Top 7 Reasons to Switch to FireFox

There are many reasons to love FireFox. But a big benefit is the ability to install little applications that perform specific tasks. In the FireFox world these are called “extensions”. If you’re like me you’ll find extension are sorta like potato chips – you just can’t have just one. So let me share my 7 favorites:

1. Favorite Extension #1: Auto copy

Auto copy is a killer keystroke saver. You’ll never Ctrl-C again. Simply highlight the desired text on the web page with your mouse and it’s instantly copied to the clipboard. Jump over to whatever application you want to paste that text into, paste it and you’re done.

2. Favorite Extension #2: ScrapBook

How many times have you book marked a site only to return and find it changed? Or worse it’s vanished? That makes the ScrapBook extension the web researcher’s indispensable friend. It lets you take a snapshot of any page. Or you can grab just a chunk it. ScrapeBook keeps such snapshots organized and even lets you add comments if you like.

3. Favorite Extension #3: TinyURL Creator

How often do you want to sent a friend a URL only to discover it’s a mile long? Like this one for instance:
http://www.google.com/search?as_q=&num=50&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq
=%22john+gergye%22&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_
occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&safe=images

Wouldn’t it be easier to send something like this: http://tinyurl.com/427gg?

Good news. There’s a handy extension that will cut any unwieldy URL it down to size using TinyURL. Even better it will also inventory those you’ve created in case you want to use any of them again.

4. Favorite Extension #4: Popup Blocking

Okay so this one's not really an extension. It's more of a built in feature that lets you stop pop ups dead in their tracks. I mean there’s nothing like seeing this message “Firefox prevented this site from opening a pop up window” to give you a warm glow inside.

5. Favorite Extension #5: Google Pagerank

Want to know the Google PageRank of a page? Sadly the Google Toolbar only runs in Internet Explorer. But never fear. If you like to eyeball PR, say to check out potential link partners, the Google Pagerank Status extension displays pagerank. In numeric form so you can tell at a glance the PR of a given page.

6. Favorite Extension #6 LoremIpsum Content Generator

Whenever you need some quick content to check a web page layout this is your tool. You can tell it to create so many characters, words or paragraphs. Giving you a variety of “Latin-like” content in the blink of an eye.

7. Favorite Extension #7: Copy URL

Instead of copying a snippet from a page and then going back and grabbing the URL you can do it all at once with Copy URL.

All of these tiny apps can be downloaded here: https://addons.update.mozilla.org/extensions

John Gergye is author of “Street Smart Linking”. To learn more about this 131 page, step by step guide to link building visit http://www.highprlinkclub.com/j/ssl.shtml. Or test your search engine IQ by taking his seo quiz and get the free special report "Coming Out On Top".