Couple of months back I had covered Greasemonkey, a powerful and all-favorite firefox extension. Now I am taking it further and want to present some of the coolest greasemonkey addons(aka scripts) out there letting you do crazy things such as: downloading apple trailers and clips from popular video sites(Youtube, GoogleVideo….etc), integrating google reader into gmail, adding mirror links to digg listings and etc… No-technical knowledge required, guaranteed.
GENERAL Browsing:
1. GoogleTagCloudMaker - generates tagcloud from Google search results and inserts it above sponsored links. Great for filtering and finding related keywords
(click to enlarge and open it in a new window)
2. Disable Text Ads - removes annoying inline contextual text ads from 3 major distributors: VibrantMedia(IntelliTXT), Kontera and Linkworth
3. RSS+Atom Feed Subscribe Button Generator - don’t bother looking for RSS subscription links again. This greasemonkey addon automatically finds RSS and Atom subscription links on a webpage and inserts feed subscription buttons(
) to the top left corner of the page. See screenshot from del.icio.us below
4. Textarea Backup - never retype lost emails, forum posts, feedback forms, blog comments, etc again. This addon automatically saves entered text after every 10 keystrokes so if the page is reloaded for whatever reason, be it browser crash or unintended exit, the text will be restored.
5. LookItUp - lets you highlight anyword and quickly look it up on wikipedia, a dictionary or whatever info database you like without leaving the page you’re on. The result is displayed directly on the webpage and can be instantly removed with a mouse click. Which dictionary is selected depends on customizable keystrokes. View demo screenshot(opens in a new window)
6. Linkify ting - converts plain text links into real clickable links so you don’t have to manually copy and launch them in a separate window. Examples;
7. Google MP3 - handy music player Greasemonkey script that inserts a play button next to any MP3 file you happen to stumble upon while browsing web so you can listen before you download.
VIDEO and TRAILERS:
8. Apple Trailer Download - lets you easily download full movie trailers from apple.com. Once you’re on a trailer page it adds a tiny menu(screenshot below), where you can select preferred resolution and download it using ‘right-click -> Save Link as’ combination.
9. Download Video - awesome Greasemonkey addon that lets you download video clips from YouTube, Google Video, Myspace, Metacafe, Break.com, Putfile, Dailymotion and Sevenload. The script shows a small download menu at the top of supported video pages(image below). (You’ll need to save files in .flv format or change extension afterwards)
GMAIL Goodies:
10. Gmail Super Clean - clean and distraction-free gmail. Looks great, check it out here
11. Gmail + Reader Integrator - integrates Google Reader into Gmail. This literally saves you one extra tab. Highly Recommended
(click to enlarge and open it in a new window)
12. Gmail Spam-count Hide - hides spam count, since no one needs it anyways
SITE SPECIFIC (Youtube, Myspace, Facebook, IMDB, Digg, Last.fm, del.icio.us)
13. del.icio.us Prettifier - lets you change font and link colors on del.icio.us. This is the only listed plugin that requires basic html knowledge.
14. IMDB enlarge actor pictures on hover - enlarges actor pictures in IMDB cast lists when you hover your cursor over that table row. Demo
15. AdSlicer for MySpace - removes all myspace ads and blank spaces they leave behind
16. YouTube Googler - this handy addon makes YouTube video pages look more like Google Videos. It moves comments to the sidebar and expands the video frame to take up as much space as possible, exactly like on Google Video. Demo
17. Facebook Auto-Colorizer - gives each profile a unique look by colorizing page based on the user’s photo. Demo
18. Digg - Add Mirror - excellent addon for Digg users that inserts links to DuggMirror, Coral Cache, Google Cache and Archive.org below each story’s digg-count. So, if the story source is down you still can easily view its mirror page from one of the sources.
19. Last.fm Artist Fan Rank - adds your or the page owner’s fan rank to artist, track, album charts, and album track listings.
20. Instead of 20′th Addon I am including quick Greasemonkey installation guide:
Technorati Tags: greasemonkey, userscripts, firefox
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Tags: browser tips, firefox tips
Hello,
When I click on “install” a new tab opens with a listing of the script. Any ideas on how one actually installs the script?
Thanks,
Doug
@Doug
Did you install greasemonkey?
@Douglas
All above listed scripts can be installed directly from the script page using ‘install’ buttons. However, sometimes scripts may provide no install button but the ’script’(code) itself. If that’s the case ‘right-click’ greasemonkey icon, select ‘new user script’, copy provided script code to the newly opened window and save it.
Before you go ahead and create script yourself, try accessing the script page again but make sure that greasemonkey is running. Usually Greasemonkey automatically checks anything ending with ‘.js’(javascript files) and when it sees that it’s a script it tries to install it. In case something won’t work let me know.
P.S. Try to avoid installing scripts from anywhere else apart from userscripts.org
Good Stuff. The demo of 16 script isn’t available.
This list rocks! I’ve been frustrated with userscripts.org because they don’t seem to have a “popular” or “most downloaded” category at all so it’s difficult to know which one’s are worth the time.
You’re readers might also be interested in my list of my 27 favorite firefox add-ons, of which, Greasemonkey is one of them. I will definitely be linking to this article on a follow-up that I plan to write to that post… I’m going to give some of these a try right now!
Digg Mirror is great, it was the impetus that caused me to write my Add Digg Control script (http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/7883) that lets me digg articles that I open in tabs.
What a great little list.
Short yet comprehensive.
thanks very useful list 10/10
YouTube Googler returning a 404, some extra full stops in the URL causing it, here’s the link:
YouTube Googler Script:
http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/6198
Thanks for the great list!!
Have you tried adding the Super Clean Gmail to work with Google Reader.
Just curious?
@Dr. Fre & Dario
thank you guyz, links are fine now
digg.firoogle.com has a cool greasemonkey script that will replace digg search with a nicely organised google one.
Very nice site!
Stupore! Amo questo luogo!:)))))))
Cool list,thanks!
Its amazing how diffirent internet users with diffirent expertise and points of view can find such usefull tools that seem to be invisible and not seen of found by most
@2241
Can’t agree more.
Hi.
Very useful resource. THE BEST. I liked your site.
Thanks.
Sincerely,
What lovely tools.
You saved me a lot of effort and a lot of wasted time and effort
Oh what a nice and useful list
Thanks again
I am having troubles with colors with my firefox hightlight text color
It somehow changed to a green color
Any idea of how to change it back to defaults ?
@Glenda
Ussally this happens when you switch firefox themes. Hsve you changed Firefox themes recently?
CreamMonkey - integrates Greasemonkey-like functionality to Apple’s Safari browser. While it’s not 100% compatible with all Greasemonkey scripts, works fine with many of them…
@NBA
I heard about it before, but to my knowledge it supports only few scripts. What about your experience with it? Any particular popular scripts it does (or doesn’t) support ?
Oh what a nice and useful list
Thanks again
Cool list… very diverse! I’m thinking about creating some scripts myself. If anyone has any ideas be sure to contact me. pixelspotlight.com
How about creating something for MakeUseOf.com?
I prefer Gmail Beautifier over Gmail Super Clean
Only “Disable Text Ads” is really great, the rest are expendable.
“Disable Text Ads” is complete bullsh*t. Instead of downloading textads script, having it running and then removing consequences with another greasemonkey script you can simply adblock it.
Great list!!
Thanks!!!!!
I used Greasemonkey mainly because it give Blog*Spot users Trackback capability, but even since I downloaded the new monkey version (Greasemonkey 0.8.20080609.0) I lost Blogger Trackback capability. I love the old monkey (Version 0.7.20080121.0). How do I get Blogger Trackback again or did I missed something?
Greetings and lots of love from Malaysia.