “smart” option via the Option menu but there is no direct way to do it. So, I have to do it the indirect way via about:config or with a help of an extension.

OK, here is how:

Remove only bookmarks results from the list

To to this, you can just use Hide Unvisited extension to get the job done. What Hide Unvisited does is hide bookmarks that you haven’t visited from showing in the Awesome Bar. Read More»

Restore Your Lost Firefox 2 Bookmarks in Firefox 3

August 19, 2008 by Jason

Mahesh was worried because after upgrading to Firefox 3, he didn’t see his bookmarks and hence asked me if there is any way to get them back.

The answer is yes. You can definitely get back your bookmarks because Firefox has a backup of bookmarks through which you can restore them

So here are the steps to restore lost bookmarks in Firefox 3 (only for Windows, sorry Mac guys )

For Windows XP

1. Click on Start- > Run

2. Type - > C:\Documents and Settings\YourWindowsUserName

3. Display the Hidden folders by clicking on Tools at the top the Folder Options-> View -> Show Hidden Files

4. Now you should see a folder named Application data. Double click on it and then go to Mozilla-> Firefox -> Profiles Read More»