MUO Polls: Do you use any Browser Toolbar? If so, which one?

I only use StumbleUpon. Firefox addons + Bookmarklets for everything else.

Hi, I use google for FireFox3 and also Instant Buzz to get free traffic from browsing.

I used to use StumbleUpon’s toolbar, and Del.icio.us’s addon extension. But since I found out about Shareaholic, I’m not using either of those now.

I don’t really care that much for “toolbars”; I prefer the tool “buttons” that open a menu below. Shareaholic does it nicely, and StumbleUpon allowed us to choose which menu items we wanted, so I only had 3 on the toolbar, making it very small. I then drug it into FF’s bookmarks toolbar, which has a few bookmarklets with keywords too long to make them convenient to type into the address bar. Most bookmarklets are buried down deep in my bookmarks, with easy to remember keywords to type into the address bar.

Many toolbars, and even FF extensions seem to be developed just to collect viewing patterns, so if there’s a bookmarklet option, I’ll choose that first, and sometimes a keyworded search gets me by.

toolbar = waste of space

I use both stuble upon and roboform

web developer toolbar –> it’s installed, but hidden most of the time, but sometimes I need to use it and it’s really one of the best web developers tool

I have Stumbleupon and Web Developer toolbar. Then there is Del.cio.us toolbar, but I don’t use that because it’s not so good.

In my Firefox only toolbar is almost always showing is Stumbleupon, Web Developer is hidden and use then where is needed.

I adore my Answers Toolbar. Being of strangely curious mind, I love having the “answer” to every question I come across as I surf. And interestingly enough, just about every online article I read creates some kind of question in my mind that I need answered – - right now! So…voila! Answers.com toolbar.

I use Stumbleupon and PMOG (passive multiplayer online game), which basically turns surfing the web into a game.

I said “other” in-case the Del.icio.us bar should count, but if not then take that vote away. Bookmarks are all I need.

It’s a shame to see some call toolbars a waste of space. OK, so many you’ve lamented them get auto-installed on an unsuspecting user’s computer, or hated when one tries to do it on yours. But not everyone who has one is an idiot.

For instance, I love the google toolbar and have for years. Sure, I realize that FF (and now IE7) offers a search box, but that’s not all that the google toolbar does for you. Unfortunately, some of its best jewels are hidden gems, in that you need to enable them with the settings.

I use the “site” button every day (type in a search word and search what Google knows only about the current site). Sure, you can do it yourself with the site: keyword in the other browser search box, but this is much less typing over the course of a day. Same with searching google images (another button you can easily add), and froogle..

Then there’s the “up” button (again, you have to add from “settings”), which lets you traverse up a site, whereby it removes whatever’s at the end of the currently used URL. Often quite handy. Again, all things you could do yourself manually, but one click is nicer, and worth the toolbar space to me.

These and a few other things are tips I first shared back in 2003 (http://cfmxplus.blogspot.com/2003/04/have-you-got-google-toolbar.html).

And some features don’t use any “space” at all, as the toolbar also enables a context menu on each page you visit. You can right-click to see:

- backward links
- cached snapshot of page
- similar pages
- translate page

Again, all things you can do without the toolbar as long as you have a quick google search bar of some sort and know the corresponding keywords (link:, cache:, etc.). But again I use these every day, so I love not having to type those–plus some would learn of the features this way who might not ever think to learn the keywords.

If I have one complaint, it’s that I don’t understand why these last 4 features aren’t enabled as toolbar buttons (that can be added, optionally). I’d give up the space occupied by “send to” and “autolink” (though some may love those), and certainly “check” (the spell check) since that’s built into FF.

Anyone from Google (or others who might know more about this) care to comment?

Anyway, don’t dismiss toolbars (and the google toolbar) so readily. You may be missing out on more than you know.

/charlie

I no longer use StumbleUpon as it is a productivity killer! Webdeveloper is essential for work, and I dunno how much Firebug might count as a toolbar, but I can’t work without it.

Hi,

you forgot the Windows Live Toolbar http://get.live.com/

Best,
Sven

Stumbleupon and Web Developer toolbar

I use a facebook toolbar – addicted, moi?

StumbleUpon toolbar for me.I don’t use it often though

All in one Toolbar addon for Mozilla
Groowe
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/534

No discussion on browser toolbars is complete without mentioning the Conduit toolbar “engine”, which allows you to “roll your own” toolbar for your organisation or cause:

Conduit.com – Free community toolbar Builder in a Few Easy Steps
http://www.conduit.com/

One Google Toolbar for IE. I don’t often use it .

While I’m tempted to use no tool bars for the sake of screen size, google toolbar just has a few features too good to pass up. Most of all, I haven’t found a better form filler (looked at several FF extensions), the highlight feature is nice and the buttons to search for words you just googled for on the page ends up being very convenient.

I actually ended up removing the FF search box entirely (using keyword searches exclusively instead) so I can use ctrl+L to do those and ctrl+K now goes to the google toolbar so that I can advantage of the autosuggest which is surprisingly useful as well sometimes.