Now, in the days of the ubiquitous Internet, every computer owner can literally download any accessible browser- a program for working with the resources of the global network.
Although everyone has a similar software product there is a whole army of fans, Firefox can be distinguished from the Mozilla community. Among others, this browser stands out for the lack of tracking modules (which is especially "famous" for "Chrome" from "Google") and humane requirements for computing resources. In order for the work with the program to be convenient, Firefox must be configured. This will allow you to adjust the browser exactly to your requirements.
Two possibilities
Firefox customization can be done in two ways: regular means available to each user, as well as by making direct changes to the configuration file. Although the second way ( hidden settings Firefox) is more versatile, as it allows you to get full control over configuring the program, beginners should use it with caution. Changes that are thoughtless can lead to reverse effect- slowdown, crashes, etc. To start, you need to type about: config in the address bar. But configuring Firefox by standard means is completely safe: it is impossible to seriously disrupt the operation of the program, and a relatively small number of points makes it easy to restore the previous state of the browser.
Basic Firefox setup
We have already pointed out that each user must customize the program "for himself", so there is no need to blindly follow the given recommendations. So, the setup starts by launching the app and clicking on orange (in Stable and Beta versions) the Firefox button located in the upper left corner of the program window. Further in the list you need to find "Settings" and proceed to the tab of the same name. The "Launch" block allows you to specify the page that will be displayed when the browser is turned on. When installing an extension Speed Dial the corresponding Homepage will usually be inserted automatically. Do not ignore the possibility of specifying the folder for downloading files: this will eliminate the need to search for the desired path with the conductor every time. For some users this may be the desktop, while for others it may be special folder on disk. In the "Content" tab, you need to activate the blocking, this will save when visiting some sites. Here, opposite "Font and colors", you should click "Advanced" and set Unicode (UTF-8) encodings.
The "Privacy" tab contains the ability to include data packets sent by the browser special combination symbols, which informs the visited site that the user does not want (or vice versa) to create a log file with his actions. At the same time, Internet resources are not required to follow this requirement. By at least, while. But if you prohibit saving in the "History" block, then all information about the session (visited pages, data typed in forms and cookies) will be destroyed after the application is closed. In fact, this is an analogue private mode... Useful when working on someone else's computer. Items of the "Protection" tab are designed to secure the user on the Web. You should not disable them (except for the "Master Password", this is at your discretion). The "Advanced" tab allows you to make the browser the main one ("System - By default"). All checkboxes should be checked in the "Browse sites" block: this makes working with sites more convenient. The item "Choice of data" is intended to support developers: in case of failures, data is transferred to Firefox servers, where it is analyzed, and measures are taken to eliminate errors in future versions. With the "Updates" tab, special questions usually do not arise: refusal, manual and automatic modes... But in "Network - Settings" you can register ports and addresses when working through a proxy server (local or network).
Recovery
Sometimes you want to save Firefox settings... For example, when reinstalling the system. This is very easy to do with the MozBackup program. After starting, you need to select Firefox from the list, specify the backup mode and the location to save the profile. When restoring, select restore.
And about that, i.e. reduce resource consumption and speed up the browser.
All this was done without the use of third-party plugins, namely by trivial editing "hidden" in the browser config. However, there are a lot of settings in this very config, and some of them store a number of other useful things that are very interesting and may be useful to you. These are the topics that will be discussed in this article.
Configuring FireFox via about: config
- Launch Mozilka.
- We recruit (we type, not copy) v address bar (this is where we enter, for example a website) about: config and, agreeing to be careful, we get to the browser settings page.
- Find the parameter in the list browser.display.focus_ring_width and set (by clicking on the line of this parameter twice with the left mouse button) its value 0 (zero). What does this parameter do? He is responsible for dotted box around links and form elements when you click on them (until you set the value to 0, try clicking on any link with the mouse to understand what it is about).
- Further. Find the parameter in the list layout.spellcheckDefault and set the value to it 2 ... What for? This option enables instant automatic check spelling in all forms where you enter something. When the value 1 (by default it was it) for some reason checks not everywhere and not right away.
- I was also always upset (to say the least) that when selecting text with a couple of clicks, it turned out such nonsense as capturing a space after the selected text / word. To correct this misunderstanding, we find the parameter layout.word_select.eat_space_to_next_word and set the value to it false.
- Well, the last annoying nonsense is a delay of a few seconds in dialog boxes installing plugins and extensions. To remove the unfortunate waiting time, we assign to the parameter security.dialog_enable_delay meaning 0 .
- Close the settings page and restart the browser.
- Enjoy
Afterword
Made? So I did it. It seems like little things, but pleasant ones.
Hope it is useful to someone;)
layout.spellcheckDefault(Integer) - By Firefox default checks spelling only in multi-line input boxes, ignoring single-line input boxes; using this parameter, you can disable the check at all, or enable it for single-line input fields. Values:
0. Disable spell check
1. Spell checker works in "large" input fields
2. Spell checker works in all input fields
layout.word_select.eat_space_to_next_word(Boolean) - Determines how the word will be highlighted when double click on him. Values:
TRUE - when double-clicking on a word, selects it with a space on the right
FALSE - Space is not selected when double clicking on a word
middlemouse.paste(Boolean) - paste text from the clipboard with a click of the middle mouse button. Values:
TRUE - Allow
FALSE - Deny
middlemouse.scrollbarPosition(Boolean) - Setting the behavior of the scrollbar when you click on it MMB (Middle Mouse Button). Values:
TRUE - When you click the SCM on the scrollbar, the slider moves to the place where the click was made.
FALSE - When SCM is clicked on the scrollbar, nothing happens
mousewheel.acceleration.start(Integer) - after how many "clicks" of continuous wheel rotation the acceleration is considered enabled
mousewheel.acceleration.factor(Integer) - speed up page scrolling. (If you need to scroll a lot, the scrolling speed will be increased by the value specified in this parameter).
mousewheel.withcontrolkey.numlines(Integer) - the behavior of the mouse when zooming in / out by scrolling it with the wheel. Values:
1 - Mouse wheel away from you - ZOOM
1 - Mouse wheel away from you - DECREASE
approx. In MacOSX, Control + Scrolling hangs up an enlargement of the area of the screen under the mouse - for designers, presentations and people with neerlin vision.
network.automatic-ntlm-auth.trusted-uris(String) - list of addresses that require NTLM. If there are several addresses, then they are entered separated by commas.
network.cookie.cookieBehavior(Integer) - Browser handling of cookies. Values:
0 - accept all cookies
1 - cookies only from the visited site
2 - do not accept cookies
3 - Work with cookies based on privacy levels
network.http.connect.timeout(Integer) - the number of seconds to take to load the page.
network.http.use-cache(Boolean) - Determines whether to cache http documents. Values:
TRUE - allowed
FALSE - not allowed
network.http.sendRefererHeader(Integer) - Determines when to send the Referer header (i.e. it comes about sending to the server the URI of the resource from which the link was clicked or on which the images are loaded). Values:
0 - never send;
1 - send for links only;
2 - send for links and images (default)
approx. Attention: a ban on sending Referer headers may cause disruptions in the operation of some sites (for example, pictures, including captchas, may not be displayed).
network.standard-url.escape-utf8(Boolean) - coding of links when copying. Values:
TRUE - Encoding is allowed, copied links will look like this: http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D0%BB%D1%83%D0%B6%D0%B5%D0%B1%D0% BD% D0% B0% D1% 8F: Search
network.prefetch-next(Boolean) - Preloading the browser of the links that the site considers the most likely next step for the user. Values:
TRUE - Enable
nglayout.initialpaint.delay(Integer) - This is the delay before the page starts rendering, in milliseconds. Recommended 0.
pdfjs.disabled(Boolean, since Firefox 15.0) - The parameter responsible for displaying documents in PDF format in the browser itself. Values:
TRUE - This function disabled. For open PDF separate application required
FALSE - PDF documents open with a browser
permissions.default.image(Integer) - is responsible for displaying images. Values:
1 - Download all images
2 - Do not upload images
3 - Download images only from the same server
plugins.click_to_play(Boolean, for Firefox 14.0+) - Responsible for launching the page content displayed by plugins using the play button. Values:
TRUE - The content will be played only after clicking on the appropriate button (recommended).
FALSE - Content will be launched automatically on page load.
plugin.default_plugin_disabled(Boolean) - whether or not to show a pop-up warning about the absence of a plugin required for page elements. For example: notification that youtube flashplayer is required. Values:
TRUE - Show such warnings.
FALSE - Do not show.
plugin.scan.plid.all(Boolean) - permission to scan directories specified in windows registry identifying plugins. Values:
TRUE - Scan specified directories in the registry
FALSE - Do not scan
plugins.update.notifyUser(Boolean) - whether or not to notify the user about plugin updates. Values:
TRUE - notify
FALSE - do not notify
print.always_print_silent(Boolean) - determines whether or not to show the printer selection dialog when printing. Values:
TRUE - No dialog is shown. Printing is done on the default printer.
FALSE - Dialogue is shown.
profile.confirm_automigration(Boolean) - whether or not to ask about importing information from other browsers when creating a new profile. Values:
TRUE - ask
FALSE - do not ask
profile.seconds_until_defunct(Integer) - time (in seconds) after which an unused profile is considered obsolete and removed from the list of profiles.
approx. 1 day is 86400 seconds
security.dialog_enable_delay(Integer) - Delay before uploading the add-on. Recommended 0.
ui.key.saveLink.shift(Boolean) - whether to use the Shift + LMB combination to upload an object. Values:
TRUE - use this combination
FALSE - do not use
ui.submenuDelay(Integer) - This parameter is responsible for the delay before opening the submenu. Values:
1 - the submenu will open only on click
0 - no delay
n - delay (in ms)
view_source.wrap_long_lines(Boolean) - responsible for the transfer long lines when showing source code pages. Values:
TRUE - Transfer
FALSE - Do not carry over
layers.acceleration.force-enabled - hardware acceleration, "by default" with disabled:
false - disabled
true - enabled
After changing some parameters, you need to restart the browser.
Firefox stores all these settings in a file prefs.js which is located in the profile folder (~ / .mozilla / firefox), in order to avoid losing the performance of the browser, it is recommended to create a backup copy. Some parameters are very similar to each other, therefore, you need to be careful when correcting them ...
- Enter about: config in the address bar and press Enter on the keyboard.
- In the search for settings, we enter "firstparty".
- Two options appear: privacy.firstparty.isolate and privacy.firstparty.isolate.restrict_opener_access.
- We activate both parameters (it is recommended to disable the second parameter if suddenly there are problems with authorization on any site).
We enable First-Party Isolation through the add-on
- Install the First Party Isolation add-on.
- Reload your browser.
Hidden features that increase the anonymity of the firefox browser
Google Safe Browsing
This option sends data about all your online activities to Google. For example, the files that you download are first checked in Google service Cloud for the correct hash and other parameters, and only then are they downloaded to your computer. This is done in good faith to protect the user from downloading infected files. However, if you have something to hide, or you are sure that the document you are downloading was blocked by Google by mistake, then disable this option. To do this, find three parameters:
- safebrowsing.downloads.enabled
- safebrowsing.malware.enabled
- safebrowsing.phishing.enabled
You can also disable the browser.safebrowsing.blockedURIs.enabled function
Mozilla Browser Statistics
You can safely disable the parameter that is responsible for collecting data about your behavior and sends this report to the browser developers. Turn off following lines:
- healthreport.uploadEnabled
- policy.dataSubmissionEnabled
- healthreport.service.firstRun
Using WebRTC
We recently wrote about this parameter in, we recommend reading it if you use not only Firefox.
The expansion parameter in Mozilla is as follows:
- peerconnection.enabled
DRM usage
DRM is technical means that are used to protect copyrights. Simply put, those sites that do not want their content to be "stolen" block their data like this digitally signed... This is very often done by hosting providers with video files, for example, Netflix.
Unfortunately, you won't be able to completely remove DRM from Firefox (you need to download a separate assembly for this), but you can disable the most active component of the protective tools:
Also, it will not be superfluous to uncheck the "Settings" - "Content" menu:
Disable geolocation
We believe that the browser does not need to know exactly where you are, but we must warn you that disabling this feature will inevitably affect the issuance of your queries in search engines.
Submitting your search history
Since we started talking about search results, then we can not fail to mention the fact that Firefox sends the entire history of your requests search engine... It seems to us that this is not necessary at all, so disable the function:
- search.suggest.enabled
So, we have listed six parameters that should be disabled, and now we will tell you what needs to be activated.
Prevent website tracking
This option forces sites to not track your behavior on them. The blocking of Mozilla Firefox sites is very fine-tuned, and after activating this option, we did not notice that the browser allowed any Internet sites to collect information about user actions:
- trackingprotection.enabled
Watch a 3-minute video in which we show you how to set up anonymity in the Mozilla Firefox browser:
"New spy device capable of stealing all personal data from smartphones via Wi-Fi "
Alexey Komolov (St. Petersburg)
Firefox users often customize it to suit their tastes and needs. But usually people settle for superficial settings.
Below I will describe a few more subtle settings for this browser, which will help you to fine-tune the "Fire Fox".
1. Launching the settings file for editing. Launch Firefox, enter: about: config in the address bar and press Enter - the browser settings page will open.
2. Disable Auto Substitution search queries in the search box. Using the “Filter” option, find and edit the following line:
Browser.search.suggest.enabled select false
right-click on the line and select "switch".
3. Acceleration of page rendering. From the settings page, right-click anywhere and create new line named nglayout.initialpaint.delay and set it to 0.
4. Reduction in quantity backups Ad-Block + filters. Use the "Filter" option to find the line
extensions.adblockplus.patternsbackups and give it the value 1.
5. Enabling and determining the number of parallel requests. Search using the line “Filter” and then edit the following options:
- network.http.pipelining (click on the line right key mouse and select “toggle”)> true;
- network.http.pipelining.maxrequests (right-click on the line and select “change”)> 8;
- network.http.proxy.pipelining (right-click on the line and select “switch”)> true.
In order for parallel requests to work, activate Keep-Alive:
network.http.keep-alive> true;
network.http.version> 1.1.
6. Determining the number of maximum simultaneous connections to the server. Search using the line "Filter", and then edit the line:
network.http.max-connections
6. Determining the number of maximum simultaneous connections to the server. Search using the line "Filter", and then edit the line:
network.http.max-connections
Click on the line with the right button and select "change".
From FF 3. * the value can be increased up to 30 (this method is intended for users with a “wide” channel; optimal when high speed Internet).
7. Prevent the browser from closing when the last tab is closed("No, do not close"). browser.tabs.closeWindowWithLastTab (right-click on the line and select “switch”)> false.
8. Disable memorization recent tabs(tabs) and windows to reopen or recover from an incorrect session termination. Search using the "Filter" option, and then edit the following lines:
- browser.sessionstore.max_tabs_undo (right-click on the line and select “change”)> 0;
- browser.sessionstore.max_windows_undo (right-click on the line and select “change”)> 0;
- browser.sessionstore.resume_session_once (right-click on the line and select “switch”)> false;
- browser.sessionstore.resume_from_crash (right-click on the line and select “switch”)> false.
9. Enabling precompilation. Enable jit precompilation for the frontend. This method is applicable only (!!!) for Firefox 3.5 and higher, and for scripts on pages it is already enabled by default.
To do this, enter jit in the search bar, and then change the values of both found items from false to> true.
10. Line highlighting (only for LINUX OS). Click once with the left mouse button on the address or search bar- the entire line is highlighted.
browser.urlbar.clickSelectsAll(click on the line with the right mouse button and select "switch")> true.
11. Disable geolocation. Search using the "Filter" option, and then edit the line:
geo.enabled (right-click on the line and select "switch")> false.
12. Reducing traffic. If Firefox is consuming too much traffic, your firewall shows Internet activity even when the contents of the tabs are not loaded or updated, this may be due to the fact that Firefox has built-in phishing protection: Firefox updates the list of untrusted sites. If this protection is not needed, it can be disabled via the Settings> Protection> “Inform if the visited website is suspected of imitating another website” and “Inform if the visited website is suspected of attacking computers” menu.
13. Base compression SQL data(Vacuum cleaning). Firefox stores all data in the sqlite database, with intensive work these databases grow due to chunks of empty space, in addition, they turn out to be quite fragmented. The operation "Vacuum" in sqlite leads to the re-creation of the database in a new file. This removes all empty spaces and fragmentation disappears.
To do this, go to Tools> Error Console, paste the following code into the “Code” field:
Components.classes ["@ mozilla.org/browser/nav-history-service;1ans ".getService(Components.interfaces.nsPIPlacesDatabase).DBConnection.executeSimpleSQL(VACUUM");
and press Enter. The browser will appear slightly frozen during the compression process - just wait a while.
14. Disable built-in check for updates. Firefox also periodically checks for updates for itself. installed add-ons and search plugins. Checking for updates can be disabled via the Settings> Advanced> Updates menu.
An additional traffic consumption channel appeared in Firefox 3 - this is a new add-on search window. With limited bandwidth such a service begins to interfere with the communication channel, so it can be turned off. To do this, find the extensions.getAddons.showPane parameter and set the value to “false” (right-click on the line and select “switch”).
15. Reducing the number of backups of browser bookmarks. Find with the option "Filter" and edit the line:
browser.bookmarks.max_backups> 1
16. Acceleration of page transitions by the "Back" command... Determine how many previous pages to save in random access memory(to use the “Back” command): find with the “Filter” line and edit the line: browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers (right-click on the line and select “edit”)> -1 (minus one), standing there “by default ", indicates that Firefox determines the size itself depending on the amount of RAM in the computer.
Set the value according to your memory: 32 Mb> 0, 64 Mb> 1, 128 Mb> 2, 256 Mb> 3, 512 Mb> 5, 1 Gb> 8, 2 Gb> 8, 4 Gb> 8.
17. Disable the active link border:
browser.display.focus_ring_on_anything (right-click on the line and select "switch")> false;
browser.display.focus_ring_width (right-click on the line and select "switch")> 0.
18. Banning favicons (site icons): browser.chrome.site_icons(click on the line with the right mouse button and select "switch")> false;
browser.chrome.favicons (right-click on the line and select switch)> false.
19. Location of new tabs to open... Location of new opened tabs:
- browser.tabs.insertRelatedAfterCurrent (right-click on the line and select "switch")> false
- browser.tabs.insertRelatedAfterCurrent (right-click on the line and select “switch”)> true.
20. Mouse behavior. Mouse behavior when zooming in / out by scrolling it with the wheel:
- mousewheel.withcontrolkey.numlines(click on the line with the right mouse button and select "switch")> 1 (moving the wheel "away from you" increases the scale of the viewed page);
- mousewheel.withcontrolkey.numlines (right-click on the line and select “toggle”)> -1 (“minus one”)(moving the wheel "away from you" reduces the scale of the viewed page)
21. Prohibition of playing animation of graphics in gif format.
image.animation_mode (right-click on the line and select toggle)> none.
