Greasemonkey Makes Firefox Unbeatable

Greasemonkey

Greasemonkey is an excellent addon which makes Firefox a lot better. Unlike many other addons that let you do one particular thing, possibilities with this one are incredible. Greasemonkey extension lets you add so called ‘user scripts‘ which can add more functionalities or change the behavior of a web page. These scripts let you control any aspect of a web page’s design or interaction. For instance, you can add video download functionality to video sharing site like youtube, OR disable all ads on myspace OR change the appearance of gmail and lots lots more…

So, how does it work?

  • 1. Install Firefox, if you haven’t done it already.
  • 2. Install Greasemonkey. Once done you should see a small monkey face at the right bottom corner of your browser window.
  • 3. Start adding ‘user scripts.’

Userscripts.org is a directory currently listing over 2.000.000 Greasemonkey ‘user scripts’. All of these scripts are developed by users themselves. Most of them directed to solve common web problems, i.e. removing annoying ads, adding additional navigation options, and changing the look of the page. Once you’re on userscripts.org you can use their tag cloud box to quickly locate desired scripts. For instace, clicking on ‘myspace’ tag will show get you all scripts designed for myspace.

Some of the popular script categories are:

  • Myspace (ex: remove all ads from Myspace, remove all flash media from profile pages, …)
  • Facebook (change the look of Facebook, remove ads, automatic page refresh every 30-90s, …)
  • eBay (add new column displaying total item cost (price+shipping), auto-feedback, …)
  • Amazon (disable ads, show prices in different currencies, for each product show prices from other sellers, …)
  • Gmail (change appearance, integrate google reader into gmail, ….)
  • Youtube, GoogleVideo (ADD video download option, change site theme, … )
  • and many more including Flickr, Del.icio.us and whatever is popular.

Installing user scripts is extremely easy, just click on the script’s install button and Greasemonkey will do the rest. In case you don’t see desired changes then try restarting the Firefox.

Tips:

    1)Try to avoid installing scripts from elsewhere but userscripts.org.

    2) While browsing through scripts you may see something like ‘NOTE: manual configuration required‘, if you have no idea how to configure them just avoid them.

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    Comments RSS | Trackback URI

    26 Comments Leave a Comment

    2007-01-12 00:59:26

    [...] Videoronk In the last 2 weeks I’ve published 2 posts mentioning tools that can help you download videos from popular video sharing websites; once in the article about youtube tools and once here in the post about greasemonkey extension for firefox. In both cases it was about how to get videos on your comp once you find them. Since, I never really mentioned anything regarding that ‘find’ part, I decided to do some digging and see if there is any unusual video search tools I can write about. [...]

     
    2007-01-16 13:03:15

    [...] Being able to install firefox(review) as a portable application is already something awesome and compelling because, similarly to regular version portable one can also utilize any of available firefox extensions, making it much more then just a browser. I mean it’s just a USB stick but possibilities are literally limitless, for instance installing greasemonkey addon on your portable firefox will let you do almost anything from downloading youtube videos to removing ads from favorite websites(myspace). Or add to it recently discussed gspace addon and you’ll be able to use your gmail account as online storage tool from any computer. more, more and more …. [...]

     
    2007-01-17 17:44:51

    [...] search mozilla’s website for firefox extensions and userscripts.org for relevant greasemonkey addons(more on greasemonkey here) [...]

     
    2007-03-12 15:57:54

    [...] Couple of month back I have 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 such crazy things 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, guarateed. [...]

     
    2007-03-18 01:30:42

    [...] GREASEMONKEY SCRIPTS (What is Greaseamonkey?) [...]

     
    2007-03-22 03:34:40

    [...] GREASEMONKEY SCRIPTS (What is Greaseamonkey?) [...]

     
    2007-03-22 07:47:22

    [...] 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: [...]

     
    2007-03-22 21:19:10

    [...] Скрипты Greasemonkey: (Что такое Greasemonkey) Gmail Super Clean - очищает интерфейс гмайл Gmail Spam-count Hide - прячет счетчик спама GMail Attachment Icons - добавляет иконки к прикрепленным файлам, позволяя опознать тип вложения. Google Reader Integration - интеграция Google Reader с Gmail. Очень удобно! GmailTo - линки mailto теперь будут вести в Gmail Saved Searches - аналог  Smart folders (демо) Conversation Preview - позволяет просматривать письмо перед отправкой Google Calendar Integration - интеграция Google Calendar с почтой. (демо) Label Colors - позволяет изменить цвета пунктов меню (демо) Gmail Macros - добавляет горячие клавиши в интерфейс Gmail (например ‘t’ для удаления, ‘r’ для пометки прочитано, ‘p’ для пометки прочитано и переноса в архив. (Больше инфы) [...]

     
    2007-03-23 15:24:05

    [...] Скрипты Greasemonkey: (Что такое Greasemonkey) Gmail Super Clean - очищает интерфейс гмайлGmail Spam-count Hide - прячет счетчик спамаGMail Attachment Icons - добавляет иконки к прикрепленным файлам, позволяя опознать тип вложения.Google Reader Integration - интеграция Google Reader с Gmail. Очень удобно!GmailTo - линки mailto теперь будут вести в GmailSaved Searches - аналог Smart folders (демо)Conversation Preview - позволяет просматривать письмо перед отправкой Google Calendar Integration - интеграция Google Calendar с почтой. (демо)Label Colors - позволяет изменить цвета пунктов меню (демо)Gmail Macros - добавляет горячие клавиши в интерфейс Gmail (например ‘t’ для удаления, ‘r’ для пометки прочитано, ‘p’ для пометки прочитано и переноса в архив. (Больше инфы) [...]

     
    2007-03-25 07:32:19

    [...] GREASEMONKEY SCRIPTS (What is Greaseamonkey?) [...]

     
    2007-04-12 21:30:19

    [...] Callto: Linkify [Greasemonkey(?) script] - turns text phone numbers in webpages into ‘Skype Dial’ hyperlinks. When clicked it’ll initiate a Skype call to that number. [...]

     
    Comment by Pallab
    2007-04-18 07:49:25

    I would just like to comment that, its not really one of those things which makes Fx unbeatable. Opera has provides a more powerful version called Userjs out of the box. Safari as creammonkey addon And even IE can enjoy some funtionalities offered by Greasemonkey with an addon called Turnabout.

     
    2007-04-26 20:01:19

    [...] Dunck - a collaborative guide about Greasemonkey scripts. [...]

     
    2007-05-04 19:26:23

    [...] (1) Digg - Add Mirror - excellent Greasemonkey addon (Firefox only) 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. More Greasemonkey goodies [...]

     
    2007-05-06 13:02:54

    [...] 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. [...]

     
    2007-05-08 19:51:12

    [...] (11) IE7Pro (only IE 7) - little overwhelming and takes some time to get used to, but totally worth it. Includes powerful Tab Manager, AD or Flash blocking utility, Crash Recovery, Proxy Switcher, Web Accelerator, User Agent Switcher, Webpage Capturer, Greasemonkey scripts support and some more. [...]

     
    2007-05-21 00:13:32

    [...] User Script Compiler - web-based utility that can convert any Greasemonkey script to a Firefox extension. [...]

     
    2007-05-22 23:49:09

    [...] FIREFOX (Addons and Greasemonkey Scripts) [...]

     
    2007-05-24 07:03:36

    [...] FIREFOX (Addons and Greasemonkey Scripts) [...]

     
    2007-06-20 15:43:56

    [...] The best part of Google Reader, like in the case of other Google Goodies, i.e. Gmail and Google Calendar, there are many third-party tools making it even better. These include new item notifiers, addons for offline access, Greasemonkey (?) scripts, one-click shortcuts and more. [...]

     
    2007-07-27 18:39:17

    [...] GreaseMonkey SCRIPTS (What is Greaseamonkey?) [...]

     
    2007-10-06 13:03:06

    [...] Greasemonkey explained for non-techies design facebook internet social networking [...]

     
    2007-11-01 20:54:53

    [...] Greasemonkey scripts (which of course requires the Firefox browser and Greasemonkey) [...]

     
    2008-02-04 17:10:34

    [...] browsing online the other day, I came across a conversion tool which allows you to take a Greasemonkey script and turn it into a “xpi” Firefox [...]

     
    2008-02-12 21:21:10

    [...] (Greasemonkey script) - This one is really cool. Youtube videos are linked from everywhere these days. And this [...]

     
    2008-02-19 13:41:40

    [...] tab manager, AD and Flash blockier, Session crash recovery, Web accelerator, Webpage capturer, Greasemonkey scripts support, Firefox style inline search, spell checker and an excellent mouse gesture feature [...]

     
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