Make Google Better with Customize Google for Firefox
Do you use Google inside Firefox ? If the answer is yes, you definitely need an add-on called Customize Google that makes your favorite Google even better and all the more useful.
And in case you require some more convincing, here are five unique things you can do with Google and Firefox once you have installed Customize Google:
1. Remove Specific Websites from Google Search Results
Don’t like to see pages in Google results that are from Amazon.com or from domains like .info or .biz. With Customize Google, you can easily filter any websites or domains from Google by specifying rules.
For instance, *amazon* will not show pages that have amazon in the URL while a rule like technorati.com/tag/* will block pages in search results that are from Technorati search. You can extend this idea to block RSS feeds in Google results.
Related: Extremely Useful Firefox Extensions
2. Keep Your Gmail Account Safe
Last year, Rob Graham demonstrated how he could hack Gmail accounts that were using http: instead of https: to access emails.
Anyone can forget typing that additional "s" in the URL so a better alternative is to outsource this job to Customize Google.
It will automatically switch you to a more secure https: login screen while you are logging into any Google service including Gmail, Google Docs, Google Reader, Google Calendar and your Google Web History.
3. Clean URLs in Google Search Results
Did you notice the URL for cricinfo.com website appearing in Google results ? Its cricinfo.com prepended with some tracking code.
I am not worried about Google tracking clicks on search results but the problem comes when you have to copy links from the search page - they are cryptic URLs and do not look good when put in email messages. Customize Google removes the click tracking so the search results link directly to the website.
4. Number your Search Results in Google
Customize Google can add a counter next to each of your search results in Google.
This feature comes handy if you are tracking the rankings of your web pages in Google over a period of time or if you have 100 search results on a page and want to know the exact position of the web page that you are interested in.
5. Search Flickr, CNN, Yahoo, etc from Google
Customize Google adds links to rival search engines in Google search results including Google Images and Google News. This is a big time saver and you won’t realize how useful it is unless you start using this feature.
So if you are looking for some pictures on Google Images, you will also see links to Yahoo! Image Search and Flickr - no need to type the query again.
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Great addon, indeed! I’ve been using CustomizeGoogle for years, and I love it!!!
Even though you outlined many of it’s great features, there are also many more - definitely worth trying it out, if you haven’t already.
Also, if you want this kind of functionality, but are an Opera user, please see: http://www.smir.de/cg/
Wow, thanks for this post. I’ve always been annoyed at #3 above. And now I have a way around it. What a powerful extension that is!
Firefox now a days sucks. Lot of addons and the platform that is open to developers make the firefox unstable.
i have been using this feature from past few days & it has helped me a lot. But still, sometimes i feel IE7 is better compared mozilla..
I have been using Firefox for years now. Started using it because IE was memory hungry and use to take lot of time in opening up. Moreover, I was never sure, if it was doing something behind the screen. IE might have improved but now I am used to Firefox because now I simply can not do without its superb add-ons. Yes, I has IE still on my desktop. I have to resort to it reluctantly for some poorly developed sites.
Firefox is superior from every aspect. The add-ons “increase” rather than “decrease” the stability of the browser. IE 7 is by far the worst browser experience available. And don’t forget the integration of greasemonkey scripts. Cheers for Firefox and cheers for this addon!
Amit, thanks again! I switched to Firefox in August 2007 and have had no problem after that time, even though, I am using quite a nice number of add-ons. It is light years better than Internet Explorer! (I am/was using old Celeron powered PC with only 192MB most of the time, which I upgraded with additional 1GB short time ago)
I’m using Google toolbar, but I didn’t have any idea about Numbering searches, Cleaning URL, Removing URL, Searching Flickr and especially about Keeping Gmail account safe by typing additional “s”. Thanks!
It seems to me that Firefox is running much slower on my new computer that has Vista on it. Has anyone else experienced this?
Elmo,
You may well have a bunch of Firefox add-ons running, these can certainly bog down Firefox. Check by creating a new profile without any add-ons and see if things speed up. Google for ‘creating new firefox profile’ to know how to create it.
Best of luck!