FOSSwire

Firefox's Find on this page functionality is great. A quick Ctrl-F (or Cmd-F on OS X) and you can use the live searching functionality to find a particular word or phrase located on the current page.

However, there's actually an even quicker way to invoke this functionality.

If you type the / key, then just type what you are searching for, Firefox opens a Quick Find box at the bottom of the page and will search as you type.

The only caveat is that for obvious reasons, this doesn't work if you are focused inside a text field.

So next time you're looking for something on the current page, just hit / and start typing. Firefox will jump to the right place immediately!

In an unprecented move, Microsoft have apparently released a Windows Media Player plugin for our favourite cross-platform free software web browser, Firefox.

While Firefox users have generally been able to play MP3 audio files, and MPEG2 and MPEG4 videos, using Apple's QuickTime player plug-in, streaming of some Microsoft-specific formats such as WMV has sometimes been elusive. Depending on your setup, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. And Web sites that depend on access to the WMP console - including, admittedly, Microsoft co-owned and operated sites such as MSNBC.com - have sometimes responded with cryptic messages saying videos are unavailable. Up to now, MSNBC.com told viewers using Firefox they couldn't see videos from the site...with a video showing an MSNBC anchor delivering the apology directly.

But with the plug-in installed, that's changed; and now, Windows XP SP2 and Vista users who have Windows Media Player 11 can now be assured they can see videos from Microsoft's and other's sites whose video display abilities relies on their accessibility to Microsoft's rights management on the client side. Sites that didn't have this problem in Firefox - such as CBSNews.com - continue to work well.

This is a great move in my opinion and it will hopefully make the Firefox experience a lot better for the many Windows users that are now using it as their browser.

I've said this before, but I'll reiterate it - the Firefox experience is what many people's first experience of free/open source software will be, so in my opinion, it's vital that we make that experience as positive as possible.

This was announced on Microsoft's Port 25 blog (their blog from the MS Open Source Software Lab). A lot of the time, I actually really hate the hypocritical way Microsoft go about using Port 25 to 'reach out to the community', while simultaneously having Ballmer make yet another anti-FOSS comment to stab us in the back. This time, though, this is a genuinely good thing to have come out of the lab.

I heartily applaud Microsoft for this particular move.

[via UNEASYsilence]

Firefox is probably the single free software project that is used by the most people and it's a browser I personally love. Today I'm going to look at the issue of how to use a master password to protect your saved passwords.

In this tutorial, I'll be referring to Firefox, but you'll probably also be able to do this on other browsers based on Firefox (like IceWeasel or Flock). Screenshots are taken from my Fedora Core 6 Linux machine, but should look similar on other platforms.

A master password is exactly as it sounds - a password that you have to enter before you can use any of the other ones you've saved in your Firefox profile. You do lose a little convienience if you set one up, as the first time in a browsing session you need to use one of your passwords, you'll have to enter the master password, but once you've done it that one time, you won't have to reenter it unless you close down Firefox and reopen it.

It does provide a security bonus, however, so it's completely up to you whether or not you use it.

To set up a master password, head to your Firefox Preferences dialogue. On Windows, that's accessed through Tools > Options, on Linux, it's Edit > Preferences and on Mac OS X it's Firefox > Preferences.

Click the Security heading and simply check Use a master password. This window will pop up:

Fairly obviously, just enter a password and confirm it. Click OK and you're done.

Now, next time a site needs to use your saved passwords, you'll be asked for the master password. Your passwords will then be unlocked for that session. Also, if someone tries to view your saved passwords by going to the Preferences dialogue, then Security and clicking Show Passwords, they'll need the master password first (even if it's already unlocked). Always a useful thing to know when you leave your desk for 'just a couple of seconds' (without locking or logging off).

OK, call me paranoid. But if you are as well, this tip might just be for you.