Flaw with Firefox 2.0
I still think the inline spell check is worth the price of admission, but there is a flaw I have found in the new Firefox 2.0. The close tab icon is now on the tab itself, and it is very easy when changing tabs to hit this icon and actually close the tab by mistake. This needs to be fixed.
Update: OK, not a flaw, just a configuration setting to be changed. See comments. I really love Firefox.
Update #2: I had horrible loading times in Google reader with the new Firefox. I am pretty sure it is the browser pre-fetch function, which attempts to pre-load pages linked by the page you are calling up, in case you click on the links. I recommend you turn it to false. Once I did so, Reader popped right up. By the way, I am very much happier with the tweaked version of the new Google reader -- they fixed many of my concerns.
Joel:
Many helpful suggestions for Firefox 2.0 can be found here:
http://www.lifehacker.com/software/firefox-2/geek-to-live-top-firefox-2-config-tweaks-209941.php
Two friends of mine were discussing tab-close-button behavior with me recently. One likes the new way (button per tab), one likes the old way like you do (one button total) and I like to have no close buttons at all. Firefox supports all three options.
October 27, 2006, 11:40 amStephen VanDyke:
Heh, Joel beat me to it. I'm loving that I can get rid of Tab Mix Plus and SessionSaver with this upgrade (to activate saved sessions, it's the first option on the "Main" prefs page).
October 27, 2006, 12:22 pmAcademician:
You can remove the tab close buttons by going to about:config and setting "browser.tabs.closeButtons" to 0 (zero).
October 27, 2006, 12:42 pmSol:
And if you close a tab by mistake, the "History" pulldown menu has a "Recently closed tabs" that lets you re-open it easily.
October 27, 2006, 2:12 pmsmilerz:
or just get TabBrowser Preferences and it lets you tweak all sorts of settings. That's the great thing about Firefox - if they didn't do it the way that you like someone else probably wrote an extension that fixes it.
October 27, 2006, 2:44 pmAnonymous:
I like one button per tab combined with one botton on the side that closes the active tab. That's what I have right now in Firefox 1.5 combined with Tab Mix Plus.
October 27, 2006, 3:51 pmEric H:
On day 1 with Firefox, I wondered why nobody had thought of tabbed browsing before. I still wonder why IE doesn't have it (I'm required to use IE at work - ugh!). But I also wondered why they didn't put the close button on the tab. That and history search are the only two features I wanted (already have a free spellchecker plug-in).
October 27, 2006, 6:01 pmJosh:
Ever since Galeon's descent into obscurity forced me to switch to Firefox, I have been waiting for Firefox to catch up with Galeon's UI. The close button on tabs is one of the most anticipated enhancements. I'm not saying it's right for everyone, but give if you give it a chance, you just might like it. There is a certain logic to having the button on the item it actually affects.
Now if they'd just fix the key words in the smart bookmarks...
October 27, 2006, 7:56 pmsmilerz:
I also hate the close buttons on the tabs - middle click is, by far, the most efficient way to close tabs is a middle-button click.
October 28, 2006, 6:25 amBrad Warbiany:
FYI, for the Tab Mix Plus folks, you can't "officially" get it to work with 2.0 from the Mozilla site. However, they do have beta versions available with a quick google search (I don't have the link handy).
I noticed that they implemented some of the Tab Mix Plus features into 2.0, but I still like the ability to make it exactly how I want.
October 30, 2006, 3:14 pmAnnoyed:
Very annoying the 'improvement'. I think it's a step back instead. Actually this is the first Google result for 'Firefox 2.0 one button close tabs'. But the most comprehensive response is at the second result http://ffextensionguru.wordpress.com/2006/10/22/firefox-20-close-tab-buttons/
However, a little of copy paste for lazy guys as me:
# Open a new tab and type about:config in the address bar and press enter
November 4, 2006, 3:17 am# In the filter field type browser.tabs.closeButtons
# Double-click on the entry and enter the corresponding number below:
0 ~ Display a close button on the active tab only
1 ~ Display a close button on each tab (default)
2 ~ Don’t display any close buttons
3 ~ Display a single close button at the end of the tab bar (Firefox 1.x behaviour (and the best of all, because allows the selection of the oldest watched tab at the middle and simple clicks over the single button to close the rest of watched tabs ))
# Click OK