Tag Archives: firefox

Remember the Milk goes Offline

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Remember the Milk is the first 3rd party web app to make use of Google Gears for offline access. RTM is the 2nd app I use on a daily basis to be given the offline treatment; the other being Google Reader. Since Google Gears was released, I’ve switched back to Firefox just so I could play around with it and now I’m back to a Firefox as my main browser. Firefox 3.0 plans to bring all web apps offline and I’m now seeing how this kinda access is going to change the web once again. My guess is the Google Gears code is going to be giving back to Mozilla to incorporate into Firefox. Now if they can just release Gmail and Google Doc and Spreadsheets as offline apps I think I’d be in my glory.

TGIF Quick Links: Better Late than Never Edition

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Newest beta Foxytunes supports controlling XBMC from Firefox

Foxytunes is a Firefox extension that supports controlling many different mediaplayers from inside Firefox. The newest beta 1.3.5 adds support for controlling XBMC. 1.3.5 beta adds the following:

  • Xbox Media Center support
  • Go to Player > Options > Custom and enter “-ip YOUR_XBOX_IP” to get started
  • Thanks to LiquidIce for helping make this happen
  • Pandora/Last.fm mashup support
    Notification button for when new FoxyTunes version is available
    Keyboard shortcuts are now disabled by default
    Minor tweaks

Download here – http://www.foxytunes.com/firefox/download/xbmc.html#latest-preview
This is hawt. I use XBMC for everything media and Firefox for everything web. Will be nice to not have to keep turning around and looking for the remote to skip songs. First thing I’m going to do when i get home(at work now) is install the new Firefox 1.5.0.4 and Foxytunes.


Firefox productivity extensions for Google Mail and Calendar

I’ve been slowly switching from Outlook/Entourage and Exchange to Google Mail/Calendar now that Google Calendar has been released. One of the disadvantages to a web based solution like this you always have to keep a browser tab open with your Mail and Calendar open for quick access. To make this
alittle more easier, I found two Firefox extensions that help with this.

First one is called GCalQuickTab and it allows you to use the “Quick Links” at the top left corner to jump between open tabs instead of the default behavior of opening new tabs every time. It always provides keyboard shortcuts to switching to Gmail and Gcal using “g” and “l” respectively.

Second one is called goocal which is very basic right now but provides a icon in the statusbar that brings you directly to Google Calendar. This way you don’t have to clutter up your bookmark bar.

This gives me basically instant access to my calendar when i need it. If I’m already in Gmail i just hit “l” and it opens up Gcal where i can then hit “q” to Quick add an appointment. Or i just click on the Calendar icon if nothing is open. If i need Gmail, its just a “g” away from there.

You could also add in the Gmail Notifier for Firefox too but i prefer the standalone one.

Switch – Windows > OS X Apps

Here are what I’ve been using as replacements for my Windows apps:
WindowsXP>OSX

Web Browser: Firefox>Safari
Email: Outlook>Entourage
Bittorrent: utorrent>Azureus
IRC: mIRC>Colloquy
Blogging: ecto>ecto
Flickr: Flickr Uploader>iPhoto/Flickr Export
Comics: CDisplay>ComicBookLover
MP3 Tagger: Tag&Rename/Musicbrainz>Media Rage/IEatBrainz/Export Artwork
Music: Winamp>iTunes
Last.fm: Audioscrobber for Winamp/Last.fm Player>iScrobbler/Last.fm Player
P2P: Limewire>Limewire
Office: Office 2003>Office 2004
Compression: WinRAR>Stuffit
PSP – PSPWare>iPSP
DVD ripping: DVDShrink>Handbrake/MactheRipper
FTP: FlashFXP>Transmit
Video Player: Windows Media Player>VLC
Xbox: Qwix>Xbox Browser
Burning: Nero>Toast
IM: AIM/Google Talk>iChat/Adium
Webpage: Nvu>Nvu
Finance: Quickbooks 2004>Quickbooks 2006 for Mac
VOIP: Ventrilo/TeamSpeak/Skype>Ventrilo/TeamSpeex
Todo list: Google Desktop with Todo Plugin>High Priority
Text: Notepad>Textmate
Photos: Pisaca>iPhoto

Some cool new programs:
Coverflow
GarageSale
MyMySpaceMail

Favorite Widgets:
I was never a fan of Konfabulator,now Yahoo Widgets. I never found anything really useful to me but I got to say I’m loving Dashboard. Here are some of my favorite non-default widgets:

Now Playing (Tivo)
TV Tracker
Bloglines Notifier
EasyEnvelopes
Stats for Adsense

Issues:
Ventrilo and Teamspeex can only use Speex codec, default is GSM, Have to change it on the server to work.
Quickbooks not up to par with Windows Version, tho i haven’t tried QB 2006 yet.
Skype not working on Intel Macs.
Office 2004 sluggish, Rosetta
ecto sluggish. Rosetta
Needed to used a patched version of Azureus
Firefox not Universal Binary yet, sluggish, Rosetta

Things I can’t do on Mac I can on Windows (so far):
Update the firmware on my MPx220 cell phone. Updater is Windows only.