Doom9 Toolbar Extension for Firefox [v3.1]

[unskinnyboy]

Presenting a toolbar extension for Firefox (hope everyone is using Firefox by now ;)) which should make your navigation around Doom9 easier and also give instant access to your UserCP, Profile etc amongst many other things :-

http://img135.imageshack.us/img135/8100/toolbarpreview3bq.png

For download and install, go here: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2670/ and click on the 'Install Now' button there.

http://maxupload.com/img/48CCEE80.jpg

Initially, I wrote a cruder form of this extension for my own use. As I started using it, I figured others could also benefit from this. So I made few more changes/additions and made it more presentable in its current form.

If you find any bugs, broken links etc. please post here/PM me and let me know. I will try to fix it for the next build of this as soon as I get some time to work on it (something which I don't have much these days :(). The next version will also have a built-in search bar to search the site.

Please also feel free to put forward suggestions and criticisms. I am also looking for help in the way of getting some good icon resources. Finding the right icon for the right option took me the most amount of time and nearly drove me nuts. If you think any icon is ugly and can suggest a good replacement, I will gladly take it. A note to the software developers of the tools featured in the extension - if you have a good 16x16 icon with a transparent background handy for your tool, please pass them onto me.

Enjoy! Hope you will find it useful. :)

[danpos]

@unskinnyboy

WOW, it's great man!! I already downloaded it and I'm using right now!

I think that it will do easier the life of Doom9's users... ;)

Thanks for sharing it with us.

Cheers,

[sjakke]

This is great:)

[tekNerd]

Wow, great!
First toolbar with real use!
Thanks man!

Peace out!

[check]

Pretty impressive! One feature request, would it be possible to be able to use middle click to follow one of the links in a new tab? It's possible for 'normal' links, and I miss the ability :P

[sysKin]

Not trying to sound negative - quite contrary - but does this do something that can't be solved with bookmarks?

BTW, works fine with current 2.0 nightly build too.

[unskinnyboy]

@check, I will see if I can add that.

@sysKin, Not at the moment, but that would mean you bookmarking every single link in the whole site to match the functionality of the toolbar.

[jggimi]

Unfortunately for me, it is Windows only. :scared:

[MrTroy]

(hope everyone is using Firefox by now ;))Nope. Opera for the win! :cool:

;)

[buzzqw]

Opera too here !
btw... is time to redo the browser pool ?

BHH

[tomos]

thanks for this. wish i knew how to do these myself

p.s. used to use opera exclusively till 2 months ago when firefox took over ;)

[buzzqw]

for me is just the opposite :) !

come from over one year of firefox (till 1.5.0) then switch to Opera. Never complain !

BHH

[kohsaf1]

fantastic....works good, thanks USB :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

I knocked up some direct links to the various Doom9 Forum threads some time ago, which I've just tidied up....

Okay, it's not nearly as sophisticated as unskinnyboy's FireFox offering.... but whatever floats yer boat ;)

http://img164.imageshack.us/img164/2309/ie7grap3kp.png


Cheers

[unskinnyboy]

Unfortunately for me, it is Windows only. :scared:
Not anymore. I have made the extension available for all platforms now, even though I could test it in only Windows and Linux. If someone encounters some bug in other platforms like BSD, MacOSX, Solaris or even Linux for that matter, let me know.

[jggimi]

Woo hoo!

[TJeR]

Realy nice add-on .... :)

[DarkZell666]

Just being curious about this : are the menu items fed by an xml rss feed or something ? or simply hard-coded ?

You saw me coming right ? What happens if the forum gets reorganized ? ;)

From your first post I would suppose "hard-coded" since you mention dead links ...

Nice idea indeed anyway !
Good job ;)

[tekNerd]

What happens if the forum gets reorganized ? ;)


I guess he makes an update, right?

[unskinnyboy]

@DarkZell666, It is hardcoded at the moment. Knowing Doom9, you would need more than a good reason to get a new *sub-forum* let alone rearrange the whole forum. Hence I don't anticipate any drastic changes. If there is, I might just go in and change the code. In the unlikely case that the forum keeps changing a lot, RSS feed it will be.

But actually, thank you for mentioning that. It gave me some other ideas to ruminate over..

[Elias]

Great job! Will install this extension ASAP!

[chipzoller]

I think it would be nice to have just a "Forums home" button, maybe under the 'Doom9 Forums' drop-down menu. And maybe under that same menu, a "Search Forums" button?

In any case, I'm using the hell out of it already :)

[boombastic]

you rock guys!!

[Dayvon]

Beautiful...

:applause:

[deuce2]

I love Firefox... and this extension. I'm looking forward to the next version already :D

[Shocku]

Awesome extension!

I have two feature requests...can you add a way to customize which menus show up, and would it be possible to have it on the same row as other toolbars/items?

[fisix]

do i have to have the bookmark toolbar enabled, or is this an additional toolbar that i can enable/disable?

[unskinnyboy]

This is an additional toolbar and when you install this, this will be automatically enabled. If you want to disable it, you can right-click on the browser window and uncheck 'Doom9 Toolbar'.

[Skelsgard]

I can´t believe I didn´t see this thing before. Is awesome, great job!!!

[CLS]

Yamy, Firefox extension... :goodpost:

[LoRd_MuldeR]

"Got to Forum index" would be a nice addition in the Forums menu :)

[unskinnyboy]

Version 2.0 released!

Changelog v1.0 -> v2.0
----------------------
Added search facility

How to upgrade?

Go to Tools -> Extensions and you will see an Update Now button next to this extension.

http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/7867/doom9toolbarto9.jpg

Click on it, let it install and then restart Firefox. Done.

Those who are installing this for the first time, check the first post in this thread.

What has changed?

You can now do perform searches from the toolbar. Both quick search and an advanced forum specific search, including the ability to search child forums, where applicable.

http://img116.imageshack.us/img116/9981/doom9toolbar2gr2.jpg

Using the search should be pretty intuitive. Else let me know and I can explain. If something isn't working as expected or not working at all, let me know.

P.S: I haven't forgotten the other feature requests. Will work on them when I get some time.

Enjoy! :)

[Lenny_Nero]

Nice, I had a few bookmarks, but it could always be better, cheers. :thanks:

Have you thought about a template sort of thing that other forums could use with your extension ??

[deuce2]

Thanks for the new feature. One comment. When I check the informations tab it still says ver. 1.0.0. I kept thinking it didn't update and then noticed the "Quick Search" tab so it must have.:D

[unskinnyboy]

Thanks for the new feature. One comment. When I check the informations tab it still says ver. 1.0.0. I kept thinking it didn't update and then noticed the "Quick Search" tab so it must have.:D
Yeah, I forgot to change the text in the About tab. jggimi already reported it to me via PM the same day I released v2.0, but I thought I'd rather wait for the next release where I will be adding some functionalities rather than to release a v2.1 just to fix a silly typo.

[deuce2]

No rush, eh.

[shevegen]

"Not trying to sound negative - quite contrary - but does this do something that can't be solved with bookmarks?"

I just want to add one thing. I dont use bookmarks with VERY FEW temporary exceptions (when i need to close firefox but want to remember just one last link i finished reading).
So for me, extensions are very useful. For you, they probably arent. Just wanted to ensure that the other side is heard too. :)

Some things I'd like to ask:
- Is it a Win-only extension? (I thought firefox extensions are independent of the underlying OS)
- Does it offer bitrate calculator help and other javascript niceties around video stuff?
- What about a logo for the extension listing ... something as simple as a DVD that shines/halo in bright violet/orange or sth :)

[jggimi]

This is not win-only. I use it with both Ubuntu and OpenBSD, as well as Win.

No, it doesn't have a bitrate calculator.

Beyond bookmarks, it has two different searching tools with this new release. It also has a "mark all read" feature, which I suppose is a bookmark. :)

[unskinnyboy]

Just to add to what jggimi already told..
- Is it a Win-only extension? (I thought firefox extensions are independent of the underlying OS)
If I had been making any platform-specific API calls in the code, then it would have become platform-dependent, but I am not..yet.
- Does it offer bitrate calculator help and other javascript niceties around video stuff?
While I suspect such tools are easy enough to implement, they are quite outside the scope of this extension. I am sure we wouldn't want a bloatware on our hands.
- What about a logo for the extension listing ... something as simple as a DVD that shines/halo in bright violet/orange or sth :)
Didn't quite understand this. You mean like a logo in the 'About' box or something such? Sure, if someone could make me one. =)

[Inventive Software]

Found this after getting Firefox. One thing missing is the Forum Index, but other than that, it's perfect. ;)

[deuce2]

... is hardcoded at the moment. Knowing Doom9, you would need more than a good reason to get a new *sub-forum* let alone rearrange the whole forum.

... and then he added the NEWS forum:devil:

[unskinnyboy]

Version 2.1 released.

Changelog v2.0 -> v2.1
----------------------
1) Added 'Forum Index'.
2) Added the new sub-forum 'News'.
3) Some better icons (I *think*).
4) Fixed version typo in the 'About' box.
5) Some code cleanup.

How to upgrade?

Go to Tools -> Add-ons -> Extensions and you will see an Update Now button next to this extension.

[deuce2]

The index was a nice touch. I kind of missed not having it:) . Thanks for the nice toolbar, I use it (almost) daily.

[unskinnyboy]

Version 3.0 released.

Changelog v2.1 -> v3.0
----------------------
1) Middle click of the mouse opens the links in new tab now.
2) Lists the 15 latest posts in the forum using RSS feed.

http://img219.imageshack.us/img219/5848/doom9toolbarpreview02op9.png

How to upgrade?

Go to Tools -> Add-ons -> Extensions and you will see an Update Now button next to this extension.

[jggimi]

1024x768 isn't big enough to see the rss feed. In your next release, you might see if you can use Firefox's toolbar customizations to set text off, or provide some other way for those of us with ancient lcd laptops to use all of the features you're providing. :)

[unskinnyboy]

...use Firefox's toolbar customizations to set text off...Please elaborate. What toolbar customizations? And what text do you want to set off? You mean to customize the toolbar interface to disable parts of the toolbar you don't need?

[jggimi]

Right click on a toolbar. You get a list of toolbars to select and a "customize..." selection. In the customize selection, you can set icon size, text, etc ... at least, you can do that for the Navigation toolbar. I have no idea if such settings can be cascaded to custom bars like yours.

[unskinnyboy]

I cannot use the settings from the Navigation toolbar nor can it be cascaded down (it doesn't make sense to apply the same properties to mine, because the icons/text are different anyway). I probably will have to code my own. I will look into it. Hopefully, it won't bloat the executable too much.

[jggimi]

Remember, its just for us old bozos using ancient tech. :)

[Sharktooth]

any chance to get an Opera widget or Webpanel with the same functionalities?